How to play Ishar: Legend of the Fortress on Mac

Game summary

The first game in the series came out in 1992 on Amiga, Atari ST and DOS. It takes place on the island of Kendoria. At the beginning, the player controls a warrior called Aramir, and he must defeat Krogh, an evil sorcerer who has killed lord Jarel. The game takes its name from Krogh's fortress, Ishar, whose name means "unknown" in the game's fictional elf language. In order to achieve this, the player's characters must travel across the whole island and, among other things, meet with the surviving companions of Jarel. Most of Ishar takes place in an outdoor environment, which was original for computer roleplaying games of the time. It also featured a unique system to change the lineup of player characters: the player can have up to five characters at the same time, but each one will like or dislike his comrades. These preferences come into play when the player tries to recruit or dismiss a character, because the other characters will then vote for or against the recruitment or dismissal. If a character cannot be dismissed by a vote, it is possible for the player to have him assassinated by another character, but there is a risk that other characters will murder the murderer himself, possibly creating a chain of murders that slays the whole party but one.
First released: Dec 1992

Play Ishar: Legend of the Fortress on Mac with Parallels (virtualized)

The easiest way to play Ishar: Legend of the Fortress 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).

Ishar: Legend of the Fortress 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 Ishar: Legend of the Fortress like you would on any PC.
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