How to play Xenogears on Mac

Game summary

Xenogears follows protagonist Fei Fong Wong and several others as they journey to uncover the truth behind mysterious, cabalistic entities operating in their world. The principles and philosophies of Friedrich Nietzsche, Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung influence the plot, character design, and world of Xenogears. Additionally, the symbols, theological concepts, and devotional practices of several world religions are represented in fictionalized forms in the game. Major psychological themes are the nature of identity and human memory, particularly as these relate to the phenomenon of dissociative identity disorder. The relationship between humanity and machines is central to the game's plot, as indicated by the presence of giant robots dubbed "gears," which almost each playable character can control.
First released: Feb 1998

Play Xenogears on Mac with Parallels (virtualized)

The easiest way to play Xenogears 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).

Xenogears 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 Xenogears like you would on any PC.
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🕹 Editor's notes

Xenogears is a role-playing game based on a human colony in the far future. This game took the JRPGs to a new level in the 90s, making it one of the pioneers in this game type.

This game was a big success as it got its greatest hits released on the PS4, proving its impact on the JRPG gaming genre. Xenogears was developed by SquareSoft and published by Square EA in the late 90s.

You can find this game on all PlayStation consoles, and it is a single-player game mode.

Plot

The plot of this game revolves around a young man named Wong, whose village gets demolished in the most unimaginable way. His village was caught up in a fight between two opposing nations, and he was left to go in search of justice.

This battle between the two nations commenced because of a mechanized mecha called Gears. In the midst of all this chaos, Wong finds himself in the driver’s seat of the Weltall.

The storyline has deep philosophical roots in this game, and Wong is the bearer of all the undertones. He is controlled by a higher power which he has no power over. All these experiences mold his character in the game, which is a long story.’

Gameplay

The game is divided into two discs, with the first having almost 40 hours of gameplay. Here, Wong and his comrades go on a mission across the world on a flying ship and experience all kinds of battles.

The second disc is more of a refelective session, where Wong has a lot of boss battles. The game has turn-based gameplay, which sounds disappointing for such an excellent build-up story.

However, turn-based RPG games were a hit in the 90s, so it is not surprising to see the impact Xenogears has had in the modern RPG genre.

Games like Xenogears playable on Mac