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Zoom · Nov 20, 2001, 09:29 PM

I just got an iBook running OS 10.1.1 and I'm looking for some good freeware (or cheap shareware) games that run nicely on it. I'd like to take a quick poll and see what people can recommend.

Personally, I'm looking for simple games like solitaire, poker, arcade games, and the like, but I'm open to whatever.

I would be willing to run games in Classic mode if they're good enough. Apparently, that's what I'll have to try for MacMAME since it totally chokes and dies in OSX.

Osirisis · Nov 21, 2001, 09:28 AM

Take a look at airburst. I have to say that it's a fun shareware game

Anything from Ambrosia is good also. Depends on your taste in games. The above listed are great ways to kill time mindlessly

godzookie2k · Nov 21, 2001, 09:31 AM

Fuq airburst! TuxRacer is where its at!!! There is nothing better than watching a fat penguin haul ass down a slope on its belly.

Nick

sniffer · Nov 23, 2001, 01:54 AM

Parsec

Mediaman_12 · Nov 23, 2001, 04:36 AM

GLTron

ShortcutToMoncton · Nov 23, 2001, 08:51 AM

Tux Racer hasn't been updated over 6 months, and it's pretty buggy....

greg

Adam Betts · Nov 23, 2001, 09:01 AM

WingNuts from Freeverse Software

I know it isn't shareware but it is certainly the best "shareware" game on my OS X now. Airburst is great but get old very fast.

[message edited to avoid violating the NDA]

[ 11-27-2001: Message edited by: Adam Betts ]

iKevin · Nov 23, 2001, 11:00 AM

I'd give Maelstrom my vote....asteroids like game. I echo the feeling that anything from AmbrosiaSoftware is good...aside form the cheezy sound effects

Euphrates · Nov 23, 2001, 11:04 AM

Adam: Warcraft III (beta version)? Is this some cruel form of punishment?!

Adam Betts · Nov 23, 2001, 02:53 PM

[message edited to avoid violating the NDA]

[ 11-27-2001: Message edited by: Adam Betts ]

Zoom · Nov 23, 2001, 11:01 PM

Yeah, actually I dig Maelstrom, too. Used to play it a long time ago. Does it run well (or at all) under OSX?

Keep the ideas coming.

How about simple card games and Tetris-like games? Anyone know of a free backgammon game?

Adam Betts · Nov 23, 2001, 11:41 PM

Originally posted by Zoom:
Yeah, actually I dig Maelstrom, too. Used to play it a long time ago. Does it run well (or at all) under OSX?

Not really... last time I played it and it was horrible. It kept crashing and cause some strange behavior to my OS X. I couldn't play more than 5 min. I'm not sure if there is newer version out there. I dig Maelstrom a lot too

If only Ambrosia put full support on it, the experience would be much better than it is now. Actually someone else than the people at Ambrosia volunteered to port Maelstrom to Linux and MacOS X and the result isn't as good.

[edited to remove the annoying smilies]

[ 11-24-2001: Message edited by: Adam Betts ]

Euphrates · Nov 24, 2001, 08:26 PM

I figured you were either beta testing or making me go insane with confusion (did they have a public beta signup I missed?!). Needless to say I hate you

.

juanvaldes · Nov 24, 2001, 11:34 PM

Originally posted by Euphrates:
I figured you were either beta testing or making me go insane with confusion (did they have a public beta signup I missed?!). Needless to say I hate you

.

Dito

iKevin · Nov 25, 2001, 12:38 AM

Originally posted by Adam Betts:


Not really... last time I played it and it was horrible. It kept crashing and cause some strange behavior to my OS X. I couldn't play more than 5 min. I'm not sure if there is newer version out there. I dig Maelstrom a lot too

If only Ambrosia put full support on it, the experience would be much better than it is now. Actually someone else than the people at Ambrosia volunteered to port Maelstrom to Linux and MacOS X and the result isn't as good.

[edited to remove the annoying smilies]

I don't know what caused you to have a bad experience...I haven't had any problems at all with Maelstrom running in OS X v10.1.1

I play it all the time!

[ 11-24-2001: Message edited by: Adam Betts ]

I don't know what caused you to have a bad experience...I haven't had any problems at all with Maelstrom running in OS X v10.1.1

I play it all the time!

[ 11-25-2001: Message edited by: iKevin ]

cdhostage · Nov 25, 2001, 07:38 PM

You have to be into RPGs to like what I suggest:

Start by playing the game Avernum. Then play Avernum 2. by the time you're finsdhed with those (if you play every available moment, as i did), you can start playing Avernum 3.

Zoom · Nov 26, 2001, 12:34 PM

Is Avernum a D&D style game? Can you give me a link? Too lazy to search right now.

How about Realmz? I used to play that game all the time, back in the 3.0-5.0 days. What's it on now? Is it any better? Still new games for it? Does it run under OS X? That was a pretty fun little game, for as simple as it was.

Osirisis · Nov 27, 2001, 07:09 AM

Realmz is still around. Tim stopped at 7.5(?). They released Divinity which allowed you to make your own scenarios for the game. I bought that but never had the time to play around with it. I haven't tested to see if it runs in X yet, but I never had any problems with it on any of the systems I played it on. Tim is currently working on New Centurions, which looks promising. Sci-Fi type realmz game.

Avernum is a 3-d version of exile with a completely revamped engine. I haven't played it myself, but I still remember playing exile back in the days. That series had a really good storyline. All the endings to choose from in the original Exile were enough to keep you busy for a while.

Here's the link you wanted.

Edited to include link.

[ 11-27-2001: Message edited by: Osirisis ]

Adam Betts · Nov 27, 2001, 12:01 PM

Did you try out WingNuts from Freeverse software yet? It's really good game!

[message edited to avoid violating the NDA]

[ 11-27-2001: Message edited by: Adam Betts ]

hotani · Nov 27, 2001, 01:46 PM

if you are into Othello, the best I have seen so far in OS X is MacIago - go look it up on versionTracker.

Very nice looking, but not too challenging. I have been kicking the crap out of the hardest level ever since I downloaded it. I lost once because I fell asleep or something

- so you do have to pay attention, its not that easy.

Zoom · Nov 30, 2001, 03:40 PM

Thanks for the info, guys. When I have time, I'll check some of these options out.

I bought Divinity, too. I wrote up the storyline for my scenario, character names, etc, etc. Never actually created the game. I started laying it out, but ran into problems with the tool. Never got past that point.

Adam Betts · Dec 1, 2001, 07:56 AM

Wow, I'm surprised that nobody mentioned JewelToy. It's certainly the best puzzle freeware game for MacOS X! It's built in full cocoa, yummy!

Go and start a search on "JewelToy" on www.versiontracker.com It's even more addictive than anything you've tried, even tetris.

cdhostage · Dec 1, 2001, 04:32 PM

Avernum can be found at http://www.spidweb.com/

If you liked Realmz, you'll like Avernum. Same sorta game.

Much, much much much more storyline than any Realmz game, though. Enormous amount of stuff to remember and a whole lot more strategy to combat.

Really, Jeff Vogel wrote the Exile game long, long ago. I forget how long ago, but I remember playing it on my LC 550, and Exile II was already out. Exile III came after that. The largest RPG storyline ever created.

Avernum is basically the same game as Exile. Same starting point, same major NPCs, same general places. Completely rewritten, though. Like he started over from scratch and checked his notes every few minutes to keep the plot, but not any of the fun, different stuff the same. Drastically different gaming engine, nicer graphics, new spell system (I sorta liked the Exile III spell system better). Avernum III is going to be even larger textually than Exile III,

Archangel · Dec 1, 2001, 08:06 PM

Originally posted by Zoom:
Yeah, actually I dig Maelstrom, too. Used to play it a long time ago. Does it run well (or at all) under OSX?

Keep the ideas coming.

How about simple card games and Tetris-like games? Anyone know of a free backgammon game?

Check out this thread for tetris-like games. I recommend the one called QIG which is found towards the end of the thread.

Ambrosia always get two thumbs up from me. I just wish they would release EV:N pronto pronto.

Cake · Dec 1, 2001, 09:01 PM

As far as OS 9 is concerned, you can still d/l the demo version of Unreal Tournament which is the finest game on the planet if you love FPS as I do.
There's an incredibly active Demo community of clans too (I'm in two of 'em and one on the fullversion of UT).

Jansar · Dec 2, 2001, 06:31 PM

Whoever posted "Parsec," it looks real promising, even more so than TuxRacer, I'm afraid. There are really nice selections here in this forum!

Archangel · Dec 4, 2001, 12:32 AM

Originally posted by Adam Betts:
Did you try out WingNuts from Freeverse software yet? It's really good game!

[message edited to avoid violating the NDA]

[ 11-27-2001: Message edited by: Adam Betts ]

I tried it. It's pretty cool. Too bad the demo only has one level though. I'll save my $25 so I can put it towards EV:N though.

Archangel · Dec 4, 2001, 09:12 PM

What I need is windowed games. I don't like switching to a full screen game when I'm just waiting to kill some time. Also, it can't be very demanding, so I can stop playing for a bit to get some work done with no reprecussions on the sucess of my game. Know any? The only one I got right now is QIG (tetris), but sometimes I need somethign besides a tetris-type game.

sniffer · Dec 5, 2001, 01:04 AM

Originally posted by Jansar:
Whoever posted "Parsec," it looks real promising, even more so than TuxRacer, I'm afraid. There are really nice selections here in this forum!

I posted the Parsec link. I've been watching the Parsec development now and then for about a year now. They have been working on this game for ages now. If I remember correct now (thought I am a bit tired), they have been working on it since 96 or something. It moves in small steps, but in the right direction, and there is no doubt that this project has some serious potential. This summer, one of the developers decided to port the game to the OS X platform, so he went out and bought a mac for the task, and thanks to him, we can now download and try a test version of the X version right now. The OS 9 version have been there for a while. I think us in the mac community should be thankful for their effort to support our platform, and support them back if we can. Their goal is to make a free game with commercial qualities.
I've recently tried the X port against the Windows version in LAN, and it's very nice to see how well it works cross platform. When the internet version ships, it has potential to become huge, and it's great to see that OS X support is included in this project.

[edit: BTW, you might find the X version a bit slow at this stage at this moment with its default settings and unoptimized code and all. I did some tweaking in console, and found stuff that boosted fps noticable. Keep in mind that this is the first X port so far.. At least since the last time I checked for updates..

With my current setup within game, it runs flawlessly and looks perfect. Even PC friends gets impressed about the graphic showed on my "8MB video card".. Whoho..

/edit]

[ 12-05-2001: Message edited by: sniffer ]

sniffer · Dec 5, 2001, 01:33 AM

To the first poster.

I just checked, and Parsec is now up in version 0197.
And the bug fixes is as follows:
build 0197----------* better support for low end graphics cards* fixed some sound issues* fixed keyboard initialization bugs under Windows

I'll guess this game is going to work as a charm on your iBook!

Remember thought, as I stated before, this game isn't optimized yet, and is still in test stage.

macthelastredman · Dec 5, 2001, 05:42 PM

Originally posted by Zoom:
I just got an iBook running OS 10.1.1 and I'm looking for some good freeware (or cheap shareware) games that run nicely on it. I'd like to take a quick poll and see what people can recommend.

Personally, I'm looking for simple games like solitaire, poker, arcade games, and the like, but I'm open to whatever.

I would be willing to run games in Classic mode if they're good enough. Apparently, that's what I'll have to try for MacMAME since it totally chokes and dies in OSX.

I am quite addicted to iColumns for OS X

Jansar · Dec 6, 2001, 09:19 PM

Yeah, I feel your pain. I love running OS X, but all of the emulators there cannot run in full screen or they cannot use a 3D acceleration mode. I really cannot wait until the day when OS X has full support with everything.

btw, about Parsec, I actaully begam playing it, and it's really cool. The only problem is that I was only doing "free flight" and I had nobody to play against. I'll try to scour together some people or just wait until the arrival of the Internet version.