Which war games are worth your time? The best games to play on mac free. It’s a tricky question to answer since war is sort of the default here in the world of PC gaming. The fighting in Counter-Strike will never cease, and Call of Duty will always find another geopolitical reason to nurture conflict. PC games are, as DC Comics eloquently once put, in a state of Infinite Crisis.

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Developed by Gearbox Software, Borderlands 2 is an action role-playing first-person shooter game available on Steam. It serves as the sequel to Borderlands. Released in 2012, the game has been crossing swords with the best co-op games on the site. Find out What are the best co-op games on Steam, including Portal 2, Borderlands 2, Terraria and 42 other top answers suggested and ranked by the Binge.co user community in 2020. Looking for an open world game that has realistic/lethal combat. In other words a person dies after getting hit by a bullet or 2 (depending on placement), or a few slashes of a sword/weapon. (preferably something other than just you standard multiplayer FPS).

We’ve chosen to dig out the war games that don’t use conflict as a convenient backdrop, but treat it as a serious theme deserving of examination. Some of these greats recreate historical catastrophes in pedantic yet moving detail, while others concern fantastic beasts and wizards, but nonetheless simulate something real about the struggles of wartime.

This war games list also features a wide range of genres, so expect to find everything from indie adventures to grand strategy games, not to mention plenty of shooters. We also update our lists regularly to ensure the games presented below really are the best war games around.

The best war games are:

World of Tanks

Tanks play a pretty significant role in modern warfare, so much so that Wargaming has given the mechanical miscreants their very own multiplayer game. World of Tanks has been going for roughly a decade now and in that time the roster of classic tanks has ballooned to over 400, and even includes some armoured vehicles and other WW2 curios.

Those 400+ vehicles all boast unique stats and qualities that you’ll get to know over hundreds of hours of tank vs. tank deathmatch, where you’ll constantly be earning progress to the next shiny metal death machine on your chosen upgrade path. With seasonal events, a ceaseless flow of new hardware to unlock, and plenty of background changes to ensure the game feels fresh.

Want to try World of Tanks? PCGamesN has teamed up with Wargaming to give a free US tank – the M22 Locust and 600 gold to any new players who sign up using this link.

World of Warships

If tanks get their very own world than it’s only right that warships get the same treatment. World of Warships mirrors its tanky counterpart in terms of its progression mechanics, but the transition from war-torn cities to open waters creates a very different type of gameplay. Torpedoes and cannon barrages travel for seconds at a time before striking their target, creating a fascinating battle of feints and dodges. With very little cover to rely on, warship commanders need to become comfortable blasting from range and reading enemy shots.

Like World of Tanks, Warships is also subject to an unending tide of new ships, gameplay tweaks, and seasonal events that stave off any sense of stagnation. Plus it could soon be among the best submarine games as Wargaming has confirmed they’re working on bringing subs to the game.

Play now

War Thunder

After seven years of continual updates and improvements, there are few multiplayer war games as complete as War Thunder. Whether you prefer aerial dogfights, tank combat, or naval battles, War Thunder is essentially three simulation games rolled into one. So you really don’t have to choose – recent updates have even added helicopters and modern military vehicles to the mix.

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More of the best: Read our roundup of the best plane games

Whichever battlefield you elect to play on, War Thunder’s realistic ballistics modeling and attention detail promise as authentic an experience as you could want. Every vehicle has been painstakingly modeled, inside and out, so every shot yields a different result based on factors like range, shell type, the angle of the enemy tank’s armour, its thickness, where the crew are located within the enemy tank, and much more. That damage modelling is consistent across the whole game, so whether you’re strafing the canopy of an enemy fighter plane or lining up the perfect torpedo strike you’ll need to do plenty of quick maths before pulling the trigger.

DEFCON

There are some political climates under which you don’t really want to play war games like DEFCON. This is perhaps the bleakest way you can while away an evening on Steam with your friends. Inspired by 1983’s cinematic cult classic Wargames, DEFCON is one of the oddest strategy games around, utilising multiplayer to pull on the paranoia and high stakes of the Cold War.

You’re cast as a general playing with the lives of millions from the safety of an underground bunker. You soon come to learn that mutually-assured destruction isn’t as simple a concept as it sounds, and that strategic nuclear warfare is a psychological game of intense pressure. You’re looking to wipe out your enemies and disable their capacity for retaliation, while knowing that doing so will expose the positions of your own silos and submarines.

Alliances form fast and break down quicker in the wake of terrible betrayals. But if you do it right, you’ll manage to exterminate your opponent’s civilian population while saving your own. Hooray?

Brothers in Arms: Road to Hill 30

Authenticity is a questionable ask for all the best war games – how can any immaculately recreated battlefield capture the experience of living through its horrors? The first Brothers in Arms made a great go of it, telling the true story of a parachute infantry regiment in the United States’ 101st Airborne Division, dropped behind enemy lines on D-Day.

Levels were designed around historical reconnaissance photographs taken in ‘40s Normandy, and research included both interviews with veterans and classroom lessons on combat tactics. The result remains the closest thing we have to an interactive Band of Brothers, and that most rare of things – a respectful shooter and one of the best WW2 games.

Valiant Hearts: The Great War

By the time a game’s given you a gun and sent you on your way, you’ve already been encouraged to start thinking in kill counts – to take on the opposing role in whatever in which you are involved. Valiant Hearts is different to most war games: a procession of gentle puzzles and occasional rhythm action that simply has you witness the Great War as it ravages France.

It is to Rayman’s Ubisoft Montpellier’s credit that Valiant Hearts doesn’t do the usual and try to capture the reality of combat – instead opting for cartoon abstraction. But don’t think it holds back on the harrowing detail due to its art style, as its environments are filled with snippets of shiver-inducing real-world history.

The principal characters in this sometimes heartbreaking adventure game are, without exception, just trying to find their way back to each other. Torn apart by the most widespread war ever fought, borders and battle lines are irrelevant to these soldiers and civvies, yet they are shook by them to a distressing degree.

This War of Mine

In war, not everyone is a soldier. That is the tagline of This War of Mine- a game based loosely on the experiences of the citizens of Sarajevo, who lived under siege for 1,425 days during the Bosnian War.

Practically speaking, that means you’re presented with a cross-section of charcoal-coloured buildings and an unflinching view of the people eking out an existence within. Sampling elements of survival games, you manage their lives, directing them to craft and trade during the day, and then – once the snipers are gone – sending them out to scavenge for food and medicine at night. Think of it as the war games equivalent of Fallout Shelter, but with less busy work and much more to say – as we found in our This War of Mine review.

There is no way for you to win this war or to contribute to it. Your role is simply to keep going, and somehow reconcile your needs with your conscience. This War of Mine isn’t fun, per se, but it’s uneasy brilliance makes it one of the most important videogames to confront war and has paved the way for Call of Duty: WW2 and Battlefield 1’s more thoughtful breed of war games in the process.

Battlefield 5

EA had its work cut out when it came to surpassing the seriousness of Battlefield 1’s Great War. Few war games have depicted the horror of that conflict as well as Battlefield 1 did, placing you in the boots of a series of young men as they each meet their untimely demise in a desperate last stand against against the Imperial German Army. Battlefield V continues this sombre tone as you gear up for the killing fields of World War 2. Each of Battlefield 5’s War Stories are single-player vignettes intended to “create feelings of despair”. With each death your character’s name, birth date, and death date loom out to remind you that this war game is about more than just entertainment.

When it comes to gameplay, however, Battlefield V rivals the best FPS games on PC. Weapons feels refreshingly janky compared to the futuristic fare of Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, offering up a satisfying rattle and kick with every shot you fire. The battlefields themselves change constantly throughout a match as destructible buildings are torn apart, showering players with rubble.

Battlefield V pushes graphical boundaries, too. Real-time ray tracing is only available on the dearest Nvidia graphics cards at the time of writing, but gives us a glimpse into the future of triple-A gaming. Hellish infernos glint nightmarishly in puddles and muzzle-flashes from a rifle reflect in nearby windows – it’s only natural that resident hardware nut Dave James chose Battlefield 5 as his personal game of the year for 2018. When it comes to big-budget first-person shooters, Battlefield V is the complete package.

Unity of Command

Unity of Command is a turn-based war game set on the Eastern Front of World War II, and one of the brightest lights in the genre’s recent renaissance. If you can find it bundled with the expansion campaigns, you’ll have access to everything from Operation Barbarossa to the Soviet drive into Germany.

Unity of Command is one of the best war games thanks to its merciless focus on your ability to manage supplies across distance. Winning is about reading the map and planning bold, decisive campaigns that will keep your army rolling, despite perilously long supply lines and the constant threat of being cut-off.

It’s a great introduction to the sub-genre of operational war games, and a welcome change of perspective for those of us wondering what really makes a war run. If they can’t be fed or equipped, it doesn’t matter how well a soldier is shooting.

Operation Flashpoint

Sometimes the most sobering thing you can do to drive home the vulnerability of battle in war games is to strip away everything we’re used to in a shooter – regenerating armour, piles of hit points, copious cover – and show how quickly we’d really last under fire. Operation Flashpoint is a concerted effort to do just that.

Related: hone in your crosshairs on the best sniper games around

At the start of each mission you’re presented with a briefing, handed a map, compass, watch, and notebook. Then you’re booted onto an unforgiving island in 1980s Eastern Europe. You might be guarding a base, engaging in reconnaissance, bearing down on an objective, or simply driving a truck – but all the time, you’ll be acutely aware of the sudden death that awaits you if you slip up. Bohemia’s Arma 3 is a successful (and far prettier) continuation of the same feel.

Company of Heroes

Carentan is a rural town in northern France with a lovely old church. It was also a strategic objective in the Second World War – perched as it was between Utah and Omaha beaches – and hosted perhaps the finest RTS level ever crafted in Company of Heroes.

Read more: keep yourself up at night with the best horror games

Relic spent many months pacing that one mission before pitching the demo to publishers. Evidently, THQ saw the game for what it was – a push towards making real-time strategy experiential rather than mechanical. The developers intended players to feel empathy for their enemies, even as – especially as – they encircled the Germans during the decisive Falaise Pocket. A number of real-life battles are rendered from above in Company of Heroes.

Company of Heroes is one of those war games where your concerns weren’t abstract resources but manpower, munitions, and fuel. For the first time, RTS encounters felt like desperate skirmishes rather than cold strategic manoeuvres. For the first time, they felt human. If you’re still looking to scratch that itch, Ancestors Legacy’s brutality is much inspired by Company of Heroes.

Panzer Corps 2

After nine years in development, Panzer Corps 2 is finally here. It’s been a wait, but the WW2 strategy game has arrived with plenty to show for it. There are 1,000 unit types, 61 single-player scenarios, and a random map generator for single-player and multiplayer skirmishes. If that’s not enough, there is 4K support, custom camouflages and insignias for units, and dozens of map skins for various locations, seasons, and weather.

Hopefully this list has shown you there’s much more to war games than RTS strategy or scoring multiple headshots. Conflict is a huge part of games, and there as many ways of exploring it as there are games in the genre. So from thoughtful explorations of violence to intense firefights, the PC really does have it all when it comes to war games. If you prefer your fights a bit more mechanical, why not check out the best tank games? But until next time, make… videogames… not… war? Well, playing is almost like making, right?

Flight simulators and aircraft combat games serve a solid niche for those of us that like to take to the skies when we're not doing other things with our computers. Here's a roundup of the top ones you can download today, with prices from free to reasonable and the focus from arcade-style action to ultra-realistic flight sim. They're not only great games, they're some of the best Mac games you can find.

X-Plane is without peer on the Mac. Calling X-Plane a game isn't just wrong, but it's insulting: X-Plane is the definitive flight simulator for the platform. Intricately detailed, it's also incredibly scalable - X-Plane runs on mobile, oz77n home Macs and PCs, and also operates as a detailed professional-grade aviation simulator.

More than 30 aircraft are available in the default installation: You can fly everything from a single-engine Cessna 172 — the most popular airplane in the world — to a B-2 bomber. The app models fixed and rotary wing aircraft both, along with tons of atmospheric conditions that affect flight. It even simulates what'd be like to fly the Space Shuttle. More than 1,400 additional aircraft models can be downloaded online. And you can fly almost anywhere: Land at more than 33,000 airports worldwide, touch down on an aircraft carrier and more.

A free demo is available, so don't let the price tag scare you off. Given the incredible level of detail and the huge ecosystem that supports X-Plane, it's well worth the money if you take your flight simulation seriously.

• $59.99 - Download now

FlightGear

An open source flight simulator, FlightGear is a bit more do-it-yourself than some of the other apps in this list, but it's still remarkable and definitely worth checking out. You download the central app, airplane models and scenery separately. Hundreds of aircraft models are available for download.

FlightGear's rough open source edges show, but if you're a developer or a code tinkerer, there's fun to be had here. And for everyone else, plenty of fun airplanes to fly and scenery to explore.

• Free - Download now

WarBirds

Total Sims' WarBirds flight combat game has going since 1995. Take to the skies behind the yoke of dozens of legendary World War II-era aircraft. Single player mode consists of 20 training modules, 12 instant missions, and five different Free Flight modes. What's more, you can play offline for free, for as long as you want.

But the real meat of this game is in online play, which does incur a monthly fee to continue to play. You go on raids with squadrons of other real-world players as you reenact many famous battles of World War II. Total Sims is a bit funky with their Mac support; their FAQs reference Apple's GameSprocket technology, which went out the door when Classic Mac OS gave way to OS X more than a decade ago. But it goes to show just how long WarBirds has been on the platform, too.

• $13.95 (monthly, free offline play) - Download now

Falcon 4.0: Allied Force

Graphic Simulations has been making flight sims for the Macintosh since the early 1990s. Falcon 4.0: Allied Force is the latest iteration of its classic F-16 Falcon flight simulator, taking you to the Balkans and the Korean peninsula for realistic combat missions.

Arm your aircraft with realistic weapons and ordnance, then fly missions deep into hostile territory with a dynamic campaign engine that changes things every time you play.

• $9.99 - Download now

Sky Gamblers: Storm Raiders

Atypical Games' entry is an absolute must if you want to dogfight World War II style. The game features terrific graphics and easy to understand gameplay. There are single-player missions here but where the game really shines is in multiplayer dogfighting combat, which has been the series' strength. A variety of different online game modes test your skill, like Capture The Flag and Last Man Standing.

Sky Gamblers supports iCloud and Game Center - any progress you make in game can be saved to the cloud. It also supports a joystick or gamepad, which is a must for any flight sim, as far as I'm concerned. $5 gets you plenty of game play, but there are in app purchases that let you unlock new customization features and new airplane models.

• $4.99 - Download now

F/18 Carrier Landing II Pro

It's obviously a port of a game that originated on iOS, but it's lots of fun regardless. Take off and land from aircraft carriers and airstrips in some of the most legendary combat aircraft flying: the F-A/18 Super Hornet, F-14 Super Tomcat, F-16 Fighting Falcon and MiG-29K are all represented, along with the Harrier, F35B Lightning II and more.

RORTOS calls itself maker of the most advanced flight sims for mobile, and they're pretty snazzy on the Mac too. More than thirty missions along with a half-dozen training missions and free flight so you can buzz around on your own with no agenda.

• $5.99 - Download now

Heads up, virtual pilots — what'd I leave out?

This is my list of favorites right now, but I'm sure I've left some off that you love too. Feel free to let me know in the comments!

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