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Playing PC games on a Mac (Read 995 times)

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dark_crystalis

#1 June 17, 2008, 04:51:24 am

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A few years ago this seemed to be a dream but recently there seems to be several solutions, the most popular one being Bootcamp. I've also heard of another solution named Cider but it lacks any tutorial or explanation that isn't in engrish to the point that you can't understand it. There's also a program named CrossOver which is supposed to work well. When you go online you can find people talking about how they can run Half-Life 2 and Oblivion on their macs which sounds completely unrealistic. My question to you is do these methods actually work properly? I tried Bootcamp once and I failed starting up a game but that was with the BETA. I'm currently trying to install Guild Wars: Nightfall with CrossOver so I'll post an update about that tomorrow probably.

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HL

#2 June 17, 2008, 10:07:21 am

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just use bootcamp. its pretty much the best iirc. (and they probably play them by having the right specs)

ps

whats your ign & post in our guild wars topic in netplaydamnit

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baseball19225

#3 June 17, 2008, 10:52:40 am

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Bootcamp is pretty good. I use it mainly for my Win XP games and they run with no problems. Some companies are pretty cool though and include the Mac installer with their software (Blizzard do that for everything now, if you ever play their games).

hey also I have Guild Wars but I've not started properly (and can't this month) guess I should get to that topic too huh

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Vellfire

#4 June 17, 2008, 11:22:54 am

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Software that runs inside of OSX tends to be awful for gaming, like Parallels. Boot Camp really is your best option, although if you want to play old PC games Scummvm and Dosbox are also available.

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dark_crystalis

#5 June 17, 2008, 02:36:47 pm

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Booting up into another OS was what I kinda didn't wanna do though. I'm not a hardcore gamer and all so if possible I'd like to stay in OSX and be able to play them if possible. The only games I'd actually want to play are:
Heroes of Might and Magic 2-3
Guildwars
Morrowind
KOTOR

GW:Nightfall on bootcamp didn't work... I might try installing the original first then Nightfall.

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HL

#6 June 17, 2008, 03:01:58 pm

Will you walk the realms of Chaos with me?
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Ya but you said you tried the beta. <.< I was assuming you haven't tried it lately. The game doesnt matter since Guild Wars is all one game.

You'll need to boot into another OS or use an emulator simply because OSX sucks for games.

EDIT:
Wine will work with GW tho I know that.

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dark_crystalis

#7 June 17, 2008, 03:10:57 pm

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And what is Wine and how would I use it?

I tried the BETA of Bootcamp but as far as I know their official release was for the new OSX.

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HL

#8 June 17, 2008, 03:24:04 pm

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nvm WINEs for linux, lol. *fails*

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dark_crystalis

#9 June 17, 2008, 04:10:46 pm

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I'm pretty sure Wine for mac is what's known as Cider which I currently have but I'm having a lot of trouble to try to use it to make a game run on mac since all the instructions are in engrish.

EDIT: I just installed GW with Crossover and I'm currently on it, I'll need to update everything so it might take a long time before I can actually see if it works properly. I'm going to do a Prophecies character for now.

Last Edit: June 17, 2008, 06:43:47 pm by dark_crystalis

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Paranoia Dude

#10 June 17, 2008, 06:42:43 pm

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Bootcamp beta worked fine with my copy of Guild Wars, so maybe it's got to do with your hardware. How old is your mac?

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dark_crystalis

#11 June 17, 2008, 06:46:29 pm

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Quote from: Raz on June 17, 2008, 06:42:43 pm

Bootcamp beta worked fine with my copy of Guild Wars, so maybe it's got to do with your hardware. How old is your mac?

I wasn't able to start games probably because of driver issues and all that. It's about a year old now, it's a macbook. I would just prefer to not use bootcamp since I have to reboot and all that. I don't mind playing on the lowest setting as long as it's not too laggy.

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ATARI

#12 June 17, 2008, 07:00:50 pm

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Really the best bet is just to use Bootcamp, becuase it is just like running Windows XP natively on your mac. Programs like Parallels and VMWare fusion are able to do simple applications by virtually booting into windows, but are not able to handle graphic intensive games. I haven't been able to get crossover to work with any games yet in OSX, so I really wouldn't recommend it.

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GigasFist

#13 June 18, 2008, 09:06:05 am

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Bootcamp works really well. I've got Bioshock and Oblivion installed on my Window's Partition on my iMac and both run great.

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The Magi

#14 June 18, 2008, 09:28:05 am

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Try using Crossover Mac. The latest versions run it reasonably well with some problems.

This is your only other "decent" option aside from running Windows off a Boot Camp partition. Trust me, I know.

http://www.codeweavers.com/compatibility/browse/name/?app_id=1658
http://www.codeweavers.com/compatibility/browse/name/?app_id=1658;screenshot=1

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baseball19225

#15 June 18, 2008, 09:36:49 am

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Quote from: GigasFist on June 18, 2008, 09:06:05 am

Bootcamp works really well. I've got Bioshock and Oblivion installed on my Window's Partition on my iMac and both run great.

Whoah really? That's good to know. How are our Bioshock settings, and are they reduced? I'm looking at putting some more precious gams on my iMac so it'll be cool playing any ones that my Win XP laptop never handled.

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The Magi

#16 June 18, 2008, 10:12:43 am

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Just to clarify so people understand what Boot Camp is: It's a fully operational windows partition that takes near-full advantage of the hardware on your system. There is no software or emulation at all. Once Windows loads Boot Camp is completely out of the picture.

The only limitations that are presented by boot camp partitions right now are:
Windows XP (32 bit): Maximum ram is 2GB
Windows Vista (32 bit): Max ram is 3GB (Will detect up to 4GB, but won't be able to use it)
Windows XP/Vista (64 bit): Drivers are fudged on iMacs and Macbooks but should work reasonably well on a Mac Pro (I haven't tried it yet)

Some people have noted that wireless signals are significantly weaker in Windows than in MacOS, primarily with the the new 802.11n cards that Apple has made standard in all their machines. Going wired solves this problem. You might also be able to wait until this November when the format becomes officially released. Likely there will be firmware updates for it to resolve connectivity and speed issues.

Balmung Cycle Part I: Completed Game

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baseball19225

#17 June 18, 2008, 01:03:50 pm

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Quote from: The Magi on June 18, 2008, 10:12:43 am

Just to clarify so people understand what Boot Camp is: It's a fully operational windows partition that takes near-full advantage of the hardware on your system. There is no software or emulation at all. Once Windows loads Boot Camp is completely out of the picture.

Yeah, true. After setting up the partition and installing Windows, the only mention of BC that I see is when I'm using XP. Down in the tray, there's a Boot Camp icon that lets you change settings or restart in OS X easily. Other than that, it's pretty much done.

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GigasFist

#18 June 18, 2008, 07:15:09 pm

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Quote from: Adeline on June 18, 2008, 09:36:49 am

Whoah really? That's good to know. How are our Bioshock settings, and are they reduced? I'm looking at putting some more precious gams on my iMac so it'll be cool playing any ones that my Win XP laptop never handled.

Bioshock runs at Medium-Low Settings, a little better then my dead HP which had an NVIDIA 6600 (IIRC). Oblivion runs a bit better. I think some things could run a bit smoother with a little more RAM also (I'm only at 1GB)

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baseball19225

#19 June 19, 2008, 01:13:28 am

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Quote from: GigasFist on June 18, 2008, 07:15:09 pm

Bioshock runs at Medium-Low Settings, a little better then my dead HP which had an NVIDIA 6600 (IIRC). Oblivion runs a bit better. I think some things could run a bit smoother with a little more RAM also (I'm only at 1GB)

Awesome, thanks for that. I may not get Bioshock itself, but I'm glad that something so intense seems to be fine. Plus I'm on 3GB RAM; that should help with most games.

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GigasFist

#20 June 19, 2008, 01:34:04 am

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Here's a quick Screenshot for some clarification (Click to reveal)

Theres a bit of rendering time from loading but then again most games do that.

The Game Settings (Click to reveal)

Sorry they're a little distorted, Only drawing program I have on my XP partition is MSPaint

which also likes to shrink the screens down.

There's a few other games I'd like to try like Jade Empire, Half-Life 2 and ~~Crysis~~ I'm also curious how Fallout 3 will fare on it, but chances are I'll probably pick it up for a console.

Last Edit: June 19, 2008, 08:21:26 am by GigasFist

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