OS X List of Mac Metal games

[jeanlain]

Finally, we have big games using the Metal API.
EDIT: the list can't be exhaustive. All upcoming games from Feral, Aspyr and those that run on UE4 and Unity 5 will most likely use Metal. I grouped games according to the developers who actually did the porting to Metal.

Feral Interactive
- F1 2016 (Ego Engine 4.0)
- F1 2017
- Hitman (Glacier Engine)
- Total War: Warhammer (Total War Engine 3)
- Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War III (Essence Engine 4)
- Bioshock Remastered (Unreal Engine 2.5?)
- DiRT Rally (Ego 2.5)
- Deus Ex: Mankind Divided (Glacier Engine)
- Rise of the Tomb Raider (Foundation Engine)
Announced:

Aspyr
- Mafia III (Illusion Engine)

Blizzard
- World of Warcraft (WoW Engine)
Open beta:
- StarCraft II (SC2 Engine)
- Heroes of the Storm (SC2 Engine)

Epic Games (Unreal Engine 4)
- Obduction
- Refunct
- Everspace
- Fortnite
- Ark: Survival Evolved
- Observer
Open Beta:
- Unreal Tournament
Announced:

Unity (Unity 5)
- Ballistic Overkill
- Cities: Skilines
- Micro Machines World Series
- Universe Sandbox 2
- Battletech
Announced:
- Space Pirate Trainer (VR!, version running on the Mac mentioned at WWDC)

Telltale Games (Telltale Tool)
- Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy: The Telltale Series
- Minecraft: Story Mode - Season Two
- Batman: The Enemy Within - The Telltale Series

Others
- The Witness (custom engine) - Thekla
- Headlander (Buddah Engine) - Double Fine Studios
- War Thunder (Dagor Engine 4) - Gaijin
Open beta:
- Fugl (custom engine) - Team Fugl
- Arma III (Real Virtuality 4) - Virtual Programming
Announced:
- X-Plane 11 (custom engine) - Laminar Research
- Dota 2 (Source 2 via MoltenVK) - Valve

What else? I can keep the list updated.

 

[Eric5h5]

I think Dying Light uses Metal. (It requires 10.12, and while in general it works well, one section has a tendency to crash and the error message says something about metal.) Unity has been supporting Metal in builds for quite some time...Unity 5.5 at least, and in Unity 5.6 it's no longer labeled as experimental.

--Eric

 

[jeanlain]

Interesting. I can't find any confirmation about this game using Metal. Since it's yet another engine (Chrome engine), I think we would have heard from the developer one way or another if they ported it to Metal. The bug report may be related to the window compositor, which uses Metal, rather than the game itself.

A way to tell whether an app uses OpenGL is detailed here.

 

[Eric5h5]

If you're referring to the ioregistryexplorer thing, that has two instances of accelCommandQueue (Metal) associated with Dying Light, and one accelGLContext (OpenGL). So it would seem to use OpenGL to at least some extent, though if there's no use of Metal aside from the window compositor, it's a bit odd that it requires 10.12...I don't recall any significant OpenGL features added in Sierra?

--Eric

 

[wubsylol]

Saying something requires Sierra doesn't necessarily mean it requires graphical capabilities of Sierra.

 

[jeanlain]

If you're referring to the ioregistryexplorer thing, that has two instances of accelCommandQueue (Metal) associated with Dying Light, and one accelGLContext (OpenGL). So it would seem to use OpenGL to at least some extent, though if there's no use of Metal aside from the window compositor, it's a bit odd that it requires 10.12...I don't recall any significant OpenGL features added in Sierra?

--Eric

Well the accelGLContext shows the app uses openGL, and the renderer is the prime suspect. Why would it use OpenGL at all if the renderer was based on Metal?
But, it'd be safer to perform a similar analysis on a confirmed Metal game and compare. I don't have any such game, I only have GFXBench.

EDIT: maybe the steam overlay uses OpenGL, but it shouldn't correspond to the game process I suppose. Does it even work on Metal games?

 

[Eric5h5]

The Steam overlay doesn't work with Dying Light, at least. However that's not the first time I've encountered that with a game, so I don't think it means anything.

Saying something requires Sierra doesn't necessarily mean it requires graphical capabilities of Sierra.

Yes, but with Mac games the OS requirements are usually directly related to a graphics API feature/bugfix.

--Eric

 

[JordanNZ]

Another one to add to the list. First unity based game I've spotted too.


http://ballisticoverkill.tumblr.com/post/160707164416/136-playing-with-friends-leaked-patch-notes

 

[wubsylol]

Cities: Skylines has also been patched with Metal support, making is the second Unity-based game I've seen.

https://steamcommunity.com/app/255710/discussions/0/1290690669220501824/

 

[jeanlain]

Cool.
I think it will be hard to make a comprehensive list, given updates that add Metal support without notice or game releases not explicitly mentioning Metal. Especially for games that also support OpenGL and may not even require El Capitan.

EDIT: I updated the list with game engine info and corrected some mistakes.

 

[old-mac-man]

Cool.
I think it will be hard to make a comprehensive list, given updates that add Metal support without notice or game releases not explicitly mentioning Metal. Especially for games that also support OpenGL and may not even require El Capitan.

EDIT: I updated the list with game engine info and corrected some mistakes.

Thanks for this thread, very informative

 

[JaguarGod]

Nice thread! F1 2016 is quite impressive if you have the hardware to really push the graphics options. I am assuming that all of Feral's future titles that are not already late in development are going to be using Metal?

 

[jeanlain]

Nice thread! F1 2016 is quite impressive if you have the hardware to really push the graphics options. I am assuming that all of Feral's future titles that are not already late in development are going to be using Metal?

I can't speak for them, but I suppose so. Doing an OpenGL game for the Mac wouldn't be forward-thinking.

 

[JaguarGod]

I can't speak for them, but I suppose so. Doing an OpenGL game for the Mac wouldn't be forward-thinking.

Yeah, I guess I really wasn't thinking when I posted that reply. Sorry about that. Looks like I had a senior moment! Well, I am getting old.

 

[jeanlain]

Sorry about what?
Your comment was relevant and appropriate.

 

[JaguarGod]

Sorry about what?
Your comment was relevant and appropriate.

Thanks. After reading it I realized that it was not a very smart question though. It would simply make sense that they would use metal for everything new. That's all.

Speaking of Metal, I just started downloading Mafia III and I am interested to see how it runs. I have not played the game on any other platform, though my Daughter has played it on the PS4 and it looked really good.

 

[OEMPT]

Thanks. After reading it I realized that it was not a very smart question though. It would simply make sense that they would use metal for everything new. That's all.

Speaking of Metal, I just started downloading Mafia III and I am interested to see how it runs. I have not played the game on any other platform, though my Daughter has played it on the PS4 and it looked really good.

I got it for my Mac Pro 5.1 with a ATI Radeon RX 460 4gb card... and the game does not load at all

 

[jeanlain]

War Thunder now supports Metal, with a comparison test too:
https://warthunder.com/en/news/4731-development-war-thunder-on-mac-supported-by-metal-en

 

[jeanlain]

A reddit thread about Metal games (not by me):
https://www.reddit.com/r/macgaming/comments/683elm/list_of_macos_games_that_use_the_metal_api_for/
According to some posters, the Witness and WoW run better on Metal than on DirectX.

We also note that F1 2016 runs faster on macOS than on Windows.
As always, this may depend on the hardware.

 

[JordanNZ]

Virtual Programming are onboard now.
Their next port will use metal.

http://www.deliver2.com/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=343

 

[jeanlain]

Thanks. I have added the name of (engine) developers or porting houses who are using Metal.

 

[Janichsan]

War Thunder now supports Metal, with a comparison test too:
https://warthunder.com/en/news/4731-development-war-thunder-on-mac-supported-by-metal-en

Yeah, the new Metal renderer is fast…

OpenGL:

Metal:

…but it has so many issues at the moment (object and texture pop-ins, missing reflections and other effects, weird mouse pointer shenanigans, the screen is occasionally bright pink,...) that I wouldn't bother with it.

 

[jeanlain]

Apparently, Firewatch won't support Metal...
https://panic.com/blog/

we got so close to a Metal-powered Firewatch Mac, but Unity complexities got in the way. We’ll get it next game!

 

[wubsylol]

Apparently, Firewatch won't support Metal...
https://panic.com/blog/

More like they just don't want to put in the resources to further develop their 2yr old game, which is understandable I guess.

They were still happy to have their (totally unknown at the time) name splashed up on screen at WWDC when Metal was announced.

 

[jeanlain]

I missed this comparison from a French website.
https://www.mac4ever.com/actu/12005...indows-avec-f1-2016-metal-fait-des-merveilles

Consider also that Metal is capped at 60 fps!
Metal and Feral are both great.
Interestingly, the Mac is slightly behind at the highest resolution. It shows that Metal really helps the CPU, but that drivers have room from optimisation.
With openGL, result used to be the opposite, with macOS being far far behind at low resolution, due to driver and OpenGL overhead causing the GPU to wait on the CPU. Only at very high resolution, where the CPU isn't the limiting factor, did performance get closer to Windows levels.