The best, *well-meaning advice* I can offer is: if you plan on doing more than playing casual, very inexpensive games every now and then (like Tic-Tac-Toe, or Pac Man, etc.), absolutely, positively do *not* buy a Mac. You will almost never buy a game written natively for the Mac's OS X version of OpenGL (OS X doesn't support Windows' DirectX/D3d API which is used in ~99 out of every 100 games released today)--what you will get is a *port* of the original game, ported almost always by a company *other* than the company that originally developed the game. A second-string company, in other words. That's not 100% the rule--just ~98% of it, or so.

*D3d games ported to OS X's OpenGL API, aside from being merely a port of the original Windows game and actually *not* the original game itself, also suffer because Apple is batting with an OpenGL API version somewhere close to OpenGL for Windows' version 3.x--about a decade or so behind the current OpenGL API for Windows, which is now at version4.x. Bluntly, what this means is that there are quite a few D3d API features in current Windows D3d games that *cannot* ever be ported directly to OS X's OpenGL version because there are no equivalent or similar capabilities in the current version of OpenGL supported by OS X. Shortcuts have to be taken, compromises made, etc., just to get the games to run. IE, OS X is just an all-around rotten OS for gaming--and that's the bottom line. (Which is not to say that OS X is awful for everything else--it's not! It's merely pretty awful for gaming, though.)

*OS emulators will always disappoint when it comes to running Windows' games on a Mac, because you are running a Windows software emulation on top of OS X, which tries to translate calls from D3d (or OpenGL 4.x) which have no equivalency in OS X's current ~3.x version of OpenGL, while also translating Windows code into the nearest OS X equivalencies. Emulators will, however, work OK in those games which put very low demand on hardware in general--games without much in the way of fluid animation, high-resolution support and high and 3d frame-rate support. But, always, what you are getting is second best compared to playing the game on the OS for which it was natively written--you'll pay at least the same price for such games, if not more, then you'll pay for the emulator, but their performance and stability will always be second-rate compared to running Windows games natively on Windows. That is only logical and shouldn't be hard to understand at all.

*Bootcamp by Apple, a software program that automates installing Windows alongside OS X for the general Mac user who would not otherwise know how to begin to do that, is the best solution of them all for playing games on the Mac because everything is being run natively right down to the hardware--no more waiting for ports, no more second-best ports, no more software emulation, etc.. Underneath OS X, every Mac is an x86, 100% IBM-compatible Intel clone of exactly the same kind as are sold every day running Windows instead of OS X. The only fly in the ointment there, unfortunately, is that Apple generally has to supply the hardware drivers for its custom peripherals for which there are no Windows drivers readily available. Bootcamp is light-years ahead of buying OS X game ports of Windows games or running software emulators on top of OS X, etc. It's really the only way to game under OS X that makes sense, imo.

So why is the Mac the red-headed stepchild of the gaming industry? Three reasons, primarily:

1)19 out of every 20 computers sold on planet Earth every day in every year do not run OS X, but some other OS, and that 95% chunk of the market is mostly the Windows' market.

2)The development tools Microsoft supplies to D3d game developers are plentiful and of high quality. Microsoft spends a lot of money supporting Windows D3d game developers with such tools on an ongoing, current basis. Comparatively speaking, Apple support for OS X game developers is non-existent. (Apple being far more concerned with iOS and cell phones than the Mac for the last several years.)

3)Now that Macs have moved to Intel x86 and are x86 clones themselves, Bootcamp is by far the best option for developers wishing to support Mac gaming--by developing for Windows, the small Mac gaming market is now automatically included, the price of admission for a Mac user being only a copy of Windows (generally cheaper than the Windows emulators that sell for the Mac--and of course much better, duh--since now everything is run natively and no software emulation is involved.) Apple supplies the Bootcamp software, standard, with every version of OS X.

The best thing Apple might have done for the Mac gamer is to create Bootcamp--which is by far the best way to game on the Mac! But, really, if you are someone who wants to do more than casually pick up a couple of games a year and someone for whom gaming is actually a quite enjoyable hobby and a major source of personal entertainment--the best thing you can do for yourself is to avoid buying a Mac *like the plague.* If you like gaming there's absolutely no sense in punishing yourself that way.

The way I have always seen it, though, is if you enjoy gaming and you go ahead and buy a Mac *anyway*--well, you really have no ground to stand on as far as complaining goes after having made that very poor decision. This is *not* a slur on OS X or Apple-branded x86 clones; it's merely my personal opinion of what a gamer lets himself in for if he unwisely buys a Mac. If you don't plan to do much at all in the way of computer gaming--then hey, the Mac is the equal of many other x86 clones and OS X has many things to commend it. Gaming, however, and unfortunately, is not one of them...;)