The 12 best Mac game deals in the Steam Winter Sale 2017

Feral Interactive brought Codemasters’ acclaimed Dirt Rally to Mac in November, and it launched at the usual full price of $60—seemingly well worth it for this robust, ultra-polished rallying simulator. But if you held off or didn’t want to pay that solid sum for a new Mac racing game, now you can get it for the much more amazing price of just $12.

That’s 80 percent off, and it’s a total steal for a super-realistic simulation that packs in 70 stages across six huge rallies, along with 40-plus cars from rallying history. It’s also a beautiful game, assuming you have the hardware to handle all of that mud and muck. It’s a more challenging racer than previous Dirt entries, but an alluring one all the same.

Here’s an even more stunning drop for a massive new-to-Mac game. The long-awaited Mac port of Deus Ex: Mankind Divided just arrived a couple weeks back, also at $60, but now you snag it at an 85 percent discount at just $9. A digital deluxe version, which bundles in a season pass full of add-on content, sells at the same discount at a total price of $13.48.

Mankind Divided picks up where Deus Ex: Human Revolution ( $3 on Steam) left off, with tech-augmented agent Adam Jensen recruited to expose an international conspiracy via a mix of stealth action, gunplay, and intense melee combat. The gorgeous cyberpunk world demands a top-tier Mac, with only AMD graphics cards supported right now—but if you have the hardware and you love an involving action game, this deal seems impossible to ignore.

We had Sid Meier’s Civilization VI on our list of Steam Summer Sale picks, but now the deal is even sweeter, with last year’s vast turn-based strategy game selling for 50 percent off. That’s the same price you’ll pay right now to unlock the full iPad version, which just hit the App Store before Christmas, although it’ll also go back to $60 on January 4.

Civilization VI builds upon the franchise’s familiar “4X” design—that is, “explore, expand, exploit, and exterminate”—as you command a historical leader and build a civilization to last throughout the ages. It’s a bit easier to understand and get into than previous entries, but if you’re new to Civ and don’t want to spend $30 right off the bat, you can find the also-excellent Civilization V for $7.49 right now.

Here’s one of the absolute best dirt-cheap deals in the Steam Winter Sale. Square Enix’s Tomb Raider reboots Lara Croft’s adventure franchise, and now just a few years after release, you can snag the full game for just $3—an 85 percent discount over the usual price.

Tomb Raider finds young Croft on her very first quest for treasure and glory, as she drops into some very rough, violent scenarios and emerges a hardened explorer. This Tomb Raider takes some cues from Sony’s Uncharted games, with a bigger emphasis on cinematic set pieces amidst the large, beautiful environments, along with more gunplay in the mix. It’s a fantastic action game, and at three bucks, it’s also an essential impulse buy.

Valve is both the owner of Steam and an incredible game developer in its own right, and the company has no problem offering up its own games for next to nothing during the annual sales. Case in point: the Valve Complete Pack bundles in 19 games at a usual cost of just over $200, but right now it’s selling for just $16.40—a 92 percent discount.

The highlights in the bunch are both brilliant Portal first-person puzzle games, the entire Half-Life first-person shooter odyssey, both Left 4 Dead co-op horror games, and current multiplayer shooter smash Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. You’ll also get a few older odds and ends in the mix, but if you haven’t played the Portal series (Portal 2 shown) or Half-Life 2, it’s well worth it to get the whole bundle.

Tower defense strategy games are often experienced from an overhead perspective, as you place offensive towers and turrets to try and protect some kind of base. However, Sanctum 2 sees things differently. While you’ll still place down an array of weapons to ward off intruders, Sanctum 2 puts you right into the action with its first-person view and ability to personally blast invading monsters.

It’s a fun tweak that makes Sanctum 2 such an exhilarating take on the tried-and-true genre, plus the ability to create maze-like routes to slow down and funnel enemies towards their demise is ever satisfying. Coffee Stain Studios’ game takes a big hit during the Winter Sale, dropping 80 percent to the much more appealing price of just $3.

Surely one of the biggest steals of the Steam Winter Sale, indie darling Fez is just one dollar right now. That’s a 90 percent savings, and we even recommend it at the usual price! Looks are deceiving with Fez, as screenshots suggest an old-school, Super Mario-esque affair—but this 2D world can be fully rotated to see things from a different perspective and unearth secrets.

That’s the bigger part of the experience, as Fez is arguably more a puzzle game than a platform-action affair. Little Gomez must rotate the world to find mystical cubes and locate new paths, and later on you may need to take down notes to try and crack some of the perplexing codes you’ll encounter. It’s a head-scratcher in parts, but Fez is a truly gorgeous and spellbinding experience.

F1 2017 doesn’t see quite the same level of discount as Dirt Rally, another Codemasters racer—but at $36, that’s still a sizable 40 percent discount on a game that only just released a few months back. Like Dirt Rally, F1 is a serious simulation with fabulous graphics, impressive realism, and loads and loads of licensed content crammed into it.

Here, you’ll be able to play through the 2017 championship season, experience a lengthier 10-year career, command classic F1 cars from the past, and dig into research and development to enhance your car between races. F1 2017 has been hailed as the series’ best entry to date, but if you’re willing to go back a year, you can get F1 2016 much cheaper at just $15 right now.

Before creating the millions-selling Don’t Starve series, Klei Entertainment developed the incredibly cool Mark of the Ninja, a side-scrolling game with a sleek cartoonish look. While many ninja games are all about fast-paced action, Mark of the Ninja places a huge premium on stealth as you sneak through the 2D levels to get the jump on foes.

The tense quest provides an array of options to work your way through levels, as you utilize traps, special abilities, and other tactics to dispatch foes without being spotted. At a 75 percent discount, you’ll spend under $4 to snag Mark of the Ninja today. And several other Klei games are also ultra-affordable right now, with a big bundle selling for less than $20.

Tacoma was one of the most mesmerizing Mac games of 2017, and now you can snag it for half off—that’s just $10. It’s the latest creation from The Fullbright Company, makers of the similarly memorable Gone Home ( $3 on Steam), and it follows the same kind of philosophy: it’s a narrative game that you experience by exploring an empty space and piecing together what happened.

Only this time, Tacoma finds you setting foot into an abandoned space station, watching holographic recordings of the now-departed crew to try and figure out what led to this point. The moments feel deeply intimate and real, and almost hard to watch in that sense—but it’s all beautifully done, and this is a game that might stick with you for some time.

While the older 3D Grand Theft Auto games eventually made their way to Mac, we haven’t seen any of Rockstar’s more modern open-world action affairs from the last decade-plus. But Square Enix’s Sleeping Dogs is a darn close alternative, delivering a dazzling environment to freely explore as you drive, fight, race, and shoot your way through a large crime adventure.

Sleeping Dogs drops you into Hong Kong as Wei Shen, an undercover cop trying to take down the Triad organization. The gorgeous open city has plenty of things to keep you entertained beyond the main storyline, plus this Definitive Edition bundles in a bunch of add-on content to make it feel vaster than ever. It’s 85 percent off right now, making this huge, exciting game less than $5.

If you’re buzzing on Star Wars again because of The Last Jedi, then now might be the perfect time to loop back on the last main movie’s game— Lego Star Wars: The Force Awakens. As the name and image above suggest, the game translates the movie’s characters and big moments into virtual plastic bricks, adding a light comedic touch as you blast stormtroopers and collect loot.

It’s a formula that’s been done again and again over the years, but it’s one that still shines here thanks to some new additions. Lego Star Wars is also approachable enough for kids, yet adults can join in and have fun with them—or on their own, of course! It’s just $12 right now at a 60 percent discount, or you can get the bundle with the season pass of add-on content for just $13.59 total.