Guild Wars 2 on MacBook Airs?

Im going to play it with late 2010 MBA on saturday(pre-purchased). Although it is known that 320m integrated gpu is a quite a bit better, i still have the lame cpu as a possible bottleneck.

Therefore i really don't which mac will run better. Still i will surerly give you my first impressions asap.

Keep us updated imHappy! My computer has similar specs as yours so I'm very interested in how your game runs

so how'd you get on then? ...im just about to attempt it too!

imHappy said:

Im going to play it with late 2010 MBA on saturday(pre-purchased). Although it is known that 320m integrated gpu is a quite a bit better, i still have the lame cpu as a possible bottleneck.

Therefore i really don't which mac will run better. Still i will surerly give you my first impressions asap.

Click to expand...

Did it work? I thought the requirements are much higher.

I was playing GW2 a few days on my 2011 MBA (13 inch, 1.7GHz IntelHD 3000 384MB).
The game is playable, from 15-25 FPS on low settings, I did run at 1440x900 and i did use native renderer (subsampling is just too bad quality for me to even bother playing).

I would doubt WvW will be playable at all, seeing as my desktop takes quite a performance hit in the large battles

cluthz said:

I was playing GW2 a few days on my 2011 MBA (13 inch, 1.7GHz IntelHD 3000 384MB).
The game is playable, from 15-25 FPS on low settings, I did run at 1440x900 and i did use native renderer (subsampling is just too bad quality for me to even bother playing).

I would doubt WvW will be playable at all, seeing as my desktop takes quite a performance hit in the large battles

Click to expand...

Are you talking about beta events? The performance in the end version has increased substantially, it runs with 40-50 fps on the old 2009 MBP with 9600M GT (which is comparable to HD3000 overall).

The 2012 MBA will be able to competently play the game at medium/low settings.

Guys, here are my results on my desktop PC:
- Quad core i7 (1st gen) @ 2.7ghz
- 8GB DDR3 ram
- GTX 460 AMP edition (1GB vRAM)

Settings:
- 1920 x 1200
- Most settings maxed (shadows were high, reflections were turned down I think and something else wasn't max... can't remember what it was but I'll check later and edit my post)
- FXAA ON

I'm hitting a solid 35-50fps in Queensdale with a decent amount of players running around

Haven't tried huge WvW battles yet but I expect to take a performance hit.

I tried maxing EVERYTHING. It was playable but not terribly smooth and I didn't really notice a substantial difference in graphics so I adjusted my settings accordingly to get smooth gameplay.

I'd like to play the game when I'm away at University (whenever I get some spare time.... which is VERY rare these days ). I don't have access to my desktop PC while I'm away and so I've installed it on my mac.

My mac:
- 2010 13" MBP
- 2.4ghz C2D
- 4GB ram
- nvidia 320m (256mb shared vram)

I've tried it out and I have to say, I am very pleasantly surprised. Here's my settings:
- 1280 x 800 native res
- Everything on low
- Native rendering (subsample looked horrible and didn't really add much FPS anyway)

- Rollin' with my pet solo + firing some arrows off at 1-2 bandits I was getting a very solid 30fps

- When engaging with a mob that is 3-4 strong, the fps drops to around 25

- Participating in an event with 12 players (I counted them ) and engaging a mob of around 12-15 (just guessing but the mob seemed around the size of the players around me), the fps fluctuated between 13-25 but I never saw it drop below 13.

CRUCIALLY, even when the fps dropped to around 15, to my amazement, the game was still VERY playable. I was still able to roll around spamming arrows and hitting the F2 key to get my pet to use his skill with a decent amount of fluidity. I really didn't feel THAT hindered.

- I would estimate that averaged around 25fps during my play time

- Comparing my 24" monitor @ 1920 x 1200 on high settings to my 13" mbp on low settings, there was a noticeable drop in graphics quality. Having said this, the game looks far from bad. At low settings, the game still looks pretty decent for an mmo and looks quite a bit better than GW1.

- The character selection screens + map panning was as smooth as butter

- Soon after playing, my computer got warm around the wrist rest area and the keys got warm as well. From the sounds of it, my fans were maxed out. I would say playing on your lap would be an uncomfortable experience.

- Using the trackpad wasn't as bad as I thought it would have been but I still recommend plugging in a usb mouse or something.

- Finally guys, I'll test out WvW sometime soon and post my results here.

I'm not expecting it to run smooth in WvW though. Here's the deal - If you head over to GW2G forums, you'll find a nice discussion amongst people highlighting the fact that at this stage of development, GW2 is VERY cpu intensive. There's speculation that to truly max this game at 1920 x 1080, you need at least an SB/IB quad core machine.

You guys with your macbook airs should be fine running the game. I know that 15-35 FPS is far from ideal but it IS playable. I think the 15-35 fps is fine for PvE but I think having the fps a little higher would be better for use in PvP.

I'm going to be restricting my PvP to when I'm at home using my desktop PC.

I'm not sure how well my mac will cope in WvW but I'll try it out for you guys and post my results.

leman said:

Are you talking about beta events? The performance in the end version has increased substantially, it runs with 40-50 fps on the old 2009 MBP with 9600M GT (which is comparable to HD3000 overall).

The 2012 MBA will be able to competently play the game at medium/low settings.

Click to expand...

This was live, last week.
The 9600M GT is a bit faster and has real VRAM.
Also the MBP probably has better cooling than the MBA.

Guys, SORRY, I completely forgot about updating it.

Well first of all, yes. It IS playable but expect to play it in the LOWEST settings at 720p. As a matter of fact, I finished the whole game, killed Zhaitan and everything with this machine, and still playing it for WvW.


As for WvW, I generally avoid LARGE zergs because it is boring for me, and second; yeah it is really laggy.

sPVP, completely playable. In fact I generally end as top player in most of my matches (thief ftw!)


So, in conclusion, this game is really playable in BOOTCAMP. I sometimes play for 8 hours and all normal yet runs really hot. The whole PVE content is a breeze in this 2010 MBA. As for PVP; WvW runs alright as long as you avoid large zergs yet you can STILL be part of them for defending or attacking keeps/camps etc at 5-12 fps. Still playable .

Some stats:
FPS IN CITIES(Lion's arch, Divinity Reach, etc)
15fps-22fps

Outside(average)
22fps-33fps

WvW
Large zergs(attacking/defending/20vs20)
8fps-12fps

roaming around(skirimishes, roaming with small group)
22-30 fps

roaming with a big group, 15-40 people
17-24fps

This machine has a been a champ for me. Playing so many games for large amount of hours and have not overheated(yet).


PS. Sorry for posting this 3 months after. But better later than never.

Sorry for my grammar, not English speaker.

EDIT. MMORPG does not require 60fps like FPS games. Therefore Guildwars 2 for me should ATLEAST run at 25 for enjoyable gameplay. Also, to be honest 10fps or more is actually playable but just not enjoyable.

Does it work or not?

Oh my god! I just want to know if Guild Wars 2 works for MacBook 13inch LED-backlight widescreen notebook?