How to play Sansan on Mac

Game summary

Sansan (サンサン) is an online service allowing people living in Japan to play the abstract strategy board game Go with other subscribers over the internet on a Windows PC. However, at its launch in 1994, a version for the Sega Mega Drive was also made available. This version of the game allows players who have a Sega Mega Modem to connect over a 33.3kbps or ISDN line to play other members who have a Sansan ID. However, as of 2011, there are no known Mega Drive-compatible Sansan servers. A local two-player version of the game is also included for play. For whatever reason, the Mega Drive version did not last very long — it is one of the rarest and most sought-after Mega Drive games; Sega of Japan's official archive doesn't list it (despite Sansan Co., Ltd. having T-series code T-147) and a ROM was not dumped until February 2011. The Windows PC version of the service continues to this day.
First released: Sep 1994

Play Sansan on Mac with Parallels (virtualized)

The easiest way to play Sansan 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).

Sansan 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 Sansan like you would on any PC.
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