“Maybe you just got your first Mac, or maybe you’re a long-time user looking for something new,” Ric Molina writes for Mac Gamer HQ. Either way, this will surprise you: Most of the best video games are available on Mac.”
“Turns out that 7 out of the 10 most-played games on Steam have a Mac version, and all the best indies support the Mac too,” Molina writes. “These top Mac games will show you how far Mac gaming has come.”
“I know you often wonder if your Mac has the chops to run modern games,” Molina writes. “To give you an idea, I included my take on what type of Mac you will need to play these games. And if you want to test the waters with no risk, get started with a few free Mac games. Bookmark this page for when you don’t know what to play next, and let’s get started.”
The 100 best Mac games you can play today here.
MacDailyNews Note: Conveniently, the list is sortable by name, genre, price, and performance requirements.
Macs are for coffee shops, classrooms and boardrooms, not for nerdy uncool loser gaming.
Macs can do everything PC’s can do without fighting viruses and spyware all day long.
Technically, they can’t do everything because they don’t have a touch screen.
I wish that was true, but you know very well that it isn’t.
While this is an impressive list, most of these are old versions. Consoles and Windows get priority treatment over the Mac every time. Sports games on a Mac are scarce too — no Madden football, no FIFA soccer.
These are the best selling games for January 2016, and not a single one is available on the Mac: http://www.gamespot.com/articles/top-ten-best-selling-games-in-the-us-for-january-2/1100-6434729/
Apple has shunned gamers so long, and now pros as well, that software developers have lost faith that Apple will ever keep up its hardware specs to support the latest and best.
Dismiss the gamer market if you want to, but those guys are at the cutting edge of processor and display performance, and those computer makers who cater to that market are very profitable.
Since iOS became the center of attention, Cook has been chasing easy profits there instead of keeping the Mac relevant. That is too short sighted. Apple needs to sell trucks again.
When Macs across the board are one or two chipsets behind, then software developers will continue to leave the platform. Many pros and gamers left long ago. The loyal Mac users have no choice but to play 2+ year old games.
“those computer makers who cater to that market are very profitable.”
They may be very profitable, at the scale of their operations. But Apple dwarfs them all… even added togother.
PC to Mac shipment Ratio is like 9:1, how does Apple “dwarf them all”
Performance Gamer PC shipments are dwarfed by Mac shipments, duh. And are minuscule compared to iOS device shipments.
Performance Gamers are really a very small segment of society. Casual gaming is the mainstream of the gaming market as programmers have come to realize with iOS. Casual games out sell/ship the niche performance gaming market by buckets. Casual gaming is the gaming of the masses, so on a per capita basis, Apple is the leader in gaming. Just not performance gaming, and they don’t want performance gaming – neither do I; I have a life to live.
Apple invented the mass market PC (personal computer) with the Apple II (first PC to be commercially successful that wasn’t trash). Then they invented the mass market GUI PC with the Mac (first GUI PC to be commercially successful). Then they invented the Newton (first tablet PC). Then they invented the iPhone (first commercially successful modern PC in your pocket and arguably the most personal computer ever.)
Know your history – Apple has always made personal computers for the mass market. They do not market towards niche computing environments (until the trash can Mac Pro which is pretty much only a video cruncher, and sales have shown the error of that move) (I blame Steve’s love of Pixar).
Performance gaming is a niche market that does not appeal to Apple. Apple could spend tons of research money on performance for a small segment of the market, or they could spend tons of research money on quality, aesthetics, and dependability and appeal to the majority of the market. Apple always chooses the latter. I don’t blame them, that is where the profits are.
However, I do wish they would go back to Mac Pro’s that were affordably customizable as that has more appeal the the mass pro market. Plus then the whiners wouldn’t come here to whine. Ok, I’m dreaming on that last one.
Don’t forget the pub! And agreed, no games.
Don’t you know? Nerds now run the coffee shops, classrooms, and boardrooms.
Go back to your android. Nerd.
Not reason to be so vigilant to gamers my friend. Macs can’t run every game, but its mostly due to developers not wanting to code for it. And trust me, there are plenty of games for the Mac, so to say that it isn’t for a gamer is not at all accurate. Apple just puts more emphasis on the work side of things, which is great cause thats how i make my money.
This is a blatant attempt to rile us up. Please ignore the trolls.
I’ve been a Mac user since the early 1990s and aside from using Macs for work and communication with my friends, I’ve always found time to play a game or two. In fact one of the constant gripes from we Mac users is that we’ve been ignored by many of the major game “studios”. Likewise I can remember the disappointment and rage over what happened when Microsoft bought out the Halo franchise.
It could also be argued that one of the issues that has held Apple back from greater market penetration has been a lack of ported or Mac only games.
Apple sees this as a market to be tapped into as they are devoting greater resources into this area.
Also more and more games companies are porting their wares to the Mac market because there is a market out there to be tapped into. They’re NOT doing this out of the goodness of their hearts.
Also I live in a first world country of 24 million people and the games market is worth three billion dollars per annum. When you extrapolate that worldwide it’s frankly humungous!
On a personal note I’ve been a teacher, a businessperson, and worked in the entertainment industry. I’ve been married for over twenty years to a former radio DJ (now a journalist) and I don’t consider either of “uncool” it’s just that the Mac community is a broad church that welcomes all users. I’m not ashamed of the fact that I’ve been playing Mac games since OS6’s “Submarine”. I see games as having their place and whilst I don’t think your life should be dominated by one particular interest games DO have a place for Mac users.
“Gamers” or whatever they call themselves are not in Apple’s target market, and for good reason. They don’t fit within the image so painstakingly crafted by Steve and honored by Tim. They are android and google losers who love plunking around on their motodroidgear crap. Image is everything. We don’t want those scum fouling up our brand and image.
Tim Cook has $billions in the bank and he can’t make Apple computers compete with Windows machines for gaming. Apple has failed in this area and thrown in the towel.
And, as long as Macs can’t fill the needs of consumers, Windows will continue to be around and thrive. I have to believe that Tim Cook really doesn’t care about Macs.
Whats the difference between professional and college ‘games’ and gamers? When attending ‘games’ you sit on your ass and drink beer and howl at the moon. Gamers, on the other hand, exercise their brains and have great manual dexterity. I like gaming better.
Wow, dude you’re clueless and in denial.
Steve, while keynoting the first iPhone, talked about some markets and the gaming industry was such a small niche with a competitive edge and not much cash that Apple wasn’t even interested. Gaming is a colateral effect of releasing great computing product.
Even now, Apple with their ecosystem doesn’t promote gaming even if they are the initiator of the casual gaming industry…
For I, I am surprise at how many game have been ported to the Mac…
Sky Gamblers Storm Raiders should be on that list. It’s not really supported any more…but the online play is awesome.
The Mac has been so ignored of late that I recently found a Pages template which was obviously designed before half the functionality was removed, making the template unusable. Yawn, back to MS Word.
The only barrier between gaming and mac are the mouse acceleration and DirectX 12.
I have tried gaming on both OSes, El Capitan and Win 10 bootcamped on the same machine, same steam client and on the same game Portal 2. Im an FPS gamer and Win10 has better mouse control than EC.
The framerate on windows is on average 200fps while on mac it’s just ~100fps. Also the mouse screw up when the fps drops on EC. while the mouse look on win10 never disappoint me when the framerate drop.