(this is a copy of a post that was originally posted on guildwars2 subreddit. Reposting to be able to share as i get questions about it)
Hello Gamers!
Recently, apple released Game Porting Toolkit. It's a tool originally for to give game developers rough overview, how their windows game would run when ported to metal (apple graphics framework)
It is a robust extension of wine, which translates directx calls to metal. This means shortest possible translation path from directx to graphics which can be displayed on a mac.
Despite being somewhat hard and VERY long to set up, people have already managed to run lot of games which previously played very poor on mac, could not be ran at all, or could not be ran in dx12 mode. For a bigger list of games that grows daily, check r/macgaming subreddit.
I could not pass up a chance to see how Guild Wars 2 runs on apple silicon mac with it - and results were really really good! But i also recorded and uploaded videos so that you can see for yourself:
- Elon riverlands (60-80 fps): https://youtu.be/WAhCY1JQ5gw
- Open world meta (not a meta boss but still a lot of players) (25-40 fps): https://youtu.be/4KiQXDqh_Ng
- Random open world places, incl mistlock: https://youtu.be/sB8EOu6poQQ
- Medium scale wvw (25-50 fps): https://youtu.be/YBUluhsg7oE
- Wvw siege (20-40 fps): https://youtu.be/cexQYtlV2VM
- Urban battleground fractal (45-90 fps): https://youtu.be/Kmlwj2mUySw
Some of them were recorded on power, while some on battery - info is included in each title All were recorded on a mac with m1 max, 10 core, 64gb ram, 32 gpu cores
To be able to use maploadinfo (or other params), i created a gw2.bat file next to gw2-64.exe, with contents:
"C:\Program Files\Guild Wars 2\Gw2-64.exe" -maploadinfo
and ran game via:
gameportingtoolkit ~/my-game-prefix 'C:\Program Files\Guild Wars 2\gw2.bat'
for more info on how to set up this on a mac (ventura 13.4 or sonoma required), please see this indepth article: https://www.applegamingwiki.com/wiki/Game_Porting_Toolkit
For me it feels game runs very very smooth - it feels closest to what can be called "running native on a mac" and i'm sure short metal path is to thank for.
Downsides:
- i was not able to run arcdps using gameportingtoolkit yet. With d3d11 (dll next to exe and d3d11 builtin,native override) game crashes. With dxgi (dll next to exe and dxgi override) the game either ignores it or crashes. So far i was only able to run arcdps with dx11 on wineskin (zero issues) and parallels (...i think. not super sure if it was dx11 or dx9). Crossover only back in the day with dx9
general issue of fullscreen games on a mac - swiping mouse far enough to the edge which has dock (auto hide or not), shows dock. I have not researched this very much yetenough to use game's "fullscreen" or "windowed fullscreen" mode instead of mac green "zoom button" to fix that- minor graphical glitches - "strings" in mistlock and oddly looking grass in ebg. I have not raided in this version yet, but concerns for some more intricate effects like instadeath aoes, sh walls, deimos hands or samarog friends, are valid to be had
- sometimes it takes 3-4 gameportingtoolkit runs to actually start the game
- gw2launcher: i had high hopes for it (launches in crossover and wineskin, but is not able to actually launch game with "unable to move file" error) since i saw mentions of people having success with it under linux and gameportingtoolkit being in essence, much closer to wine than crossover/wineskin (with their integrations like dxvk). It doesn't even start with gameportingtoolkit. Chances are, this is missing dotnet or other libraries issue, i have not researched this very much yet
What caught most of my attention in mesmer changes is how chrono can now provide either alacrity or quickness via just summoning phantasms. It's exciting - if it makes it possible to be alacdps/qdps with no or little use of continuum split, i'll be happy to pick chrono back up
Quickness via burst seems like sucha a quality of life and flexibility boost though! Provide quickness by doing what you would be doing anyway. Numbers aside, love the idea. In general, love instances where key boons now fit organically like with berserker or untamed
Glad it works out for you! I used to play a bit hfb in fractals long time ago, but then fell off. Recently check out condi quickness firebrand (when mantras were in spam mode) and.. it felt crazy spammy lol i was overwhelmed
One thing i never liked about guardian are cast times. Much of the weapon skills feel super slow to actually cast, even with quickness. This is particularly visible when using gs5 to pull enemies/do cc - how much time you have to spend "doing" gs5 (i understand it's dual function, this is just for illustration)
I think they are mostly trying to shake things up, and this time, really shake things up from the looks of it. I agree it sucks for some classes to be getting super nerfed. At the same time i welcome options that open up.
What did you use to play?
Condition virtuoso is a really strong pick for a class that basically doesn't have much of a rotation. I remember also condi tempest being very easy to play if doing cc is not your thing, haha! Do check out "beginner" tab for snowcrows those builds are really easy and have progression levels, first level of each is usually plenty damage: https://snowcrows.com/builds?profession=any&category=beginner
I actually checked out condi soulbeast for a bit in open world, and it seemed super fun! Perhaps the ranger class feature, a pet is not that exciting compared to other classes? Soulbeast surely changes that up for me :)
Nice! glad the patch works out well for you. I played a bit of staff and p/p daredevil in open world. with invigorating precision and lifesteal food it was really doing nice damage and staying alive. My only issue was, any cc cut off my healing source (attacking) and thief being one of lowest hp classes, even with marauders, was dead fast :)
This page has all upcoming changes nicely formatted with wiki links.
What do you think of those changes?
- Ranger: i'm super excited about those changes, particularly druid. Looks like druid will be come super op heal support with those changes and i'm VERY interested in the dps and condi alac options. Curious about quickness untamed too.
- Engineer - on the fence with quickness via leap/blast. On one hand it's great there is no more need to spam gyros. On the other i very much like the fact that spamming gyros also gives superspeed to allies. Can't have it all i guess