More Mac games at the Expo, Part 2

I’m very glad EA has returned to releasing games for the Mac, because they have some of the coolest titles that are available on the platform. I already discussed Spore at length, so I’ll concentrate on a few of their other games that are demoing at Macworld 08.

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 08 is a pretty fun game, as golf games go. I don’t really like golf games myself, but I do think that the golf game that comes with Wii Sports is a lot of fun: it’s easy to play and you don’t have to use a power meter to control your swing. Tiger Woods PGA Tour 08 is fairly similar. I picked it up quickly and was scoring triple bogies in no time. The best part was that you use the mouse to swing your golf club. Not as natural as swinging the Wiimote, but still pretty fun.

Battlefield 2142 is set in a futuristic landscape where “a new ice age has thrown the world into a panic.” This first-person shooter (FPS) allows you to choose sides from two superpowers that are dukeing it out for supremacy. The controls are all similar to other FPS games you might be used to – WASD to move, right-click to zoom – so picking this game up and getting into it is easy.

My favorite was Command & Conquer 3 Tiberium Wars. This is a real-time strategy (RTS) game that lets you build up a base of operations and deploy foot soldiers to the field to try and outmatch your enemy, whether that enemy is your computer or another player. These types of games can be complicated to learn because there is a lot to know, but Command & Conquer 3 is fairly easy to play, fast-paced, and a lot of fun. Controls were similar to playing on a PC, but with one slight drawback: the single button mouse that comes with a Mac can be slightly wonky when it comes to left-clicking versus right-clicking, and accidentally right-clicking on a newly created unit erases it. That’s pretty annoying. Otherwise, a very exciting title for the Mac.