Screen Flickering During Certain Games

Now before i start i am fully aware that Macs are not the best computers to play games on, however. i have brought a lot of games from the app store over the 6 months i have had my iMac and i have noticed that some play ALOT better than others. for instance, Bioshock runs amazingly. no lag, no screen flickering or anything even with it set to full graphics. Modern Combat Domination runs great too. its not as graphicly challenging as bioshock i know but this too runs perfectly. then i decided to get Call of Duty 4, this flickers and jumps everywhere even with LOW graphics set, as does Batman Arkham Asylum. i recently download a ported (yes i know its bad but i did it anyways) version of Skyrim. this game runs smoothly without flickering etc etc set on high graphicsand the game is HUGE. yesterday i decided to buy Command & Conquer Red Alert 3. the game plays with out lag but flickers a lot. its really bad. i was just wondering if anyone could tell me why certain games cause my screen to flicker really bad even thou they arent that graphicly intense while other that are seem to run fine. the first game i brought was Motorbike from the app store. the levels arent huge and the graphics are very basic but this flickers very badly. hope someone bring some light to the subject

Your iMac should be able to handle most games as it has an ATI chipset with 512 MB of VRAM. I have the same machine as you do and have not run into anything that would cause flicker. However, I'm not a gamer per se. I do have some games but they're mostly board type.

Flicker is usually the product of incorrect or low refresh rates. There isn't anything you can do to increase the refresh on your iMac as it's set at a resolution of 1920 x 1080 at 60 Hz. The fault is probably with the game as it tries to run at a higher refresh. Try experimenting with the game settings until you find one that's best.