Task: Launch Amiga Games, Demos, and Music from Workbench Using TinyLauncher
Needed: Amiga Computer, TinyLauncher Software
Time: 15-30 to Install and Set Up
Introduction
One of the great advantages of using an Amiga with a hard drive is WHDLoad, which makes it possible to run thousands of classic Amiga games and demos directly from hard disk rather than constantly swapping floppy disks. WHDLoad is extremely powerful, but browsing through drawers full of installed games from Workbench isn’t necessarily the most elegant way to use it.
I have previously posted about the Amiga Game Selector which is a powerful and convenient software package for launching games, software, and demos from Workbench. Another option is the lightweight TinyLauncher which is a small, fast front end for launching WHDLoad games and demos. It can also organize and play classic Amiga MOD music. It requires very little memory, can be operated largely from the keyboard or joystick, and gives an Amiga equipped with a hard drive or CF card the feel of a dedicated retro gaming system.
For this project, I installed and experimented with TinyLauncher on an Amiga 4000 with a 68040 processor, 16 MB of RAM, and an IDE CompactFlash hard drive. It is an especially nice application for a hard-drive-equipped Amiga, although TinyLauncher is certainly not limited to the A4000.
Instructions
I have previously posted about installing WHDLoad games on an Amiga computer. This is worth doing first to get the most out of TinyLauncher.
First, download and uncompress TinyLauncher from Aminet. Copy the TinyLauncher drawer to a convenient location on your hard drive or CF card. For a CF card, the easiest thing to do is to mount your card as a hard drive in an emulator such as WinUAE. From there you can mount a folder on your PC and copy the files over. There is no requirement that your games themselves be stored inside the TinyLauncher drawer.
Second, launch TinyLauncher and use the right arrow to navigate to SysConfig and hit Enter. Press one of numbers to set the path to your games, demos, or music Mods. Once the path has been set then press F1, F2, or F3 to update the database with the games, demos, and/or music files.
Third, you are ready to launch! Simply choose games, demos, or music from the menu and then select what you want to launch from the list. Use the left and right arrows or joystick to move from page to page.
Comments
This was my first time using TinyLauncher and I was very impressed. Super easy to use and not loaded with unnecessary features. Worth a try!