id's John Carmack updated his .plan with a very lengthy discussion of the factors involved in the decision to release the Mac version of the Q3ATest prior to the PC version (next story). Here is an excerpt from the quite lengthy update that talks about the bottom line here:

We hope it will be done soon, but there are factors out of our direct control involved.

Don't be spiteful. This is just the beginning of the testing and release process.


One conspiracy theory suggests that Apple is somehow getting us to do this.

What we have "gotten" from Apple is a few development machines. No cash payoff. No bundling deal. No marketing contract.

I am looking at this long term. I want to see OS X become a top notch platform for graphics development. I think highly of the NEXTSTEP heritage and I might move my development from NT if it turns out well. There is a lot of groundwork that needs to be laid with apple for this to happen, and my working on the mac right now is part of that. Plus a lot of complaining to various apple engineers and executives. :-)

To be clear:

At this time, there is no mac that is as fast for gaming (or just about anything, actually) as a pentium III with a top of the line 3D card. Period. I have been misquoted by some mac evangelists as saying otherwise.

The update concludes with this:

Gaming is not a reason to buy a mac, but Apple is taking steps so that it may not be a reason to avoid a mac if you have other reasons for wanting one.

MacOS still sucks.