The Challenge: Limited Mac Gaming Options
The Mac has never had many quality games available. Frankly, the number of games native to the Mac is minuscule compared to the thousands and thousands of PC games available.
Game developers overwhelmingly support PC game development. That’s probably primarily because of its much larger user base than the Mac user base.
There are some excellent Mac-only games and some games with both PC and Mac versions, but by far, most of the games available are PC-only.
Why My Mac Gaming Options Are Even More Limited
I’m a gamer, but because of the kind of games that I enjoy playing, my games are probably even more limited than most gamers who use the Mac. I’m interested in the narrow niche of World War II and ancient strategic and tactical games, commonly known as war games. Don’t think “Call Of Duty” type first-person shooters, but rather strategic and tactical military simulations, many of which are highly realistic.
I’ve always been interested in history, especially World War II and ancient history. I enjoy the intellectual challenges and the learning that I gain by doing military simulations.
Gaming is one way I recharge my energy as an introvert. With a good game, I can get lost in tactics or strategy and forget everything else happening in my world for an hour or so.
There are many great WWII and ancient war games, but almost none for the Mac. So, what can a Mac-using gamer like me do? How can I play PC games on the Mac?
When there were Intel Macs, I used Boot Camp to partition my drive, install Windows, and play pretty much whatever games I wanted to. However, since moving to Apple Silicon, that ability has been lost.
There are several options, however, available to Mac gamers.
Crossover: Easy Setup, Limited Compatibility
The Crossover app runs Windows applications, including games, without installing Windows itself, using the Wine format. It’s best for individual apps rather than a complete Windows environment. To play a game, you install Crossover and then a PC game in a “bottle.” Crossover provides step-by-step wizards and tutorials to make the process easy.
Many gamers (including me) use the Steam service to purchase games and have them available on their devices. Crossover can run games through Steam. However, Crossover’s abilities are limited.
Some games you want to play might work, and others won’t, and there’s no way to tell in advance which ones will function adequately on Crossover. You have to experiment and see whether it works acceptably or not.
One advantage of Crossover is that it’s available for a one-time payment. You pay, and then you pay for significant upgrades. And, as mentioned before, you don’t have to figure out how to install the ARM version of Windows on a silicon Mac.
Using Parallels or VMware Fusion for Gaming
A second popular way of playing PC games on the Mac is to use a virtual PC platform like Parallels Desktop or VMware Fusion.
These apps run Windows seamlessly alongside Mac OS on the Mac desktop. They offer excellent performance, tight integration, and support the latest Windows ARM version. Parallels Desktop makes it easy to install Windows with built-in support.
As was true in Crossover. Some games will run acceptably under virtualization, and some won’t. One of the negatives of Parallels Desktop, the leader in this area, is that it cannot run games that require DirectX 12, which is required for many of the newer games.
Parallels Desktop is available for a one-time payment (and then pay for fairly frequent upgrades) or a monthly or yearly subscription. I found the yearly subscription to be the best value.
Cloud Gaming on Mac: NVIDIA GeForce Now Explained
A third approach to gaming on the Mac is using the NVIDIA GeForce service to stream PC games directly to your Mac. This cloud-based gaming service, developed by NVIDIA, allows users to stream video games directly to their devices over the Internet.
However, it also comes with quite a few restrictions. The service is restricted to specific games it supports, and you must own the games you play. If your favorite game is not supported, you’re out of luck. You also must have a fast Internet connection since you are streaming the games over the Internet
A limited free level is available, or you can subscribe monthly, with prices depending on your desired speed and access level. The monthly tiers are reasonably priced at $10 and $20.
One of the advantages of their system is that you can easily add or drop higher monthly access and fees depending on your level of play. So, if you want to play a particular game for a month or two, you can subscribe for that period and then let your subscription lapse.
The few games I play on it function well, with great graphics and motion. I can play a few games on NVIDIA GeForce that won’t run under Crossover or Parallels Desktop.
No One-Size-Fits-All Solution
Unfortunately, there is no one-stop PC gaming solution for the Mac enthusiast. You must experiment with different platforms to see what works with your favorite games. I use a patchwork of the three services to run most of the games I enjoy. However, some games I’d like to play don’t work on any of them.
Because it supports several games I regularly play, I use Crossover and NVIDIA GeForce the most. However, that will vary depending on each person’s preferences regarding which games matter to them.
The ideal solution would be to have a gaming PC to play your favorite games. However, while run-of-the-mill PCs are inexpensive, gaming PCs are not. They can cost almost as much as a new Mac.
You also need space to set up the gaming PC. I’ve considered this option several times but always discarded it for practical reasons.
If you enjoy playing PC games and want to play on the Mac, experiment with the available services. They all have free trials to test whether the games you want to play work on their platform.
AI Note: I wrote this blog post myself, using my own words for the initial draft. I used AI only to suggest headlines, section headings, and improvements to the text.
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