Octopus Overlords

Just got my new iMac, and man am I ever lost! And why the hell do they still come with one button mice?! I know they support more than one button.

Anyway, what are the must have programs for a Mac? I have the Spiderweb software games, and PD gave me some other game recomondations a long time ago. What else do I want to get? Keep in my mind I am broke after buying this thing.

No help here, Lee, sorry. I'm curious though. I've always wondered if Macs have the same problems running older games that PCs have. i.e. operating systems. Can OS X for instance run a five-year-old game? Obviously I know absolutely nothing about Macs, though they've always intrigued me, as has this question. I apologize for the derail.

Sorta back on topic in a retro way: I seem to remember a game called Marathon 2 that was ported over to PC that I liked. Also, Terminus (a space sim) came out of the box with support for PC, Mac, and Linux, and was supposed to be pretty good. Oh, and Snood is excellent if you've never tried it. A wonderful time-killer originally developed for the Mac. Recent games though, I have no idea.

I know my suggestions are pretty lame, but I felt obligated to at least try after all the help you gave me about a year (or was it 2 years?) ago when I was looking for suggestions for my new C-128 that I'd just got at a rummage sale. Your comprehensive list with descriptions was invaluable!

I know some games can't run on OSX. Like Combat Mission..

Warcraft 3 and Unreal 2004, they are a must have.
There are some older games that do have problems running in classic mode. The only way to find out is try or look for a board that posts them.

Thanks guys.

From what I gather to run older games I need to install OS 9. Something I haven't done because I don't have anything that requires it. I think it just reboots into OS9 to run older stuff. It sounds easy enough, but I would rather avoid it.

Any of the good games out on the Mac I already have on the PC. Just looking around I haven't seen any special games that I must get. The only thing that is jumping out at me Escape Velocity Nova and Ambrosia's Mah Jhongg looks good.

Yeah, I've heard wonderful things about EV Nova, but have never played it myself.

I don't really game much, but here's some awesome Mac software:

SubEthaEdit, a kick ass, totally free Mac text editor.

Nisus Writer Express 2, a sub-$100, excellent Word replacement which does styles, is easy to format, and which saves in the universal RTF. Also check out Nisus Thesaurus, their free, Services Enabled thesaurus tool.

Apple Keynote, the program PowerPoint would be if it had some class. It's not been updated in awhile, but all signs point to a big, big update (version 2) to coincide with the release of Mac OS X Tiger next spring.

NetNewsWire, the best RSS aggregator on God's still-some-what-green-but-kind-of-graying Earth. This is the standard by which I judge all RSS readers. This is the standard by which all others fail.

Netflix Freak, which lets you manage your Netflix account without having to deal with Netflix's lousy website.

The OmniGroup Software, all of which is great and decently priced. OmniWeb 5.1 will be out soon, and will trounce every other Mac browser on the market (OW 5.0 already kicks ass, but has an older WebKit engine, 5.1 brings OW even with Safari). OmniOutliner is the first sensible outlining tool I've ever encountered. OmniGraffle is Visio done right and priced better. OmniDictionary is a free little dictionary tool.

Transmit, the best little FTP program evah. Their NNTP reader, Unison, is exemplary as well.

VoodooPad lets you build your own little wiki-style stacks, sort of like a modern version of HyperCard. This can be quite usable as a cross linked way to organize notes or prepare an outline.

Just a few of the gems that keep me totally wedded to the Mac platform.

Ambrosia rules. Pegleg and Harry the Handsome Executive are two of the better Mac games ever made... i want PC versions!

you also need Dark Castle and Crystal Quest.

Great list Kirk, thanks. I really don't want all of MS Office, but it looks like Word isn't available by itself for the Mac. (Apple Works didn't seem to be all that great for word processing.) So I will be checking out NWE2 soon.

I had Dark Castle for my Amiga years ago, that game is still floating around?

Picked up Myst 4 today just because it was Mac compatible and I also received Photoshop Elements 3 today. I am all set, just wish I didn't have to work tomorrow.

Lee wrote:Great list Kirk, thanks. I really don't want all of MS Office,

What about Open Office for OS/X?

OpenOffice for Windows is pretty bad. OpenOffice for Mac is utterly unusable... it's a lousy X11 port.

A very popular column I wrote in May comparing Word & OpenOffice:
http://www.kirkmcpike.com/columns/web/2004/05.04.html