The Apple Macintosh was first released in 1984 as a home computer in direct competition with the IBM Personal Computer. The Mac's graphical user-interface provided a more user-friendly experience than the command-line interface of the IBM PC, but the huge technical differences meant many software developers were hesitant to commit, resulting in a comparative shortage of quality software. The Mac has never had as much support by the gaming industry as its PC competitor, but most popular games are ported and a large back catalogue exists due to the long lifespan of the system.