When the new iPad 3 tablet was officially presented, Apple praised the quad-core graphics processor in the new device, a processor that is twice as powerful as the one in the iPad 2, but which can support twice the resolution and 4 times more pixels. Considering the resolution of the new device, the hardware implemented in the iPad 3 is good enough not to give the impression that the tablet has problems running games or applications, but there are no performance differences between it and the old iPad model.
NEW 3 is a fairly stunning game whichever iPad you play it on, with visuals rivaling most of what we've seen on the PS Vita. Oddly, though, both versions will impress you in completely different ways. The game's detailed environments and assets look great on the Retina display, and if you didn't know any better you'd swear it was always meant to look like this. With an iPad 2 on hand, however, you'll quickly notice that certain sacrifices have been made in favor of resolution. The game is indeed much more effects-laden on the older tablet, with depth-of-field blurring and some particle effects such as burning buildings in the background completely removed on the new iPad.
In an attempt to see if the iPad 3 with its Retina Display and quad-core processor really brought important changes in terms of games, those from TheVerge they made a detailed comparison for several games run on the new tablet and the previous model. They noticed that some developers discounted video effects to offer higher resolution graphics, while others chose not to display native resolution graphics, but to offer as normal an experience as possible on both tablet models. .
In NOVA 3, an interesting difference was noticed, iPad 3 having graphics at a higher resolution, but not having certain video effects that the iPad 2 tablet had and ran them without problems. Those from Gameloft claim that in a new update of the game they will offer users the option to choose between seeing the graphics at maximum resolution on the iPad 3 or running the effects available only on the iPad 2, so the quad-core graphics processor would not be capable to do both things because it doesn't have enough processing power.
In conclusion, it looks like NOVA 3 is somewhat of an outlier for having such dramatically different graphics on both iPads, and the newer tablet does manage to distinguish itself with some visually excellent titles. 2D games often look amazing on the new iPad, for instance, of which the likes of Waking Mars, Aquaria and Superbrothers: Sword and Sworcery EP are good examples. However, it's rare to see a technically demanding game run at Retina resolution without some compromises, and rarer still to see one equal or exceed the iPad 2's graphics performance at 2048 x 1536. The A5X and Retina display are both very impressive components, then, but it's clear that in gaming much of the former's capability is limited to supporting the demands of the latter.
Those from TheVerge say that the A5X processor in the iPad 3 is only as powerful as the A5 in the iPad 2, and that's because the resolution has increased considerably. The same thing happened with the iPhone 4 in 2010, it being only slightly faster than the iPhone 3GS and that's because its hardware ran graphics at double resolution. Probably the future iPad model will have hardware capable of running large graphics and special video effects, but until its release we still have to wait.
