What games are people playing on SS in 2021?

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bigbro
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What games are people playing on SS in 2021?

Post by bigbro »

Hi,

I know some people are using SS for serious work, but lately I've only been using it for games.
I'm just curious what games people are playing on SS in 2021.
Maybe the experimental D3D/OpenGL support will result in some more games being playable in the future.

Here are the SS games I play the most (I play some others in BII), most played first:

- Risk II: best version of Risk. A blast in multiplayer. AI is so-so but single-player is still fun to me.

- Civilization II Gold: sessions of Civ2 can last for many consecutive hours but SS runs it like clockwork.

- Nascar Racing: Yes, driving in the wrong way, crashing into the pack and watching it in the game's surprisingly advanced replay tool is stupid. But it feels good.

- SimCity 2000: those cities all look very similar, yet every city has its own character.

- Diablo: I could play it directly on W10 but nostalgia kicks in.

- some shareware games: Bushfire, Reckless Drivin', ... : the computing word lost bigly when classic Mac shareware games disappeared. Those two are among the last of the greats (early 00's). I play many more under BasiliskII (Ambrosia Software games, etc.). Classic Mac shareware games make up for a whole subculture. Richard Moss captured this spririt perfectly in his 2018 book The Secret History of Mac Gaming https://secrethistoryofmacgaming.com/.

Looking forward to reading a few answers.

Bb
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adespoton
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Re: What games are people playing on SS in 2021?

Post by adespoton »

The big one my family plays (because it's better than the versions on other platforms) is Lode Runner Online - Revenge of the Mad Monks. It's essentially the pinnacle of the Lode Runner experience; the only thing that would make it better is multiplayer network support. But it has the best level builder, great colors, and good existing levels.
swordlink1
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Re: What games are people playing on SS in 2021?

Post by swordlink1 »

bigbro wrote: Thu Jun 03, 2021 4:19 pm I know some people are using SS for serious work
This makes me feel like I'm the only one that emulate macs for fun just because I found it online...
If you need more info, tell me ;)
bigbro
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Re: What games are people playing on SS in 2021?

Post by bigbro »

As a user, emulating systems just for the fun of it is perfectly respectable.
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Ronald P. Regensburg
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Re: What games are people playing on SS in 2021?

Post by Ronald P. Regensburg »

I think that people using these emulators for fun or as a hobby are the majority. Some are interested in experimenting with the software, feel challenged to get things working. Some run old MacOS versions for nostalgic reasons or for playing the games they remember. Some need the emulators to be able to open old document files that no modern software can open. And, indeed, some still continue to use old software for serious work.
Keith Palmer
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Re: What games are people playing on SS in 2021?

Post by Keith Palmer »

Although I am a bit late responding to the original question, of late I've been using Sheepshaver to play the comedy action game from Ambrosia, Harry the Handsome Executive. I'd got it running on my old G3 iMac, but I'm forever short of table space to set up additional computers... Before that, I'd got it in my mind I wanted to try the very original version of Myst again, and found I had to copy my CD image directly into Sheepshaver's hard disk file, then use the "Virtual CD" utility. I've been experimenting a bit with getting Civilization II running as my brother has made nostalgic comments about being able to play that game again, but haven't quite sorted out just how to do that myself (I'd had it in my mind to use a .bin/.cue CD image to get the game's music playing, but have been having problems getting the game started that way).
moosiakdefrogosas
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Re: What games are people playing on SS in 2021?

Post by moosiakdefrogosas »

only Civilization
Jorpho
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Re: What games are people playing on SS in 2021?

Post by Jorpho »

bigbro wrote: Thu Jun 03, 2021 4:19 pmHere are the SS games I play the most (I play some others in BII), most played first:
Indeed, isn't it much better to run most of those games in BII, if not natively?

Pegasus Prime used to be an excellent use for Sheepshaver, but now that it's playable in ScummVM, that's no longer a requirement. I can't recall if there are any Macromedia Director games that were PPC-exclusive, but ScummVM might take care of those soon as well.
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adespoton
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Re: What games are people playing on SS in 2021?

Post by adespoton »

I went through the list of Classic games I play, and realized I only play them on BII.

Then I realized that I could probably shoehorn most of them into MACE. So that's going to be a little Christmas project for me :) End result: games that will play "natively" on Monterey that were designed for System 7! First up: Lode Runner Online, using the existing downloadable framework for Glider 4.10. No BII or SheepShaver needed. Of course, MACE doesn't support scaling, so I'll have to use the accessibility feature to scale the game to full screen; it might turn out that BII LRO looks/behaves better in the long run.
bigbro
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Re: What games are people playing on SS in 2021?

Post by bigbro »

Jorpho wrote: Fri Dec 03, 2021 6:03 pm
bigbro wrote: Thu Jun 03, 2021 4:19 pmHere are the SS games I play the most (I play some others in BII), most played first:
Indeed, isn't it much better to run most of those games in BII, if not natively?

Pegasus Prime used to be an excellent use for Sheepshaver, but now that it's playable in ScummVM, that's no longer a requirement. I can't recall if there are any Macromedia Director games that were PPC-exclusive, but ScummVM might take care of those soon as well.
Hello

I agree I could play more games in BII and less games in SS, but I have to keep SS be it only to play Risk 2 and a few other PPC-only games.

Risk 2 is the 2000 Microprose version of Risk and I'm still having a blast with it.

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