Performance on older iOS devices?

It has recently been happening on my near-cutting-edge 512GB iPhone XS Max (last model's "most expensive iPhone ever") too, often if not always associated with the phone overheating.

I often have to dim the screen while playing too.

Android can keep up.
So I guess it's not that.

Friends don’t let friends do Android.

Glitches and lag aside, both my iPhone XS Max even my very old iPhone SE (from the iPhone 6 days) play the game perfectly, without any performance issues.

iPhone SE was one of the cheapest phones Apple ever made, and iPhone XS Max was touted as the most expensive. Both play the game very fast and smooth.

Here are some online pictures I found of the tiny iPhone SE (mine is black):
Even that plays War Robots perfectly.

BUT
I've started experiencing random occasional game freezing / overheating now, even on my top-of-the-line 512GB iPhone XS Max. When this happens, the phone will begin slowing down and locking up during a match.

It rarely happens, but it does happen. And it can cost the match.

Until the new iPhone 11 Pro Max was released, it was the biggest and most powerful iPhone - having the most RAM, fastest processor, most storage, etc.

So the fault can't be blamed on the phone not being good enough. Or a lack of device specs / RAM. Last model, it was the best on the market. There was nothing commonly better.

And yes, I usually close ALL the other apps except War Robots when playing.

So...

...

The problem isn't the hardware, it's that Apple deliberately clocks down their older hardware to get people to believe that the device is slow - it's not, IPC (instructions per clock) is a very slow increment today, in fact performance isn't even gaining anymore, just efficiency.. the transistors are so small now that the industry is stagnating. It's the only thing Apple can do to make their newer devices look better... Rolling eyes.

It's also worth considering that if they raise the native resolution with new releases, say 720p to 1080p, performance will actually go DOWN not up even if the SoC is quicker.

I’ve had some issues ever since 5.2 dropped....and my pad is 1 year old nextgen 9.4”

Pretty sure most of the crap is Pix, wether on purpose or due to incompetence is up for debate.

An example is watching AJs flying, almost impossible to hit while in flight with Quantum Radar active...they bounce around, which is on purpose IMO-that extra advantage Pix gives meta crap.

Whatever

I was using a iPhone 6 and just purchased a new Xr. The 6 was working pretty well until the last update, well I’ll qualify: for the last 3 or so major releases (about a year), the 6 worked fine before an update and then stutter/slow/crash, over heating, etc. Not long before the next update it would be ok again, then same deal after the next update. This last update has been the worst of all, including late start on every match (that’s likely server side but who knows).

Now using the new Xr. About the same, but less often. Still overheats after 3-5 games or so.

It’s not device. It’s Pix. Sloppy code, ambitious new features/greater complexity with the usual “we’ll get around to gameplay and efficiency improvements when we feel like it because $$$” - it’s causing some devices to work overtime. I also suspect it’s brutal on batteries.

Need to think about long term risks/costs for device burnout vs enjoyment from the game. I was ok with running the old 6 into the ground but now my mindset is shifting with an expensive new device.

So does the light.

For nearly all devices it is one of 3 things... processing power, memory, overheating.

Older devices will struggle with processing.
Devices only a couple years old will struggle with memory.
And newer devices, if they struggle, is usually overheating.

The more powerful that devices are becoming, the more cooling they require. With such power, it is hard to create cooling to keep up, just like the usual struggle of battery life to keep up with the hardware power creep. My original Pixel phone played the game like a dream, and that thing is 4 years old! However, after about an hour, it would start to overheat and memory buffer would fill up, and the game would start to stutter. Heck, War Robots plays on super old apple devices like my iPad 4th gen! But fails miserably on all above issues during its first game, haha. I currently main War Robots on the Samsung S10. this phone has pretty good heat pipes and handles the game smooth as butter, barely even warm to the touch after 2 hours. The S10+ has some more advanced vapor chamber tech and probably stays completely cool to the touch for elongated game time.

the OP having overheating issues is probably the most common issue with modern device mobile gaming. external coolers are always a pretty good solution. I recommend to others simply taking off your phone case. That thing alone holds a lot of ambient heat onto the device! Glass/metal casing of the phones help convect the heat away... and then ironically your hands conduct some heat right back which your case absorbs.