SentaiBrad

Hafitz said Hi Jason, Was wondering if the dosbox that comes with launchbox has a 3dfx support, if none, is there any plan to release with a 3dfx support? and can I simply use ykhwong's dosbox with launchbox? We don't maintain, develop or even really offer support for DOSBox honestly. We have nothing to do with their project. Also yes, as long as the DOSBox exe's are the same name, It should be as easy as just replacing the folder. I've had to install DOSBox separately before. I would say to keep everything named the same because I don't know if LaunchBox is smart enough to just pick it up, but there also may be options in LaunchBox so you can just tell specific games who need a separate version to just use that one instead of the pre-bunbled DOSBox config.

BD said I figured as much. No, not an external. That's strange. Has it done it since? Have you tried adding in 500mb or 1GB of RAM Cache too? That fixed my problem on the External and loading problems, but... if you're not on a slow read / write... it should work fine. Edit: However, it is a new feature so I wonder if Jason could be more specific with his help.

BD said When scrolling fast, dragging the scroll bar on the right, i get this error: System.InvalidOperationException: Collection was modified; enumeration operation may not execute. at System.ThrowHelper.ThrowInvalidOperationException(ExceptionResource resource) at System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary`2.ValueCollection.Enumerator.MoveNext() at LaunchBox.Caching.ImageCacheList.ClearOldest() at LaunchBox.Caching.ImageCache.DisposeOldImages() at System.Threading.ExecutionContext.Run(ExecutionContext executionContext, ContextCallback callback, Object state) at System.Threading.ThreadHelper.ThreadStart() So pretty much, LaunchBox couldn't keep up with the HDD Cache. Are your images on an external?

CircinusPrime said Quick update: disabling RAM caching solves the parameter not valid error, but I'm still getting no box art drawing for all my 55 games, even though background art loads just fine. With so many games doing this, I wouldn't think it was a case of corruption? I can edit a game's entry and in the image preview the box art loads fine, same with manually navigating to the images folder and viewing the box art from there Do you have your images located on a USB2 drive or over a network by any chance? Maybe even an older drive with a poor read / write speed? I would say try deleting the images for one game as well, then re-download them completely and see if they have issues showing up.

Conehead said got back yesterday and saw this . the new interface is really good. bugs .. none so far awesome work Jason Yea, it is looking awesome. I also have a question for the Beta Testers. Do you guys use a controller with LB? Ideally in a "Steam Box" fashion? Or just on your TV like 5 feet away? Or do you use a controller at all? The question I have is, with the new UI would icons on the left be something that would make life easier? Maybe a 2 column system with an arrow at the bottom. 2 columns of game system icons.

ps4isthefuture said It's a little work until someone gets a database retrieval script and scripting for retrieving art work but it's a step in the right direction and something to pass time. Please feel free to contribute to this. This is really cool. Seeing what people could do with LaunchBox, but I think its safe to say that this is out of the realm of what Jason wanted. Im not saying that there couldn't be features like this in the future, way in the future, but I am certain he is more concerned about updating, maintaining and creating new features for games. I'm also sure he doesn't want to compete with Kodi (XBMC), its an extremely well established Movies, TV and Music front end; Though I just use it for TV and Movies. Not that we shouldn't compete with them, but there is really no point when they're this extremely well established with skins, addons and the like, on several platforms. It doesn't make sense to target that demographic just yet in LaunchBox's case. I still think however, this is frikin awesome. I love seeing what other people want to do with their programs and it does excite me when others take the normal functions of the program, and uses them for unintended purposes. Not malicious ones either.

Jason Carr said Sincro has graciously developed and contributed a tool to import metadata for MAME ROMs, either from MAME.dat or arcadehits.net. Eventually this functionality will likely be built into LaunchBox, but as for now, this tool should serve the purpose well: Download LaunchBox MAME Import Download MAME.dat Thanks to sincro for this awesome contribution! Feel free to make any suggestions or ask any questions, and either sincro or I will follow up. Sweet. I was thinking of trying to do a few MAME games, even though they're a bitch to deal with really. This makes things easier though.

Hafitz said Hi there, Again thank you for developing this great Frontend Software. I'd like to know something. I have a couple of games, virtua fighter 2, monster truck madness and etc, well these games all comes with CD Audio Track. Is there a way I can create a .cue \ .bin off it, then automount the images and launch the games without the CD while retaining the in game music audio? I know it works for dos games and dosbox. Your tutorial is very helpful, but what about windows games? Maybe can show me which video to watch or explain if there's a way? Thank you! Hafidz (Le Fizsyiah) PS: Can't Wait for Premium! The short answer is, no. LaunchBox and DOSBox are focused on the DOS side of everything. DOSBox is the emulator and were simply the front end with some tools. If we needed to emulate Windows games, there would probably be more tools to deal with images for those games. The fact is, so far LB wasn't made with any of that stuff in mind. Now, you could probably figure something out in the meantime with scripts, and in the options you can uncheck "Use DOSBox." I don't know if that will work honestly, just unchecking a box and trying to use existing tools, but if it relies on DOSBox, it probably wont. Now, Jason could add better tools to deal with windows games from the 98 to XP era, but there hasn't been too much of a desire for that until now. I'll let him know to read this and he might be able to figure something out, or put this on the feature list.

nmc said Hello guys, The new GUI is getting really hot, nice work Jason. Is there a way to extend the controller usage into the platform sidebar browser? Aside from that, it´s getting really cool. Better controller support is planned.

Hafitz said Nevermind guys, I figured it out!! Pretty simple interface!!! No problem. Welcome to the Forums and I am glad to hear you like LB.

KeenanW said Jason Carr said Keenan, good find, but I can't reproduce it. Can you screenshot or copy paste me the error text? It's just a generic "Stopped Responding" error message. No error log as far as I can see. For the right-click issue, staying in the main game list window and waiting five seconds doesn't make it crash. My XML file is 2.5MB, so maybe it's taking a bit of a time to load that information. If I right click anything before five seconds have passed, it crashes. Under tools try the clean up images option, if it even works. Otherwise try moving your images folder. If you have a lot of images, it will take a while. Otherwise also try using your XML backups. copy the first XML backup to the folder. Copy the LaunchBox.xml name and delete it. Rename the new XML with your copied name. See if that helps. You may also need to go back a few backups. If not that, do older versions give you the issue? Does the latest nightly give you issues? And about the size of XML's, unless you have a slow processing computer, and I mean really slow, a 2.5mb is relatively small. I personally operate with a 7.29mb XML and a 9.5GB images folder. It is however all dependent on the computer. Writing those last few sentences reminds me as well, do you use LB on a USB2 drive or over a network? The HDD Cache works abysmally over those 2 methods, hence being able to choose the amount of RAM LB uses now in conjunction with the HDD Cache. By default it is always on.

CircinusPrime said Hmm... Actually, it works just fine the first time I run it. After adding a game, the box art does not show (but the background does), but it still runs fine. After restarting LaunchBox, I get a new error: System.ArgumentException: Parameter is not valid. at System.Drawing.Image.FromStream(Stream stream, Boolean useEmbeddedColorManagement, Boolean validateImageData) at System.Drawing.Image.FromStream(Stream stream) at LaunchBox.Caching.ImageCache.PrepopulateImageCache() at System.Threading.ExecutionContext.Run(ExecutionContext executionContext, ContextCallback callback, Object state) at System.Threading.ThreadHelper.ThreadStart() However, I can push the error behind LaunchBox and it works fine, except for box art. Here's another screenshot if it helps any: http://puu.sh/bgF3j/89471bd6ef.jpg There are two options under tools. Clean up Images and Refresh Images. If you are having a problem where some images disappear (i had a problem where about 100 front covers went poof, but it was still there) try the refresh button. If still no, try Clean Up Images and then refresh. If still no, go in to your Images folder and manually delete the entry for the game and try to re-download the images. I believe its on the list too for better mass library functions, similar to what a scan will do. Like downloading selected images for every game for example. So if at the very least we can't pin point this issue we have tools to work around it. Another general thought about images, I had a trouble image that would cause crashes quite a lot. It gave me horrible crc issues and the like, but corrupted images can cause a number of odd issues. That's why I suggest manually deleting the trouble images folder. I didn't solve my problems until I moved my entire 10GB LaunchBox folder to another drive. Oh, and USB2 externals have horrendous reads on images as well.

CircinusPrime said SentaiBrad said https://www.launchbox-app.com/new-releases/launchbox-version-3-4-released https://www.launchbox-app.com/new-releases/launchbox-version-3-3-released The download links in the older release posts are redirecting me to the 3.5 setup instead of the old version. Either way, I stumbled across a 3.1 setup, and it still does the same thing They are? Damn... I should also say, have you updated your PC in a while? Not necessarily just drivers, but the software? Microsoft specific packages like .Net Framework and the like? If you're on Windows 7 or 8.1, run your Windows Update and that should make sure most of your Windows Specifics are updated. I don't know if that will help... but its worth a shot otherwise Jason is going to have to take a look.

CircinusPrime said SentaiBrad said I haven't been playing around with the new version, so it could be a random bug, or a personal bug. I've had a few of those. Try an older XML in your backups folder just to be safe. There should be 20 of them by default. Try the oldest one in there if you haven't already. I've gone through a few of my backup XML files, including the latest and oldest to no avail. Do you happen to have an older version of LaunchBox that I can try, to see if that would do anything? https://www.launchbox-app.com/new-releases/launchbox-version-3-4-released https://www.launchbox-app.com/new-releases/launchbox-version-3-3-released

CircinusPrime said SentaiBrad said The forums are great got any kind of post a user wants to make, so welcome. What have you tried specifically, just a different exe? If so, try the latest exe in a folder all on its own. New images folder, new XML. Another thing you could try is your XML backups. They've actually started to save me. Copy the name 'LaunchBox.xml' then delete that file. Go in to your backups, rename the first one and put that in with your exe. See if any of that helps. Otherwise can you walk me through what happened if you can remember? I'll see if I can't reproduce this error. I've tried those suggestions, and I'm still getting this. Here's a screenshot if it helps: http://puu.sh/baxeo/728cdb14e3.jpg As for exactly what happened, the first time this started happening was completely out of the blue. I had LaunchBox set up and running smoothly, and one day after a reboot it started happening out of nowhere. No updates, no changes at all. I'd pinned LaunchBox to my taskbar and used that to run it. I've also gone straight to the install directory and ran the executable directly I haven't been playing around with the new version, so it could be a random bug, or a personal bug. I've had a few of those. Try an older XML in your backups folder just to be safe. There should be 20 of them by default. Try the oldest one in there if you haven't already.

CircinusPrime said I'm not submitting a bug report for this since I'm pretty sure it's something wrong with my system Every time I try to run LaunchBox, I get the following stack trace: System.Runtime.InteropServices.ExternalException: A generic error occurred in GDI+. at System.Drawing.Image.Save(String filename, ImageCodecInfo encoder, EncoderParameters encoderParams) at LaunchBox.WelcomeForm.SaveTempPngAndGetPath(Image image) at LaunchBox.WelcomeForm.WelcomeForm_Load(Object sender, EventArgs e) at System.Windows.Forms.Form.OnLoad(EventArgs e) at System.Windows.Forms.Control.CreateControl(Boolean fIgnoreVisible) at System.Windows.Forms.Control.CreateControl() at System.Windows.Forms.Control.WmShowWindow(Message& m) at System.Windows.Forms.Control.WndProc(Message& m) at System.Windows.Forms.Control.ControlNativeWindow.WndProc(Message& m) at System.Windows.Forms.NativeWindow.Callback(IntPtr hWnd, Int32 msg, IntPtr wparam, IntPtr lparam) It started happening at random and persists across LaunchBox reinstalls. Any thoughts? The forums are great got any kind of post a user wants to make, so welcome. What have you tried specifically, just a different exe? If so, try the latest exe in a folder all on its own. New images folder, new XML. Another thing you could try is your XML backups. They've actually started to save me. Copy the name 'LaunchBox.xml' then delete that file. Go in to your backups, rename the first one and put that in with your exe. See if any of that helps. Otherwise can you walk me through what happened if you can remember? I'll see if I can't reproduce this error.

Ok, now I fully understand. I think the i was a feature request a while back, being able to view info quickly like this. Jason intentionally coded it this way, but I am unsure if its really important for the behavior to stay this way. He'll need to specify. Edit: Also as a note for the first feature request, that would most likely need to be an option, as with most things. I personally have a lot of rom hacks and Japanese games where the box art wont tell me the name exactly. This is a me problem however.

ncross216 said This is my first time posting in this forum so please just inform me if the topics already exist or i make any mistake. 1. It would be great if we can hide Game title as most of our box-art contains the title itself. 2. When LB starts, the first game is always selected and has a white selection box around it. No auto-selection would look more nice when the app starts. 3. In case of bringing up the game details popup by clicking the game icon 'i', is it possible that the popup will get disappeared when user moves away the pointer from the game. thanks! Welcome to the forums. I don't think any of these are implemented right now. The first two make sense. The first one will most likely be a UI option and the second one will most likely be a default behavior, unless Jason made it the current way on purpose. He would have to say though. As for the 3rd, is this a bug report or a question? I can't tell what you mean exactly. -Brad

mnemonic said Less covers on the left and info+screenshot on the right. Here is a screenshot of some xbmc addon which should give you a hint of what I mean. The execution of that addon though is poorly. It wastes a lot space so the info is not even shown without scrolling. If implemented in LB it should be done a bit better. A movable divider instead of fixed division would be awesome. http://img221.imageshack.us/img221/4422/screenshot009l.png The current LB built only hovers the info or shows it next to the selected game. This looks ugly since it covers the boxarts of other games. Additionally the screenshot is shown nowhere even though it's downloaded. I second this actually. The great thing is too that we are probably going to go through a UI rewrite at some point in the future so the final decisions haven't been made BUT, we also don't know how extensively it is going to change. At least the general consensus of most of the users is that we should. Jason agrees for the most part, how ever he is still one person. It will come with better themeing options, most likely better controller support while inside the program and lots more features. I don't want to make any promises on his behalf, but changing up the UI a little bit is certainly being talked over between himself and I, and of course everyone on the forums. We were leaning more towards an OpenEmu STYLE, but not to copy them. We want the UI to still be unique to us. Also, Kodi is an awesome program. I just never got in to using it for Roms.

mnemonic said No need to apologize. First, as you may recognized, I'm not a native english speaker. Additionally I have a distinct tendency to express myself complicated even in my mother tongue. Second, I have to admit I haven't seen/used the file selector field while importing roms. Sorry, my bad. But actually this field does not help enough to solve all the problems. It helps to narrow the file selection to one file type. i.e. *.mds .This is o.k. and helps if you have one type you want to import. Sadly at the heyday of the cd there were a plethora of backup-image types invented, and most of them are multi-file. Clone-cd for example generated 01.img, 01.ccd, 01.cue, 01.sub for one disc. So when using the file-selector I would have to use multiple runs for every image type. To get them all in one import run I would have to combine multiple entries like *.ccd, *.mds., *.cue. But it seems this syntax is not supported in the file selector field. Is there a valid syntax for multiple file type definitions or is this not supported? Regarding the multi-disk problem: Assume a game has 5 disks, wouldn't it be nice if lauchbox would only show one cover and asks you what disk to launch when clicked? Yea, for now you have to do multiple imports with the right filter settings. Jason knows that its been requested to add multiple filters per import, but there are a lot of things for him to do, and he's one person. Also, yea, there are way to damn many Disc formats. As far as Multi discs go, its kind of pointless for LaunchBox to ask you what disc to load. You can have multiple entries of the same game. For example, Final Fantasy IX. I scanned for TheGamesDB, got all of the images etc, but I renamed them afterwards with Disc 1, Disc 2, Disc 3 and Disc 4 afterwards. It sucks, but it works without more features needing to be written. That said, I don't think LaunchBox draws from one set of images. Like for FF9, I am fairly certain there are 4 entries in the Images folder with the same images downloaded multiple times. I do think there should be better multi disc back-end handling, but I am not so certain that would be one I like (Picking the disc on one entry). Ultimately it would be nice to give everyone a plethora of options, however its unfeasible.

mnemonic said @SentaiBrad I think we have a misunderstanding here. First my entry point for my ideas was Jasons post. I'm talking about cd-image import based on folders. So the filename that is searched on the db remains the foldername. The scheme I was refering to was for the inside the imported folder. Example O.k.: Gamename (folder) 01.mds 01.mdf Also allowed: Gamename (folder) Gamename01.mdf Gamename02.mds Not allowed: Gamename (folder) GamenameDISKONE.mdf GamenameDISKONE.mds So in the last case the program could ask at the end of the import run for everygame that does not math the pattern which file to use for the emulator. As you can see this has nothing to do with the gamedb since it's querry is based on the foldername which I'm not talking about. Also a solution would be putting all files of a folder in one zip. Problem with that is that a lot of emulators can't deal with ziped cd-images. Let alone multi-image zip files. So you only want one disc image instead of Disc 1, Disc 2? Also, if you're not worried about TheGamesDB searches then the name is irrelevant. It can be called what ever. Maybe we do still have disconnect here. Say you do import a game with two discs. You setup the right filter like *.iso. Its pulled in both games. If the files have the game name, I would just let it use the game name. The option to use the folders name was important for games whose file name was different than the folders name, but the folder had the game name. All my Wii games for example were their internal codes like QVF9E, but the folder held the proper name. If you use the file names, assuming they have the game name included, then you could just put Disc 1 like GameName (Disc 1). Anything in the ( ) is ignored by LaunchBox. As far as choosing what file for the emulator, you set Filter options before the scan even takes place regardless of what naming convention you want use. So it will just pick the file extension and add the link to the Emulator. So even if you import a multi disc game, its still attached to the emulator, delete the second disc from the library if you don't want it there, or just launch from Disc 1. I am really trying to understand, but I don't think I am. What I think the problems could be... shouldn't be problems because LB already handles things fairly well. Sorry for not completely understanding.

mnemonic said There are two solutions that come to my mind for the launch-file selection problem: 1. Ask for the file to use (if possible at the end of the import, so selection can be done in one go and you don't have to monitor the import) I think windows explorer smb transfer work that way 2. Define a file scheme as a default. XMBC does this for series for example. You just can't name the files like you want you have to rename the files according the scheme defined by xmbc in order for the import to work. You might even combine the solutions by hirachy (first two, if something is detected that does not fit scheme then one) or by selector before import. With kind regards, mnemonic For #2, you might be thinking of when it imports the Data from TheGamesDB. We can't really control their end unfortunately. We've expanded on the initial import rules before because they were a tad too strict. We've since gone back and tried to work around most grammar differences. So it should import most games data just fine, but It will still miss a lot. Jason wanted that initial scan to be strict because he wanted to make sure it didn't import the wrong data for a game. For example, if one of your games is Tetris, it shouldn't import Tetris 2 data, but it could. For #1, what do you mean ask for the file to use? When you select Import Roms, you define the filter so anything with that file extension is imported in to your library. Now, as for answering both, the Console should most likely reflect TheGamesDB method of naming the consoles otherwise you get a weird split naming. That's the only time I made sure the names were exactly the same, otherwise now with the less strict searching initially and the smarter parsing afterwards you should be able to hit search and find the game there. If after a little bit of editing it still doesn't pop up then TheGamesDB doesn't have it. That's another problem we have too is that the GamesDB is user driven, and there isn't remotely every game added yet.

Jason Carr said Welcome to the forums, mnemonic. There isn't really a Windows game importer for the moment, but you can manually add them via Game > Add, as Brad suggested. The DOS game installer wizard won't work very well, though; I wouldn't suggest using that. Thanks, Jason Oh no, I wouldn't either. But it COULD be done.

mnemonic said How do I import a non-steam windows game? All I see is a wizard for DOS games. With kind regards, mnemonic It isn't in the same spot as the other import features, but, Game -> Add. From there just point the application path to any .exe you want. The DOS importer could technically do the same job too, you would just need to uncheck the option to use DOSBox.

mnemonic said If you import a PSX images like this: (Folder with with Gamename) which contains 01.mdf and 01.mds and 02.mdf and 02.mds What do you get? Four games! Please fix this. With kinde regards, mnemonic There isn't a problem here. People choose how they want to name their files. There is no way we can expect to know every single method. When you import a rom, there is a Filter box. In here you enter the extension of the files you want to scan. In the case of PS1 images there could be several. For me, I ran several scans using different filters. First was *.iso, then was *.img. After I broke it down to the ones that used the very specific ones. mdf or mds will load fine depending on the emulator. To be careful though, choose the one that has all of the data which would be the image with several hundreds of mb vs a few mb. So just add *.mdf. There is even a check box to use the folder name for the imported roms name. Hope this helped.