Apple Silicon gets a taste of horror as Cronos: The New Dawn comes to Mac

By Shimul Sood Published April 9, 2026

Bloober Team

Bloober Team is bringing its award-winning survival horror title Cronos: The New Dawn to Mac, with native Apple silicon support rolling out on April 28. And no, this isn’t just another late port quietly slipping into the ecosystem — it’s another sign that Mac gaming is slowly, but steadily, stepping into the spotlight.

A survival horror trip through time

Originally launched last September across PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch 2, Windows, and Linux, Cronos: The New Dawn carved out a distinctive place as a survival horror experience. The premise is as unsettling as it sounds. Players are thrown into a brutal, decaying future where survival is anything but guaranteed. You’re fighting creatures that merge, evolve, and become even more terrifying as the world around you collapses.

And just when you think you understand the chaos, the game twists the knife: you can travel back in time to harvest souls and uncover the origins of the apocalypse that wiped out humanity. Because apparently, surviving the end of the world wasn’t complicated enough already.

Mac gaming gets another serious win

Bloober Team is rolling out native Apple silicon support, along with Apple’s modern graphics technologies like MetalFX Upscaling, which arrived with macOS 26 Tahoe. MetalFX is part of Apple’s broader push to make demanding games run smoother and look sharper on its own hardware without requiring brute-force power alone. This means Cronos is optimized for Mac.

This announcement also follows another notable moment: the day-one Mac launch of Crimson Desert alongside PlayStation and Xbox versions. That kind of simultaneous release used to feel almost unthinkable on macOS. Apple has been steadily positioning the Mac as more than just a “can it run games?” platform. With Apple silicon, improved developer tools, and technologies like MetalFX, the company is clearly trying to make gaming a real use case.

Recommended Videos

To be clear, Cronos: The New Dawn isn’t a new release, but its arrival on Mac still matters. Every major title that lands natively adds weight to Apple’s long-running pitch: that the Mac can be a serious gaming machine, not just a creative workstation that occasionally dabbles in play. And if survival horror in a collapsing future is part of that pitch? Well, Apple might be leaning into the drama a little harder than expected. Either way, April 28 is one more date Mac gamers can circle.

Contributor

Shimul is a contributor at Digital Trends, with over five years of experience in the tech space.

Topics

Tech News

Gaming

Epic is improving its game launcher with a long overdue speed boost and plenty of new features

Epic Games Store Launcher V2 could finally address years of user complaints

Epic Games has spent years trying to make the Epic Games Store a serious rival to Steam. It has given away free games, signed exclusivity deals, and kept major PC releases such as Borderlands 3, Assassin’s Creed Mirage, and The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria away from Valve’s storefront at launch. Those moves have helped Epic build an audience, but they have not been enough to seriously threaten Steam’s position as the default PC gaming platform.

One problem has been the launcher itself. Earlier this year, an Epic executive admitted to Eurogamer that the launcher “sucks,” and the company now appears to be working on a much bigger fix. According to slides from an Unreal Fest presentation shared by LuKaOnIndeed on X, Epic is developing Launcher V2, a ground-up rebuild of the Epic Games Store launcher that is supposed to be much faster and easier to use.

Gaming

Forget RTX filters. BenQ’s gaming monitor does the pretty stuff itself

BenQ’s AI game filters are what I wanted RTX filters to be

BenQ AI Gaming Monitor Filters

I’ve spent years messing with in-game brightness sliders, GPU filters, HDR modes, and monitor presets to tinker with my experience on my favorite games. Of course, I'd always go with the original artists' intent first, but replaying these titles with new filters does freshen up the atmosphere.

This is why I was particularly impressed by BenQ’s new MOBIUZ gaming monitors. During a recent visit to BenQ’s Taiwan HQ, I got a hands-on look at the company’s latest AI-powered game filter tech, and it immediately made more sense than I expected. The company isn't just slapping on the "AI" sticker onto a gaming display. What you are getting here is custom touches to change up your experience by pulling from BenQ’s game art database that automatically tunes brightness, contrast, and color balance to match the game’s visual style. The fun part is that your performance doesn't take a hit.

Gaming

Sony’s wild PSN login patent could turn the DualSense into a security gatekeeper

A newly published filing outlines controller-based sign-ins for PlayStation users, aiming to make stolen accounts harder to exploit.

Geoff Keighley holding DualSense.

Sony has filed a PSN login patent, first spotted by RespawnFirst, that would pull the DualSense controller into the sign-in process. A PlayStation console would start the request, then the controller would help confirm that the account holder is close enough to approve access.

For players, the appeal is easy to see. PSN account abuse can lead to unauthorized purchases, lost access, and attempts to resell established accounts. Sony already offers 2-step verification and passkeys, but this idea adds a hardware check to the login chain.