We released The Witness for MacOS a little while back, and we felt it'd be a good idea to post the system requirements somewhere so we could link people to them when they ask. So...
The Witness requires Metal for rendering. Metal is a graphics technology from Apple that allows faster and more fluid graphics. These are the Mac computers that support Metal:
- MacBook (Early 2015)
- MacBook Air (Mid 2012 or newer)
- MacBook Pro (Mid 2012 or newer)
- Mac mini (Late 2012 or newer)
- iMac (Late 2012 or newer)
- Mac Pro (Late 2013 or newer)
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT205073
It's possible to build custom Mac systems with Metal support, either using an old Mac Pro and upgrading the graphics card or building it from scratch using compatible parts (Hackintosh). These configurations are unsupported, but some customers have found them to work.
If using an AMD GPU, the only supported add-in card with Metal support is:
AMD Radeon 7950 (Tahiti Pro) Sapphire card.
If using an NVIDIA GPU, any GeForce 6xx or newer should work, but it is necessary to install the latest drivers from:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/mac-driver-archive.html
System Requirements:
Minimum:
* OS: El Capitan 10.11.6 * Processor: Intel Core i5 @ 1.8 GHz * Memory: 4 GB RAM * Graphics: 1 GB of video memory - Intel: HD Graphics 4000 - AMD: Radeon R9 M290 - NVIDIA: GeForce 640M * Storage: 5 GB available space
Recommended:
* OS: Sierra 10.12.4 * Processor: Intel Core i7 @ 2.4 GHz * Memory: 8 GB RAM * Graphics: 2 GB of video memory - AMD: Radeon R9 M390 - NVIDIA: GeForce 780 * Storage: 5 GB available space
The list of Apple systems with AMD graphics that support Metal is:
Mac Pro 6,1 (Radeon FirePro D300, D500, D700) - cylinder iMac 15,1 (Radeon R9 M290, M295X) iMac 17,1 (Radeon R9 M380, M390, M395, M395X) MacBook Pro 11,5 (Radeon R9 M370X) MacBook Pro 13,3 (Radeon Pro 460)
The list of Apple systems with NVIDIA graphics that support Metal is:
MacBook Pro 9,1 (GeForce GT 650M) MacBook Pro 10,1 (GeForce GT 650M) MacBook Pro 11,3 (GeForce GT 750M) iMac 13,1 (GeForce GT 640M, 650M) iMac 13,2 (GeForce GTX 660M, 675M) iMac 14,2 (GeForce GT 755M, 775M) iMac 14,3 (GeForce GT 750M)
Delighted to have the Witness on MacOS — but now I have to switch machines! How can I move my save files? (Purchased from the Mac app store.)
I found ~/Library/Containers/com.thekla.the-witness/Data/Library/Saved Application State/com.thekla.the-witness.savedState but transferring the three files in that directory (data.data, window_1.data, windows.plist) from the old machine to the new didn’t seem to have any effect.
Thanks for your help!
I asked earlier about how to move save files between machines when purchasing from the Mac App Store, and I think I’ve figured it out. Leaving the results here in case others come looking as well —
Moving the files located in these two directories from one machine to another seems to have done the trick:
~/Library/Containers/com.thekla.the-witness/Data/Library/Saved Application State/com.thekla.the-witness.savedState
~/Library/Containers/com.thekla.the-witness/Data/Library/Application Support/The Witness
I did not test whether moving the second directory without moving the first would have been sufficient.
I assume that macbooks with non-discrete GPU are out? So no Intel graphics on those mentioned devices?
@Peter I’ve got a 2014 13 inch MBP with Intel Iris graphics, and the game ran really surprisingly well. IIRC, I kept it at medium settings and only rarely saw stuttering frame rates.
Wow. I think my four year old macbook air just about sneaks in there. Not that it would be a pleasant experience, but I’m certainly curious after devouring this on the ps4. Best of luck with the iOS release, which really is a unique proposition I think.
I have a Mac Pro (late 21013) with AMD FirePro D300 graphics cards (which are supposed to support Metal) and have major framerate problems in parts of the game and occassional crashes. The game runs just fine on my Mid 2015 MacBook Pro with AMD Radeon R9 M370X graphics even on high graphics quality..
I have an iMac 2009 version running the latest version of El Capitan, with a 2.66Ghz Intel core i5, 12 GB RAM, and an ATI Radeon HD 4850 512 MB Graphics.
Will The Witness run properly on my computer? It would be nice to know before I purchase it. Thanks
Hi,
Although the 2012 Mac Mini meets the minimum requirements (mine has 16GB, 2.6 GHz i7),will it a ‘pleasant’ experience running it on this machine?
Thanks,
Richard
Any chance this is coming to Nintendo Switch? Otherwise I’ll bite the bullet and get it on PS4 but I’d much rather play it at the airport waiting for flights! :D
Man, I gotta visit this blog more often! lol
I had ZERO idea “The Witness” was *finally* on Mac!
Will be buying it the instant after I tap the POST COMMENT button!
Thank God I just got a new 2017 MacBook ….
I bought the witness on a separate Apple account on my iPad before I bought a computer. When I got the computer I set up family sharing but when I went to get the game it said I had to purchase it again. Please help!
I bought this and I have a imac with 10.11.6. After installation I received message that it would not work without “Metal’. I don’t know how to install metal. please help.