When it comes to video games Mac owners get the blunt end of the stick, but fear not I have a solution that’ll solve all your problems. Today we’re gonna look at how to play Windows games on Mac OS. Let’s get started. Another great glide wrapper is dgVoodoo2, which allows you to play not only 3dfx games, but also DirectX (1-7) and Direct3D games. Both programs are very useful, as one may work better than the other. As written above, dgVoodoo2 is great for old windows games which often use DirectX.
Summary :
It is impossible to directly run Windows games on Mac. But, due to some reasons, you want to do it. How to play Windows games on Mac? This post shows you some possible ways. While to solve data loss issue on both Windows and Mac, you can ask MiniTool Software for help.
Also, if you want to install or run any Windows-only games, you will have to use the Steam for Windows application. Because of this, you will have to switch between your primary Steam for Mac application and your new Steam for Windows application depending on if the game you want to play is for Mac or Windows. Another great glide wrapper is dgVoodoo2, which allows you to play not only 3dfx games, but also DirectX (1-7) and Direct3D games. Both programs are very useful, as one may work better than the other. As written above, dgVoodoo2 is great for old windows games which often use DirectX. Download and play your favorite Nancy Drew interactive games on your Mac or Windows desktop. Can you solve all of Her Interactive's mysteries?
How To Download Windows Games On Mac
Yes, you can play many games on your Mac computers. However, compared with Windows devices, there are always limits on Mac. Most Mac devices are lacking in the graphics department, and even worse now, there is a lack of decent macOS-supported AAA games.
In this situation, you may ask is it possible to play Windows Steam games on Mac? In fact, the answer is yes and there is more than one way to run Windows games on Mac.
In the following contents, we will show you how to play Windows games on Mac in different ways. You can select one accordingly.
GeForce Now for Mac
Pros: Easy to operate, no need to download it, huge library of AAA games are available
Cons: Needs internet connection with high speed and recommends Ethernet cable over Wi-Fi
The best and easiest way to play Windows Steam games on Mac is to use GeForce Now for Mac, an Nvidia’s cloud-based game streaming service for macOS and Mac OS X users.
Currently, it has a Beta form in Europe and the US. With it, you can play many games from the Steam or Battle.net accounts instantly without worrying about the machines’ graphical power.
How to play Windows games on Mac via GeForce Now for Mac? You can search for a guide online.
Shadow
Pros: full cloud-based Windows experience, high-end specs for gaming
Cons: a high-speed internet connection is needed, expensive
If you want the full Windows experience, Shadow is your best choice. Unlike GeForce Now for Mac, Shadow can offer you a full copy of Windows 10, enabling you to install many launchers, like Steam, Origin, Epic Games Store, etc. and modify settings as you do on a Windows computer.
Besides, some applications are available on Mac, Windows, Android and iOS. With Shadow, you are able to access to the virtual PC from almost any device.
Play Old Windows Games On Mac
Additionally, the internet speeds of Shadow are very fast. The virtual computer can offer up to 1GB/s download speeds and 100MB/s upload speeds. That is the game downloads and updates are lightning-fast.
However, you need to pay for this service with price at £26.95 per month now.
Boot Camp
Pros: cost-efficient
Cons: needs more hard drive space.
If you don’t want to pay for playing Windows games on Mac, you can choose to partition your hard drive with Boot Camp. Then, you can run Windows on a separate partition. This means that you need to use hard drive space on your Mac to run Windows. By the way, you’d better install Windows 10 on the separated partition. Then, you can play both Windows and Xbox games on your Mac computer.
To do this job, you can also search for a guide on the internet.
Are you bothered by Xbox One green screen of death issue? Do you want to fix it? Now, you can read this article to get some available solutions.
Virtualization Software
Pros: allow you to run Windows and Mac side-by-side.
Cons: decreased computer performance, expensive.
Using virtualization program to run Windows games on Mac is another choice. The software includes Parallels, VMware, VirtualBox, and more.
But, you should know that this will hit the computer performance since the virtualization software is running on the same partition and your computer need to run other programs in the background.
Tip: To recover data from a virtual machine running Windows OS, you can use a professional data recovery software: MiniTool Power Data Recovery.
There are also some other choices for you to run Windows games on Mac. For example, you can use Wine to build an additional layer on your Mac. Then, it tells Mac to run Windows Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) to run Windows programs without error, but, it is not fully compatible with all games. Besides, if you are old school DOS gamers, you can choose to use Boxer to play Windows Steam games on Mac.
How to play Windows games on Mac? Now, you can choose a way based on your actual situation.
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- Mac games
Macintosh emulation is quite hard to achieve, you'll have to try and fail a lot, and do a lot of research.
About 1000 Mac games are available on MyAbandonware, from 1980 to 2005. You will need one of these softwares to play them:
![Windows Windows](https://www.maketecheasier.com/assets/uploads/2017/12/open-source-games-hero.jpg)
- SheepShaver: games from mid 90s to 2005 (MacOS 8.1 to 9.0.4), follow the download links to the precompiled binaries, made available on E-Maculation forums ;
- Basilisk II: games from 1991 to 1996 (MacOS 7 to 8.1), follow the download links to the precompiled binaries, made available on E-Maculation forums ;
- Mini vMac: games from the 80s, although some games were still made for the emulated Mac in th early 90s.
Many old games will work fine in a SheepShaver or Basilisk II, you should only install and configure one emulator first and to run the game in it.
Complete guides for Mac emulation
Making Mac games work is quite complicated compared to DOS games. You'll have to find a Mac computer ROM to emulate a Mac computer. These ROM files are quite annoying to get, you can extract one from a working Mac, or get one for vMac here (archived), or several one with this guide at Redundant Robot. You should then follow these guides:
- SheepShaver: setup guide on Windows, Mac or Linux ;
- Basilisk II: setup guide on Windows, Mac or Linux ;
- Mini vMac: setup guide on Windows.
Mac emulation is more complicated than DOS emulation, but the E-Maculation community is very helful, with tons of guides and tutorials in english. You should also read this page from Macintosh Garden.