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skizzosjt

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skizzosjt last won the day on May 14 2023

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  1. skizzosjt
    Sorry but I got another gripe with FFmpeg. FFmpeg just like WMP messes up the videos "width". Only the "width", height is not impacted. I put "width" in quotes because it's not really width. As in it's not taking for ex a 1920 pixel wide video and making it 1930 pixels wide. The width of the video would still be 1920 pixels, but, the contents of the video get stretched out wider when using FFmpeg just like it always has with WMP. VLC did not do this this by comparison. It always has been more difficult to identify this occurring with WMP due to videos have a black screen blip and reset when returning to platform wheel, but it's always been there in previous version of the frontend using WMP too. still there on latest 13.24 beta 1 Here is a video for reference. For easiest way to see what I am talking about is to pay attention to the outer edges of the N64 controller on the left, where it is exactly when I am in the N64 game wheel. Like place your mouse cursor there for a good visual indicator. Then notice when I back out to the platform wheel it suddenly looks like the entire image stretches out width wise. Watch in fullscreen to make it easier to see too. This is not theme specific, but unless you have some sort of theme setup like what I am using here it would go unnoticed. For someone who wants a nice seamless transition between wheels where it looks like only part of the view updates when you back out to previous wheel, this is jarring and ugly to see. Big Box FFmpeg width issue.mp4
  2. skizzosjt
    maybe this is what you are looking for circled in red then use the slider on the left hand side to make your entries appear smaller or larger. I know this isn't zooming but if you needed text bigger/smaller font sizes can be changed here in Options There might be some other options available I am not aware of, I haven't really done much customization to LaunchBox, only Big Box
  3. skizzosjt
    there is a problem that has been occurring since version 13.22 the official release. All betas and official releases since then reset game videos and animation type stuff happen when exiting any game from any platform. It's 100% recreatable every time. So for example I boot Contra from the Arcade platform. Upon exiting, the game video actually resets to the start. You can briefly see that it is paused right where it left off but then it resets instead of continuing where it left off. Then at the same time all the text and badge images, etc, the chunk of info in top right area of the default theme will re-animate as if you just entered the view. Seems like it's doing all the stuff it would do if you just went into the view, rather than returning from exiting a game. This is noticeable and 100% recreatable on every custom theme too. Both video resetting and other animations reoccurring at exit when they should not be running. If I reinstall v13.21 or earlier the problem is not there. I then reinstall v13.22 or anything newer and the problem exists. The problems exist on default and custom themes regardless of the media player I have selected. Video for reference using v13.24 beta 1.... Big Box Game Exit Issue.mp4
  4. skizzosjt
    Windows 11 on the official 13.23 release FFMPEG is working much better! especially in Windows 11 since all video formats I have are playing in Windows 11. There are some issues though in Windows 11 regarding audio for webm format videos that also happen to occur in Windows 10. Seems I find a pattern with webm if they are having audio issues they are using Vorbis. It is not 100% throughout the entire video. Might be sounding crackly or like milliseconds of audio drop out for a few secs, then plays ok for 10 secs, then the next 4 secs sound bad. But it's always the same spots in every video. The issues do not move around, always consistent when played in LaunchBox or Big Box. webm files using Opus sound OK though. I can also take these files using Vorbis, re-encode in Handbrake changing only audio codec to Opus and now the audio plays OK in LaunchBox and Big Box. I've encountered likely the same crash a couple other users have mentioned in LaunchBox. When a video is playing in LaunchBox in Windows 11 and I click on something else in LaunchBox, sometimes, it hard crashes. No error report window. Attempts to reproduce it are not consistent. This has not happened to me on Windows 10 though. Windows 10 Windows 10 is much better too for FFMPEG. Really good job on fixing the previous problems so quickly. But I do notice webm format videos are problematic. And only some webm videos. I start to notice a pattern between ones that do or do not play at all due to mostly older videos, games released in 2020 or prior do play, while newer ones do not. I started looking at video's properties and there is a pattern where every single webm video that does not play in LaunchBox or Big Box in Windows 10 is using V9 video codec. I can take these webm files using V9 codec, re-encode them using Handbrake using V8 codec, and changing nothing else, and now they play in LaunchBox and Big Box on Windows 10. Going in opposite direction, I can take a working webm file using V8 codec, re-encode using V9, and now it doesn't work in LaunchBox or Big Box. Opus audio codec seems to work better too. Vorbis will still work in the sense the file will play in LaunchBox and Big Box, but there is usually some audio issue going on like I mentioned above. So, I found the best recipe for settings was to use V8 and Opus passthrough if file was already using Opus, or changing it to Opus if it was using Vorbis. AV1 codec works too. The only webm video codec I can encode through Handbrake and the file will not play in LaunchBox or Big Box in Windows 10 is V9. For webm videos that play in LaunchBox and Big Box in Windows 10 since they are using V8, but are using Vorbis for audio, if I re-encode them changing just Vorbis to Opus, audio now sounds OK. To clarify all these webm format videos play fine in Windows 10 and 11 through any media player. It's just in LaunchBox and Big Box the problems exist. Windows 10 & 11 In LaunchBox and Big Box, using FFMPEG, viewing any video fullscreen regardless of its format, the frame rate looks worse when viewing it normally. Sort of like the video is dropping frames or something.
  5. skizzosjt
    The positives THE COLORS! FFMPEG actually matches color management that VLC uses! this is the fix I've been waiting for! Category, platform and playlist videos recall their time position when going from a one of those wheels, into a downstream wheel, and then returning to the upstream wheel. Not exactly something I would call a show stopper if it did not work like this, but it's a win regardless since it's how VLC worked. I did not run into any videos that did not play when using Windows 11, even before I updated K-lite pack. (Windows 10 is another story though, detailed below) The negatives USING WINDOWS 11 Everything else is worse compared to both VLC and WMP. With FFMPEG videos don't start at their actual start. They are instead starting playback a few seconds into the video. To elaborate I end up with videos showing as a black screen then after a few seconds they start playing, but, several seconds into the video rather than at the start (00:00:00). I see this behavior in the default theme and ones I've customized If you go into the platform/playlist wheel or game details screen at a particular point in transitions the audio from the video continues to play from the previous screen, while the video on the current screen also plays. so FFMPEG allows two videos to play at once somehow. Only can see one of them, but the previous screen video audio will continue to be audible. Once backing out of current screen and returning to previous screen the behavior returns to normal only hearing the audio of the visible video that is playing. USING WINDOWS 10 All above issues mentioned under Windows 11 applies to Windows 10 too and then are more specific to just Windows 10 detailed below FFMPEG doesn't work really at all for me in Windows 10. (almost) every video is a black screen and never plays video or audio. some videos change to a green screen instead after waiting long enough. idk, it's a mess from my perspective. the only videos I've gotten to play back using FFMPEG in either LaunchBox or Big Box are just a few random webm format videos (4 webm format videos played - out of the 164 webm format videos I have - all Steam trailer vids). Not a single mp4 file played in either LB or BB. When a video does play with FFMPEG it looks bad. Audio sounds OK I think, no crackling or crazy misalignment, but video wise it's awful. Seems like a slide show with frames dropping off. for videos not playing at all, vast majority of the videos I have tried, they seem like they are gonna be a black screen with no audio forever.....if you wait long enough, say maybe 30secs, they switch to being green instead and you might hear some audio chirp but nothing else happens.....at this point is when Big Box becomes unresponsive having to wait several seconds for inputs to be recognized. Fans ramp up, it's clearly super busy trying to do something when this occurs. Performance will feel terrible until it seems Big Box has not tried to play a video for a bit, then it goes back to normal. So overall performance using FFMPEG feels worse relative to VLC or WMP, but this specific performance behavior I only saw on my Windows 10 system, but not the Windows 11 one. All issues can be seen on the default theme too regardless of using Windows 10 or 11. Already updated k-lite pack to latest 19.1.5 basic version on both Windows 10 and 11 systems. I was on a version from a couple months ago, 18 point something on both of those systems....regardless the update didn't change any behavior with FFMPEG on either system.
  6. skizzosjt
    this feature exists! as long as you're on v1.21+ (1.21.0 is latest as of making this post)
  7. skizzosjt
    More information about ""
    Hmm ok then. I don't understand why these not bugs don't exist when I publish through CTC v3.1.5 or earlier version going back to 2.5.5. What could I be doing wrong if you are implying it is a user made issue ? Using CTC v3.1.5 or older vesion -Inside CTC v3.1.5 or older version -Certain clear logos in wheels have a distorted aspect ratio. Caveat here is this is purely cosmetic inside CTC. When I publish from v3.1.5 or earlier version these clear logos that show a distorted aspect ratio in CTC look fine in Big Box -These same images when inserted into a theme as an image element, using uniform for stretch property look correct in CTC. The distorted aspect ratio business only happens to these images in the wheel -Wheel index looks fine. -Inside Big Box -All Clear logos in wheels and the wheel index look fine. Using CTC v3.3.1 or newer version -Inside CTC v3.3.1 or newer version -Same exact notes as above for v3.1.5 apply here for 3.3.1 also -Inside Big Box -Same certain clear logos in wheels have distorted aspect ratio -Wheel index looks funky. Characters and the icons for search and filter are partially cut off or off center in their viewing area Changing resolution or DPI in Windows is impacting how the wheel index looks and only the wheel index, no other theme elements are impacted when making those adjustments. Wheel index should not be impacted by either of those Windows settings. If I publish a theme from v3.1.5 I do not see the issues in Big Box. Using exact same project files if I publish the theme from v3.3.1 the issues exist in Big Box. The issues also exist when I publish from v3.3.2 Further I had been doing all troubleshooting from my daily driver Windows 10 system. I've now done more troubleshooting on another system running Windows 11. This system has never had LB/BB or CTC on it. I had to go through all the .net downloading and first time setup. Even got a prompt to download it starting CTC the first time. So, this would eliminate the possibility of me having some legacy or unknown setting toggled that is otherwise contributing to the issues. These are fresh installs and everything I did is default settings when I test with a brand new fresh blank theme with nothing but a WheelGamesView view that has nothing but the default autopopulated Wheel and Wheel Index using nothing but default values that CTC populates for all their properties. I use a 4K display at 100% scaling at both of these systems, the Windows 10 and Windows 11 one. For the fresh LB/BB install I used latest v13.22 and only imported in Windows platform games for testing purposes, downloading just their clear logos. No customization was used, everything is defaults. Even doing first time installs on a new system, I still experience the issues.
  8. skizzosjt
    Most common way is likely using the custom launch parameters. Edit the game and go to the launching > emulation section and toggle on using custom command line. you enter can enter the command for the preferred different core in it. Another way would be to setup another emulator instance in your emulator list for Retroarch but this time select a different core in the associated platforms list. then you assign this different instance of Retroarch as the emulator for that game. You can also add more cores for a platform on a single instance of Retroarch in the associated platform list, but it wouldn't choose that one each time by hitting the play button like normal. It would require right click play with to select the intended different core or using the game details screen then play with if within Big Box. A few choices to suit different use cases
  9. skizzosjt
    not really a feature but it is possible. you can manually open the appropriate xml file and change the value. you can enter that you played a game for 5000 hours that you never played if you really wanted to.
  10. skizzosjt
    More information about ""
    hi @y2guru! I am either reporting some bugs, or asking for some help if they are not bugs. I've noticed a few issues in recent months (sorry I am taking so long to report anything). I am on latest 3.3.2 and notice that images used in platform wheels and game wheels do not maintain their aspect ratio if said aspect ratio is very large. As in much wider than they are taller. Take the Nintendo GameBoy Advance logo, and Sony Playstation 3 logo as examples. Both of these are squished in height, being shorter than they should. That is an assumption on my end, they could in fact be stretched to be wider instead but either way it creates the same distorted aspect ratio. I notice the same with some game clear logos too like Shadow of the Tomb Raider which also has the same sort of aspect ratio of being much wider than taller. I assumed I had either distorted images or a funky setting used in CTC but neither is the case. The images look fine when viewed outside of CTC, and if I use the images as an image element inside CTC, they look fine. Only within the wheels do they look wrong. Something seems to not be treating aspect ratio properly when above/below a certain threshold. Here is an example of the Nintendo GameBoy Advance logo. As you can see from comparing them, the one in the wheel looks squished in height compared to the same image directly above it. I have also the exact same image as an image element directly above it and sizing it to be the exact same width. All other clear logos visible in the wheel look OK, so it's not a problem that impacts all images. With the evidence in front of me it seems this only impacts really wide aspect ratio images. Note this is the first time I thought to test this on a horizontal wheel too and the problem persists. I use a vertical wheel instead and I just want to clarify that regardless of using a horizontal or vertical wheel, this issue is present. The second issue I have noticed is the game wheel index is all funny looking only once published. The wheel index looks perfect in CTC, but once published it is not using proper sizes or scaling for something. The letters and magnifying glass for search for example look larger and/or off centered. I noticed this code has changed compared to old versions and I have figured out how to manipulate some margins in the XML file after publishing to make things visible, but my point here is there is something wrong on CTC's end with making it wrong from the get go. Here is an example showing the clear logo looking like it is squished on the game wheel also. I have the exact same image as an image element right next to it for comparison and it looks correct. Just showing this issue is present on all wheels, not just a platform wheel. Also showing that the wheel index looks totally fine within CTC's editor. However, once I publish this theme, it looks funny in Big Box. It still functions as in selecting the letter does move the wheel accordingly, but parts of text/icons are hidden or covered up Here is this test theme published in Big Box. The wheel index has all the individual selections like the letters and search and filter, etc, look too big or their viewing area is too small. Portions of them are all cut off and off centered If I edit the game wheel index how I actual want it to look like, this problem gets worse. Here it is in CTC. All I did besides change a color is make these corners rounded with a value of 20 in each field. I stuck in a rectangle behind the wheel index so you can actually see I did the round corners (hard to see black on black lol) Now here it is published in Big Box. Now I move the position around and change the font, and it looks noticeably worse. Here it is in CTC still looking OK within the editor But soon as I publish, it looks all sorts of wrong in Big Box. It looks like the actual characters are all too large and are creating "..." in place of not being able to fit the character Here is what I actually use which is a customized version of Colorful. The game wheel index looks fine as I want it to within CTC. Go to publish, and it's all sorts of funny looking in Big Box Here in Big Box. It looks like the actual characters are all too large and are creating "..." in place of not being able to fit the character I can see both of these above issues even when starting a brand new theme in CTC v3.3.2 so it is not anything related to some funky setting I have in an otherwise fully built up custom theme. I'm talking brand new from scratch theme with nothing but a wheel and index element in it and these problems still exist. I do not use any scaling. My resolution is 4K (3840 x 2160) and 100% scaling/DPI. I've found that messing around with these values were the quickest way for me to fix the issue in the meantime. This is a screen shot of the XML file once published. The highlighted line regarding margins I change to this instead.... Margin="-40,-10,-45,0"> However, seems to be another issue on top of this. Why doesn't all aspects of the game wheel index scale properly with different resolutions and DPI/scaling options? I do test my theme against other resolutions and scaling and the game wheel index selections like the letters/characters and the magnifying glass etc, they all get smaller as I increase DPI/scaling. So for ex, 300% scaling makes it so all these letters and images are visible, but they are much smaller than I want. This really shouldn't be happening, changing scale/DPI should not impact the visual size of this stuff, it should look the same exact size regardless of scaling/DPI used. I notice the round corners change appearance (larger or smaller radius) when I change resolution and/or scaling/DPI When I change resolution this also makes a difference. I am building everything, and use everything, at 4K and 100% scaling. However, if I change my desktop resolution to 1920 x 1080 and continue to use 100% scaling and then launch Big Box.....now the game wheel index looks like it does in CTC. This behavior makes me think something is wrong regarding the game wheel index and its scaling per the users resolution and/or DPI/scaling. Can you please advise if these are in fact bugs and if so would they get added to a fix it list for a future CTC version? If they are not bugs, could you lend me a hand on what setting(s) I can change to resolve this stuff? Sorry for the very long post. Only trying to be detailed to either help resolve a bug or get some help fixing whatever mistake I am making!
  11. skizzosjt
    I don't really use EA often at all. I have two games on it, which are actually Steam games but it still launches the EA launcher too (boy that is a pet peeve of mine - only one launcher, please lol) Last game I would have played a few times was Star Wars Jedi Knight (over a year ago) and I don't ever recall the EA launcher popping back up after exiting the game. I had to update the launcher to test this and it def does pop back up every time I exit a game now. So seems like new behavior for their latest app version. yea def can launch these games directly, but same here, the launcher window is restored at game exit each time. @Bucky can you also try using AHK to close the EA launcher? create another script with just a single line to close this window. put it on your desktop and double click it to run it from there. if this doesn't close the window then we know something def going on on your end preventing it from working WinClose, ahk_exe EADesktop.exe that pop up about needing admin privileges is suspicious but from what I can tell it's doing that to the game, not the launcher. AHK cannot close apps/windows that have admin privileges unless the script is also launched with admin privileges. but we're only using AHK to close the launcher rather than the game. if still not working, as a last ditch effort you can try making the script run with admin privileges but this opens another can of worms because you would need to always click yes on the UAC prompt to allow the script to use admin privileges so not exactly fully automated Here is the instructions from AHK docs. you just add this at start of a script https://www.autohotkey.com/docs/v1/lib/Run.htm#RunAs full_command_line := DllCall("GetCommandLine", "str") if not (A_IsAdmin or RegExMatch(full_command_line, " /restart(?!\S)")) { try { if A_IsCompiled Run *RunAs "%A_ScriptFullPath%" /restart else Run *RunAs "%A_AhkPath%" /restart "%A_ScriptFullPath%" } ExitApp } WinClose, ahk_exe EADesktop.exe
  12. skizzosjt
    with both displays hooked up try and play the videos from Windows Explorer but make sure the videos are opening up on the 4K TV (rather than the 1080p one). takes Big Box out of the equation. do they "glitch" when played? if so then have just the 4K TV hooked up and try and play the videos from Window Explorer, still a problem? if so, that TV, its settings, or cable is the culprit.
  13. skizzosjt
    Dolphin shouldn't flash any other window at boot of a game. maybe missing some launch param. are you using "-b" for batch? that would launch the game without the actual Dolphin interface window with your list of games and such. it would only launch the actual game window with that param
  14. skizzosjt
    sorry that one is on me. clearly did NOT double check my work 🤦‍♂️ I left a line out and flip flopped the intended command. I did the following: Run the storefront launcher, wait for launcher to exist, run the game, wait for game to exist, wait for the launcher to close....lol makes no sense here is what I intended to do: Run the storefront launcher, wait for launcher to exist, run the game, wait for game to exist, wait for game to not exist, close the launcher. Run, "C:\Program Files\Electronic Arts\EA Desktop\EA Desktop\EADesktop.exe" WinWait, ahk_exe EADesktop.exe Run, "C:\Program Files\EA Games\Mass Effect\Binaries\MassEffect.exe" WinWait, ahk_exe MassEffect.exe WinWaitClose, ahk_exe MassEffect.exe WinClose, ahk_exe EADesktop.exe ExitApp Back at my main PC now and I do have the EA launcher on there. I tested out both of these commands, WinClose and Process, Close, they both work closing EADesktop.exe. So with that said, best to use the WinClose option since it's proven to work and the standard graceful way of closing a window or app
  15. skizzosjt
    Run, "C:\Program Files\Electronic Arts\EA Desktop\EA Desktop\EADesktop.exe" WinWait, ahk_exe EADesktop.exe Run, "C:\Program Files\EA Games\Mass Effect\Binaries\MassEffect.exe" WinWait, ahk_exe MassEffect.exe WinWaitClose, ahk_exe EADesktop.exe ExitApp this is how I would do it. give this a shot and let us know how it goes! tip on why those didn't work for ya. I would assume the script is closing the game within nanoseconds after opening it Run, "C:\Program Files\EA Games\Mass Effect\Binaries\MassEffect.exe" WinClose, MassEffect.exe that runs the game, and the very next line is closing it. (edit: actually it would not close it cause I just noticed it's missing the ahk_exe part) when you use WinClose to refer to a process you need to use proper AHK criteria syntax. since it's a process it's "ahk_exe". you'll notice my suggestion uses these if you really want to learn some stuff thumb around in the AHK docs page. it helped me a lot. you can find stuff through their content or index tree or search keywords. https://www.autohotkey.com/docs/v1/ https://www.autohotkey.com/docs/v1/lib/WinClose.htm https://www.autohotkey.com/docs/v1/misc/WinTitle.htm
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