Good Games for PowerMac G4 Quicksilver

You've probably figured out already that most new games want a much newer processor. I've run into that too. You're going to be shopping the used market.

How much VRAM does the nVidea 6800 have? Should bbe plenty.

Depends on the kind of games you like. Over the years my son and I have shared the "Dark Forces/Jedi Knight" franchise from the Star Wars Universe. Lucas Arts skipped the Mac platform with with the original Jedi Knight and returned to it with "Jedi Knight 2: Jedi Outcast" and later, "Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy." The later is the more demanding but runs fine on my G4 1.25 single processor. There is occasionally an outside scene that get a little choppy but it's not a dealbreaker.

As for WW2 games, the earlier "Medal of Honor: Allied Assault" and MOH "Spearhead" run fine. Later versions of the MOH franchise may need more computer.

One of my favorites is the "No One Lives Forever" pair. All tongue-in-cheek, poking fun at 1960's spy movies that combined some puzzle solving with a FPS. The first version ran OK on a G3/500 PowerMac; NOLF2 needs a G4 but should do fine at 1gHz.

I know what Apple says about the minimum RAM for Leopard, but I would be looking for more RAM before getting games. Think a minimum of 1G. I don't have a QS but, for specs I found, it looks like you can install three 512MB sticks for a total of 1.5gHz. THe required PC133 is getting a little pricey but gaming uses a lot of RAM. This is QS RAM from one of my two preferred RAM vendors:

http://www.datamemorysystems.com/apple_info/Apple_PowerMac_Dual_Quick_Silver_1GHz_Memory1246.asp

Some good choices . . . .

Call of duty (1 & 2)
Bloodrayne
Return to castle wolfenstein
Giants Citizen Kubatu
Alice American McGee's
Halo
Medal of honor
Fallout 1 & 2
Baldur's Gate
Dungeon Siege
Max Payne
Total immersion racing
Ford racing 2
Collin Mc Rae racing
Battlefield 1942
Tomb raider
Oni
Evo 4x4
rayman 3
Neverwinter nights
Unreal Tournament

some tips for which ones run on 10.5 vs 10.4 and universal binary should you upgrade later . . . .
http://www.insidemacgames.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=31884
http://guides.macrumors.com/UniversalBinaryGames

If you're going to be serious about getting the best performance out of your Quicksilver, you should be starting by adding two 512MB modules of RAM and a larger, faster hard drive. With RAM, more is better, and too much is just enough; and with hard drives, 40GB just isn't large enough anymore, especially with Leopard, and 5400RPM is slow,slow,slow.

jws

Another vote for Oni

http://www.feralinteractive.com/game/oni

OpenArena is free and plays great on my G4 (specs below) with the graphics maxed.
Upgrading your RAM would be a good idea though.

Good to see Oni back. That was another my son and I used to enjoy. I didn't mention it because the version we have (the original) requires an OS9 boot to work properly--Classic mode won't cut it.

The Aspyr site implies CoD2 won't work on our machines:

CPU Processor: PowerPC G5 or Intel chipset
CPU Speed: 1.8 GHz

The original CoD demo runs great on my G4/1.25SP

Oni osx update:

http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/games/demos_updates/oni.html

COD2 works on my mac: G4 MDD 1GHZ Dual 9800XT 2GB Ram (also worked with a 9800 Pro)

Thanks! Have already sent the link you provided to my son!

Under Classic, the original version was a little choppy and, for some starnge reason, a USB mouse would only allow 180° of rotation of the character instead of teh 360° that you could achieve under OS9. It always ran better with an OS9 boot which is something my son's MDD can do.

CoD2 works well on my QS.

CoD2 works well on my QS

Based on that, I found the CoD2 demo and it runs--but not great--on my 1.25Ghz SP MDD (10.4.11; 1.75G RAM; Radeon 9000). It's still a little choppy. The big issue is lack of color depth. I guess the stock R9000 vid card is struggling as it's not among those the sysregs say are required.

The color looks badly shifted. Smoke and dust are are rather odd shade of azure and darned near opaque, and many stationary objects glow with a lurid red. I don't see a color-depth option in the gfx setting. I just tried it minutes ago so still need to play with the settings. Even with the CoD1 demo, I had to tweak to get around odd colors.

If I didn't have a critical need for OS9 gfx support from my MBDD, I'd upgrade my card.

Allan,
Same thing when I had my 9000 Pro (smoke and dust etc . .)
The 9000 Pro does not meet the graphics card requirements

Looks great after installing the 9800 Pro and 9800Xt.
The video card is more of a requirement than the cpu you have.
Runs great on my Dual Mdd 1Ghz 9800Xt 2Gb Ram

Patrick wrote:

The 9000 Pro does not meet the graphics card requirements

Yep, saw that before I downloaded so I expected problems and noted it above. Did the weird red glow on the objects go away with a better card?

I don't want to chance loosing OS9 hardware acceleration support on the MDD. I have an old CAD program that creates a certain style of technical drawing that has to remain consistent. I started this series in 2000 and continue to add to it for my old employer even now that I'm retired. No other CAD or illustration program works the same as the old one, and it doesn't work properly under Classic emulation.

By the time the company decides to update the drawings with current tools, I'll have retired the G4 anyway.

My wife's eMac 1.42G has the ATI 9600 chipset with 64MB VRAM so I may try it on that unit for grins.

My wife's eMac 1.42G has the ATI 9600 chipset with 64MB VRAM so I may try it on that unit for grins.

Works. No color shifts nor glowing red objects. Looked pretty good!

Aspyr Game Agent will list all of their titles and tell which ones your particular system can run, they have a pretty good library of titles:
http://www.aspyr.com/product/info/63
another cool 3D game, I am still just getting into, Indiana Jones and the Emperor's Tomb, pretty impressive graphics
http://www.aspyr.com/product/game_specs/28

Some other Mac game publishers to check out
http://www.freeverse.com/
http://www.pangeasoft.net/index2.html

and you can browse for free demos here to try out for yourself:
http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/games/