Game launcher

[MatrixCL]

To record runs and preset some settings, one needs to create a shortcut to the game and add the parameters. Or run it from the console (command prompt in Windows).

As I'm a full stack developer by profession and have MS Visual Studio (not just Code), I was thinking of writing a simple game launcher. A Windows forms application with which you can select a couple of options and then run. The separate launcher with then launch the game with the correct command parameters.

I'm a little surprised I wasn't able to find one of those on this website, so I wanted to double check whether there really isn't one already. And if not, would there be any interest in that, or would I just be doing it for myself?

[Caligari87]

There are man many existing programs for this. I'm not sure what you tried, but googling "doom launcher" will give plenty of results, most of which should be compatible with 90% of Doom engines. The [wiki]Frontend[/wiki] page on the ZDoom wiki also lists several which specifically have G/ZDoom compatibility.

Some of these are abandoned and out of date of course, and some may not have all the features you want. In that case, it's fine to write your own or fork an existing one. It's not really a feature suggestion for the engine though.

[MatrixCL]

Right, I'll admit I wasn't very thorough in my search. Basically I expected that if there would be any, then surely the download page here would show it, since it includes several other 3rd party software as well.

But thanks for the link! I checked them all out and none are really what I was looking for. So I might make one myself anyway. We clearly don't have enough.

[Caligari87]

Basically I expected that if there would be any, then surely the download page here would show it, since it includes several other 3rd party software as well.

But... it does...

Support
ZDL
Want a simple launcher to make using ZDoom easier? Try this.

Anyway, yeah, making your own is fine too. I use a custom bash script on Linux to launch my favorite mods.

[MatrixCL]

Basically I expected that if there would be any, then surely the download page here would show it, since it includes several other 3rd party software as well.

But... it does...

Well I'll be damned, I see ZDL right there now. I completely missed it.

My idea was actually to copy the options from the game (all of them eventually, but starting with the most important once) rather than having to fill in command-line arguments. But if it stores what arguments you used earlier, I guess it won't be worth the effort to make my own.