AstroBob

Hi Folks, With the release of LaunchBox 13.16 today, you can now find a lovely new playlist in your Game Discovery Center. As you explore Big Box, you might come across a playlist called Community Top Picks - Event Playlist, featuring some truly awesome suggestions! 😉 Hopefully, it gives you some suggestions for some hidden gems you might not have tried before 🙌 Thank you once again to everyone who contributed to this list. The winners of the Steam keys for this event have all been contacted. More details on the release can be found below:

Version 13.16 - Released September 12th 2024 Release Summary Live Stream Deep Dive Full Changelog: https://www.launchbox-app.com/about/changelog New Features: LaunchBox now offers save management capabilities (In Early Access). Automatically track and organize your saved games and save states, starting with RetroArch support and expanding to more emulators in the future. Import multiple save files for the same game and back them up locally to the Vault, all conveniently within the game's edit window For more detail on this feature, check out the FAQ below Quickly identify games with save files using new badges. Distinguish between saved games and save states at a glance Create custom playlists effortlessly with enhanced auto-population options. Filter by saved games or save states to build tailored playlists Efficiently find games with save files using new on-the-fly filters. Quickly browse through your collection based on saved game and save state availability The Game Discovery Center can now access special online lists curated by the LaunchBox team, offering fresh and seasonal game recommendations Free LaunchBox users can now experience a taste of Big Box with a 30-minute demo mode. Explore the interface and features, minus themes and game launching LaunchBox now includes the BigPEmu plugin within the setup file for easy downloading and updating of the BigPEmu Emulator Added option to prevent emulator update checks by right-clicking and selecting "Don't check for updates" while in the Manage Emulator window Improvements: LaunchBox now better protects your gaming experience by better managing messy data files, including those created by third-party applications Custom fields now offer a dropdown menu for quick and easy value selection The Advanced Search Options box will now close when your mouse is no longer over the search bar or the pop-up Clicking "Install" for Amazon Games titles will now initiate the installation process directly within the Amazon Games client Fixed: Resolved file lock issues that prevented smooth switching between LaunchBox and Big Box. Issue where launching a game in LaunchBox by pressing enter on the keyboard could inadvertently open two instances of the game under specific conditions Resolved crashes caused by specific characters in LaunchBox file paths Fixed an issue where updating emulators from the Edit Emulator window could result in errors Removed the option to download missing RetroArch cores in the ROM Import Wizard when RetroArch is not the selected emulator Restored the "All Games" import function for Amazon Games, addressing issues caused by their recent storefront updates Epic Games Store game installation status is now displayed more reliably Keyboard shortcuts now function within the Audit window, providing easy access to context menu options

NOTE: The most up-to-date version of this article is now available on our new Help Center. Please visit the article here Hi Folks, With the release of LaunchBox 13.16, we’re excited to introduce a powerful new feature: the ability to manage save games and states directly within LaunchBox. Say goodbye to navigating filesystems and renaming files manually. Check out the release video for an overview, or read on below to find out exactly how it works: Why is this feature listed as early access? The scope of what we can do with this feature is incredibly broad, and what we have now is just the beginning. We plan to extend this functionality in the future, and some of the workflows may change or evolve alongside it. What emulators are currently supported? Currently, this feature supports platforms using RetroArch. We plan to extend support to more emulators in the future. How does this feature work? First, understanding save directories is key. When you edit a game (Metadata > Game Saves), you’ll find a new section for managing saves and states. Within this section, if you have any saves present you'll see them divided into two areas: • Active Saves: These are your current save files, located in the [RetroArch > saves] directory. There can only be one active save file, which must have the same filename as your ROM. • Save Backups: LaunchBox manages multiple save files here, located in [LaunchBox > Saves]. LaunchBox automatically appends numbers to keep them unique. When you move saves between Backups and Active, LaunchBox handles the file naming for you. Workflow Examples 1) Importing Saves Let’s say I have a save file dumped from one of my childhood cartridges. From the <Game Saves> window, I can click on <Import Save>. After locating the file, it will now appear under <Save Backups>. It’s recommended to give your saves a unique name to help you identify them. Note that this doesn’t affect the actual filename (LaunchBox handles that for you), so feel free to use memorable names. To use the save we just imported, click on <Restore Backup>. You’ll be asked if you want to overwrite the active save (if you have one), so make sure to back it up first (more on that below). And that’s it—the save we just imported is now the active save, and I can bask in the glory of my childhood save games. 2) Backing Up Saves Next, let’s say I want to create a snapshot of my save. This is particularly useful for RPGs, which often contain many missable events. You can back up your save intermittently and revert to them if needed. From the <Game Saves> window, choose your active save and select <Backup Saves>. A copy of the save is created under <Save Backups>. It’s a good idea to give it a unique name. If you have multiple backups, notice how LaunchBox appends a number to keep them unique. When restoring a backup as the active save, LaunchBox will automatically rename it to match your ROM. 3) Deleting Saves Finally, you can click the trash icon next to any save file to remove it from disk. This is especially handy when paired with badges and playlists, allowing you to easily identify and clean up save files that are no longer needed. What about save-states? Everything mentioned above applies to save states as well. The key difference is that you can have multiple active save states, unlike save files, where only one can be active. How do badges and filters work with this feature? Enable the badge for saved games by turning on [Badges > Game Attributes > Enable Has Saved Games / States]. This shows a badge next to any game where a save file is present on disk. You can also filter your library with [Game Saves > Has Any Saved Game / State] to quickly find games with existing saves. What about additional apps? Each additional app has its own saves, which can be managed similarly. You’ll notice a new tab for managing saves under additional apps. I’ve set up a core directory in RetroArch's saves folder. Will this still work? By default, RetroArch organizes your saves as saves/[platform]/[savefile], but you can also configure it to use a directory like saves/[platform]/[core]/[savefile]. Both structures are fully supported, and LaunchBox will automatically detect and work with either setup. See It In Action If you'd like to see the save management features in action, you can check out our live stream where we covered multiple use-cases for this new feature, including dumping saves from cartridges, managing memory cards, backups, non-supported emulators and much more! There’s still much more we want to achieve with game saves—stay tuned for future updates!

This is likely due to the Amazon API being down at the end of last week. Please check out our thread on this issue, which has instructions on how to address this issue. TLDR: We have a new beta version out that addresses these crashes while we work to resolve the issues with Amazon's API

Hi Folks, Here's a quick update: we've rolled out a new beta that addresses the immediate crash. For anyone still experiencing this, please update to 13.16-beta-4. This should allow you to turn back on auto storefront imports and stop the immediate crash on load. Let us know if you encounter any immediate issues with this or if anyone is still experiencing this crash on the latest beta. Cheers,

We're receiving several reports from users when trying to import games from Amazon Games store, which is causing LaunchBox to crash. Why is this happening? Amazon's API that we use is currently down. When LaunchBox tries to make a call we get back a 504 error At the moment, we're unsure how long this outage will last for What causes the crash? Users who are logged into Amazon games who either: Have their storefront settings set to Import All Games (instead of only installed games) Run a storefront scan (either startup or manual or the legacy Amazon import) How can I temporarily fix this? In LaunchBox, go into Tools > Manage > Storefronts and change Amazon from All Games to Installed Games If LaunchBox is crashing immediately when opening, navigate to `LaunchBox\Data\Settings.xml` and change the AmazonAutoImport line to this: <AmazonAutoImport>InstalledOnly</AmazonAutoImport> LaunchBox should now open correctly What are we doing to address this? We've already fixed the crash internally and a beta should follow with the fix as soon as we can. This fix will be included in the next official release of LaunchBox which we are hoping to come out next week. Once Amazon's API is back up, we'll be monitoring closely to ensure they haven't made any substantial changes that we may need to accommodate. We'll continue to update you as this situation evolves.

We know you're all eagerly awaiting the prize announcements 😄 The winners for all giveaways have been selected, and we’ll be reaching out to them over the coming week. - For the grand giveaway (hardware + licenses), winners will be contacted via email. - For the forum events and Steam Key giveaways, winners will be contacted through DM on their forum account. Please bear with us as we work through contacting everyone (there are a lot of awesome prizes to work through 😉). We will announce once all winners have been contacted.

Hi Folks, I wanted to provide an update on Linux, given we discussed it during last week's closing stream and AMA. I'm attaching the response that we just added to our recent AMA, and you can also see where we discuss this in a lot more detail on our closing stream. It's linked to start at the timestamp where we discuss it ⏰ 45:55 Q: What is your stance on supporting Linux in the future? We hear you loud and clear, and we understand there is strong interest in Linux support, especially from Steam Deck users and others in the Linux community. We are actively exploring this possibility, but there are significant challenges due to the app’s foundation in Microsoft .NET and WPF, which were originally designed for Windows environments and aren’t fully compatible with Linux. Supporting Linux isn’t impossible, but it does present a large technical hurdle. It would likely require a substantial rewrite of the app from the ground up, and we have to carefully balance this effort with the need to maintain and improve the existing functionality and experience for our current users. That said, we’re experimenting with various UI frameworks to ensure we can deliver cross-platform compatibility while preserving the powerful customization and theming options that set LaunchBox apart. We want to make sure that whatever we build for Linux—whether it’s for Steam Deck or other platforms—retains the quality and flexibility users expect, without compromising on features. In short, Linux support is something we’re working toward, but due to the complexity of the project, we can’t commit to a specific timeline right now. Rest assured, it’s on our radar, and we’re taking steps in the right direction.

Hey @damageinc86, I just wanted to update this post as I know you submitted this to our recent AMA. I'm posting our response to this question for transparency: I'm also attaching the timestamp to our closing stream where we discussed this: 🔗 2:55:14 We recognize the challenges posed by different controller layouts, particularly when transitioning between devices like an Xbox controller (where the “A” button is in one position) and a Switch controller (where the “B” button may occupy a similar position). These inconsistencies can make it difficult to navigate LaunchBox or Big Box fluidly, which can indeed impact the overall user experience. That said, creating a framework to manage multiple controller profiles and remap all of their inputs in a unified way is not something on our short-term plans. The main reason is that there are already external tools that do this very well, such as reWASD and X360CE, that provide robust solutions for controller remapping at a system-wide level. These programs allow users to create consistent controller profiles that are applied not only within LaunchBox or Big Box, but also across all applications and emulators on their system. By setting up these profiles at the controller level, users can ensure that each controller behaves the same way across all programs, making the need for specific in-app navigation mappings less critical. From our perspective, where we do feel we can make an improvement with controller mappings is within the emulators themselves, i.e configuring a controller mapping in LaunchBox, and having that be automatically applied to the emulator's configuration, negating the need for users to have to configure controllers separately via emulators. I hope that helps provide some clarity on the issue. Give me a shout if you'd like to discuss anything further.

Hi Folks, Please check the original post, it has now been updated with a recap of answers to your questions. I have tagged the original poster in each question, and you can check out our closing stream where we discuss most of these questions in a lot more detail. Thank you to everyone who participated in this event, we hope we were able to provide some insightful insight and really appreciate your comments and feedback 🙇

Ah so that's how you do it, I was wondering if that was possible, good to know. But yeah, I imagine since a LaunchBox-managed RetroArch instance uses default RetroArch, which expects them in the system folder by default, that's what we went with. But I totally agree, it would be great to have a bit of order to RetroArch's BIOS folder, it can get a bit unruly in there XD

Hi @Sbaby hope you're well and apologies you haven't received any follow-up here. Just to let you know I'm going to look into this with the team, and will follow up on your request and also the ticket submission. Please allow me some time to get some clarification here, but I just wanted you to know that we're looking into this and will get back to you as soon as possible. Appreciate you bearing with us here

Hi @B-17 Bomber hope you're well. I've looked into this and Attract isn't currently supported from the Game Discovery Center. That said, to answer your original question, there is a keyboard/controller mapping that you can set to `Start Attract Mode`. So you can use this shortcut to start Attract Mode manually. I'm not 100% sure how your additional controls are accepting inputs, i.e if they are constantly sending inputs that stop Attract Mode from starting, you may want to consider turning off `Use All Controllers` In `Options > Controller` so that only your designed controller can control Big Box. Hope that helps clarify, let me know if you have any further questions.

Hi Folks, Just wanted to provide a quick update here, we're aware of the errors people are experiencing here and are actively looking into this. It's been tricky to pinpoint given the random nature of the errors, and a refresh of the page will (in most cases) make them go away. That said, we know it's an issue and have someone looking into this. Unfortunately we can't give an accurate ETA when this might be resolved, but as soon as we have any leads we'll be sure to let you know. Please do keep us posted here if you're noticing periods where they aren't just intermittent errors or any changes in behaviour from what you've seen previously. Apologies for the problems caused here, we'll keep you posted

Hey @EvoluZion3 thanks so much for the additional data points there. We're both running similar builds then (same version, game folder location etc) but the only different is mine is only around 2.5k games. Interesting that after the initial process, it's now completed in seconds, that makes me think it could be building some kind of file comparison table under the hood which it uses to compare to. I'm going to talk to the team to try and understand a bit more about what this process is checking for under the hood, and in the meantime do let me know how it runs today and throughout the week. If it reverts to the 3 minute scan it sounds likely that the initial comparison could be whats taking the time here. Keep me posted, and I'll keep you posted 😃

Hey @Isoku, I split your post out here so I can follow up, as I was also curious about this. So, unfortunately, it seems like you cannot have BIOS files organized by subfolders. LaunchBox will expect the BIOS files to be in the `system` location, and if you browse to a BIOS outside of this location using the `browse` option, it will simply copy that BIOS back into the `system` folder. I imagine this is a limitation with RetroArch, where it expects BIOS files to be in this location. I just ran a test whereby if you have your BIOS in subfolders, RetroArch won't find it correctly. I can't say if that's the case for ALL BIOS, as each core could be different, but unfortunately that means you're going to have to keep your BIOS in the default `Retroarch > system` folder. I agree, that it's a nice way to organise things at all, but I do find that the Manage Dependencies option in LaunchBox at least let's me identify which BIOS is related to which system. Hope that helps to clarify. Let me know if you have any further questions.

Nope, no need to change your save structure. This is exactly how I have mine setup and it recognises saves no problem. The only thing to be aware of is that the LaunchBox `Saves` folder, which stores the Save Backups, doesn't include a core directory. But this shouldn't be an issue anyways since when you backup / restore saves via the new UI, it moves everything into the right place. It's more just something in case you're wondering why it doesn't exactly mirror your RetroArch save directory. Hope that helps clarify.

Thanks for flagging this folks, I've run some tests on my own instance but unfortunately am not seeing what you're describing as the scan takes less than a couple of seconds. That said, there are a bunch of variables that could be causing this so let's try and narrow it down What LB version are you using? I'm assuming the latest 13.15? Is your `Games` directory located within your LaunchBox directory, or is it stored somewhere outside of this location? Do you experience slowness when scanning for additional ROMs, even if there aren't any new ROMs present? Or is it only when there are new ROMs present? Are there any differences when scanning for different platforms? I'm assuming not, as you mentioned it's still slow on platforms with a small number of games, but would be good to confirm What is your total game count roughly? Finally, to completely rule out any version issues, if you update to the latest beta (currently 13.16-3) do you experience the same issue? Let me know and we'll try to get to the bottom of this.

Hey everyone, August was absolutely monumental for us! 🎉 As we wrap up our 11th Birthday Celebrations, we wanted to take a moment to recap all the amazing highlights—from our team’s exciting updates to the incredible contributions from all of you. Let’s dive into everything that went down in August! 🚀 TEAM UPDATES: BigPEmu Arrives On The Scene 🕹️ We kicked off the month with a brand new emulator plugin, BigPEmu! This new addition allows you to easily install the BigPEMU Plugin and automatically import your Atari Jaguar and Atari Jaguar CD games. ScummVM - LaunchBox Tutorial 🧑‍🏫 Alongside LaunchBox 13.15, we launched a new plugin for ScummVM. @RetroPython published a brand new tutorial that walks you through the essential steps to seamlessly set up SCUMMVM using LaunchBox. We Launched a Brand New Twitch Channel! 📺 To gear up for our 11th Birthday Celebrations, we launched a brand new Twitch channel! During the final week of August, the team went live every day, showcasing everything from basic LaunchBox builds to custom plugins, themes, and even going head-to-head with some retro classics. Check out the channel and catch some of the replays below! 🎉🎮 🔗 https://www.twitch.tv/launchboxofficial LaunchBox turned 11! 🎂 We wrapped up August with an action-packed week of celebrations for our 11th birthday, featuring daily streams, multiple forum events, and our biggest prize giveaway ever! This was our first event of its kind, and we hope you had as much fun as we did. Missed out or want to relive the excitement? Head over to our celebration site to catch up on all the events that took place throughout the week. 🎉 🔗 https://www.launchbox-app.com/celebrate/ The Great Game Gauntlet 👑 We hosted a week-long game competition where users voted on games and shared their thoughts on “What makes a great video game collection?”, with Steam keys being given out along the way. Check out the winners and see how your favorite games fared below: Community Playlists 📄 Throughout the celebratory week, users contributed to two different playlists for the Game Discovery Center. We received an overwhelming amount of amazing responses, and we’re now busy sorting these into playlists that will soon appear in your very own Game Discovery Center. Stay tuned for some fantastic new collections curated by our awesome community! AMA With The LaunchBox Team 📄 For our closing stream, we tackled burning questions from the community—all while attempting to juggle competitive arcade games at the same time! 😉 If you couldn’t join us live, don’t worry! We’re working on a recap post that will be made available soon. Be sure to follow the thread to stay updated. Get To Know The LaunchBox Team 🤝 To wrap up the celebrations, we published a series of posts introducing some of the key minds behind LaunchBox. Get to know the team and dive into their stories below! 🔗 https://forums.launchbox-app.com/tags/meettheteam/ COMMUNITY CONTRIBUTIONS: While our team has been hard at work, our community has been buzzing with activity. We’re actively exploring new ways to showcase these amazing contributions, and although it’s challenging to showcase absolutely everything, we wanted to highlight a few cool things that stood out this month. We’re actively thinking of ways to expand this and feature more of your fantastic work, so stay tuned for more highlights in the future! Plugins Galore From @JoeViking245 🔌 Joe was on fire this month, dropping two incredible plugins. With his “How Long To Beat” plugin, you can now easily see how long your next gaming investment will be, and the “Steam Grid DB Scraper” plugin lets you grab additional media to enhance your collection. 🛠️ THIS MONTH: We’re still riding high from the celebrations, but there’s no slowing down! We’re currently working through all the amazing prizes from our recent events and gearing up for a brand new release of LaunchBox that’s just around the corner. Stay tuned, exciting things are on the horizon! 🎉 We’re planning to make these roundups a regular feature at the end of each month. What kind of content would you like to see showcased here? Let us know in the comments below! Happy gaming! Andy

Welcome to the club 😉 LaunchBox curation is a game all in itself! While a lot of this comes down to personal preference, one thing that might be worth considering is the `hidden` & `broken` checkbox fields. Both of these have view options tied to them in both LaunhBox & Big Box that will let you temporarily hide games marked with these fields. On the flip side, there is the option to let LaunchBox actually delete the ROM files from disk when you delete a game in your instance. This can be useful if you want to do your curation in LaunchBox, and then also let it tidy up the ROMs for you. Let us know how you get on, or if you need tips on specific curation workflows we'll do our best to advise

Thank you all for your incredible contributions! This event has now wrapped up, and it’s been amazing to see so many fantastic games as people’s favorites. There’s definitely a trend of well-known classics, but also some hidden gems I hadn’t encountered before (thanks for essentially doubling my backlog!). It’s been a blast discovering new games and revisiting old favorites through your suggestions. 😄 Next week, we’ll be finalizing both the playlists and the prize winners. We’ll update this post once the games are added to the playlist, so keep an eye on the Game Discovery Center. As for the giveaway, winners will be contacted via DM, and we’ll update this post once everyone’s been notified. We'll also give a little recap as to what some of the most popular games submitted here were, stay tuned! 🙌 Thanks again for making this event a blast! — this is just the beginning for community playlists

Thank you all for your incredible contributions! This event has now wrapped up, and it’s been amazing seeing the variety of game suggestions for the ultimate party playlist. The sheer range of games you’ve shared that can be enjoyed with friends is astounding—I’ve got a long list to try at my next gathering! 😉 If any friendships get tested, I’ll know who to blame! 😄 Next week, we’ll be finalizing both the playlists and the prize winners. We’ll update this post once the games are added to the playlist, so keep an eye on the Game Discovery Center. As for the giveaway, winners will be contacted via DM, and we’ll update this post once everyone’s been notified. Thanks again for making this event a blast! — this is just the beginning for community playlists!

Hi Folks, What a week it’s been! It’s been amazing to see everyone’s suggestions, discussions, and contributions to the Gauntlet. A huge thank you to everyone who participated! The final day’s poll has wrapped, and the king of the Gauntlet has been chosen. Drumroll please… the winner is: 🥳 🧛‍♂️ CASTLEVANIA ADVANCE COLLECTION 🧛‍♂️ 🥳 That's a lot of love for Konami and the GBA in the community, so the final Steam key prize pool includes: Normal Prize Pool 🥉 SEGA Mega Drive & Genesis Classics Tomb Raider I-III Remastered Tony Hawk Pro Skater 1+2 Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster Double Prize Pool 🥈 Castlevania Advance Collection And the ultimate prize for 1 lucky winner 🥇 Marvel VS Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics Don’t forget, there are multiple keys up for grabs! Winners will be chosen next week and contacted via DM through the forum. We’ll update this post once all winners have been notified. Good luck! 🎉

Thanks for all the great comments, folks! It’s awesome to see so many of you prefer sticking to the default sorting and just focusing on playing the games! 😁 After all, that’s what it’s all about. Day 5 of the gauntlet is now closed, and the people have spoken—the ultimate winner is: 🧛‍♂️ CASTLEVANIA ADVANCE COLLECTION 🧛‍♂️ That means there will be extra keys of this game up for grabs in the prize pool. Check out the master post where we'll be providing updates on the prize winners

I’ll kick things off! For some of my favorite collection-style games, I like to create playlists that include both the collection itself and the original releases of each game it features. It’s definitely a bit manual, but I love checking off the original releases as I complete them and easily comparing them with their remastered versions! The ‘possible ports’ feature is another great way to do this, but there’s something special about having my favorite hand-picked collections all together in one place. How about you? Looking forward to hearing your tips and favorite methods. And don’t worry, this isn’t just about collection-style games—share any tidbit or trick you love to use to manage any of your games in LaunchBox!