How is WoW on the current MBPs? Should I wait?

[Yixian]

I have a 2013 MBA, recently installed WoW to play with some buddies and to my disappointment, a 10 year old game gets 15-25 fps on mid-high settings in new areas.

10 year old game...

Nice.

Do the current MBPs perform? I mean the 13", I can't afford 15", the price hike is ridiculous.

Or is it about the same and should I just wait for Broadwell?

 

[Merode]

Have you tried switching all video settings? Last time I checked I could easily pull off 50-60FPS in Durotar.

Try reducing shadows etc as much as needed. Some settings are not taxing at all so check FPS change after each. Afterall - more FPS is worth more than "eye candy", if you can even use that term in regard to WoW.

Reducing resolution is going to change a lot I guess.

 

[Yixian]

The thing is, Blizzard have done a great job of making the game look very modern and beautiful, but if I turn all these settings down, sure it runs at 60fps, but it looks exactly like the WoW of 2008.

Why is a brand new Apple laptop only able to achieve that? Is the OS X client really that poorly optimised?

I'll have a go at turning some settings down but really, resolution and AA are key to making the game look decent, and both of those annihilate my MacBook Air, and from the looks of things, annihilate the brand new MacBook Pros too? Wtf?!

In Bootcamp this Air run Far Cry 3 at decent settings with 30fps so I feel like something must be wrong here.

 

[markyr17]

How is WoW on the current MBPs? Should I wait?

You are using a laptop that has an integrated GPU, which means the graphics card is integrated on the CPU chip. it's common knowledge that the MacBook air does not thrive in heavy GPU usage. It will run most recent games, but it won't run them beautifully. To run the games that higher Settings, you would want a computer with a dedicated GPU, which in laptops is generally called the discrete GPU. The MacBook Pro is a little better option for gaming.

Also, regarding your comment about running Far Cry 3 in Boot Camp and getting good results, Boot Camp is always going to be better than running the Mac version of a game. Games are designed for Windows, and generally Direct X as well.

 

[Merode]

Despite WoW's age it's still a bit taxing due to sheer amount of characters/effects it has to draw during raids and visits in crowded places.

I had it running at 50-60 FPS not in the low settings but rather mid-high and the game definitely looked lots better than in 2004-2008 (check your old screenshots).

Please keep in mind that MBA and rMBP aren't dedicated gaming notebooks. They have integrated Intel graphics which are all in all quite amazing (if you ever had older HD2000 you know what I mean).

 

[Freyqq]

If you ran it in boot camp, you might get a little better performance.

 

[Yixian]

If you ran it in boot camp, you might get a little better performance.

I haven't tried it since back in Wrath days when the difference was are, but apparently now there's barely any difference in performance between the OSs with this game?

 

[Freyqq]

I haven't tried it since back in Wrath days when the difference was are, but apparently now there's barely any difference in performance between the OSs with this game?

If so, then I have to hand it to Blizzard. Probably the first game ever that can make that statement.

Anyway, the Iris Pro and 750M would be overkill for WoW at reasonable resolutions. Iris would do better than what you have at the same resolution as well.

Check this site to get a rough idea, but keep in mind that these are windows scores:

http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Graphics-Cards-Benchmark-List.844.0.html

 

[SS4Luck]

I don't play WOW, but i play D3 and my rMBP runs it flawlessly with everything turned up. I have the 15" with the 750M tho