Warcraft 3 and MacBook Pro

[DeadPrez]

Hi, I recently purchased a Macbook Pro (2.0ghz, 2gig ram, 7200 rpm hd) and just finished playing a handful of sluggish 3v3 Warcraft III (Frozen Throne) games. I'm new to Mac so bear with me. My previous desktop is Windows XP on an AMD 2700+ w/ 1 gig ram and ATI 9800 Pro. In other words, shouldn't the MacBook Pro kick ass all over something nearly two years older?

My video settings are cloned from the PC. 1280x1024x16, model detail high, animation low, texture quality high, particles high, lights medium, shadows off, occlussion on, spell detail high. I'm not saying these settings can't be tweaked downward but I would have thought the MacBook Pro would have *easily* handled Warcraft III due to the next generation of video card and (duo core) CPU. Not to mention everyone swearing WoW and other games work at full settings.

Hopefully I am just a confused new Mac user that who hasn't tweaked a driver just right or something. Please help. I don't want to have to boot Windows just to get decent performance!

edit: Is it possible/probably War3 won't run at full speed if it isn't compiled as a universal binary? I just checked via the Activity Monitor and it says Frozen Throne is a PowerPC (as opposed to Intel) binary.

[nixgeek]

That's exactly the problem you're having. If your version of WarCraft 3 was for PowerPC, it's running through Rosetta, the PowerPC emulation layer. You might want to check Blizzard's website to see if they have a universal binary for the application that you can install. That would SIGNIFICANTLY improve performance.

[Damrod]

As far as I know there is no UB version of War3 though, only for WoW

[DeadPrez]

This is seriously disappointing because I dropped like 3 grande on a Mac I was under the impression would run Warcraft III natively. Should have known there was a catch.

[nixgeek]

Umm.....this has been in the news for about a year now (even mainstream news). Apple announced they were switching to Intel processors last year during WWDC. Also consider that you're playing an old game on a newer computer (despite the processor difference). Think of it as playing an old DOS/Windows 95 game on a Windows XP computer. Good luck with that one.

There's nothing wrong with the computer....it's running the app as advertised by Apple....through emulation in Rosetta. Be glad that the application is running at all since the Intel Core CPUs and PowerPC CPUs are totally different. The problem is that you didn't research before making the purchase....that's hardly Apple's fault. If you're not pleased with it, return it and by a PowerPC Mac and you'll be back to playing WarCraft 3 happily.

BTW, the only PowerPC Macs you're going to find now are either used or the high-end Power Mac G5 Macs. I wouldn't bother spending the money on an iBook G4. Of course, at this point I don't know what to recommend to someone who's spent 3 Gs on a MacBook Pro for WarCraft 3 only.

Sorry, but I had to say something about it. It's just a matter of common sense when you're spending that amount of money.

OK, I'm done....

[DeadPrez]

Oh, I see you are trolling me. I didn't spend the money solely on the MacBook Pro for War3, but yeah War3 being native to Mac was misleading. I didn't realize I had to look for universal binaries because the Mac store people and the website never told me that. And you are coming across as a zealot asshole and your analogy doesn't actually fly.

PS: if you search major mac related websites there is a lot of misinformation about performance of Warcraft III on MacBooks. Much saying it runs perfectly at full video settings.

[nixgeek]

Originally Posted by DeadPrez

Oh, I see you are trolling me. I didn't spend the money solely on the MacBook Pro for War3, but yeah War3 being native to Mac was misleading. I didn't realize I had to look for universal binaries because the Mac store people and the website never told me that. And you are coming across as a zealot asshole and your analogy doesn't actually fly.

PS: if you search major mac related websites there is a lot of misinformation about performance of Warcraft III on MacBooks. Much saying it runs perfectly at full video settings.

I'm not being a zealot (and there's no need for profanity either). Heck I would even tell you to buy a Windows computer if you wanted it mainly for WC3 (since that's your main concern)! It just doesn't make sense to spend that amount of money and then complain about a game not working properly on it.

As for those sites, please provide the links to backup your statement. It's possible that they might have been talking about the PowerBook G4 and not the MacBook Pro.

In the meantime, check these links out. Had you really checked (and not gone by someone's word), you would have been better informed.

http://www.apple.com/games/hardware
(Take special note of the box that talks about Intel Core CPU Macs. And this is right off of Apple's page.)

The other place to check would be the website of Blizzard themself to see if the game has a universal binary, which they don't. But as you can see, they have the page with the system requirements on it.

http://www.blizzard.com/war3

Don't take your hostility out on me because I was honest. Take out your hostility at Blizzard for not making a universal binary available. Send them an e-mail, write them a letter. Let them know that you want a universal binary for your desired application. If no one says anything about it, they won't do anything about it.

[nixgeek]

By the way, it looks as though you're not the only one wanting a Universal Binary for this game. A Google search for "'warcraft III' 'universal binary'" came up with some people asking about UBs for WC3.

Here's another link to a list of universal binary games.

http://guides.macrumors.com/Universal_Binary_Games