I was just given beta access to Nvidia’s new game streaming service, GeForce NOW for Mac.
This isn’t a service to stream your gameplay videos, it’s a service that allows you to play graphically intensive PC games on Android devices and both Mac and PC computers using GeForce GTX-powered virtual PCs.
In other words, Nvidia’s provides the hardware and your device (internet connection required) functions as a fancy monitor.
Access to GeForce NOW for Mac Beta couldn’t have come at a better time.
I just purchased No Man’s Sky on sale through Steam. As I usually do when I purchase PC-only games, I rebooted my MacBook Pro and launched into my Windows partition that I have installed using Boot Camp. I spent a good deal of time optimizing the game and was able to get it playable with pretty much minimum settings – not ideal but, I’m a gameplay person, not necessarily a graphics person.
Here are my computer specs:
Model Name: MacBook Pro
Model Identifier: MacBookPro11,3
Processor Name: Intel Core i7
Processor Speed: 2.3 GHz
Number of Processors: 1
Total Number of Cores: 4
L2 Cache (per Core): 256 KB
L3 Cache: 6 MB
Memory: 16 GB
The problem with running PC games through Boot Camp is that the different built-in graphics cards that come with most Mac computers just aren’t optimized for gaming. Your processing speed is there with most high-end MacBook Pros but rendering graphics at the speed that high-end games require just doesn’t usually turn out very well.
My Experience with Nvidia’s GeForce Now for Mac
A couple days after playing a laggy version of No Man’s Sky being run on absolute minimum settings, I received the email inviting me to beta test Nvidia’s GeForce NOW for Mac.
I had nothing to lose – but I gained a lot.
After installing the software from Nvidia – about a 200mb download – I was able to quickly run No Man’s Sky from my Steam library. I didn’t have to reinstall the game on my OS X partition and, when I arrived at the home screen, I could see my previously saved game (from Boot Camp) was available to play.
After about 30 seconds of loading (if you’ve played No Man’s Sky you’re probably used to this), BOOM, I was in the game, settings maxed out and wasn’t experiencing the slightest bit of lag or performance issues.
The video above was recorded as I played No Man’s Sky (a PC only game) through OS X using Nvidia’s GeForce NOW for Mac.
I am still completely blown away by how well this works. I’ve already started thinking about all of the PC games that I haven’t even tried on Boot Camp because I didn’t think it would be worth it.
Nvidia has turned my video processing, work computer into an incredible gaming machine in a matter of minutes and, whether you’ve ever run a game on OS X or you’re a die hard PC gamer, there is no denying that this will drastically change the entire PC / Mac / computer gaming industry.
Well done Nvidia, I can’t wait to see how this technology progresses.
To see the demo in action, don’t forget to check out the video above.
