It’s hard to beat the Apple silicon chips inside Macs and MacBooks. It’s why people wonder, “How come I can’t get AAA games on my Mac?” with all this performance?
This is what Apple realized too, so it released the Game Porting Toolkit at WWDC 2023. Making Mac-native titles easier will be made easier with this tool. The latest games don’t sell Macs or MacBooks at Apple stores despite all of these. What’s the deal?
1. Macbooks and Macs Are Expensive
Compared to its power, the MacBook Air M1 is an affordable computer, but it still costs $999. A Mac mini can be had for just $599, but you’ll need to shell out an extra $150 to $200 for peripherals like a monitor, keyboard, and mouse.
Cheap gaming laptops are available for less than $700 if you’re trying to save money. Make sure you get the best bang for your buck by building a well-rounded gaming PC.
You can also buy second-hand PC parts if you’re really tight on cash, so you can get the specs you want until you save up. It’s even been said that Linus Tech Tips (YouTube) builds gaming PCs for $500. Intel and AMD are better options for gamers who don’t want to spend a lot of money.
2. Apple-Silicon Computers Can’t Be Upgraded
Mac gaming got a boost from Apple-Silicon chips, but it’s one of the biggest things holding them back. ‘Cause Apple silicon chips are SoCs (What is an SoC?). SoCs combine everything from processors to GPUs to RAM to SSDs in one package. They’re all closer together, so they’re more efficient and power dense.
You can’t upgrade a computer with Apple silicon. It’s common for gaming machines to be upgradable, so even if you start with a $500 machine, you can eventually upgrade it to a $5,000 beast.
You can even upgrade RAM and SSDs on gaming laptops, which don’t have upgradeable CPUs and GPUs. Unless you buy a new laptop, a MacBook Pro with 512GB SSD and 16GB Unified Memory is stuck.
3. Apple Macbook Airs Don’t Have Active Cooling
For gamers on a budget, the M1 MacBook Air is a good choice. Its aluminum shell passively cools its CPU instead of offering active cooling.
It’s OK for non-demanding office tasks, but it’s not enough for gaming. Using my M1 MacBook Air to play The Sims 4, it got pretty warm after 30 minutes. Playing a demanding game like Call of Duty will make it even hotter. I’m getting less performance than I expected because the computer is likely thermally throttled (or both). Nevertheless, I can run my Acer Predator gaming laptop for several hours without noticing any performance drop.
4. Macos Doesn’t Have Some Gaming Apps
It’s hard to run games without other apps. DirectX 12 is essential for many games, for instance. DirectX isn’t supported by Apple. They’ve got their own Metal API. Basically, you need CrossOver to run games that don’t support Metal API.
Even though CrossOver now supports DirectX 12, which lets you run games on Mac using a compatibility layer, it still takes up more space than running them directly. It’s important to note that some eSports titles require third-party services, like anti-cheat software, to run properly. The majority of anti-cheat apps don’t work on macOS, so you can’t play those games.
5. MacOS Only Has a Few AAA Games
We still don’t have as many AAA games on Macs as we’d like. A lot of games aren’t Mac-compatible, like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II. MacOS doesn’t support even popular legacy titles like Grand Theft Auto V or Red Dead Redemption 2. Using something like CrossOver or Wine will let you play these games.
However, these games aren’t designed to run on Macs, so even if you use the apps, you won’t get the best experience. If you don’t have a gaming PC, you can check if your Mac can run the title.
6. Ports of Mac Games Are Usually Lower Quality
To make a title available to Mac users, developers need to port it to macOS. Find out more about game ports, remakes, remasters, and reboots. Game developers just make games that are released on one platform (like PlayStation 5) natively compatible with another (like PC).
Many AAA PC ports are bad, it’s a well-documented fact. Console games ported to the PC usually have bugs, visual artifacts, and performance problems. Considering developers have been creating PC ports for years, it’s easy to say that macOS ports of AAA games might suffer from the same issues.
Gamers Need More From Apple
Powerful Apple Macs with silicon-powered processors allowed many users to enjoy powerful computers at a reasonable price. Despite that, it’s still expensive and has gaming-related hardware and software issues.
I don’t think Apple’s just releasing better hardware is going to cut it unless a major shift in gamers’ thinking happens. Instead, it requires the perfect blend of gamer demand, developer support, hardware advancement, and more to shake up the gaming industry. This is much like how the Apple App Store made the smartphone we know today.
