GOG does a great job of making classic games available for the Mac, and I hope to see more Mac strategy games released. In particular, it would be great if you could port several strategy games currently available on GOG for Windows like Chaos Overlords and Imperialism 1 and 2. These three games were produced for the Power Mac years ago. Other strategy powerhouses that ran under DOS or Win 95 like the Great Battles Collection and Jagged Alliance also would be welcome. I'd buy all these games right away!

You can run just about every DOS-based strategy game on GOG on Mac OS X through Boxer. Imperialism 1 and 2 run pretty well in CrossOver and/or Wineskin, as do many, many other strategy games ostensibly available only for Windows on GOG (Panzer General II, Praetorians, Lords of the Realm 1-3, Galactic Civilizations I, Imperial Glory...)

...and you can. You just have to apply a little extra effort to do it. Yes, it's not native, and yes, you're fiddlng around with Windows binaries. But that's more than offset by the fact that (a) GOG's games are DRM-free, cheap and come with extras, (b) WINE has made massive progress recently in performance and compatibility, and (c) WINE is significantly easier to setup and configure than it has been in the past.

There are also plenty of resources to help you, too: There's the WINE AppDB, and the CrossOver Compatibility Centre. has an exhaustive set of pre-made WINE compatibility wrappers for OS X users. And of course, there's my own [url=http://www.gog.com/forum/general/gog_games_on_mac_os_x_a_how_to/page1]step-by-step tutorials for running GOG games on OS X, and my GOGmix too.

Thanks again Rampancy, I appreciate your suggestions and the links to resources. I downloaded Boxer and plan to download the Crossover trial system. I'll look into Wine, too. I've run some emulators in the past, but most of them have been the plug-and-play (to use an old tech phrase) type. I'll see what I can do with the leads you've given me.

No problem! If all you want is basic simplicity, CrossOver is the way to go; Wineskin is very powerful, but it does have a bit of a learning curve.

IIRC, if all you want to do is just buy and play, games like Sacrifice, Disciples: Sacred Lands, Praetorians, Heroes of Might and Magic III, Heroes Chronicles, Battle Realms: Winter of the Wolf, and Imperial Glory all run out of the box with zero configuration necessary in CrossOver. Total Annihilation, and Total Annihilation: Kingdoms also work, but you may need to install the Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 runtime, which you can do in CrossOver's built-in software installer.

Alpha Centauri, Earth 2150, Disciples 2, and the Age of Wonders series also work, but they need a bit of tinkering to get going properly.

Crossover seems to be the easiest solution. And it's good to know about the Visual C++ install. As far as Alpha Centuri, the good folks at GOG have already ported it to the Mac. It's gotten excellent reviews over the years, and it's next on my gaming to-do list. But first I need to check out all the great resources you've given me!

Rampancy -- your suggestions have been quite useful. BTW, I obtained Windows Vista (I know, not the ideal Windows OS) and it seems to run fine on Parallels Desktop 8 for the Mac. Running the strategy games on my GOG Wishlist shouldn't be a problem now.

Incidentally, for all you Mac users -- don't bother trying to get Windows 98 to work on Parallels 8. Even though the company says Parallels can handle Windows 98, it's impossible to configure the graphics card under 98 for more than 16 colors -- which makes running games virtually impossible. I contacted Parallels customer service and they replied by suggesting my 98 disk might be damaged, even though I was able to install 98 in all its 16-color glory.

I tried to use Wineskin but never got the hang of it, and after obtaining Vista I never got around to sampling Crossover. In any case, some of the games I want to play, like Imperialism 2, have been tested on Crossover and found to be incompatible, and several others haven't been tested yet.

Most of all, my thanks for steering me to Boxer. I didn't know it existed, and it's a snap to use on the Mac -- it's all menu-driven and much easier than DOSBox. I'm able to easily install and run most of the old DOS games I had stashed away from the days when I used a Performa 640 Mac (which came with a built-in DOS card). It's great being able to launch classics like Age of Rifles by inserting a CD and clicking the mouse a few times!

Now, it's time to order a few GOG games ...

Just for your information, there is a polished and improved DOSBox version for Windows which also has menus, easy configuration etc. – I just use this version, much better: http://ykhwong.x-y.net/xe/143

Thanks ZivilSword. I'm still not great at configuring these types of program, but it's good to know it's out there.

Glad you are doing well in reaching the goal of playing what you want how you want. :D

Boxer is awesomeness. I personally can't think of a reason to look any further. Wineskin is actually not hard to use after a few hours with it. Everything falls into place nicely with a little practice. On the other hand, for pain free classics gameplay it is hard to beat running Windows GOGs in a Parallels VM. Much of the time that should work just fine.

I get the impression you are like myself and like stuff that just works with a minimum of screwing around. I don't blame you. This is why I am so happy to see GOG releasing classics all done up for Mac. I know how to do this too but to be honest, I do not want to do it. I greatly appreciate the added value and convenience when GOG does it for me.

Tops on the list I'd like to see GOG do up for Mac:

All things Might & Magic
All things Infinity Engine
All things Sierra

When the above comes to pass I shall be a very happy Mac gamer indeed!

Hi DirtyHarry50,

Yeah, like you I'm all for using programs that don't assume I know anything about programming. I've struggled with several downloads off sourceforge that require configuring, entering command codes etc. You said it all -- Boxer is indeed awesome. It's the only DOS emulator a Mac user needs.

So far I've had no problems with running GOG games on my Mac through Parallels -- as I said before, I'm using Vista, which I understand became something of a joke a few years back because of all its problems, but it seems to work okay.

And, like you, I really appreciate the one-click convenience that GOG Mac conversions offer and would like to see more. For now I'm content using Parallels to play some of my favorites.

BTW, I initially had trouble figuring out how to get Parallels to recognize the GOG files I've downloaded. I tried copying them to a CD (Copy/Paste, not drag-and-drop), but the copy always produced an alias, not the complete file, and Vista couldn't recognize it.

The solution I found was to Copy and Paste the folders to a USB data stick, which Vista does recognize, and to run the .exe file from that. Later I copied the soundtrack and other files to the GOG folder on the virtual hard drive.

You've got some good suggestions for future ports -- I'd love to see Sierra's Manhunter series for the Mac.

Vista is just fine now for your purposes. I wouldn't worry about that at all.

I'm surprised you had to do any fooling around to install your games in Vista. Normally, it ought to go something like this:

Download game installer from GOG to your Downloads folder in Vista using Internet Explorer or whatever you like.

Open the Downloads folder and double click the game installer file.

The installer should then open and guide you through the installation.

If you are downloading the games in OS X with Safari or something (which really ought to work fine too) maybe try doing the above, download them right into your Windows Vista and double click them there. Hopefully that works fine. It should.