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[slembcke]

 I really have trouble imagining that Apple would ever use the OS to cut off third-party apps that weren't distributed through their own "app store", because that would be such a spectacularly stupid and catastrophic thing for them to do;  the backlash would be unbelievable.

Well, I'm not worried that they are going to do it outright. I am worried that the existence of the app store is going to make it almost impossible to be profitable if you aren't on it. If 90% of the users really only look in the app store to find their Apple approved apps, then it becomes a moot point whether or not a few users can buy your software if you can't/don't sell it through the app store. For many developers that sell very consumer oriented applications, this is a very real issue as they already know that they would have to gimp their apps in order to meet Apple's requirements. For the rest of us, we go from a payment processor that takes 12% of our profits to one that takes 30%. Yikes!

I guess we'll have to wait and see.

[Richard Kain]

I am very excited about this news. OSX has been gaining popularity along with Apple hardware. And this particular platform has been more than a little starved for games. This announcement is going to give OSX a much-needed shot in the arm as far as development is concerned. Thanks to the precedent set by the iPhone and the iPad, many developers will be willing to release their games on the Mac OSX App store as well.

I won't get into the issues regarding Apple's submission process. That's been covered a thousand times.

The real issue as I see it is that Apple is late to the party. They should have done this years ago, back when the App Store for the iPhone was gaining in popularity. Instead, they dragged their feet. Now Steam is available on Mac, and could easily steal some of the App Store's market share for distributing games on the Mac platform. Even if I do try to release a game for the OSX App Store, I'm also going to submit that title for release on Steam. And if Apple drags their feet with unreasonable submission requirements, any title I make will probably come out on Steam first.

[BrianSlipBit]

Richard, I largely agree with your sentiments.

I know the Mac app store doesn't necessarily equal "Mac game store" but let's face it, there will probably be a lot of games.  If Apple is truly going take gaming "seriously" like they've been saying for soooo many years at this point -- then how about some contemporary OpenGL drivers?

OpenGL 3.0+ has been available for 2+ years at this point.  Many of Apple's products have GL3.0+/DX10 hardware in them, yet developers are relegated to OpenGL 2.1 courtesy of Apple insisting on writing their own drivers rather than deferring to the hardware providers and experts (i.e. NVidia in this case).

[Richard Kain]

I am worried that the existence of the app store is going to make it almost impossible to be profitable if you aren't on it. If 90% of the users really only look in the app store to find their Apple approved apps, then it becomes a moot point whether or not a few users can buy your software if you can't/don't sell it through the app store. For many developers that sell very consumer oriented applications, this is a very real issue as they already know that they would have to gimp their apps in order to meet Apple's requirements. For the rest of us, we go from a payment processor that takes 12% of our profits to one that takes 30%. Yikes!

A year ago, this would have been a real concern. Today, I don't think developers have anything to worry about. If a developer is unwilling to compromise their game to get it on the App Store, they can just release it on Steam instead. The only real disadvantage to Steam is that it doesn't come pre-installed on every Mac. If Apple maintains its draconian and often random policies regarding their approval process, they are going to lose ground to a download service that already exists on their operating system. A year ago Apple could have launched their OSX App Store and sold games unopposed. Now there is competition, and developers have more than one option available to them.

[Μarkham]

9.2

Apps that rapidly drain a products battery or generate excessive heat will be rejected

So much for Dwarf Fortress.  Or anything processor-intensive, depending on whatever Apple product the program is being reviewed on, which doesn't seem to be specified.  Or anything Steve Jobs says drains batteries, like Flash-based apps.

[BrianSlipBit]

Richard, you talk about Steam like it's a guarantee as far as approval goes.  I wouldn't count on that.  From what I understand, they've been known to be somewhat picky.

[Richard Kain]

Richard, you talk about Steam like it's a guarantee as far as approval goes.  I wouldn't count on that.

There's never any guarantees when dealing with another company's closed system. At the same time, there are a decent number of indie titles on both Steam and the current App Store. Moreover, I was pointing out that Valve may not be quite as picky as Apple is on submitted projects. I don't know that for sure, but based on some of the indie games that Valve has already released, I think it is a fairly safe bet.

And of course, there is one obvious consideration. Steam has always been targeted at full PC-style games, usually controlled with a mouse. The current App store is full of software specifically designed around being controlled with a touch screen. Although there are similarities between the two, they are not the same interface. If Apple applies similar approval principles to the new App Store that they had for their portable devices, there is a lot of PC-style software that won't make the cut. Menu-heavy games in particular will be culled, despite the fact that most PC users aren't turned off by complex interfaces. Steam is already designed with PC interface principles in mind.

[Galaxy613]

9.2

Apps that rapidly drain a products battery or generate excessive heat will be rejected

So much for Dwarf Fortress.  Or anything processor-intensive, depending on whatever Apple product the program is being reviewed on, which doesn't seem to be specified.  Or anything Steve Jobs says drains batteries, like Flash-based apps.

Well that's a beautiful clause they can pull.

But these are a NDA rule list that was leaked, no doubt it will be up for some changes...

[Oddball]

My concern is that consumers will assume that the Mac AppStore will have similar priced Apps to the iPhone/iPad AppStore. They'll expect everything to be only a dollar, and that could drive all the prices down. Even if you can still sell you apps/games elsewhere you'll have a hard job competing with the multitude of $1 AppStore alternatives.

[BrianSlipBit]

My concern is that consumers will assume that the Mac AppStore will have similar priced Apps to the iPhone/iPad AppStore. They'll expect everything to be only a dollar, and that could drive all the prices down. Even if you can still sell you apps/games elsewhere you'll have a hard job competing with the multitude of $1 AppStore alternatives.

I agree.  The price deflation (i.e. race to the bottom) is certainly something to be fearful of.  Expectations have already been set courtesy of the iPhone app store.

The one thing I can see as possibly serving as a deterrent to this is that on a computer, people will (hopefully) be less interested in the (somewhat/sometimes) gimmicky $1 apps and more interested in full(er)-featured "slightly more expensive" apps/games.

No matter what though, I still think it's gonna be a tough sell.

[OneMoreGo]

But these are a NDA rule list that was leaked, no doubt it will be up for some changes...

They said that this is a guide and it can change at any point and they will release updated versions every so often. I still think they've left themselves enough wiggle room to reject pretty much anything.

I notice the iOS app store has suddenly become very lax in the last month or so(I even saw a DOS emulator today!), I wonder if that is because they don't want to seem to have overly restrictive policies at the time they announce the mac app store.

[VideroBoy]

9.2

Apps that rapidly drain a products battery or generate excessive heat will be rejected

So much for Dwarf Fortress.  Or anything processor-intensive, depending on whatever Apple product the program is being reviewed on, which doesn't seem to be specified.  Or anything Steve Jobs says drains batteries, like Flash-based apps.

Though from the perspective of a person buying off the App store, a guarantee that anything she buys won't drain her battery in a half-hour or cook her computer would be kind of nice.

The fact is that people who are not computer geeks want their computers to work as simply and reliably as any kitchen appliance. This has been for the most part Apple's design philosophy. This is why the iPad exists. An integrated App store would be a boon to a non-technical person who doesn't know how to and doesn't want to trawl through magazines, flyers, stores, and the Internet for some application she wants. Trawling that us computer geeks take for granted (and, arguably, unfairly expect others to take for granted).

Will I be happy if the Mac becomes a closed environment? Probably not. But only computer geeks will care. Regular people either won't notice or be happy they don't have to manage their applications anymore. I'm not even sure I want regular people to care.

What we have is basically something that developers will hate but people will love, and concessions to one side will piss off the other side. How do we manage that? You tell me.

[Matthew]

Launched today!  Very curious initial reports of sales.  There's an early breakdown of price distribution here:

http://www.tuaw.com/2011/01/06/mac-app-store-by-the-numbers-almost-1-000-apps-on-day-one/

[Matthew]

We did $1500 of sales (our take) on launch day.  Our exact numbers are over at: http://blur.st/sales-day-1 (along with stats on some other Unity games).

[BrianSlipBit]

We did $1500 of sales (our take) on launch day.  Our exact numbers are over at: http://blur.st/sales-day-1 (along with stats on some other Unity games).

That sounds pretty damn good to me.  It also doesn't surprise me.  Should only (hopefully) get better from here.

[Musenik]

Thanks Matthew, for sharing your numbers! I'm struggling to get pygame apps wrapped in Apple's app store packaging.

[Matthew]

These are the steps for Unity game, which require external wrapping.  Maybe it'll help a little: http://technology.blurst.com/unity-games-and-mac-app-store/

[Pineapple]

Can I put BlitzMax applications on the store? If so, I might try to put a couple games/apps up.

[Oddball]

There are a couple of BlitzMax apps already on the AppStore. There's a thread explaining how to make them AppStore ready over at the BlitzMax forums.

[Pineapple]

Sweeeet.

This might finally be my chance to make some dollars off my programming for the first time ever