I desire very much to run an old Mac game I used to love called “Barrack” by Ambrosia Software. Trouble is, I don’t have an operational Mac, and I’m not quite so desperate to play the game again that I want to buy an old Mac off of eBay just to do it. I am, however, willing to buy the game from the website if I can find a really inexpensive way to run it.
According to the company’s website, the game isn’t compatible with OS X, but is best run on a PowerPC. What are my options, here? Is there an emulator I can download that would allow me to make this happen? Or am I stuck with either buying a used machine or finding a similar game?
I’m getting conflicting information on the title: Wikisays it is 68K compatible, but also says it requires Mac OS 9, which didn’t run on 68K computers. And, as you said, the actual website merely recommends a PowerPC, but claims it will work on any Color Macintosh.
If it really will run on 68K, the easiest thing to try would be using an old (now open source) emulator called Executor. Unlike every other emulator, you do not need the Mac OS software, or a ROM. But it is limited to MacOS 7 emulation.
The next thing I’d try is PowerPC emulators. I got out of the Macintosh emulation game before these were feasible, but apparently PearPC can emulate up to a G4. You’d need to have access to the MacOS system software, however, and probably a ROM, which is probably available online, but is technically supposed to only be downloaded from a working machine.
The 68K Mac emulator I preferred was called Basilisk II, which ran great on even a Pentium 3. It still exists (with a setup guide included) so you might luck with that. The advantage is that Apple released up to Mac OS 7.5 out to the public, so you don’t have to worry about having the Mac OS itself available. You will need a ROM, though.
Barring getting all this to work, you may be best off going to eBay and seeing if you can get an old Mac–even a 68k one if you think it will work.
How is Ambrosia software in general? The founder / president / main guy over there was a close friend of mine in high school. Being a PC guy I was never that aware of his computer work.
I used to run it on a Quadra. The game most assuredly did not require OS9. I think the Quadra I had was running 7.1 at the time.
BigT, I ran across another site that mentioned Executor, but the link they had to it was defunct. I will definitely give that a try – thank you!
Ellis Dee, I don’t really have any experience with much else Ambrosia has done. Over the weekend, I did download a trial of a brick-breaker type game they had. It was fine, but simple.
To emulate a PowerPC running MacOS 9, you need SheepShaver, not PearPC. (PearPC is for running MacOS X 10.2 / 10.3 / 10.4).
It’s a good emulator but emulators in general are not good for games, or so I am told. Still, a modern PC should be able to pretend to be a decade-old PowerMac with decent agility.
I loved loved loved the Escape Velocity series of games. Many hours spent on those games for sure. I always wanted an Escape Velocity MMPORG but from reading the Eve Online thread that may be a good substitute.