Historically, the Mac platform has lagged behind Windows when it comes to gaming, including release dates and overall availability. However, macOS is catching up, thanks to Apple's new porting tools and a notable pivot into the video game market. Robust Mac gaming is no longer an eccentric wish, but a viable and promising reality.
If you're a Mac person, you can now enjoy the hottest video game releases of the year, oftentimes at launch or shortly thereafter. For example, the acclaimed Lies of P launched on Mac right alongside its console and PC counterparts, giving gamers a brutal and fascinating spin on Carlo Collodi’s The Adventures of Pinocchio. Likewise, No Man’s Sky received a port that brought the sweeping intergalactic adventure to macOS courtesy of Apple's new silicon chips and Metal API. There are countless excellent Mac ports worth downloading, and even more on the horizon, such as Hideo Kojima’s fascinating Death Stranding (arriving in early 2024).
Ready to explore the best Mac games? Check out our top picks that run natively on Mac. Note that most of the highlighted releases are available via Steam, but some, like GRID Legends and Resident Evil Village, can only be found in the Mac App Store.
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Baldur's Gate 3
5.0
Baldur’s Gate 3 is an exemplary RPG that embraces the genre's tabletop roots. In it, your party is tainted with a mind flayer’s parasite, so you must fight the corruption or let the aberrant evil take over your minds. You do this by exploring Dungeons & Dragons' Forgotten Realms; battling creatures in flexible, turn-based combat; or exercising diplomacy in tense situations. Baldur’s Gate 3 embraces choice, so there is no wrong way to play.
Baldur's Gate 3 Review
Deus Ex: Mankind Divided
4.0
In Mankind Divided's future time, humanity has embraced machine augmentation, creating a dystopian world of cybernetically enhanced people—and a wary population that hates them. Adam Jensen, a special operative armed to the teeth with cyber-weaponry, must unravel a worldwide conspiracy that endangers the global populace. As an action-RPG, Mankind Divided lets you customize Jensen to play as aggressively or evasively as you like. Careful exploration unearths alternate routes within a level, giving you tremendous replay value.
Deus Ex: Mankind Divided Review
Factorio
If the idea of building and managing factories sounds like a bore, think again. Factorio blends real-time strategy, survival, and resource management to create an engrossing and addictive game loop. Scavenge materials to create tools and machines, which you can then use to acquire advanced materials to construct new projects.
GRID Legends
Grip the wheel and burn rubber in this motorsport game that delivers thrilling arcade-style racing and a robust single-player story. Even better, GRID's Nemesis system creates hyperaggressive AI drivers that deliberately sabotage you based on how you interacted with them in previous races. If you need a change of pace, you can customize tracks to define routes, rules, and obstacles.
Lies of P
Lies of P is a Souls-like action-RPG that pits you against monsters in brutally unforgiving combat. You play as Pinocchio, a puppet who awakens amidst a tumultuous automaton revolt within the city of Krat. Madness has taken the survivors, and killer machines lurk around every corner. Master the parry system to riposte foes, and save what little humanity is left in Krat—as you make sense of your own.
The Medium
Marianne is a spiritual medium who finds herself in an abandoned communist resort in the Polish wilderness, seeking answers about her powers and haunting dreams. As a medium, Marianne projects herself into the spiritual realm for dual-reality exploration rife with puzzles and threats. Create psychic shields and blasts to ward off malevolent spirits, and swap between worlds to make headway in the sprawling, haunted resort.
The Medium Review
No Man’s Sky
4.0
No Man’s Sky is no longer the buggy, underwhelming space adventure it was at release. Developer Hello Games improved every game facet so it now has enhanced graphics and an overwhelming amount of content, including crafting, space battles, and trading. No Man’s Sky has cross-save functionality between the Windows and Mac versions, too.
No Man's Sky Review
Resident Evil Village
4.0
Ethan Winters faces unspeakable horrors as he searches for his kidnapped daughter in a derelict European village. This first-person action game takes you through the countryside's beast-infested dirt roads and into the depths of a vampire-haunted castle. Puzzle out where you need to go, and gun down any shambling abomination that gets in your way.
Resident Evil Village Review
Rise of the Tomb Raider
4.0
Search for the Lost City of Kitezh as the legendary Lara Croft in this third-person action game. A brotherhood of military zealots also seek the city and fight Lara tooth and nail to reach it first. Craft and upgrade your gear, master movement and stealth to ambush enemies, and solve brain-teasing puzzles as you search for the lost city.
Rise of the Tomb Raider Review
Stray
4.0
Play as an adorable stray cat in a post-apocalyptic world where mankind is on the verge of extinction and only machine wardens remain. You're separated from your fellow felines and must explore an ancient underground cityscape maintained by the robots. Explore, solve puzzles, evade capture, and unravel the mystery behind humanity’s demise, while searching for a way back to the surface.
Stray Review
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