harsaphes
Supreme [H]ardness
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Hey guys, I have a new Macbook Air, 13 inch and I was wondering if there are any games I could play on it?..Since there isnt a drive on it I was thinking about Steam. Your thoughts?
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Games for Air?
- Thread starter harsaphes
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UnknownSouljer
[H]F Junkie
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Gaming is dependent more on the graphics card... gaming on the 13" MBA with the 320M is 'okay'. Source based games will run fine, just don't expect stellar performance in Crysis. Steam works... or you can buy an external Superdrive and install anything you want that way.
harsaphes
Supreme [H]ardness
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Yeah. Not looking for a big game experience. Just something for a long flights ect. Just installed Steam and Torchlight.....runs great.
rubicsphere
n00b
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Original Starcraft and all the source games will run fine at native resolution. I recommend portal if you havent already played it
silentcoercion
Limp Gawd
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On the 11" MBA, WoW runs really nicely. Also, Minecraft and Amnesia: The Dark Descent (though that needs a real mouse). Haven't tried a lot of other games on it, thus far.
harsaphes
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Thanks Guys!
Centauri
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Zinn
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Macbook Air is surprisingly capable for gaming. The 11" slightly more so than the 13" IMO, because they have the same GPU, but the 11" is lower resolution. I remember playing Half Life 2 on high details on an airplane trip and the battery just refused to die. Pretty impressive.
Archaea
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at you.I thought that video looked a bit fishy!
:20, 5:10, and 6ish minutes on your own video. Heck - just listen to the entire audio -- he talks about it the whole time - the review is really about the gaming service he is recommending --- NOT about the Macbook Air! He is playing streaming gaming where the processing and video rendering is being preformed on a much more powerful system. At the :20 second mark he clearly says there is no way these games would run on the mac book air!
Ha! Hilarious! This post should be nominated for something!
So you're saying that if you press buttons and the game responds the way you expect, you see video and hear audio, but the rendering happens on a dedicated OnLive server rather than the local GPU, then somehow it's not truly playing a video game, right?
I guess if you're streaming a movie over Netflix rather than playing it off a DVD, it's not really watching a movie either. It's something fishy.
Therefore, your conclusion must be that the MBA can't play games nor movies (due to lack of DVD drive).
I guess if you're streaming a movie over Netflix rather than playing it off a DVD, it's not really watching a movie either. It's something fishy.
Therefore, your conclusion must be that the MBA can't play games nor movies (due to lack of DVD drive).
Why are there onLive trolls in this thread? Go play in the console gaming section instead.
Anyway, as others have said definitely check out Steam. Air has no problem playing anything based on Valve's Source engine, and should be able to handle just about anything available for Mac in the Steam catalogue.
Anyway, as others have said definitely check out Steam. Air has no problem playing anything based on Valve's Source engine, and should be able to handle just about anything available for Mac in the Steam catalogue.
Archaea
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no goofball. I'm saying that your original post claiming that a macbook air can run Just Cause 2 or Dirt 2 at 720p is a sham and absolutely laughable because it isn't rendering the gameplay on it's own hardware in the video you referenced --- more importantly - the mac book air CANNOT do that on it's own hardware as the video host freely admitted in your own referenced link!
I'd wager you didn't know you were recommending a streaming gaming service, and your following coverup post is pathetic at best. I don't think anyone would be terribly impressed if you said -- "Hey Guys the Macbook AIR can render 720P YouTube videos! --- Isn't that amazing!" I still think your post should be nominated for some sort of 'tech comedy' post of the year award when considered in the context of this thread! It definitely is good for a laugh! I personally don't want any part of a streaming gaming service at the current time because the lag introduced through the video and input data transfers would be INTOLERABLE to me in anything but a turn based game! I've tried this functionality using the PSP streaming video off my PS3. Even over the PS3's built in WAP without layers of network switches and WAN lag induced by the external internet -- the PSP controls are noticeably laggy. Maybe in 20 years this technology will be feasibly fast for competitive gaming.
To the original poster's question. The second comment summed it up. That video card and processor combo is okay. It's just fair. It can run older games fine, but won't really be able to keep up with newer titles at high quality settings.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2119...ed_with_similarly_priced_windows_laptops.html
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My original post was nothing more than a smiley and a link. I may have implied that "you can play Just Cause 2 or Dirt 2 at 720p on the MBA" and I stand by that statement. You can play. Using OnLive. I didn't say the MBA can run those games locally on its own graphics card.I'm saying that your original post claiming that a macbook air can run Just Cause 2 or Dirt 2 at 720p is a sham and absolutely laughable because it isn't rendering the gameplay on it's own hardware in the video you referenced --- more importantly - the mac book air CANNOT do that on it's own hardware as the video host freely admitted in your own referenced link!
I've been happily using OnLive since it became free to use (no account fees). It's great for trying out games without 8 GB demo downloads, and playing console action games like Batman: AA or Assassin's Creed, where the latency due to cloud rendering is least noticeable or detrimental to gameplay. I also use it to play said games on my 8.9" Atom netbook with a wireless 360 controller while lying down. I don't have to worry about my save games, changing computers or playing from different places. I bet in a few years OnLive will be mainstream.
I kinda think the same about yours.
Fair enough. OnLive isn't for everyone. But you sound like a typical person who hasn't even tried it, yet you're making claims about latency. What about the latency in your HDTV? I doubt you're using a CRT monitor to avoid it. News flash, latency from OnLive is comparable to most crappy HDTVs (if you have good internet and location).
He was asking what games can be played on MBA, not which games it can render locally. So I recommended he tries OnLive out. There's no reason not to, it's a 3 megabyte download and it's free to make an account and try demos for 30 mins.