A respectable port of Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition invades macOS

Despite all the graphics capabilities of modern Macs, being a Mac gamer is generally a thankless existence. Every once in a while, though, Mac gamers get a bone thrown to them that is substantial enough that they think, for a brief moment, everything might be OK. One such bone has been thrown to us today—Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition just came out on macOS. The game is available on Steam (those who own the Windows version on Steam automatically get the Mac version) and is planned for a later Mac App Store release. Age of Empires II is arguably one of the greatest strategy games, and unlike too many of its real-time strategy (RTS) peers, it remains quite popular to this day and is still getting updates almost 30 years after its initial release. The new Mac release is a port of the Definitive Edition remaster, which arrived in 2019. It comes with the original game’s Age of Kings expansion, plus three of the more recent content packs: Lords of the West, Dynasties of India, and Dawn of the Dukes. (The game’s Microsoft-owned development studio, World’s Edge, has been releasing periodic expansion packs ever since the Definitive Edition release first arrived.) There are many, many other content and DLC packs available for purchase, if the hundred-plus hours in that package isn’t enough, as all the DLC supported on Windows is also supported in the Mac version. The Definitive Edition has assets and an engine updated for up to 4K resolution, new unit animations, a remastered soundtrack, and a plethora of quality-of-life improvements. This port was made by Feral Interactive, a mainstay of Mac ports perhaps best known for working on Mac versions of the games in the Total War and XCOM series. Of course, ports can be hit or miss. I spent about an hour testing it out today on an M1 Max MacBook Pro and didn’t run into any problems. However, there is one huge caveat: The Mac version will not support cross-platform multiplayer with Windows or Xbox players. Granted, many people who have played this game over the years have never touched multiplayer and therefore won’t care, but some of the game’s most hardcore fans will feel that makes this port a non-starter. This is not the first time the game has been available on Macs—the original version came out on Mac, too. But the Definitive Edition remaster that led to a major resurgence for the game in recent years hasn’t been available until now. It’s also worth noting that this is the first Microsoft-published game to get a macOS release in half a decade. But since this was done by Feral—a studio that pitches ports to IP owners—rather than in-house, it’s unlikely that this means the gates are opening.