I recently write about how theM4 Pro Mac miniskirt — with its tiny bod factor and excellent execution , coupled with the largely headache - free experience of macOS — has made me extremely tempted toditch Windowsonce and for all . There ’s just one trouble with this melodic theme , though : I ’m an devouring gamer , and Apple ’s M4 Pro chip is n’t quite as open as the RTX 3070 that resides in my current PC .
Then I produce an email from a reader that changed my perspective .
The reader suggested I look intoGeForce Now , Nvidia’scloud gamingservice . You pay a subscription fee and in riposte can swarm games to your computer with gamy resolutions and dissipated underframe rate . The games are host on Nvidia ’s own machine , meaning you could play improbably ask title without need the hardware to twin .
It was an challenging conception . I ’d be able to spiel high - end game at levels that would normally be fashion beyond the capableness of the Mac mini ( or , indeed , those of my own PC ) . GeForce Now has a great library of games and even enables you to play Windows exclusives on a Mac , which could mean a more grand listing of titles than I ’d have admittance to if I ditch Windows and hold fast with the veritable macOS experience .
This would theoretically let me to continue my personal computer gaming habits on a Mac — and in fact do it in a way that ’s much close to Windows than I ’d be able-bodied to do natively on macOS — all while advance the benefits ofswitching to Mac . And I have to say I ’m moderately tempt by it .
Far from foolproof
Despite the positives , GeForce Now is far from a unfailing root to my enigma . For one thing , I often mod the biz I play , whether that ’s Skyrim , Fallout orCyberpunk 2077 . Modding on GeForce Now , though , is very limited — if it works at all .
You have to rely on modding tools that are integrated into the game , like Bethesda ’s Creation Club in Skyrim and Fallout . Yet theCreation Clubhas a much more circumscribed extract of mod than something like theNexus Modswebsite . report show that you ’re special to 25 mods when using GeForce Now and that these often call for to be reinstall each time you play , which could be a real pain . To be fair , I have n’t played my modded games in a while , but I ’ve got Cyberpunk’sPhantom LibertyDLC hold off in the wings , so the likelihood is I ’d have to toy it unmodded .
As well as that , you ’re circumscribed to the game Nvidia has in its library . decent now , that figure stands at over 2,000 titles . That sounds like a lot , but it ’s not without its take . Some of the games I ’ve been toy the most the right way now are available , likeStardew Valley , Baldur ’s Gate 3and titles from theAssassin ’s Creedseries . Some , likeFootball Manager , are n’t on GeForce Now , but they can be played natively on my Mac , so that ’s not a problem . In rare typeface , though , games I play are n’t useable either natively on the Mac or on GeForce Now . I ’d have to do without those .
And then there ’s the cost . My main choice is between the Performance and Ultimate tiers ( I ’m not interested in the very limited gratuitous option ) . I do n’t heed that Performance is limited to 1440p — that ’s what I play on now anyway — but I want to play at more than 60fps . For that , I ’d need Ultimate , which costs $ 99.99 for six month . That ’s quite a lot on top of the $ 3,000 I ’d probably have to pay for the specced out Mac mini I want to replace mygaming PC . I know Apple outfit is expensive , but you do n’t commonly have to factor out in the price of cloud gaming as well .
Looming on the horizon
I ’m someone who has always preferred owning something instead of take it , so GeForce Now finger like a slightly uncomfortable thing to be considering . But if I want to go all - in onmacOSwhile still maintaining a gaming experience that ’s as good as my current setup ( or dependable ) then cloud gaming is looming prominent on the horizon .
Of of course , there are choice to GeForce Now , but they all get along with many of the same issue that affect Nvidia ’s offering . Yet at the same prison term , going the pullulate route could salvage me the cost of upgrading to something even buirdly — like theMac Studio — just to get the kind of gaming performance I desire .
finally , it ’s something I ’m going to have to give a spate of thought to . I ca n’t expect a totally painfulness - innocent experience if I ’m going to throw my entire microcomputer frame-up to a different platform , but diving into cloud gambling could be one way to downplay the disruption to my play hobby — even with its smattering of quirks and drawbacks .
