Questions
What you need to bring, why two of Apple's own files make the games look right, and where your saves are kept.
The games were made for a Mac, and lean on pieces of the Mac that were never part of the game. Apple's licences don't let this site hand those out, so you bring them once, and every game uses them.
Holds Chicago, Geneva and the other fonts the menus, dialogs and status lines are drawn in, and the colour Apple menu. Any System 7 file works, or a disk image with one on it.
Gives the Mac's own black arrow, drawn at the screen's scale. The site reads a Color Classic ROM; without one, your browser's pointer stands in.
Drop either file on any page of the site, or on a game. It's kept in this browser and used by every game from then on.
Your own copy of the game: the disk image or archive it came on (.dsk, .img, .sit, .hqx and the like). Drop it on the site and it finds the game and its version. A few games whose licence allows it are offered here to play straight away.
Each port is rewritten from one release of its game, checked routine by routine against that release. Another version has different code and data, so the site names the version it needs and tells you when a copy differs.
On a PC keyboard it is Alt; on a Mac it is ⌘. Menu shortcuts are written as “⌘ or Alt + key” on each game page. Ctrl is left to your browser.
Browsers keep pages silent until you click or press a key. Press Play on the game first; the sound starts with it.
Without the System file the site has no Mac fonts, so your browser's own stand in. They are close in size but not in shape, which is why text can look plain or a little off. Drop a System 7 file once and every game draws in Chicago and Geneva, as on a Mac.
They are Apple's, in Apple's System file, and its licence doesn't allow passing it on. The same goes for the ROM. The site only reads the copy you give it, in your browser.
A System file is on any System 7 install or startup disk; a disk image of one works as it is. A ROM is read from a Mac you own with a ROM-dumping tool.
No. Like your games, they are read and kept in this browser only. The site has no server to send them to.
No. What you drop is read by the page in your browser and kept in the browser's own storage. Nothing leaves your computer.
In the same storage, for this site and this browser. Saving needs no file dialog. Clearing the site's data in your browser's settings removes your copies and saves too.
Some ports can export a save as a file, in the original's own format, to import on another computer or into the original game.
No. Each game's original code is read, understood and written again, then checked against the original's results. An emulator runs the old code unchanged; About explains the difference.
It plays as the version it follows: the same rules, numbers and pictures. A few things are changed on purpose, to fit the site or to play better today, such as smoother frames, keys that suit a modern keyboard, or how quitting and saving work. Each game's page lists what it adds.
Each port takes months. The home page lists the games that are playable and the ones being worked on.