Game screen flickers, turns black, or weird textures everywhere!

Posted this in normal tech support but will post here as well in case it is a Mac specific issue:

Okay so in all my years of playing WoW I have never experienced an issue like this before. Randomly when playing, my game screen will flicker lightning fast, textures won’t load (shades of neon green, red, or blue), or the screen just goes black and I cannot see what’s happening. And the weird thing is- it only happens in retail, not classic. It gets so bad I have to exit WoW to get it to stop. Sometimes that works and sometimes it doesn’t.

I would be pretty surprised if it were my computer specs causing the issue. 2013 iMac, 16gb ram, 3TB, decent graphics card. I don’t even run the game at ultra graphics (like recommended 4 or something pretty low), and my frames run at a pretty consistent 60fps.

Yes, I have tried restarting WoW. Yes, I have tried restarting my computer. And yes, I have tried deleting the cache folder. None work so far. No, I have not tried reinstalling WoW. Please don’t make me :slight_smile: …T.T

Can try and provide links to pics to demonstrate what’s going on if that will help. Any and all help appreciated. Thanks so much!

Whenever you have a hardware related issue, it is best to state specs so that they know what configuration you are running and which OS.

The sad news is some 2013 model Macs are being EOL’d by Apple this year. I don’t know if yours is one of them, but usually when it’s on that list, things like graphics issues aren’t on Apple’s list to fix. It’s sort of their way of nudging you to a new computer… they sell hardware after all, so it’s in their interest to push people along.

That being said, Classic doesn’t have the same overhead as Retail. I consider that the expansions from WOD onward to be bloated in terms of load… with BFA being the worst in terms of load. Classic while on the new engine, really doesn’t come close to any of the later expansions in terms of load.

As far as graphics issues, is it screen tearing or is the screen literally completely black? Screen tearing can fill the entire screen at times but movement or camera rotations can reveal it to be tears. My machine has screen tearing quite frequently in retail. It also gets patches of green flickering (not whole screen) just squares of it. In order to fix those problems, I have to go into the Advanced settings graphics settings in WoW and switch one of the settings that forces a reload of the graphics. So if you can still bring up the settings window, this is your fix as well. No need to exit WoW.

My graphics card is supported and so is the OS, but in my case, Apple has long since EOL’d my machine so it’s not getting any graphics updates anymore. So I have lots of issues, similar to what you describe, but probably slightly different.

I recommend posting your specs so that it is easier to narrow down the possible culprit. Although I can probably say it’s 100% a graphics driver related. And one due to poor driver support by Apple.

Thanks for the informative reply. This (among other things) is one reason I have a love-hate relationship with Apple. From what you describe it sounds like my issue could be fairly similar. I can’t post links on the forums so not sure how I could show you screen shots of what is happening. But here are my specs:

iMac 27" (Late 2012)
OS Mojave 10.14.6
Processor 3.4 GHz Intel Core i7
Memory 16GB 1600 MHz DDR3
Graphics NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680MX 2 GB

So I guess late 2012, my bad. Also realized this iMac is still capable of upgrading to Catalina which is currently installing. I have it set to automatically update the software so not sure why that didn’t happen- also my bad. Maybe upgrading to Catalina may help? Not sure if that would really effect the graphics card use/drivers or not.

According to Apple’s website, your machine is indeed EOL’d. This means they aren’t pushing updates specifically to address your system. As such, graphics bugs are not fixed unless it also affects configurations that are not EOL’d using the same chipset.

Catalina has it’s own issues, especially on older hardware. It wasn’t written for it, thus mileage may vary. Again, it’s not going to fix issues specifically related to your hardware, more likely compound them.

Next, be forewarned that when the pre-patch goes live for Shadowlands it’s highly likely they you will no longer be able to play WoW in a playable state. Your hardware is outside the minimum specs.

We are both in the same boat I am afraid. Do we buy a new Mac, knowing that they are switching to an entirely new chipset thereby making any purchase obsolete within 2 years OR, do we wait 2 years and forego playing WoW. Or do we dump the Mac platform and get a PC just to play WoW.

That’s where I stand. And perhaps you as well.

As for graphics problems, they can be reset in most cases by exiting the game or changing a preset in the advanced settings that essentially forces it to reload the graphics. Problem will return, but at least it is still playable. You will know it is reloading the graphics when your machine hangs while it reloads. Fun, it’s like loading screens but on demand!