Apple has released a Graphics Update for Snow Leopard, and this is particularly good news to Mac gamers. Remember those pesky Starcraft 2 crashes I wrote about two weeks ago? This update specifically addresses some of the problems with Starcraft 2 for Mac as well as other issues with Team Fortress 2, Portal, and Aperture 3.

If you are a Mac gamer it is highly recommended to install this update. You can download the graphics update through the Software Update control panel, accessed through the Apple menu.

Here are the release notes from Apple:

The Snow Leopard Graphics Update contains stability and performance fixes for graphics applications and games:

Addresses frame rate issues occurring in Portal and Team Fortress 2 by Valve, on iMac (Late 2009 and Mid 2010), Mac mini (Early 2009 and Mid 2010), Mac Pro (Early 2009), MacBook (Early 2009 and Mid 2010) and MacBook Pro (15-inch, Mid 2010) or MacBook Pro (17-inch, Mid 2010) models.

Resolves an issue that could cause Aperture 3, or StarCraft II by Blizzard, to unexpectedly quit or become unresponsive.

Resolves an image corruption issue that may occur when disconnecting and reconnecting external displays while the system is running.

The hardware and software affected by this performance update are the following: MacBook (13-inch, Early 2009), MacBook Pro (17-inch, Mid 2010), MacBook Pro (13-inch, Mid 2010), MacBook Pro (15-inch, Mid 2010), iMac (21.5-inch, Late 2009), Mac Pro (Early 2009), Mac mini (Early 2009), Mac OS X 10.6.4, Mac mini (Mid 2010), iMac (21.5-inch, Mid 2010), iMac (27-inch, Mid 2010), MacBook (13-inch, Mid 2010), Portal, StarCraft II, Team Fortress 2

It’s no secret that I’m basically a Starcraft 2 addict, whether it’s multiplayer or singleplayer doesn’t even matter I just love playing the game. Of course it’s also fun to get a little extra help in the form of some cheat codes, so here is the complete list for SC2. These cheat codes work for either PC or Mac versions of Starcraft 2.

Starcraft 2 Cheat Codes

You activate the cheat codes within Starcraft 2 by hitting the Enter or Return key and then typing the cheat and hitting return/enter again to enable it. You will get a notification saying the cheat is active and letting you know that achievements are disabled (see note below).

• God Mode – terribleterribledamage
• Create Units at No Cost – moredotsmoredots
• 5 Billion Credits – whysoserious
• 5000 Vespene Gas – realmendrilldeep
• Unlimited Energy – jaynestown
• Upgrade Weapons, Armor, and Shields – iamironman
• Disable Ability Cooldown – hansshotfirst
• Disable Tech Requirements – sosayweall
• Disable Victory Conditions – tyushasleftthegame
• Play “Terran up the Night” Song – overengineeredcodpiece
• Cinematics Menu – eyesofsauron

Remember that cheats only work in Single Player, either in Custom Games, Tutorial, Campaign, or any other Single Player mode.

Starcraft 2 Cheats Disable Achievements

This is very important to note; if you use cheat codes in Starcraft 2 you will lose your ability to earn achievements while the cheat is activated for that game. This is the message you will see:

“CHEAT PlayerName Achievements have been disabled due to cheat usage. To enable achievements again, start a new game or load a saved game.”

You then need to either start a new game or load a previously saved game to get achievement unlocking back again.

The cinematics cheat can cause Starcraft 2 clients to randomly crash which is likely part of the wider bugs but the framerate cap listed on the Starcraft 2 bugs and fixes page seems to help.

Alright gamers, fire up iTunes and the App Store because for a limited time the Civilization for iPhone app is free. No this isn’t the trial lite version, it’s the full Civilization Revolution, which usually sells for $6.99. The game is being given away for free courtesy of the FreeAppADay program, but there’s nothing to sign up to get the game.

You can grab the 80 MB download of Civilization Revolution from the iTunes Store or the App Store client on your iPhone but the deal is expected to expire by tomorrow.

Civilization Revolution is the iPhone version of the Sid Meier Civilization dynasty, where the objective is to build an empire, discover the in-game world, and conquer all to eventually rule the world. It’s a really fun turn-based strategy game and well worth a download even at $6.99, so being free is an absolute steal and comes highly recommended.

I’m always looking for good mobile games and Civilization Revolution fits the bill well when I’m (temporarily) pulled away from my current addiction of Starcraft 2.

Starcraft 2 has been out for about a week now and since launch date my life has basically revolved around the game (I’m a nerd, I know). The game is an absolute blast and you should buy it if you like real time strategy games. Now all that said, it’s not without problems. Despite a lengthy beta testing period, there are still some pretty annoying bugs and crashes in SC2, particularly for Mac users who have NVidia hardware.

Here is the known problem list for the Starcraft 2 Mac client, and more importantly some potential fixes for the problems:
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Starcraft 2 is out and it’s pretty much eating all my free time at the moment. I’m still in the process of tweaking my graphics settings for optimum performance, and the easiest way to benchmark Starcraft 2 performance on machines is to check the FPS (frames per second). Here’s how to do that on both a Mac and Windows SC2 install:

Check Starcraft 2 FPS on Mac

To check the frame rate on a Mac, while you are in a game hit: Control+Option+F

Show Starcraft 2 FPS on Windows

Checking FPS in Windows is basically the same key command, in SC2 hit: Control+Alt+F

On either operating system, once you hit the command to display frame rate, the FPS counter will show in the upper left corner and look like so:

If you’re wondering how well SC2 will run on your machine, check out the Starcraft 2 system requirements for Mac. Later I will post some preliminary findings on how well the game runs on a few different Mac setups.

If you’re a fan of Blizzard and real time strategy games and you haven’t gotten this one yet, you can order Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty on Amazon.com and get free shipping. I love RTS games, and I can say it’s definitely worth it.

RTS fans around the world are having a party today; Starcraft 2 is out for both Mac and Windows, and you can download the game now directly from Blizzard or pick it up from various retailers. The game costs $60 regardless of whether you get the digital distribution/download or if you opt for the physical box.

For a completely digital release, you can get the game directly from Battlenet and Blizzard:
Download & Buy Starcraft 2 from Blizzard

If you’d like to have a physical box, install DVD, and manual, you can get the game with free shipping from Amazon:
Buy Starcraft 2 on Amazon.com

Be sure to check the Starcraft 2 system requirements for Mac before getting the game.

Is it just me or do some of the scenes in Starcraft 2 look like they’re right out of Avatar?

The countdown to the Starcraft 2 release date closes in, July 27 is less than a week away and it’ll be available for Mac and PC users. This is really exciting for RTS fans like myself, and I’m especially happy that Blizzard is going for a concurrent release for both Windows and Mac OS platforms. Be sure that you meet the Starcraft 2 system requirements for Mac so that you can enjoy the game, they’re pretty reasonable so most people who bought a Mac over the last couple of years should have no problem running the game.

You can pre-order Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty on Amazon for $60.

These are the Mac system requirements for running Starcraft 2:

Minimum Starcraft 2 System Requirements for Mac

These are the baseline specs that you’ll need to run the game, if you are near the lower end of the settings here you probably won’t have great performance.

• Mac OS X 10.5.8, 10.6.2 or newer
• Intel Processor
• NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT or ATI Radeon X1600 or better
• 12 GB available disk space
• 1 GB RAM (2 GB highly recommended)
• DVD drive
• Broadband Internet connection
• 1024X768 minimum screen display resolution

Recommended Starcraft 2 System Requirements for Mac

In addition to the system specs above like available disk space and an internet connection, to run Starcraft 2 the best on your Mac these are the recommended specifications:

• Intel Core 2 Duo processor
• 4 GB system RAM
• NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT or ATI Radeon HD 4670 or better

Obviously the better and newer your Mac, the better Starcraft II will perform on it.

You can order Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty on Amazon.com.
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The Nintendo 64 was another great console that had many great games, and you can relive many of the gaming experiences of the N64 by getting an emulator for Mac OS X. The N64 Emulator I use in Mac OS X is called SixtyForce, it opens and plays N64 ROM’s quite well and allows you to run the games at full screen or in windowed mode, customize your controls to use either a keyboard or USB gamepad, and more.

You can download SixtyForce for free at sixtyforce.com but you’ll have to get game ROM files elsewhere.

SixtyForce isn’t as full featured as some of the other emulators out there in the Windows world, but as far as I know it’s the best option for emulating the Nintendo 64 console natively in Mac OS X.

Do you love emulators too? In case you didn’t notice, we’re pretty big fans of emulators and the older game consoles around here. Here’s some of the other ones we’ve covered in the past:

PS2 Emulator for Mac – PCSX2 is the best PS2 emulator for Mac OS X that I’ve seen so far, it’s not perfect but it works.

Nintendo DS Emulator – Play Nintendo DS games in Mac OS X. Biggest downside is that it doesn’t support full-screen mode (yet at least).

SNES Emulator for Mac OS – SNES is my favorite console of all time, and SNES9x is arguably the best emulator for Mac OS X ever.

SNES9x is a full featured SNES emulator for Mac that lets you do all sorts of things, including using an external game pad, customized controls, enter cheat codes and Game Genie codes directly into the game, create freeze states (ie: saving anytime anywhere), export movies of gameplay, and so much more.

It’s been out a while, but I just wrote about playing SNES on the iPad and realized that we’ve never covered the very SNES emulator for Mac that I mentioned in that article: SNES9x. Yes, there are other SNES emulators for Mac but I always find myself returning to SNES9x, I never have a problem with it and I’ve been able to play through games completely without a crash. In my opinion, it’s the most developed SNES emulator for the Mac platform, if there is a better one I haven’t found it yet.

Downloading the SNES Emulator for Mac

SNES9x is open sourced and a free download but it’s nowhere to be found on the official developers homepage so you usually have to Google around to find a download link. At the moment, Softpedia download works for SNES9x 1.52 and this link works to download SNES9x 1.43 but these may change and you may be forced back to Google around for the package. The version I am using is 1.52 and was released this year, it works flawlessly in Mac OS X 10.6.4.

Playing SNES Games on the Mac

Now that you’ve downloaded SNES9x, you’ll need ROM files of the games to actually play SNES on your Mac. Playing the ROM files is simple, you just double click the .smc and it will launch automatically into SNES9x.

Downloading and Playing SNES ROM Files

Many ROMs are available to download without issue and these are called abandonware, but some ROM’s are considered a legal grey area; some people say it is straight piracy to download ROMS, others argue that if you bought and owned the SNES games a long time ago you should still have the legal right to play them in whatever form today, and of course there are others who say they’re ancient games so it shouldn’t matter anyway. This is made even more complex due to the various copyrights that may or may not exist for the games themselves. Due to this ambiguous nature and various copyrights, you should probably just Google around for specific ROM files and check the copyright yourself, they are generally really easy to find and many games belong to the public domain.

I always end up playing games that are either not controversial (aka Abandonware) or that I owned before anyway so I don’t have any moral dilemma with ROMs, but that’s me, and by no means am I an expert on ROM copyright or rights usage. Do your own research and enjoy playing SNES on your Mac!