From Mac-exclusive AAA games to running Windows games through translation layers, and even emulated Switch games, Andrew Tsai investigated whether the MacBook Neo can truly run games well. Here are the results.

MacBook Neo performs better than expected

When Apple introduced the MacBook Neo powered by the A18 Pro, featuring a 6-core CPU, 5-core GPU, and 8 GB of unified memory, people naturally began to ask: Will these be sufficient?

Of course, the initial answer was clear: It depends on what you intend to use it for.

However, when the reviews for the MacBook Neo were published yesterday, it quickly became apparent that Apple's low-cost computer could handle much more in terms of productivity and general work tools than many initially thought.

Gaming, however, is a quite different story. Despite Apple's efforts to position the Mac as a gaming powerhouse, the gaming community has not embraced it with the enthusiasm Apple hoped for.

With this in mind, Andrew Tsai decided to run the following 10 games on a 512 GB MacBook Neo, and also performed Switch emulation:

  • Cyberpunk 2077
  • Minecraft
  • World of Warcraft
  • Control
  • Resident Evil Requiem
  • Resident Evil 2 (remake)
  • Counter-Strike 2
  • Elden Ring
  • Dark Souls Remastered
  • Mewgenics

Overall, despite its biggest limitation being the 8 GB of memory, the MacBook Neo delivered better performance than most people expected. Naturally, native macOS games performed better than Windows games running through translation layers, and in all cases, performance was largely dependent on the memory intensity of the game.

For example, Cyberpunk 2077 ran well at 720p resolution with all settings set to low, while Minecraft fluctuated between 50 to 300 fps at 1080p.

For games running through translation layers, the results were quite variable; titles like Counter-Strike 2 were “completely unplayable,” while Mewgenics “worked almost flawlessly. After all, it’s a basic 2D game running on OpenGL.”

If you're interested in gaming, even if some of these results seem intuitively obvious, watching Tsai's video is still worthwhile, as it contains interesting insights into what the MacBook Neo can do for the Mac-based gaming community both now and in the long term.

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