How to play Empire! on Mac

Game summary

Empire! is a game with arcade and strategy in equal measure. You begin with a small Cub Scoutship in the Abatlu system, with your ultimate objective to build a great galactic Empire across the stars. It won't be easy though. You'll have to trade, destroy aliens and complete countless missions before you can claim to be the greatest star pilot of them all. You can collect pods that contain cargo using cargo ropes from either side of your ship. As you make progress, you can upgrade your ship. Starbases are where you head to trade, but to get there you'll need to consult your system map. Warp holes will allow you to travel to other planets, where you can collect ore, other minerals or people to take back to starbases. Just make sure you avoid plague-infested planets! To finally succeed, you'll need to wipe out an alien invasion force. then you can buy starbases. Once you own solar systems then there's one last thing to do - construct a frontier shield that will enclose your Empire!
First released: Dec 1986

Play Empire! on Mac with Parallels (virtualized)

The easiest way to play Empire! on a Mac is through Parallels, which allows you to virtualize a Windows machine on Macs. The setup is very easy and it works for Apple Silicon Macs as well as for older Intel-based Macs.

Parallels supports the latest version of DirectX and OpenGL, allowing you to play the latest PC games on any Mac. The latest version of DirectX is up to 20% faster.

Our favorite feature of Parallels Desktop is that when you turn off your virtual machine, all the unused disk space gets returned to your main OS, thus minimizing resource waste (which used to be a problem with virtualization).

Empire! installation steps for Mac

Step 1
Go to Parallels.com and download the latest version of the software.
Step 2
Follow the installation process and make sure you allow Parallels in your Mac’s security preferences (it will prompt you to do so).
Step 3
When prompted, download and install Windows 10. The download is around 5.7GB. Make sure you give it all the permissions that it asks for.
Step 4
Once Windows is done installing, you are ready to go. All that’s left to do is install Empire! like you would on any PC.
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