Amiga.com sells emulated Amiga titles

MethodGit · 23 November 2007, 16:07

I did check to see if this had been reported/discussed already, but seemingly not.

It appears the folks over at Amiga Inc have attempted to cash in on the emulation market somewhat by selling some downloadable Amiga games for Windows at $4.99 a pop. It's not a very large list to be honest, and mostly consists of select Cinemaware and Vulcan titles anyway. Out of interest, I proceeded to examine this further by purchasing a download of the oldest game on the list - Commodore's Mind Walker. It installs well, and appears to consist of a single executable, though during initial installation it'll download and install a seperate program called Amiga Classic Engine - another single executable, and which appears to be an offshoot of WinUAE. In fact, you even get a bonus download in the form of the customized source code used for these single-emulation games, known officially as "WinUAE Caveman". Maybe Toni can shed a bit more light on this?

Running MindWalker starts up the game straight away in 16-bit full screen mode (although not quite straight away as it shows the classic AmigaDOS 1.3 screen beforehand). Wondering if the GUI would pop up if I pressed F12, it instead plonked me back to Windows. Hmmm. Running the "Amiga Classic Engine" exe directly though, brings me the GUI. It appears to be based on a slightly older version of WinUAE (as in it uses the recent vertical GUI format, but lacks some of the more recent features added in the latest WinUAE).

I believe I also saw JOTD's name mentioned during the installation process, so I'm led to believe he also has knowledge about this business somehow?

So yeah, this may not go down as popular with many people all round, but I thought I'd report on it at least.

alexh · 23 November 2007, 16:32

This was announced ages ago but this is the first I've heard about how it works.

I had Bill McEwan contact me about Thalion games and a colleague about Eclipse titles months and months ago.

They are only offering 25% of the $4.99 to the developers without whom they wouldn't have a business model.

Zetr0 · 23 November 2007, 17:01

lets be serious though.... its taking the piss a bit isn't it?

Graham Humphrey · 23 November 2007, 18:00

Zetr0 that is one hell of an understatement.

alexh · 23 November 2007, 18:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zetr0

lets be serious though.... its taking the piss a bit isn't it?

No more than Nintendo's Virtual console, from whom they got the idea.

If they had written it as an app for the Xbox360 (development not that dissimilar to windows) and sold games through Xbox-Arcade we would have signed up.

Fred the Fop · 25 November 2007, 12:35

Quote:

Originally Posted by alexh

No more than Nintendo's Virtual console, from whom they got the idea.

If they had written it as an app for the Xbox360 (development not that dissimilar to windows) and sold games through Xbox-Arcade we would have signed up.

Yeah, but Nintendo is legitimate (albeit flawed) giant, with great respect. Amiga.inc is nothing, not even worth a used tampon.

ant512 · 25 November 2007, 14:09

25% of $4.99 is better than 100% of nothing. Assuming the contract gives Amiga Inc nothing but a licence to distribute the games, and they're not trying to pinch the copyrights, the only negative for the original coders is the unclean feeling they get from working with McEwan.

jotd · 25 November 2007, 14:17

I've signed an agreement with Amiga Inc which allows them to use my WHDload slaves for their game packs.
Also Bert has made a special WHDLoad version for the system.

The whole thing is wrapped and blackboxed so we don't see whdload acting in the background.

In exchange, I'm entitled to as many games as there are slaves from me which are used in the whole game library. Since my work is freeware, I don't mind.

They add to enhance WinUAE to fit their needs, but could not modify it because of the GPL license (or they would have to give away their code). I guess they hacked around it to avoid legal issues.

Pyromania · 25 November 2007, 18:53

The more ways there are to run Amiga games and applications the better.

23 November 2007, 16:07	#1
MethodGit Junior Member Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: The Streets Age: 40 Posts: 2,731	Amiga.com sells emulated Amiga titles I did check to see if this had been reported/discussed already, but seemingly not. It appears the folks over at Amiga Inc have attempted to cash in on the emulation market somewhat by selling some downloadable Amiga games for Windows at $4.99 a pop. It's not a very large list to be honest, and mostly consists of select Cinemaware and Vulcan titles anyway. Out of interest, I proceeded to examine this further by purchasing a download of the oldest game on the list - Commodore's Mind Walker. It installs well, and appears to consist of a single executable, though during initial installation it'll download and install a seperate program called Amiga Classic Engine - another single executable, and which appears to be an offshoot of WinUAE. In fact, you even get a bonus download in the form of the customized source code used for these single-emulation games, known officially as "WinUAE Caveman". Maybe Toni can shed a bit more light on this? Running MindWalker starts up the game straight away in 16-bit full screen mode (although not quite straight away as it shows the classic AmigaDOS 1.3 screen beforehand). Wondering if the GUI would pop up if I pressed F12, it instead plonked me back to Windows. Hmmm. Running the "Amiga Classic Engine" exe directly though, brings me the GUI. It appears to be based on a slightly older version of WinUAE (as in it uses the recent vertical GUI format, but lacks some of the more recent features added in the latest WinUAE). I believe I also saw JOTD's name mentioned during the installation process, so I'm led to believe he also has knowledge about this business somehow? So yeah, this may not go down as popular with many people all round, but I thought I'd report on it at least.

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23 November 2007, 16:32	#2
alexh Thalion Webshrine Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Oxford Posts: 14,475	This was announced ages ago but this is the first I've heard about how it works. I had Bill McEwan contact me about Thalion games and a colleague about Eclipse titles months and months ago. They are only offering 25% of the $4.99 to the developers without whom they wouldn't have a business model.

23 November 2007, 17:01	#3
Zetr0 Ya' like it Retr0? Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: United Kingdom Age: 49 Posts: 9,768	lets be serious though.... its taking the piss a bit isn't it?

23 November 2007, 18:00	#4
Graham Humphrey Moderator Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: Norwich, Norfolk, UK Age: 37 Posts: 11,168	Zetr0 that is one hell of an understatement.

25 November 2007, 14:09	#7
ant512 Registered User Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: California Posts: 965	25% of $4.99 is better than 100% of nothing. Assuming the contract gives Amiga Inc nothing but a licence to distribute the games, and they're not trying to pinch the copyrights, the only negative for the original coders is the unclean feeling they get from working with McEwan.

25 November 2007, 14:17	#8
jotd This cat is no more Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: FRANCE Age: 52 Posts: 8,381	I've signed an agreement with Amiga Inc which allows them to use my WHDload slaves for their game packs. Also Bert has made a special WHDLoad version for the system. The whole thing is wrapped and blackboxed so we don't see whdload acting in the background. In exchange, I'm entitled to as many games as there are slaves from me which are used in the whole game library. Since my work is freeware, I don't mind. They add to enhance WinUAE to fit their needs, but could not modify it because of the GPL license (or they would have to give away their code). I guess they hacked around it to avoid legal issues.

25 November 2007, 18:53	#9
Pyromania Moderator Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: Chicago, IL Posts: 3,396	The more ways there are to run Amiga games and applications the better.

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