Would Iris Pro be sufficient for less-intensive games?

[cloud25]

I'd love to play some games on a new 15" rMBP every now and then, nothing too intensive as I prefer consoles for latest game releases.

How would the Iris Pro fare with games like SCII, Diablo III, LoL, Dota 2? I'm really hesitant on forking over another couple hundred for GT 750M if Iris Pro can run them without issues.

 

[0983275]

I can run SCII and D3 fine on my MBA, Iris Pro will run them.

 

[iKrivetko]

It is quite a capable piece of hardware, so as long as the drivers and the games are optimised well, it'll handle them without breaking a sweat.

 

[Shmanky]

How is Team Fortress 2 on Iris Pro?

 

[Luftwaffles]

I'm in the same boat. I'm itching to see how well my new 15" can handle EVE Online.

My current Lenovo T420 with the HD3000 manages to hang in there on the lowest settings possible, so I'm curious to see how far Intel's come in two generations.

 

[luffytubby]

computer games are not designed to be played by integrated graphics. Nvidia and AMD owns this market. With that said the majority of computers in the world dont have dedicated graphics. But you cannot be sure that everything will run well. you might experience impossible bad performance in some games. Intel dont really spend time optimizing for games. its not a big part of their agenda.

they are trying to phase out nvidia/amd in other areas. like video and photo editing.


I dont know anyone who loved to game on their laptops who didnt regret getting a machine with integrated. even if they where happy enough with it in the beginning it starts sucking more and more as the machine gets older. 650m is not cutting it anymore any many modern games and you are going to feel it in the next call of duty and battlefields who dont even look that much better than their year old previous installments.

its a new console gen that marks a steeper rise in specs despite the development friendly language between the two. devs are getting lazy and its easier to optimize for higher end hardware than low end. and iris pro is a fairly low end GPU. Its a hig end integrated GPU but its not something to be mentioned with gaming.

the driver thing is also an issue. Gaming has to be 10% max of what you want to do with the machine. otherwise, please stop and either get the 15 inch model with 750m or have a gaming pc or a console. its not going to be a dedicated gaming macine.

 

[springsup]

computer games are not designed to be played by integrated graphics. Nvidia and AMD owns this market. With that said the majority of computers in the world dont have dedicated graphics. But you cannot be sure that everything will run well. you might experience impossible bad performance in some games. Intel dont really spend time optimizing for games. its not a big part of their agenda.

they are trying to phase out nvidia/amd in other areas. like video and photo editing.

I dont know anyone who loved to game on their laptops who didnt regret getting a machine with integrated. even if they where happy enough with it in the beginning it starts sucking more and more as the machine gets older. 650m is not cutting it anymore any many modern games and you are going to feel it in the next call of duty and battlefields who dont even look that much better than their year old previous installments.

its a new console gen that marks a steeper rise in specs despite the development friendly language between the two. devs are getting lazy and its easier to optimize for higher end hardware than low end. and iris pro is a fairly low end GPU. Its a hig end integrated GPU but its not something to be mentioned with gaming.

the driver thing is also an issue. Gaming has to be 10% max of what you want to do with the machine. otherwise, please stop and either get the 15 inch model with 750m or have a gaming pc or a console. its not going to be a dedicated gaming macine.

Iris Pro does look like a significantly more capable GPU than we're used to seeing from Intel. Here's what Anandtech had to say when they reviewed the new entry-level iMac:

The comparison of note is the GT 750M, as that's likely closest in performance to the GT 640M that shipped in last year's entry-level iMac. With a few exceptions, the Iris Pro 5200 in the new iMac appears to be performance competitive with the 750M. Where it falls short however, it does by a fairly large margin. We noticed this back in our Iris Pro review, but Intel needs some serious driver optimization if it's going to compete with NVIDIA's performance even in the mainstream mobile segment. Low resolution performance in Metro is great, but crank up the resolution/detail settings and the 750M pulls far ahead of Iris Pro. The same is true for Sleeping Dogs, but the penalty here appears to come with AA enabled at our higher quality settings. There's a hefty advantage across the board in Bioshock Infinite as well. If you look at Tomb Raider or Sleeping Dogs (without AA) however, Iris Pro is hot on the heels of the 750M.

Since the OP specifically mentions less-intensive games, it could well be that Iris Pro is sufficient for their needs.

Broadly, though, I agree with you. An integrated GPU makes for a much more future-proof machine, and it'll allow you to play the games you want to play with higher graphical fidelity.

If you're on the fence, the best thing to do is to wait for a week or so until the reviews and benchmarks get posted (again I'd recommend Anandtech; I've always found their reviews to be thorough and fair). There's lots of factors to account for since that iMac review; Mavericks and (maybe) better Intel drivers, for example.