MBP 13 M2 - Good Enough for WoW?

[Curry119]

I'm thinking about replacing my aging 2018 MacBook Air and also an older gaming rig from 2016 with the 13in MacBook Pro M2. My question to anyone here with the 13in: How does it handle the occasional game like World of Warcraft and Eve Online? I will mostly be playing games on my PS5 going forward, but I do like the occasional MMO game and want to make sure this won't be overheating if I try to run them. I would mostly use it with a 3440x1440 monitor with the lid shut.

 

[russell_314]

I'm thinking about replacing my aging 2018 MacBook Air and also an older gaming rig from 2016 with the 13in MacBook Pro M2. My question to anyone here with the 13in: How does it handle the occasional game like World of Warcraft and Eve Online? I will mostly be playing games on my PS5 going forward, but I do like the occasional MMO game and want to make sure this won't be overheating if I try to run them. I would mostly use it with a 3440x1440 monitor with the lid shut.

I played WoW classic on my M2 Air with no trouble. Retail WoW needed lower graphics settings to work smoothly. It won't overheat but it's not going to play at max graphics. I didn't play in clamshell with an external monitor so IDK how much that would effect it.

 

[MrGunny94]

Only issue it's in the in-built-retina display is quite slow in terms of response time.

 

[Juicy Box]

I play WoW retail on a M1 Mac Mini, and on Dragonflight, I have every graphical setting turned to the Max on my MM connected to a gaming 1080p ultra wide monitor.

I get very playable for, around 30-40, with the occasional dip in the high 20s.

It appears that Dragonfligh has been optimized for AS.

 

[TSE]

Semi-related question that I am curious about.

How does a game from 2004 still not run absolutely amazing on today's hardware?

 

[Juicy Box]

How does a game from 2004 still not run absolutely amazing on today's hardware?

Not sure if you mean WoW Classic or Retail, but if Classic, it is based on a modern graphics engine, so it requires semi-modern HW. Pretty much any Mac in the last 5 years can run it with max settings in 1080p.

My high end (680m) Late 2012 iMac is able to run it at Max settings with 40-60fps.

If you are referring to WoW Retail, that is a modern game, like anything else that was released recently, with the exception that WoW has never needed high end rigs to run well.