How to play Amstrad CPC games on your PC using an emulator in 2024

Want to play Amstrad games on your PC? Sean McManus provides a quick guide to using one of the leading free Amstrad emulators.

Winape is an Amstrad CPC emulator written by Richard Wilson (not me!) for Microsoft Windows. You can use it to play pretty much any Amstrad game you can get a digital copy of, including my own disc of games and programming utilities.

1. Download Winape
   At the time of writing, the latest version is 2.0b2 and the file size is about 1MB. Any version number with the letter b in it is a beta release, which usually means it is an early release. While I've had no problems with it myself and Richard has set high standards for his version releases, downloading the software is at your own risk. But then, that's true of any software if you read the small print...

2. Download some games
   Emulators usually use dsk files, which are emulator-compatible copies of Amstrad disks. Some emulators also use sna files, which are like multiface grabs. I'm only dealing with dsk files here, because most software is available in that format.

3. Unzip Winape
   Winape downloads as a zip file, which is a compressed file containing lots of other files. In this case, it contains all the Winape files. Before we can start using Winape we need to uncompress the zip file you downloaded. Double-click on it. If you're using Windows, Winape will open like a normal folder. Extract all the files.

4. Run Winape
   Go to the folder where you extracted the Winape files. Open it and double click on the Winape icon:

   

   The Winape icon

5. Ignore DirectPlay
   It might say that it needs to install DirectPlay to work, but you can skip the installation without any adverse effects.

6. Insert disc
   Go to the file menu, select Drive A and then select Insert Disc Image. You can now load the disc file you downloaded earlier into the emulator.

   

   Screenshot showing Winape Insert Disc menu option

7. Catalogue disc
   Now you've inserted the disc, you can use CAT to get a directory of what's on it. Often you'll only see one file listed, typically called DISC. Look out for files called MENU or anything else that looks like it might be the program that starts the disc.

   

   Screenshot of an excerpt of a directory listing

8. Run software
   Once you've found out what the main program on the disc is called, the command you need to use is RUN"DISC or RUN"MENU or something similar substituting your filename. You should then see your software begin...

   

   Screenshot of The Further Adventures of Fred, one of the programs on my free Amstrad games disc

9. Reset machine
   To reset the emulator, hold down the control key and press the F9 key along the top of the keyboard - this is a real function key on your PC, not one on the numeric keypad. You can also use Shift, Control and Escape, just like on a real Amstrad! Your disc remains inserted in the drive when you reset.

10. Save game
    To save a game in progress, use the Save Snapshot option in the toolbar at the bottom of the Winape Window. It looks like a camera pointing at a disc. You can use the Load Snapshot option to load a saved game. Snapshot files are often used to distribute tape games online.

    

    Screenshot showing Save snapshot button on toolbar

11. Nich Campbell's website CPC Game Reviews has plenty of games to download, together with reviews and screenshots.

More Amstrad CPC tutorials and software

Find all my Amstrad CPC tutorials here, and download my updated software disc here!