One of the complaints about Macs for some time was their lack of gaming cred- anyone that cared about PC gaming in the slightest knew that you had to be running Windows to be able to play any of the worthwhile games available, from the days of DOS until the advent of consoles powerful enough to provide a PC-like gaming experience. Macs were great for graphic design, music, and photography, but gamers need not apply.
This changed with the release of Steam for OSX. While not every title is available for Macs, Steam still offers an unmatched level of service for gamers: one stop shopping for everything from the latest cutting edge shooter to the simplest casual games, rolled in with cloud access (get a new computer? No problem- install the Steam client and redownload your purchases!) and good support for social networking.
Shortly after Steam made the jump to Mac, the then newly-released OSX App Store got in on the action as well. While the App Store can’t match Steam’s frequent sales prices, it’s a great resource for Mac enthusiasts looking for a new game (and a growing number of games are Game Center compatible, matching Steam’s social networking features).
The only thing lacking for some gamers is in the user interface. While I’ve been long conditioned to the keyboard/mouse combination used by first person shooters (all the way back to the original Castle Wolfenstein and Redneck Rampage) a lot of game enthusiasts prefer to use a game controller. Windows users can easily plug in one of a horde of USB controllers and get to fragging,but Mac users weren’t so flexible. Thankfully a recent article from The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) offers some hope for those of you that aren’t as dedicated to traditional controls as I am.
The post describes using what they argue is the best controller out there- the XBox 360 USB handset. Depending on what method of gaming you prefer, just plugging the USB controller in may be all you need do. The online streaming game service OnLive will apparently use the controller natively with no further software or drivers needed. While it wasn’t tested, they believe that Steam’s recent Big Picture mode (designed for those using a big screen TV as their display) would likely accept the XBox 360 controller just as OnLive does.
Sadly, for those playing games that don’t natively accept a controller the going might not be as easy. The article offers a link to a stable, free driver for the XBox 360 controller that will work with many games that support controller input, and other software to help should your game need keyboard input.
I’ll be sticking with my keyboard and ArcMouse for as long as Valve keeps me enthralled with first person perspective games like Half Life, Portal, and Left 4 Dead; but for those of you that want a more console-oriented experience without the console there are finally answers. Grab that game controller and fire up your favorite title- those zombies aren’t going to shoot themselves!
Video Games of EachGame.com 