The Macintosh is not a gaming machine. I understand that. I’ve been fighting the good fight for over a decade now, but it’s a losing battle. Mac users will never get as many games as PC owners, we’ll never see the innovation, and simultaneous releases continue to elude us even today.

But that doesn’t mean there aren’t great games to be played. With the right software and hardware, it’s pretty easy to fool your Macintosh into thinking it’s an Xbox 360, if even for a little while. So, if you know a Mac gamer in need of some gifts this Christmas season, or if you’re getting a new Mac and want to see what it can do, here are a couple of suggestions to get you started (provided your system can handle them).

Ambrosia Software is celebrating its 15th anniversary with a holiday bundle sale that features a collection of six classic Ambrosia games: Apeiron, Redline, Bubble Trouble, Darwinia, Aki Mahjong, and SketchFighter. Individually, these games would retail for $123, but they’re going for only $19 from now until midnight, December 24th.

Originally planned for one week only, Ambrosia Software is now putting all of its iPhone/iPod Touch games on sale for 99 cents throughout the entire month of December. The sale comprises the following games: Aki Mahjong, normally $4.99, combines the ancient Chinese game of Mahjong with an enchanting journey across Japan. The game is easy more »

Touchgrind is a very different sort of game than what is common on the App Store. It’s part game and part simulation. The idea is simple, place two fingers on a virtual skateboard deck and perform tricks as if playing with a tech deck style miniature skateboard. What’s great about this game is that it’s simple enough to immediately be fun, but complicated enough to require practice. Thankfully, that practice is fun, and possibly even rewarding.

As has been noted numerous times here at Appletell and throughout the gaming world, there are three things you can kill in computer games without fear of reproach: Nazis, zombies and Nazi zombies. If you like, you can lump aliens in with the zombies, and you can lump robots in with the Nazis. But you can’t use cops, hookers, marching bands or video game reviewers without expecting to eventually stand before Arlen Specter to explain why the downfall of modern civilization is not because of your little video game.

And yet, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (CoD4) is set in a realistic, timely world in which the battles you’re fighting don’t really stray from those you might hear about on “All Things Considered.” The developers get away with this for two reasons. First, then invent militant organizations to serve as their bad guys. Second, this game is a brutal depiction of war. Brutal to an unsettling degree. It doesn’t glorify war, and it doesn’t even really lionize soldiers. If this were a movie script, John Wayne and Chuck Norris would run from it in terror.

I gotta be honest with you; I mainly only go bowling with the anticipation of the alley being attacked by The Blob. Or the Son of Blob. Or the Beware! The Blob! Whatever. The point is, expecting a blood red, gelatinous mass to come rolling up the lanes at any moment adds a sense of urgency and terror to the game that really enhances the overall effect. This is why I’m largely disappointed with bowling video games. Nobody really dies in them.

But, I won’t hold that against Freeverse’s Flick Bowling for the iPhone and iPod touch. What it lacks in terror, in makes up for with “awesome balls,” as they put it. And I suppose the balls are pretty awesome. Unlike real bowling, where you’re mainly stuck with the ball you chose at the beginning of the game, Flick Bowling changes the balls up on you constantly. They don’t affect your game, but not a whole lot does. That’s not really the point of Flick Bowling. Rather, the point is to just show off your iPhone a bit more, and have fun doing it.

Rather than try to explain what type of game Pirates is, it may be easier to just say that it’s not a first-person shooter, and it’s not a hidden puzzle game. It is pretty much everything else. Pirates combines action, adventure, turn-based strategy, resource management, people sims and rhythm games (yes, rhythm games) into one unit. Each element stands on its own, but they work together well.

The story is that your happy and apparently well-off family was about to sit down to a tasty meal, when the traditionally evil government-types barge in and send everyone away to prison. You escape, and grow up resorting to a life of piracy to get by. Throughout the game, the locations of various family members is revealed. Find them, and you’ll be rewarded with treasure tips and such. But, you don’t have to find your family. The beauty of Pirates is that the goal is simply to retire rich and married, and it’s completely up to you on how you get there.

Full review after the break.

I recently wrote an article for Appletell in which I wondered if the App Store / iPhone combination would kill iPod gaming. In the article, I opined that it will, and probably should, but that it saddened me to say so. For one reason or another, developers just never figured out how to program games for the click wheelbinterface, or what games to port over to the iPod. A few games stood out, a few were terrible, and the majority were simply mediocre.

Then, suddenly, along comes Square Enix. Square Enix of Final Fantasy fame. Square Enix of Valkyrie Profile fame. Square Enix of Dragon Quest fame. Square Enix has released some of the best and most beloved RPG franchises—be they action, tactical or what have you—on pretty much every platform worth mentioning since the NES. And now, with the release of Song Summoner: The Unsung Heroes, they’re on the iPod. Just having this company acknowledging the iPod is big enough, that they’ve also released arguably the best iPod game yet makes it all the more satisfying.

Full review after the break.

It’s not long into Fable: The Lost Chapters before you realize you’re in for something different. As if the words “Action/RPG” aren’t already enough to warm the soul of Mac gamers everywhere (oh, we’ve tasted action and we’ve tasted RPGs, but we rarely have them served in the same meal), the dramatic conclusion to the otherwise light and cartoony introduction will let you know that maybe this game is special.

And it is.

Find out why after the break.

Although not as hyped as Super Monkey Ball, Crash Bandicoot Nitro Kart 3D from the App Store provides just as much fun. Making use of the accelerometer for steering and the touch screen for destroying your enemies, this racing game is great for any iPhone gamer.

Check out my review after the break.