How to play Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story on Mac

Game summary

Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story is the third game in the Mario & Luigi series of games. Players control Mario and Luigi simultaneously in the side-scrolling platform environment of Bowser's body, while also controlling the Koopa King himself in the top-down world of the Mushroom Kingdom. Similar to games like Earthbound, enemy encounters are seen as actual enemies that players can avoid or attempt to strike early. The actual battles are a combination of turn-based menu attacks, and timed reactions to enemies during battle. By watching the way an enemy reacts, you can anticipate their attack and avoid it or counterattack.
First released: Sep 2009

Play Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story on Mac with Parallels (virtualized)

The easiest way to play Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story 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).

Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story 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 Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story like you would on any PC.
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