How to Download the Best Games for Mac

Mac devices offer many great games for their users. Gone are the days when only classic games such as Monopoly for Mac or Scrabble for Mac were available. As Apple has made considerable improvements over the past couple of years in your iMac desktop, MacBooks and even the MacBook Air which are nice gaming computers, there are thousands of awesome games to choose from. Also new games constantly are released, so you’ll  never get bored. Whether you’re looking for first person shooters, racing, action or strategy games, you can find them to download The best part is that you can download free games for Mac fairly easily.

In order to actually play these games, it is important to know how to download the game. For many people downloading is simple. For others, it may not be so easy. There are several frequently asked questions that people have when they try to download the best games for Mac.

Do you have to pay for the best games?

Mac games at app store

When you look for games to download for Mac devices, you can find both free games and games that have to be paid for. The price of the game will vary. Some of the best games for Mac are Slots for Gold, Xtreme slots, Cleopatra’s Paradise and hundreds of others. and are usually free to download.

Is the price for the games paid one time or are there recurring charges?

Mac game store

There are some games that require you to have a subscription to play. A game such as Minecraft for Mac is free to download, but in order to play the game, you have to have a subscription from Minecraft.net. Similarly many poker machines apps like Big Fish Casino are free but have in app purchases or subscriptions offers.

Where do you find the best games for Mac?

Mac Games

The Apple store is the best place to find any apps for Mac, but there are also many other sites that also offer the games.  You can look for these places to get the best games for Mac:

Mac App Store

Gog.com

Mac Games Store

Steam

Also you can check out different forums discussing the Mac games to not only find the most popular games, but also to find out where to download them from.

What Devices can be used?

Mac devices for games

The devices that can be used will depend on the operating system that is needed for the game. Many of the most popular games such as Minecraft for Mac require an Apple OSX 6.0 or higher to work. The quality of macOS’ game selection depend on what games you like to play. AAA first person shooters are especially underrepresented. None of the recent Call of Duty or Battlefield games are available on macOS, but other genres, like MMORPGs and strategy games, are actually pretty well covered. Popular games like World of Warcraft, Civilization VI, and Football Manager 2017 are available and work without you having to jump through any weird hoops. This operating system can be found on second generation or higher iPads, and iTouches, iPhones 4 and above and Apple desktop and laptops with the latest operating systems.

The general rule of thumb is that if you intend to play fast 3D action games such as Batman or Tomb Raider then any Mac fitted with Intel HD Graphics, or a standard Intel Iris, will probably be a disappointment. They just don’t have the power to run these graphically demanding titles, and frame-rates will quickly drop to almost unplayable levels when there are lots of characters battling it out on the screen. That reliance on integrated graphics means that these are several Mac models that gamers will probably want to avoid:

  • Mac mini
  • MacBook
  • MacBook Air
  • Non-Retina 21.5in iMac
  • 13in MacBook Pro

Your primary form of entertainment is less demanding fare such as Football Manager, Limbo, or many of the indie games you’ll find on the Mac App Store then pretty much any Mac will fulfil your needs – as would an iPad.

Macs that you can consider if you want to play the latest 3D games.

  • 15in MacBook Pro
  • Retina 21.5in iMac
  • Any 27in iMac
  • iMac Pro

To enjoy casino games on Mac instant play casinos make it easy to play through Safari or any other browser you use on your computer. If you do run into problems anywhere, the Boot Camp function available on modern Macs also gives you the option of installing Windows on your computer to give you access to even more software.

Note that a fast storage system can also help to improve gaming performance. Conventional hard drives can be a bit sluggish at times – just as they take time to load the Mac OS when you turn your Mac on, they also take time to load all the complex 3D graphics data needed for games.

Apple’s Fusion Drives will help a bit here, but if you want to speed up all-round performance for your Mac then a high-speed solid-state drive is always the best option.

One option to consider here is buying an external solid-state drive that you can connect to your Mac. Many games can be installed on an external SSD drive, allowing them to load more quickly, while you leave all your other files on your Mac’s slower internal hard drive.

Can you get updates for the games?

Mac game updates

The best games are always improving. It is important to make sure that you install any updates to the games that you get. You Mac device can be automatically set to get the updates for games such as Sims for mac or Mario for mac to make it easier to do.

Also you must update your apps with the same Apple ID that you used to download them originally. If you want to sign in with a different Apple ID, choose Store > Sign Out from the menu at the top of your computer screen, then sign in again.

For games from steam or other gaming developers it will automatically update all games in its catalogue to the latest official version. So just google the latest version of the game in question and in theory these game developers should have already updated it to that version.

How long does it take to download games for Mac?

The amount of time required will depend on the speed of the Mac device, the speed of the internet connection, the size of the game that is being downloaded and the server that the download site uses. Games can take anywhere from a few minutes to download to several hours to complete the process.

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