Me wanting to play Sierra and Windows games on my Mac

I have been recently feeling the desperate urge to play Sierra and Windows games on my Mac. The main one is AOE II. Apart from this I also really want to get my hands on the older Sierra games like Light House, Gabriel Knight 3, Emperor etc. So I did some Google-Ing online and found out that Steam (on which I play DOTA) has some of these games !! Woohoo ! Party, right ?

I go to the app and purchase these games - I am like "It's worth the 900 bucks I am paying for Gabriel Knight and AOE II. I mean, I love the games - and I do not want to install some pirated version (just in case it crashes my computer)". What do you know... After I complete the payment, I try to install the games and I am unable to !! I PURCHASED VERSION FOR WINDOWS !!!! nahiiiiiiiiii

I frantically started checking online if one can return games purchased on steam, and a very helpful link told me that one can do so. Thankfully I wasted no money ...

I still needed to get the games; and had no clue where to get them from. I did not want to risk downloading it from some random websites (even by paying money) - who knows what might happen to my computer. Then Sudhir told me about this software called Wine - which enables a mac user to be able to use windows softwares on their macbook without having to bootstrap (have 2 OSs on your comp and run either one when you want) and all that jazz.

So, back to Google we went and found this super helpful blog using which I used to install the software. I felt like a pro, you know, using command prompt (aka Terminal) and all that jazz😎. For those of you like me, go to "Go -> Utilities -> Terminal" :)

After I installed Wine and did everything, I needed to get the .exe file of AOE2; and finding this turned out to be a nightmare 💀 I kid you not. I searched and searched everywhere and I could not find the exe file ! Sudhir had one on his computer (Windows) and I tried using that but it kept failing !

So, back to Google I went and found some software called "PlayOnMac". A lot of links to answers people had asked about playing Windows games on their Mac led to this software. By this time, Sudhir had given up and told me he will help get it done. I knew I'd have around 3-4 days for that to happen - so why not search while I have the time :)

Searched online for this PlayOnMac thingy and found a website from where I could download the software. I threw caution to the wind and downloaded it and then tried installing it. My attempt was foiled yet again ! My MacBook told me that I cannot install apps that are not downloaded from the AppStore and in order to be able to install it I need to allow the system to install such apps. I had no clue what to do, but some pop up came from my comp itself saying that I should go to Security and Privacy and make the changes. This option sits in System Preferences -> Security and Privacy. Then you have to press the lock symbol at the bottom in order to be able to make changes to the app installation preferences.

Phew, finally when that got done, I was able to open this PlayOnMac software on my computer. It sits in the LaunchPad.

When you open it, you get an option to Install programs, and on clicking on that you can choose (from the top) to install Games ! And there is a plethora of games to choose from :) :) :)

I chose AOE2 HD and it required me to get it from Steam (the DOTA application thingy) and it installed the same through this PlayOnMac software - this is because Microsoft has given the distribution rights to Steam. Once all this got done, I started installing AOE2 HD... It look over an hour thanks to the sh***y internet I have at home - but hey! It got done :) And now it's time to PARTY, BABY !!1 woohooo

Finally; all on my own I managed to install and play AOE ! and there's tonnes more where all that can from. YAY !!!

Next step : Gabriel Knight 3

Buy guys, you know what the best part is ? I got all these games for FREE !!! :) yeah ! that too on Apple :)