AstroBob

Hi there, thanks for the question. This is a common question folks have about where Big Box themes apply, we have a detailed guide that explains what's going on here and where Big Box themes apply. Please let me know if that doesn't answer your specific use-case though and we'll get you sorted. Cheers,

Thanks for the continued discussion, everyone! It’s great to see so many valuable suggestions. We’re fully aware that the current platform structure isn’t perfect, and some platforms may not entirely align with the guidelines we’re aiming for in the next round of updates. While these existing changes can’t be undone, we’re actively exploring structural adjustments under the hood—to help address these concerns. Our goal is to create a system that’s more flexible with categorization while still allowing users to track platforms in ways that matter to them. We understand that our definitions may not work for everyone, and we’re committed to finding a balance. Keep an eye out for updates in the new year, as we’ll be reviewing the feedback and proposing some additions. Thank you so much for your contributions, and we wish everyone a happy holiday season! 😊

Hi @kurzih Thanks for bearing with me! To start, we’ll need to rule out a few factors. Step 1: Rule Out Issues with Your Specific LaunchBox Build To test this, please follow these steps: 1. Install a brand-new instance of LaunchBox on the same drive, but in a different location. 2. Import a few games from one of the problematic platforms, along with their BIOS files. 3. Use this new instance to download RetroArch via LaunchBox and launch a game. Can you confirm if you notice the same delay with this fresh setup? Step 2: Check for Older Install Files Do you have an install file in your updates folder for a version lower than 13.13? If so: 1. Use that file to set up LaunchBox in a new location, as in Step 1. 2. Run the same test process. Versions earlier than 13.13 don’t include the dependency check, so this will help us determine if that check is causing the delay. While our internal tests don’t show any noticeable difference with or without the dependency check, it would be helpful to verify this in your setup. Let me know how it goes!

Hi there, thanks for bearing with me there. It's hard to say for certain but from your screenshots it looks like you do not have the retroarch core downloaded. For example NES, normally you'd see a little [#] on the right-hand side if it's installed. Can you double check the core is properly installed and see if that helps? If that doesn't work, can you please try a different core for NES just to rule out compatibility with the Ambernic device(i.e try using mesen of FCEUmm, make sure it's downloaded and also set in LaunchBox) Keep me posted

Hi @BlindGuyMcSqueezy thanks for bearing with me there. I've run some tests and the best way to do this would be to select all his games for a platform and go to Tools > File Management > Change ROMs folder path for selected games This will let you set the new directory which should update the application path for all your games. Let me know if that works for you Cheers,

Thanks for the kind words! 😊 It’s certainly possible, though cloud storage services like Google Drive have historically caused issues with LaunchBox, as they can create locks on specific files the app needs to access. If you’re asking in relation to syncing your save games, this is something we’re actively considering. It’s a fairly hefty project, but we’d love to eventually offer seamless save syncing across LaunchBox builds.

Hi @braincell1973 Thanks for the detailed report. I see what you’re saying—the issue occurs when the “Show Play Tracking Prompt” option is turned on, but notifications from LaunchBox are blocked at the OS level. This causes the game to fail to launch. For reference, the play tracking prompt is the notification LaunchBox sends to display your in-game time spent. If you don’t use this feature, I recommend turning off the “Show Play Tracking Prompt” option in the settings menu. I’ll bring this up with the team to see if we can get it addressed. Thanks for bringing this to our attention!

The best-case scenario is to have everything stored on the internal SSD, as this ensures the most efficient read/write times for the LB installation, games, media, etc. Realistically, though, we know that’s not always possible. The most common directory to split out is games, so it’s important to be mindful of where they’re stored to avoid introducing any bottlenecks. As for library size, it’s difficult to give a definitive answer. A large library with lean media and metadata might outperform a smaller library with heavy metadata, large media files, or resource-intensive themes. The best approach is to judge performance based on your current library—if it’s performing well and you want to expand, go for it. You may start seeing diminishing returns in the long run, but at its core, it’s a database designed to handle thousands of entries. We’re also doing some work under the hood to treat it more like a proper database, rather than relying on large .XML files, which will make it much more robust. Hope that helps clarify things! Let me know if you’d like to discuss anything further. 😊

Thanks for the update! I’m glad to hear that performance is working well with the new setup. Most modern external hard drives these days are pretty robust, so it shouldn’t be an issue that it doesn’t have its own power supply. That said, if you’re planning to keep it permanently connected to the PC, opting for one with its own power supply might be a good choice in the long run. Either way, it sounds like everything’s working well—time to dive into some games now! Happy Holidays! 🎄🎮

Thanks for your understanding @duerra, it’s definitely been a tricky one to track down, but I was surprised (and glad) when I encountered it myself. However, like you, I haven’t been able to consistently reproduce it. It hasn’t happened to me again since the first time I experienced it, but at least we now have a solid hypothesis. We’ll keep an eye out for it moving forward, and I’ll be sure to update you here if we make any breakthroughs. Thanks for all your help with diagnosing this

Version 1.16 - Released December 20th 2024 Release Summary Full Changelog: https://www.launchbox-app.com/android-about/change-log Check out our FAQ on getting started with Network Drive Support + Check out the release video: New Features: Network Drive Support: Import games directly from your local network drive. When launching a game, they will download locally Local Game Indicator: Games stored on your local network are now easily identified by a cloud icon for all default views New Filter Option: Quickly filter your game library to view only local or non-local games Screen Timeout Shortcut: Quickly control your Android device's system screen timeout directly within LaunchBox Expanded Emulator Support: Added full support for CEMU and Lime3DS emulators Improvements: Framework Overhaul: Upgraded to the latest MAUI framework for improved performance and stability Fixed: Fixed Play Time Sync: Resolved an issue that could cause inaccurate play time tracking Android Game Parsing Fix: Addressed an Android game parsing issue on startup for certain Android based VR headsets

The most up-to-date version of this article is now available on our new Help Center. Please visit the article here With the release of LaunchBox for Android 1.16, you can now import games directly from a network drive. This article dives into the details of how to set it up and explores the workflows associated with this powerful new feature. What Are Network Shares? A network share is a folder or drive on one device (like a PC or server) that is accessible to other devices on the same network. It allows you to store and access files, such as game ROMs, without needing to copy them onto each device. Why Use This Feature? Android devices, like smartphones, tablets, or dedicated Android gaming devices, often have limited internal storage compared to PCs. If you frequently use your Android device for gaming, you might find your internal storage filling up quickly or end up relying on an SD card to hold your games. For users who also maintain a LaunchBox build on their PC, keeping games in sync between devices can also become a hassle. This feature eliminates both problems by allowing your Android device to access games stored on a network share without needing to store them locally. When you want to play a game, LaunchBox for Android downloads it from the network share on demand, saving you both storage space and time spent syncing libraries. Once the game has been downloaded, it remains local to your device, meaning the next time you go to play it you won't need to download it. What Do You Need to Get Started? To use this feature, you’ll need an existing network share that hosts your games. There are numerous ways to set up a network share and we aren't going to cover all of them here, but here are two common scenarios: 1. A Shared Folder on Your Windows PC: Host a network share on the PC where your primary LaunchBox library resides. This can be configured for: Local Access: Accessible only within your home network. Remote Access: Accessible from anywhere via the internet. Here’s a helpful guide to create a simple network-shared folder: 🔗 How to Create a Network Shared Folder. Our feature set supports drives that use the Server Message Block (SMB) protocol. Unfortunately, we are not able to guarantee compatibility or provide support with other types of network drives or setups. 2. A Dedicated NAS (Network-Attached Storage) Device: If you use a NAS to store your games, ensure the shared folder is properly configured and accessible on your network. How to Configure in Android? For a step-by-step video guide, check out our release video where ETA Prime walks your through the process: [Insert Link Here]. To set up network share imports within LaunchBox for Android: 1. Go to Import Games: From the main menu, choose Import Games and under Folder of Games to Import, select Network Share. 2. Authenticate and Connect: LaunchBox will search for available shared drives. Depending on your setup, you may need to manually authenticate yourself by providing login credentials. 3. Select Folder: Choose the folder you want to include in the import process. 4. Complete the Import: Follow the standard import process to finish adding your games to the library. At this stage, the game entries will appear in your LaunchBox library, but no ROMs will be downloaded yet. What Happens After Importing Games? After importing, you’ll notice a small download icon next to games imported from your network share. This indicates the game is available on the share but hasn’t been downloaded locally. To play a game: Select the game as you normally would. You’ll see an option to Download and Play, which downloads the game before launching it. The initial download time depends on the size of the game and your connection speed, but once downloaded, the game will remain stored locally and can be played offline. Are all Systems Supported? At the time of writing, all systems except for Arcade are supported for importing over a network share. This is because Arcade games often require additional dependencies to function properly. If you attempt to import Arcade games using this method, you will receive the warning below. However, you can still import Arcade games locally. Recap Let's recap the advantages and disadvantages of this feature, and why you might want to use it: Advantages: No need to store your entire library on your Android device. Games are downloaded locally only when needed. Once downloaded, games can be played offline without requiring access to the network share. With remote access configured, you can play your games from anywhere. Disadvantages: The host machine for the network share must be active for your Android device to connect. Initial game downloads may take time, especially for larger files and slower connections. More games means more media. Make sure your device has enough storage to cover this or turn off certain media downloads. This feature is a game-changer for Android users with limited storage or those who want seamless access to their PC-hosted libraries. By leveraging network shares, you can enjoy a vast library of games without the need to store everything locally, while still maintaining the flexibility to play offline once a game is downloaded. We'd love to hear your thoughts on this feature, let us know in the comments below!

Hi @BlindGuyMcSqueezy Thanks for narrowing this down, so I'm guessing the paths in your game "Application Path" is something like "D://Games/... whereby it's actually specifying the drive letter and location first, right? Can you let me know what you have specific in your Platform settings as the game location and an example of what is being shown in your game's application path? Let me run this by the team if there's a better way to fix it rather than deleting and re-importing and I'll get back to you.

Hi @BlindGuyMcSqueezy thanks for reporting this, just FYI I've moved this into it's own thread so we can troubleshoot together. Leaving a reference here for other users who might have the same issue:

@kurzih Thank you for referencing the Bitbucket ticket. There’s no need to rewrite it, as we have it here now and will take it into consideration. We’re still refining the best workflow moving forward, and this thread is an attempt to reignite discussions now that we have a new internal system for adding platforms to the database. We’ll be sure to utilize the information from Bitbucket, but if there are any specific discussions you’d like to highlight, feel free to drop the links here. @LonestarK Thank you for the great suggestions! For full transparency, it’s very unlikely that Super GameBoy will be added as its own platform since it is simply an add-on designed to enhance games for an existing system. This rationale would also extend to creating a new image category specifically for it. That said, we have a larger infrastructure plan that may address this. Instead of adding additional image types for specific use cases, we are exploring the implementation of a tagging system. This approach would avoid fragmenting “Screenshot” into multiple image types. Instead, we would have a single “Screenshot” image type, with the flexibility for users to apply specific tags. This concept is still a work in progress, but we acknowledge the challenges caused by the rigidity of the current image types. We actually discussed this thread last night, and while we’re not able to action anything significant before the new year, we aim to start implementing some of these changes early in the new year. We appreciate your input—please keep the discussion going in the meantime!

Hi there, Thanks for the additional video. Based on the fact you mentioned re-installing the existing version, I want to confirm the LaunchBox directory is configured properly. Can you go to your LaunchBox directory, and make sure that there isn't an additional LaunchBox folder inside there? When running the updater to re-install you have to be careful to choose the root of your directory, otherwise it will install into LaunchBox/LaunchBox. Can you confirm what is the filepath of your LaunchBox .exe, and confirm that there is no second LaunchBox directory present? Cheers,

Hi @kurzih thanks for the ping and apologies you haven't had a response here. Firstly, thank you for being diligent and running through the performance thread, that info is very useful. Please leave this with me for now as I want to check a few things and will update you as soon as I can. Cheers,

Version 13.18 - Released December 20th 2024 Release Summary Full Changelog: https://www.launchbox-app.com/about/changelog New Features: Users can now manually import ROM files for multiple platforms at the same time by navigating to Tools > Import > ROM files > Multiple Platforms Improvements: GOG Import Wizard will now only show games you have yet to import GOG Import Wizard is better optimized to show all installed games on your hard drive You can now set the auto-import platform per storefront in Tools > Manage > Storefronts New comparison types have been added to auto-populate playlist string-based rules which allows for multiple values: Contains Any Value, Doesn't Contain Any Value (ie. Version - Contains Any Value: Rev 1; fr; Brazil) Users now have the ability to disable the Save Management Feature under Tools > Options > General > Save Management The Game Discovery Center in the Trial Mode of Big Box will now see all curated server-side playlists Added support for the following new image types (Poster, Square, Icon) A new link binding has been added to the LaunchBox Game Details view for additional apps that point to a website (for theme developers) Optimized the startup process for slightly faster load times Fixed: Some advanced search fields with boolean values now work as intended The Install Emulator page within the ROM Import Wizard will now better reflect existing emulator installations List View better respects column sort order after adding or editing a game BIOS detection in the ROM Import wizard now considers RetroArch core changes Prevented unintended auto-imports for certain platforms LaunchBox Carousel element rendering issues under certain conditions Secondary platforms under Associated Platforms will now correctly respect M3U checkbox settings A rare issue where specific custom themes could incorrectly sort games when using Arrange By options Rare crash when loading non-existent images into the image grid Issue causing slow loading times of the Game Details Pane on initial startup

Thanks for the update, glad to hear those changes have improved things for you. Based on your explanation, just to make clear a new external HDD just to store your games won't make a different in terms of the performance of navigating around LaunchBox, since that is stored on your internal HDD. If you were to upgrade the internal HDD though, to one that has faster read/write speeds then it's possible you may see an improvement, but I don't think it would be that noticeable. That said, if you need to upgrade for more space anyways then it's probably worth it, but just want to be clear in terms of what you can expect for LaunchBox performance. Let me know how you get on or if there's anything else I can help you with. Cheers,

Hi @Fuzzykropolis thanks for the great questions. I'll answer them one by one While it's not ideal, if you're updating multiple games you can leverage the audit window by going to Tools > Audit. From here you can click on a game's name to open its metadata window, which saves you from having to go through the right-click menu to edit its metadata Absolutely, the LaunchBox directory is designed to be portable, so if you move to a new machine or re-install your OS, assuming everything is within your LaunchBox directory you can simply move it over to the new machine and all your images will come with it. Please see our full FAQ on how to move your build to a new PC which explains this in more detail While we don't store custom media for you, if you have an account on the LaunchBox games database you can sync certain statistics that will be synced across all LaunchBox builds where you are logged in. Those stats include Last Played Playtime Play Count Favourite / Completed Custom Star Ratings You can enable this by going to Tools > Cloud and logging in with your LaunchBox games database account. Hope this helps, let me know if you have any more questions and how you get on.

The only thing I can think of at this point is to rule out anything that LaunchBox might be doing that isn’t applicable when loading through RetroArch. If you edit the platform, there are a few options to check: • Default Core: I know you mentioned this already, but just to confirm, make sure the core you have selected is actually downloaded in RetroArch. • Extract ROM Archives: If your ROMs are zipped, ensure this is turned on. Otherwise, leave it off. • Verify Configuration: What happens when you select this? Does it flag any issues or provide helpful feedback? • Open RetroArch: Does this open your current instance of RetroArch? It would be good to verify that you don’t have another instance installed and that LaunchBox isn’t pointing to the wrong one. If none of the above works, it might be worth changing to one of the other RetroArch options (sideloaded etc) to see if that makes a difference.

You need to have the option to opt into Beta releases turned on for it to find the update, but we’re close to the official release this week anyway. 😊 It’s hard to say with certainty, but if you’re sticking with an HDD and simply expanding the storage, I don’t think it will provide a noticeable gain in performance unless the new HDD has significantly faster write speeds. That said, moving from an HDD to an SSD may give you a boost, simply because SSDs are inherently much faster to access. The main performance delay you’ll notice with an HDD is the time it takes to spin up. For example, when loading a game, it may take a bit longer to get the HDD up to speed. For lightweight games, I don’t think it would be that big of a deal, but on some heavier platforms that constantly read/write to the disk, you might notice a difference. Before investing in a purchase like that, it would be good to understand what exactly you mean when you say “LaunchBox is slow.” A new external SSD will only impact how fast you can access games. If the performance issue you’re experiencing is related to startup times or navigating around LaunchBox, then upgrading to an SSD for your games won’t help at all, as those processes rely on the internal drive where LaunchBox is stored. If you’re able to elaborate on what you’re hoping to achieve and provide more details about the performance issues you’re seeing, I might be able to advise further. I hope that makes sense!

Thanks for the heads up there, strange since it should install the required dependencies on the first install, but I'll bring this to the team to see if there's anything we need to update. Glad things are working as expected now, thanks for bearing with us there. Cheers,

Thanks, so it’s not an association issue, but given the example you gave I wouldn’t be surprised if it categorises those as the same game. Let me know if the `Import Duplicates` makes any difference.

Hi there, Thanks for the update. For your arcade platform that uses FB Neo and works correctly when using LaunchBox, when you edit the emulator settings, which emulator is it using (RetroArch, Retroarch (32/64-bit sideloaded etc?). And for the platforms that don't work, what do they have as the set emulator?