Macworld's 2006 Game Hall of Fame Page 2 of 2

10 of the year’s best Mac games and coolest accessories

Best reason to load up on AA batteries

PC Con Wireless: ; $30; Mad Catz

What It Is: A Mac-compatible, wireless (radio frequency) game pad.

Who It’s For: Gamers longing for a game controller that doesn’t add more wiry clutter to a desk.

Why It’s a Hall of Famer: Mad Catz took a proven design—Microsoft’s Controller S layout from the Xbox—and adapted it to play on both Macs and PCs. Say what you want about Microsoft and the Xbox, but the Controller S is a superb game pad, so Mad Catz couldn’t have picked a better source from which to crib. Twin thumbsticks, triggers, a directional pad, and tons of buttons make this a versatile and excellent input device for Mac games that actually support controllers using Apple’s HID Manager software. (And for games that don’t, you can always add a third-party application like USB Overdrive for another $20 or so.)

Best Return from the Dead

Quinn: ; free; Simon Härtel

What It Is: A networkable Tetris clone that won’t cost you a penny.

Who It’s For: Anyone who likes falling-block games and wants to play against other people online.

Why It’s a Hall of Famer: Earlier this year, it looked as though we’d seen the last of Quinn, an Aqua-licious Tetris-style falling-blocks game with Bonjour networking and support for custom pieces and backgrounds. The Tetris Company threatened legal action, and the game had to be taken offline for a while. But thanks to help from technology-rights advocacy group Electronic Frontier Foundation and others, Quinn is back and better than ever.

Best Excuse for Eating Brains

Stubbs the Zombie: ; $50; Aspyr Media

What It Is: Zombies are terrorizing this innocuous town, but instead of saving the townsfolk, you’re the big zombie on campus.

Who It’s For: Anyone who has rooted for the bad guys in Dawn of the Dead and Resident Evil.

Why It’s a Hall of Famer: Stubbs developer Wideload Games—which was founded by former members of Bungie—reminded us why we liked Bungie’s games so much, with this game and its surplus of slapstick (like flatulence bombs that incapacitate everyone nearby). Stubbs doesn’t take too long to complete, but the game makes up for this with plenty of blood-soaked fun. What’s more, Stubbs boasts one of the best soundtracks of the year, with covers of 1950s pop tunes by alternative bands like Cake and the Dandy Warhols.

Best Brain-Busting Puzzle

TubeTwist: ; $20; GarageGames

What It Is: A puzzle game in which you have to build contraptions made of tubes.

Who It’s For: Anyone looking for a cerebral game that’s also supermodel-pretty.

Why It’s a Hall of Famer: Kinetic puzzle games can be really fun, especially when they look this great. You’re on the trail of Professor Jaymour—discoverer of a large, globular energy form known as the Macroton—who has gone missing across time. To find her, you must reconstruct her Rube Goldberg-esque tubular machines, which guide Macrotons into reactor tubes. Eighty levels will keep you quite busy in TubeTwist, which uses OpenGL 3-D graphics to their fullest.

Best Game Worth Waiting for

WingNuts 2: Raina’s Revenge: ; $30; Freeverse Software

What It Is: The long-awaited sequel to a game that came out five years ago.

Who It’s For: Anyone who fondly remembers the arcade-game classic Time Pilot.

Why It’s a Hall of Famer: Take Freeverse’s offbeat sense of humor and mix it with healthy heapings of arcade-style fun. Sprinkle with liberal amounts of beautiful graphics effects—such as smoke and particle explosions, and little airplane pieces that fall and splash into the water far below—and add a level editor that gives you all the tools you need to make your very own add-ons. It’s the recipe for WingNuts 2 —and tons of fun.

[ Peter Cohen writes Macworld.com’s Game Room blog; he has been covering the Mac game market since 1994—long before Warcraft had its own world. ]