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Lord of the Rings: War in the North will hit the Mac on Aug. 29
Fans of J.R.R. Tolkien and Middle Earth rejoice -- Feral Interactive will be shipping a Mac port of Snowblind Studios' The Lord of the Rings: War in the North (US$30) on August 29. Don't be surprised if you don't recall any of the events that take place in the title, which is an action role-playing game set in northern Middle Earth. About the only mention of the war in the trilogy came from Gandalf the White, saying "With his far-reaching right hand, Sauron might have done great evil in the North. Yet all that has been averted because a handful of heroes stood in his path." That small band of heroes consists of Eradin the Ranger, Andriel the Elf and Farin the Dwarf, who take on the forces of Sauron in the game. LOTR:WITN is playable in both single-player and co-op multiplayer modes, and requires at least OS X 10.7.5 (be sure to check the system requirements before purchase). [via MacNN]
Batman: Arkham City finally hitting Mac this month
Originally slated to arrive last month, it looks like the Mac version of Batman: Arkham City is on track for release by the end of December. In development at Feral Interactive, the game was released on consoles and Windows in fall 2011 and recently came to Nintendo's new Wii U. Feral was responsible for porting the original Batman: Arkham Asylum to Mac last November. It has handled other high-profile conversions such as BioShock, BioShock 2 and Deus Ex: Human Revolution. The Mac version of Batman: Arkham City will sell for US$40 and features all of the DLC released for other versions of the game. This means the additional Harley Quinn's Revenge side story, plus the Catwoman, Nightwing and Robin packs are included. In other Mac game news, Aspyr Media has launched Rollercoaster Tycoon 3: Platinum on the Mac App Store, Steam and its own digital storefront, GameAgent. You can get it or any other title for 25 percent off on GameAgent using the discount code GameAgent25.
Batman: Arkham City Game of the Year Edition headed to Mac
Feral Interactive has a lot of expertise bringing PC games to the Mac, but they haven't quite figured out how to do it quickly yet. Batman: Arkham City was one of the biggest console hits of last year, but Feral Interactive is only now releasing it on the Mac. The game's going to be available in November, so if you haven't played it yet and you've been waiting for the Mac version, the wait isn't quite over. There is a bright side, at least: This will be the Game of the Year Edition, which means that all of the downloadable content will be included -- the Catwoman content that came with the game plus the Harley Quinn's Revenge pack. The game features an open-world environment, lots of thugs to beat up with a really fun combat system and plenty of cameos from your favorite Batman characters. Arkham City's a great game, and it'll be nice to finally have it on the Mac, but man, it would have been even better to get it a little sooner than November.
Feral Interactive bringing two Sega Sonic games to Mac
I can't say that I'm a huge fan of Feral Interactive: They're a company that specializes in porting games from other platforms over to the Mac, and I'm more interested in natively developed and published Mac games. But I have to respect them nevertheless: Feral picked up an Apple Design Award for their port of Deus Ex: Human Revolution at WWDC last week, so they must be doing something right. And now Sega has chosen them to bring Sonic the Hedgehog to the Mac platform for the first time. Feral is going to be bringing Sonic and SEGA All-Stars Racing and SEGA Superstars Tennis to the Mac App Store, with both games arriving later on this summer. In addition to porting the games, they'll also be Game Center-enabled, because Game Center will be used in Apple's next OS X update, Mountain Lion. It's also interesting that Sega has already released one of these games, All-Stars Racing, on the App Store. So Feral can probably thank the iOS platform for Sega's interest in Mac gaming. I wouldn't be surprised if it's because of Sega's success on iOS that the company is dipping its toe into the Mac App Store as well.
Bioshock 2 for Mac (finally) out now
Better late than never, I guess. Bioshock 2 has finally (more than two years after the PC release) arrived on the Mac as a port from Feral Interactive. This one is the sequel to the classic title from Ken Levine (who's currently working on the next game in the series, Bioshock Infinite), and while it's not quite as good as the original, it does add some new elements to the gameplay, and if nothing else, will return you to Rapture, the ruined underwater city that's been one of the most fascinating settings in video games over the last decade or so. This version also contains the Fall of Rapture multiplayer game, so you can face off against other players online if you like. The price is $30.99, and you can grab the game from Feral Interactive directly, or pick it up on the Mac App Store.
Feral Interactive offers digital downloads on multiple online stores
Here's a cool note I missed last week among the hustle and bustle of CES: Feral Interactive is one of the biggest publishers of Mac games out there, often porting and publishing games from larger PC developers over to the Mac platform. Last week, the company announced that four games it has published (Borderlands, Rome: Total War, LEGO Harry Potter and Bioshock) would be available for sale through three different digital download services (Direct2Drive, GamersGate and the MacGameStore). That's good news, not only for Mac gamers who want more options to pick from for their games, but for the platform as a whole. Steam has made plenty of headlines, both during the launch and since, but a deal like this shows that there is demand for Mac games even beyond the most popular digital store online. Direct2Drive especially is a fairly large digital store known for PC game sales, and the fact that Feral games are now available on the service is a nice indicator of how popular the Mac platform is becoming among gamers and other users.
Borderlands Game of the Year edition for Mac gets a release date
2K Games Feral Interactive (the company publishing this title for the Mac) has announced that the Game of the Year edition of the great "Diablo shooter" game Borderlands is on its way. It'll be out on December 3rd, and like other versions of the special edition, the game will include all of the title's downloadable content packs, including The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned, Mad Moxxi's Underdome Riot, The Secret Armory of General Knoxx and Claptrap's New Robot Revolution. All that gaming for just US$49.95, running natively on our favorite platform -- pretty sweet. I was a huge fan of Borderlands when it came out last year -- you'll probably need to enjoy the FPS genre to really get into it, but the best part of the game is the guns: killing enemies makes them drop guns, randomly created with all sorts of wacky attributes, from poison fire machine guns to exploding shell shotguns. When you add in a fun quest system and four different classes to play with, it's a really great game with almost unlimited replayability. One note: you'll need an Intel Mac to run the game, of course, and you won't be able to use any Macs with ATI X1xxx series, NVIDIA 7xxx series and Intel GMA series video cards. But if you've got a recent Mac and room for a new FPS to play, keep an eye out for Borderlands early next month.
Feral Interactive product update (Macworld Expo)
U.K.-based publisher, Feral Interactive made the trip to this year's Macworld Expo, eager to sell its product to Mac gamers. The company's booth holds many kiosks showing Feral's latest -- or in-progress -- ports, including Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy, The Movies, and Imperial Glory.Feral head, David Stephen updated us on the status of its games; Lego Star Wars, Colin McRae Rally, and Fable: The Lost Chapters will ship this Spring. (A few technical glitches that delayed the latter two titles have recently been fixed.)Stephen is also excited about the newly shipped The Movies because of updates Feral was able to make to the PC version. For example, Mac gamers have more format options when exporting completed movies. Also, because Feral wanted Mac gamers to be able to share videos on the PC-game's Windows Media site, the Mac version includes a copy of Flip4Mac's WMV Studio -- normally a $50 utility -- to render in that Windows codec.
