[Mac] Mac version cannot play with Windows at all, not even on LAN, and buyers are not told before purchase

Age of Empires II: DE II - Report a Bug
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GAME BUILD #: 101.103.57257.0 (build 188329) – same version on Mac and Windows
GAME PLATFORM: Steam (Mac: Feral Interactive port via Steam; Windows: Steam)
OPERATING SYSTEM: Mac (Apple Silicon / arm64, macOS 27.0.1) + Windows

Summary

The macOS version of Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition (Feral Interactive port, Steam) cannot play with Windows players at all: not online, not via private lobbies or friend invites, and not even over LAN. Mac players are put in a completely separate multiplayer pool.

Age of Empires Support has now confirmed this to me by email:

“Unfortunately, there isn’t crossplay available for the Mac version of Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition, and currently there aren’t plans to implement it.”

Why this is unacceptable

This is a critical limitation that is not clearly communicated before purchase. Selling the same game on Mac without telling buyers they’re locked out of playing with the Windows/Xbox player base, even on their own LAN, feels misleading. Same game, same build number, same expansions, yet a Mac player cannot join a friend sitting on the same LAN. Nothing in the game tells you either: lobbies just don’t show up, joining by link fails with a cryptic error, and LAN advertisements are silently ignored.

I spent hours troubleshooting my network, firewalls and router before finding out that this is simply by design. Anyone buying the Mac version to play with friends on Windows will hit exactly the same wall.

What I tested (so nobody else has to)

  • Both machines wired on the same LAN, ping ~1.5 ms, no VPN/proxy, firewalls allowed/disabled.
  • Online/private lobby: joining a Windows lobby via aoe2de://0/<id> fails with
    Unable to find match. Invalid match ID. Source: RLink::AdvertisementGetAdvertisementEvent::Result – Error Code: 0xfffffffe
  • LAN: the Windows host broadcasts its LAN advertisement every ~10 s (UDP → 255.255.255.255:9999, length 56). A packet capture shows the packets arriving on the Mac and the Mac game listening on UDP *:9999, yet the Lobby Browser (Server = LAN, all filters enabled) shows “No games matching those parameters found”.
  • The Mac client talks to a different API host (arthurlive-release1-api.worldsedgelink.com) with Feral-specific auth, while Windows uses arthurlive-api, so the separation happens on the backend.

Requests

  1. Put this information upfront: state clearly on the Steam store page, the Mac announcement and the Feral product page that the Mac version has no cross-play with Windows/Xbox, including LAN.
  2. Show an in-game notice in the lobby browser instead of silently hiding lobbies or showing “Invalid match ID”.
  3. Reconsider cross-play, at least for LAN and private lobbies. It’s the same game and the same build.
  4. Offer affected players a fair refund option, since this limitation wasn’t disclosed.