Can I optimise my mid 2012 MacBook Pro for gaming?

A few notes:

• The Intel® Core™ i5-3210M Processor is over 10 years old, and has only two cores. MacTracker shows that it scored 548 on Geekbench single-core tests, and 1097 on Geekbench multi-core tests. The plain M3 chips in MacBook Airs scored 3059 and 11662, respectively (just as one point of comparison).
• That Mac has only an integrated GPU – and the integrated GPUs in Intel CPUs of that era were not known for being particularly speedy.
• That Mac can't run any version of macOS higher than Catalina. Catalina is no longer one of the "most recent three" and has not been for over two years, so newer games might not be compatible with it.
• The hardware supports an external display with a resolution of up to 2560x1600 pixels – but not 4K displays.
• Even if you used Boot Camp to install a copy of Windows 10 – to use the MBP as a Windows machine – there wouldn't be any magic fix to having a >10-year-old CPU and no discrete GPU.

On the other hand:

• If you ran something earlier than Catalina on it – like High Sierra or Mojave – you might be able to play some old 32-bit games that got orphaned when Catalina dropped support for running 32-bit applications.

Hmmm… good question, YourBoiCDX… it doesn’t really support an eGPU, so that’s out… you already have the Max RAM in there, so that’s out… apart from replacing the internal drive with an SSD ( after you backed up your stuff before, of course- you should do and use a regular backup on your Mac just to be safe and smart… the only downside for an SSD , it’s more expensive than a conventional hard drive, but it is way faster for accessing data , reading and writing data , 2TB would be around $250 usd plus installation… that might help somewhat… also get better virtualization software, eg CrossOver, Parallels or VMWare fusion ( which all cost more $) … really, if’n’ you’d Want to spend that kind of $ to do that you’d be better off getting a refurbished ps4 or Xbox one and playing Roblox and combat masters on that..

just my opinion though

John B

About the only thing you can do is replace the HDD with a SDD if not already done. You can't even really add a better external monitor since you only have the integrated Intel GPU (only the 15" 2012 model had the discrete GPU as well.

Everything else is going to come down to the game's minimum and recommended specs, whether it actually supports macOS well (many are poor ports to macOS) - and maybe if you want to get a bit better performance by installing Windows using Boot Camp (I wouldn't recommend a VM in your case for gaming).

But no matter what you do, the optimizations available to you are marginal, since it is still a 2012 13" MBP.

I have the same model. The big issue: that model has integrated, not discrete, graphics (Intel HD Graphics 4000 in CPU), and many games would not run on it when that model was new. The gfx hardware cannot be upgraded or improved. Yo have the entry-level Macbook Pro model of the day, not a gaming computer.

The other issue with gaming that I've encountered is that the 13-inch Macbook Pros of that era had but one cooling fan and no side vents for cool air intake. Even simple games that could run on mine caused big spikes in internal temperatures that could be damaging to the internal components.

I have the same model. The big issue: that model has integrated, not discrete, graphics (Intel HD Graphics 4000 on the CPU). Many games would not run on it when that model was new. The gfx hardware cannot be upgraded or improved. You have the entry-level Macbook Pro model of the day, not a gaming computer.

The other issue with gaming that I've encountered is that the 13-inch Macbook Pros of that era had but one cooling fan and no side vents for cool air intake. Even simple games that could run on mine caused big spikes in internal temperatures that could be damaging to the internal components.