How to play Jimmy White's 'Whirlwind' Snooker on Mac

Game summary

Jimmy White's 'Whirlwind' Snooker is a computer game by veteran programmer Archer MacLean, released by Virgin Games in 1991 for the Commodore Amiga. 'Whirlwind' Snooker is a highly realistic snooker simulator. Although the game was not the first to simulate snooker (or pool) in 3D, it made full use of the processing power and graphics capabilities of 16-bit home computers and was praised for its then ground-breaking realism and easy-to-use interface. Many remarked that the game was the closest thing to being on a real snooker table which existed at the time, and it could be used by a player to refine real-life snooker skills. Despite being an accurate and serious simulation of the sport, MacLean's irreverent sense of humour was prominent throughout. The sound effect used for a successful pot was a resounding "pop" and numerous animations provided comic relief should a player take more than a few seconds to shoot. Balls would sprout eyeballs and arms, making faces at the player or holding up signs that read "Get on with it!" and such. The game was followed by Archer MacLean's Pool in 1992 and Jimmy White's 2: Cueball in 1999.
First released: Dec 1991

Play Jimmy White's 'Whirlwind' Snooker on Mac with Parallels (virtualized)

The easiest way to play Jimmy White's 'Whirlwind' Snooker on a Mac is through Parallels, which allows you to virtualize a Windows machine on Macs. The setup is very easy and it works for Apple Silicon Macs as well as for older Intel-based Macs.

Parallels supports the latest version of DirectX and OpenGL, allowing you to play the latest PC games on any Mac. The latest version of DirectX is up to 20% faster.

Our favorite feature of Parallels Desktop is that when you turn off your virtual machine, all the unused disk space gets returned to your main OS, thus minimizing resource waste (which used to be a problem with virtualization).

Jimmy White's 'Whirlwind' Snooker installation steps for Mac

Step 1
Go to Parallels.com and download the latest version of the software.
Step 2
Follow the installation process and make sure you allow Parallels in your Mac’s security preferences (it will prompt you to do so).
Step 3
When prompted, download and install Windows 10. The download is around 5.7GB. Make sure you give it all the permissions that it asks for.
Step 4
Once Windows is done installing, you are ready to go. All that’s left to do is install Jimmy White's 'Whirlwind' Snooker like you would on any PC.
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