I'm thinking of grabbing steam but I'm wondering if any games run well in OSX without me having to get bootcamp. I have a newly purchased Macbook Air and I would prefer to not get bootcamp if it's at all possible. Don't care about super intensive games or anything, just wondering.
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Do any games run well Natively in OSX? (Steam)
- Thread starter gdeputy
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no, you will have problem on performance. plus, there is not many games for natively mac os x. oh, your new macbook air won't be good for gaming as well. I don't understand why people keep asking macbook air gaming performance. it's not for game, period. it's just internet machine like ipad. but with key board. if you want real performance, you should consider macbook pro 15 inch. not even 13 inch. because 13 inch only has core 2 duo. not core i5 or i7. or you can get really nice high performance PC laptop with that price for macbook air. nowadays, people are silly. mac is not always good.
All Apple laptops give subpar gaming performance under Mac OS. The problem is the software, not the hardware.
I have Windows 7 (bootcamp) installed on my Macbook Air 11 1.6 4GB and this little beast never ceases to positively surprise me. I've been enjoying all the games I've thrown at it (New Vegas, Starcraft II, etc.).
To give you an idea, WoW runs at 50 FPS under Windows 7 and 40 FPS under Snow Leopard with the same settings.
But the worst in terms of performance gap between win7 and macOS is EVE Online: 60 FPS under Windows 7 drops to 15-20 under Snow Leopard.
I've heard some people having decent experience with the latest Steam ports. But to be honest, anyone serious about gaming should install Windows 7 on his/her bootcamp partition. Period.
I have Windows 7 (bootcamp) installed on my Macbook Air 11 1.6 4GB and this little beast never ceases to positively surprise me. I've been enjoying all the games I've thrown at it (New Vegas, Starcraft II, etc.).
To give you an idea, WoW runs at 50 FPS under Windows 7 and 40 FPS under Snow Leopard with the same settings.
But the worst in terms of performance gap between win7 and macOS is EVE Online: 60 FPS under Windows 7 drops to 15-20 under Snow Leopard.
I've heard some people having decent experience with the latest Steam ports. But to be honest, anyone serious about gaming should install Windows 7 on his/her bootcamp partition. Period.
Serious gaming I'll agree bootcamp that puppy up. I only casually play when I'm either drunk or bored off my rocker, and for WoW, SCII, and some of the steam ports like TF2, CS:S and DoD:S, I am quite happy with the performance - keep in mind I wasn't expecting liquid cooled SLI performance on my Macbook either. They do have enough to let you enjoy the game though, it won't be a slideshow unless you're going for Crysis on ultra-high.
Internet advice from people like the above poster is not always good either.
Ok, from someone who actually HAS these systems I can tell you steam games in Mac OS run perfectly fine. As for performance it depends on what games you want to play. The casual games play quite nicely on the MBA as do some of the older titles. MBA is not a hardcore gaming machine but casual and older games do perfectly fine on it with Steam.
Most casual games don't even require a 3D graphics cards to run, so it's hardly worth mentioning that they run "perfectly fine" on a system. Even a first generation iPhone has enough computing and graphics power for casual games.
So from somebody who actually HAS Steam games, and not just the casual ones, I can tell you that games like Left 4 Dead 2 run like crap even on a 27" iMac i5 -- as long as you are in Snow Leopard.
If you want to play something more advanced than Solitaire or one of the ten million hidden object games, you are well advised to install Windows on your machine and play the Windows versions of your games.
Even in the year 2010, Mac OS X still sucks as a gaming platform. End of story.
There is a lot of smaller games that will work fine (Sam and max, Portal, day of defeat, Civilization 4, World of goo, Machinarium, etc). Also some of the Valve games should work on somewhat low-medium settings, like Team fortress. You have nothing to lose, just try it out.
The real issue boils down to what games the OP plays, some will be just fine, others will look like crap.
to the first guy, wow, what a douchebag.
I have an incredibly powerful PC desktop rig for gaming, I was just asking if any games will run on the mac in NATIVE OSX.
Half Life 2 for example is a very very easily scaled game. It will ABSOLUTELY run decently on a macbook air in bootcamp, just curious as to the performance in OSX. It's too bad uninformed people like you populate these boards, because while the 320m is absolutely not a gaming card it can easily power some older gen games.
I'm new to OSX, so my question relates to that operating system, i'm WELL aware of what this mac air specs are capable of in bootcamp, and the performance is actually very good for such a small laptop. Thanks for making these forums less enjoyable than they should be though, by spreading ignorance and above all else being a negative poster.
For those of you that helped, thank you kindly. The most graphic intensive game I would even consider playing is Starcraft 2, which will run fine in bootcamp at all low settings (i prefer FPS over effects in SC2, technically it could run near medium.
Finally, I didn't buy my air to game, but if I felt like playing a non graphics intensive game on my air, who the hell are you to tell me otherwise? You've already made it clear you know nothing about the hardware capabilities within the air, I think from here on forward the first guy who responded to me should keep his mouth shut.
I have an incredibly powerful PC desktop rig for gaming, I was just asking if any games will run on the mac in NATIVE OSX.
Half Life 2 for example is a very very easily scaled game. It will ABSOLUTELY run decently on a macbook air in bootcamp, just curious as to the performance in OSX. It's too bad uninformed people like you populate these boards, because while the 320m is absolutely not a gaming card it can easily power some older gen games.
I'm new to OSX, so my question relates to that operating system, i'm WELL aware of what this mac air specs are capable of in bootcamp, and the performance is actually very good for such a small laptop. Thanks for making these forums less enjoyable than they should be though, by spreading ignorance and above all else being a negative poster.
For those of you that helped, thank you kindly. The most graphic intensive game I would even consider playing is Starcraft 2, which will run fine in bootcamp at all low settings (i prefer FPS over effects in SC2, technically it could run near medium.
Finally, I didn't buy my air to game, but if I felt like playing a non graphics intensive game on my air, who the hell are you to tell me otherwise? You've already made it clear you know nothing about the hardware capabilities within the air, I think from here on forward the first guy who responded to me should keep his mouth shut.
Some games are badly ported though, especially those Lucas Arts Steam Ports. I tried to run Indiana Jones 4 on my Mac, looked absolutely horrible with the Filter they added to it, plus i´ve been unable to boot it up in Full Screen. You´re far better off by grabbing a copy of Indy4 from the Internet and running it through ScummVM. Runs perfectly fine there.
If you already have a Macbook Air and a gaming PC with Steam, then just go ahead and take advantage of Steamplay. There's also a few demos available (Half-Life 2, Torchlight, for instance).
If you would read what the OP wrote you would see that the OP is talking about non-graphical intensive games, hence casual games.
I'm sorry, but quite honestly, you're talking rubbish. Left 4 Dead 2 runs fine on my Late 2008 Macbook after the 10.6.5 update. Before then, yes, it was poor, but since the update, every game I have on my mac runs just fine on full or medium settings.
It's not that bad. I play Counterstrike Source at 1280 x 800 with everything maxed out with AA x 8 and AF x 16 and I get FPS of 60-100. And it looks amazing, better than 1680 x 1050 with AA off
Hi!
Im getting a mac as well and as i only ocasionally play CS with friends i dont intend to install windows at all just for that purpose.
Can you elaborate a little more about the diffs between playing through bootcamp and OS X? Is it only related to the mouse acceleration known issue or is it something else?
Thanks
Im getting a mac as well and as i only ocasionally play CS with friends i dont intend to install windows at all just for that purpose.
Can you elaborate a little more about the diffs between playing through bootcamp and OS X? Is it only related to the mouse acceleration known issue or is it something else?
Thanks