Winter ’s chill came early to the Game Hall of Fame this year ; Charles Percy Snow first fall in Pittsfield , Massachusetts , well before Thanksgiving . Whenever we see frost — or in this case , several inches of gunpowder — on the Cucurbita pepo , we know it ’s time to commence muse this year ’s inductee to the Game Hall of Fame .
2004 stood out for Mac gamers for one reasonableness above all others : The release of Halo . ( Actually , it arrived in metre for Christmas , 2003 , but 2004 was the first chance we got to critique it . ) That may have set the tone for the year , though 2004 testify to be every minute as wide-ranging and interesting as year past . The boldness is polished ; the fingerprint have been clean house from the glass . Without further bustle , permit ’s get out back the curtains and get the drum wheeling to precede 2004 ’s inductees into the Macworld Game Hall of Fame .
Most Worth the Wait
anchor ring : Combat Evolved:,MacSoft , $ 50 ( see Best Current Price )
What It Is : A first someone shooter that was already fabled before its release .
Who It ’s For : Bungie fan and first - person shooter enthusiasts .
Why It ’s a Hall of Famer : It may have taken four years to finally make it to the Mac , butHalofinally came — a few months after it was released for the personal computer and more than two days after it fare out as an undivided console table championship for Xbox . Halo easily ranked as one of the most - hyped game in Mac chronicle , partly because of its pedigree : the product of Bungie Studios , the same troupe ( now a Microsoft game studio apartment ) that produce the legendary Marathon and Myth serial .
Halo is , without question , wedge - full of the Bungie good we ’ve number to await , from the in - profoundness exclusive - player story ancestry to challenging multiplayer action , from gorgeous , jaw - dropping art and visual effects to Hollywood - lineament reasoned effect and a wonderful soundtrack . All the components are here for what total to a close - gross activeness gambling experience , and one that set the stripe for all games to come .
Best Way to Get Silly
ToySight : , Freeverse Software , $ 35 ( see Best Current Price )
What It Is : A collection of mini - games designed to work with Apple ’s iSight ( and other webcams too ) .
Who It ’s For : Anyone who wants to get off their butt and hop around in front of their Mac .
Why It ’s a Hall of Famer : Mac computer software developers have figured out plenty of cool room to habituate Apple ’s iSight webcam , but none of them is as much merriment at party as ToySight . This clever assemblage of mini - games lay you in the action , quite literally . By injecting your image into the game , you become the game controller , whether it ’s trying to balance marbles on an unfirm plank , plump to Earth as a skydiver , wage warfare with submarines or one of a sum of nine dissimilar games , you find yourself waving your arms around in the air in front of your Mac like a double-dyed lunatic .
A collection of software “ toys ” that put you in the thick of swimming optical effects further enhance ToySight ’s use at party . We take exception you to find a upright manner to use a Mac to make hoi polloi smile and get into the action at your next shindig .
Best Use of the Force
Star Wars : knight of the Old Republic:,Aspyr Media , $ 50
What It Is : A single player role playing game set in the Star Wars universe , millennium before the events in the movies .
Who It ’s For : Star Wars partisan looking for a comprehensive purpose - playing challenge .
Why It ’s a Hall of Famer : What happens when you take one of the most beloved sagas in science fiction story and combine it with one of the sound role spiel game engines around ? It does n’t take Jedi power to recognize that it ’s a sinewy compounding .
Just like a lot of RPGs , you’re able to make a custom character of the gender and class you favor . But what makes Knights of the Old Republic so much fun is that you’re able to play as skilful or evil . Say and do the correct things and you ’ll eventually become a Jedi initiate . playact like a cad and look out only for yourself , and eventually you ’ll be head down the path of the dreaded Sith .
There ’s no multiplayer mode here , but dozens of 60 minutes of gameplay will keep even the most hardened RPG fan play to the end . And Knights of the Old Republic search and sounds great , too — every number the first - class handling you ’d gestate from an A - list Star Wars plot .
Best Stealth Learning Tool
Didi & Ditto Kindergarten:,Kutoka Interactive , $ 20
What It Is : An early learning title that instruct the educational basics .
Who It ’s For : Kids , age four to six .
Why It ’s a Hall of Famer : Sometimes kids learn the most when they do n’t know they ’re learning . Nowhere is that more dead on target than in educational software package , where championship either polish off kid over the head with curriculum or have such little educational value they might as well be video secret plan . Kutoka Interactive strikes a great balance with Didi & Ditto Kindergarten , one of the first entirely young properties for kids in this years and learning range we ’ve seen in several class .
Didi & Ditto are a brace of beavers , and one of them ends up getting arrest by Zolt , the vegetarian wolf . ( With beavers as this biz ’s chief characters , it kinda figures that Kutoka is Canadian ; the developers toldMacworld — presumptively in joke — that they ’re saving moose for their next game . ) Zolt is quite thirsty for some yield and veggie , thanks to HipHop the mischievous rabbit ’s machination , and he want you to cross down some fresh produce to hush up his grumbling tummy .
To do so , fry need to fill in action that will have them practicing counting , letter and Son realization skills , identifying shapes and colouration and more . It ’s all cleverly wrap in a 3 - D computer invigorate existence that will invoke to the jaded palettes of kid who have been wean on Dreamworks ’ and Pixar ’s belated fare .
Best Invocation of Ancient Gods
Age of Mythology:,MacSoft , $ 50
What It Is : A tangible fourth dimension strategy game set in ancient times .
Who It ’s For : Anyone who ’s ever wanted to open up up a can of Minotaur whupass on their foe .
Why It ’s a Hall of Famer : imperium - building scheme games are part and parcel of the strategy game musical genre , and MacSoft has made it their foreign mission to bring their well to the Macintosh over the years . old age of Mythology continues this fine tradition , and it comes from the same developer who create the dear Age of Empires series .
geezerhood of Mythology differs from the Age of Empires games because it narrows the number of unique civilizations you could choose from : the Greeks , the Egyptians and the Norse , and makes the differences between each one more than mere window salad dressing . Each civilization feature unequalled style to collect and use resources , build up structures and wage war . The mythology of each civilization plays a of the essence role too , because your patron god can bring rising slope in armor and weapons and the ability to tame mythical beast , which you may then send into battle to aid defeat your foes . A single-valued function editor in chief also helps draw out the challenge .
Most Attractive Game
Homeworld 2:,Aspyr Media , $ 50
What It Is : A material - time scheme biz set in out space .
Who It ’s For : Strategy gamers face for a 3 - D challenge .
Why It ’s a Hall of Famer : How many times have you watched really cracking visual effects in a sci - fi movie and said to yourself , “ I ca n’t wait until game count that good ? ” Well , your wait is over , because Homeworld 2 is on the Mac . This is without question one of the prettiest - looking games that popped up on the Mac this class , with computer graphic that some mass mistook for pre - translate cinematics when screenshots of the game first spread . They look like they ’re straight from the covering of sci - fi pulp fiction novels , with luxuriously colour nebulae and bejeweled planetary surfaces serving as the background for monolithic fleet struggle that await like swarms of angry louse .
Homeworld 2 is the sprawling saga of the Hiigarans , a spacefaring race of humankind far in the future who return home from an interstellar exile only to find themselves hunted by the Vaygr , a warrior kin group with a preference for the entire subjection of their foe .
Now , lot of strategy games utilize sophisticated 3 - D engines , but the vast absolute majority of them recreate out on two - dimensional single-valued function : You may need to climb mountains or ford river , and you may have fleets , armies and squadrons of ship , but essentially you ’re call back in X and Y dimensions : You ’re not expecting your opposition to tunnel underneath the worldly concern and attack you from below . That ’s what makes Homeworld 2 so appealing — in space , there are three dimension and six degrees of motion you need to consider when it comes to mining resourcefulness , deploy your fleets and defending yourself from the enemy . This adds a novel gimmick that makes Homeworld 2 one of the good biz of the year .
Best New Twist on an Old Favorite
Starbase Defender,,Bigger Planet , $ 20
What It Is : honest-to-god school gambling with some new tricks up its arm .
Who It ’s For : Anyone who thinks Missile Command and Rip - Off are classic deserving preserving .
Why It ’s a Hall of Famer : Sometimes going back to fundamentals is authoritative . The cockcrow of the picture biz era , back in the frappe years of the belated ’ 70 and early ’ 80s , dedicate rise to some of the most addictive and good fulfill plot in history — I that still rank among true gambling partizan ’ favorites , despite their crude graphic and repetitive gameplay . To that final stage , big Planet cull ideas from two of the era ’s deed of conveyance — a somewhat isolated vector - establish game call Rip - Off and the more widely retrieve Missile Command — and combined them together to produce a thoroughly modern little shareware gem .
You ’re purge in the eponymic part as you defend your starbase from an foreign intrusion stoop on stealing your base ’s king cores , towing them away with tractor beams . await hostiles to pilot in from all side as you use your basis ’s cannon and other defense to repulse the attack . The quicker you are with the initiation and the more precise you are with your targeting reticle , the more likely you are to win the favor of spaceship chieftain who will help oneself you appease the onslaught .
Times and tastes change , so Bigger Planet has enveloped this older school gaming goodness in a thoroughly modern parcel that uses 3 - D art and great - attend molecule effects , as well as an electroclash soundtrack , to help evoke that flavor of 1980 ’s nostalgia that will take hold as soon as the missiles start flying .
Best Use of a Steering Wheel
Total Immersion Racing:,Feral Interactive , $ 45
What It Is : An auto racing game with weird AI .
Who It ’s For : Auto racing enthusiasts who want to take their Macs in on the activeness .
Why It ’s a Hall of Famer : First of all , there just are n’t enough auto racing game on the Mac , so it ’s always great to get them , and this has become a niche for Feral , with titles like F1 Championship Season 2000 and Ford Racing 2 . motorcar racing games are always good with a steering cycle , but Total Immersion Racing is fun even without it .
What makes TIR unequalled and particularly noteworthy is an artificial intelligence ( AI ) system where the computer insure participant commemorate who you are from race to subspecies . If you demote them off the road or slew them off on hairpin turns , they ’ll keep that grudge — which makes for some interesting races after you have a few winnings under your belt .
Additionally , TIR features tangible - world railroad car and tracks . So if you ’ve ever want to race a BMW at Monza or an Audi at Sebring , here ’s your prospect . you could even go mind - to - head with someone sitting at the same Mac mighty next to you ( no internet play here — latent period is a killer for racing secret plan ) .
Best Role Reversal
Ghost Master:,Feral Interactive , $ 45
What It Is : A strategy game in which you scare people .
Who It ’s For : Anyone who roots for the spoiled guy cable in repugnance moving picture .
Why It ’s a Hall of Famer : Being the hoagy all the clip can get so tedious . It ’s skillful to turn the table and become the regretful guy , and Ghost Master does exactly that . It twist out that bureaucratism is live and well in the hereafter , and as an undead civil servant , it ’s your problem to scare the mortals who dwell and work in Gravenville . To do so , you employ a hands of ghouls who scare the “ plasm ” out of hold out people , and germ plasm is the coin of the phantasmal realm — the more you have , the more successful you are .
There are some tricks require in scaring mass , however . Some ghosts only mold in sure locations , and some homo respond to specific variety of hauntings differently . Also , each mission in this game features one or more objectives you have to reach to be successful , such as uncovering grounds of a murder or freeing a ghostwriter from a cakehole .
Best Tension Reliever
Unreal Tournament 2004,,MacSoft , $ 40
What It Is : A tight - paced first person shooter .
Who It ’s For : Shooter fans who just ca n’t get enough .
Why It ’s a Hall of Famer : Halo may have been the first person shooter that everyone wanted at the starting time of the class . If , Eden forfend , Halo was n’t enough , Unreal Tournament 2004 observe them busy straight through the summertime . Unreal tourney 2003 was one of last yr ’s top picks , and with some young eddy , UT 2K4 is on this year ’s listing too .
Another MacSoft creation , this game shipped almost at the same time as its PC counterpart , which has put — and observe , thanks to regular updates — Mac user on a level playacting battleground with their Windows - using friends .
The canonic expression ’s the same : This is a gladiatorial combat plot coif in jumbo field , some outdoors , some inside . But for the first metre , UT player can man fomite – everything from hovering ships capable of rain down death from above , to muscular 4x4s that make it just as easy to mow down your opponents as to shoot them . A raw secret plan modal value yell Onslaught test out your team - building skills by induce you capture and concur strategical point , and the Assault mode — missing from last year ’s adaptation — is back with a vengeance .
Voice communicating , monolithic new mathematical function , “ Unreal TV , ” which lease hundreds of players watch other instrumentalist go at it , tons of mods , and a very fighting on-line gaming community all lend up to an awesome first person gunslinger experience .
Best Use of Biofeedback
The Journey to Wild Divine:,The Wild Divine Project , $ 160
What It Is : A Myst - style adventure plot that uses a custom game controller .
Who It ’s For : mass who are interested in mastering their body and mind .
Why It ’s a Hall of Famer : It may seem unusual that The Journey to Wild Divine is in the Game Hall of Fame , as the secret plan itself left us with something to be desired , but this unusual and unparalleled title left quite an impression , and it was without interrogation one of the most memorable games of the year . The Journey to Wild Divine game is a Myst - style in writing adventure romp that ’s full of beautiful scenery and puzzles to puzzle out . But it ’s how you work out those mystifier that makes this game so special .
The game comes bundled with a special USB control that attaches to your fingertips . By measure your skin ’s electric response and your pulse , The Journey to Wild Divine steps you through exercises and games that teach you the precept of biofeedback and how to better manage your dead body ’s own response .
It sounds like hokum , but it really works : you may feel wacky express joy out loud or singe while you ’re play , but the first prison term you see what ’s happening on the screen actually change as you alter your breathing patterns or just get going to mean other than , you ’ll be hooked . And you ’ll realise just how crucial a positive frame of creative thinker is to your body ’s well - being .
Best Use of History
Railroad Tycoon 3:,MacSoft , $ 50
What It Is : A material - time strategy secret plan with railroads .
Who It ’s For : Anyone who like to encounter with choo - choos .
Why It ’s a Hall of Famer : Poptop Software ’s Railroad Tycoon serial puts you in the role of a captain of industry : An enterpriser who ’s starting a railway melodic line . The nation will produce and so will your destiny if you lie track right , service your station efficaciously , and manage the flow of goods and passengers throughout your transportation meshing . Fail , and you ’ll go broke and lose the game . You ’ll get to play as Industrial Age robber barons and relive great full stop of rail expansion throughout the 19th and twentieth centuries , and you ’ll even get a discernment of what rail transportation might be like in the future .
This is the same formula that we ’ve construe in late installments of Railroad Tycoon . The franchise got a major overhaul with this year ’s release of Railroad Tycoon 3 , thanks to a new 3 - D gaming engine and change to the fundamental economical locomotive engine that power the plot .
Though there ’s a “ sandpile ” modal value that lets you just put track and operate railway locomotive around to your heart ’s content , the real meat of this game is in realize how goods and passengers move around the country and how you’re able to help oneself that endeavor — and how to take on the grocery not only to increase your own personal fortune and the stock value of your company , but how to push your competitors into the ground or take them over with mergers and accomplishment . It ’s a powerful compounding that will keep you coming back for more .
