CriticalCid

After the CHDs were mentioned in this thread I tested a CHD game which only consists of a CHD file and doesn’t have an additional ROM file (Chaos Heat). It didn’t start. Now I wanted to test it with the new version you just posted but now Chaos Heat wasn’t imported at all.

Antropus said Yeah, this would be a platform to be imported manually for now, I think, and let LaunchBox do its thing. You will not get all the sweet metadata, but it will be imported for now. I will implement the ability to select any source.cpp and add a checkbox by its side, to allow you to bypass all filters. That way, it will force the program to import that source even if everything else is being filtered. I should have it implemented in a few days, so stay tuned! Awesome! I just tested your tool an hour ago and I love it already.These two features would just be the little extra mile to make it perfect for me

Thanks for your awesome tool. It works like a charm :) But unfortunately it’s exactly like I assumed it in my last post. Sega Hikaru doesn’t show up in sources because the unplayable filter filters out all the games for it. So I ask again if could integrate it as its own platform in the GUI. I also have another idea for a future version of your tool. Many games which are imported as the US, Europe or World version refer in the bio notes to the original Japanese version for more information’s. It would be awesome if it could import the bio notes from the original version instead of just a reference to a game version which doesn’t get imported in LB anyway (at least if you filter out all clones). Here’s a screenshot as example:

Incredible how much work you put in your import tool. And I really appreciate your attempt to get the metadata accurate as possible. I can’t imagine how time consuming this must be.

Thanks for the clarification. Glad to know that you have everything covered and under control :)

Antropus said I will leave a tiny little bit of manual work for ya ;) Sega Hikaru has a comprehensive list of... 6 games. So, not happening :) That’s true. But on the other hand has CPS3 the same amount of games (if you don’t count the clones) ;) The feature with the dropdown menu sounds great. But since you import the .cpp info as well it would be rather easy to change the platforms in LaunchBox itself at this point. So that wasn’t my point for Hikaru exactly. I try to rephrase my question. Will Hikaru be imported if I select the non-working filter and if not, could you integrate an option for it? It is a DEmul system and not supported through MAME, so the games are marked as not working in the MAME database. Because every game without a specified platform will be imported in LB simply in MAME with your tool I guess the importer will only use a MAME filter and no extra filter for DEmul games. So the Hikaru games would be completely left out without special treatment. I hope that my point is clearer now ;)

Awesome! I can’t wait to finally get my hands on your tool EDIT: I just thought that you maybe could integrate Sega Hikaru in the GUI as well. Since it can’t be emulated through MAME I guess it would need the same method as the other DEmul systems to ignore the non-working filter on the import.

Only if you download images from EmuMovies. It's true that LaunchBox does only support one path for the screenshots BUT it also supports subfolders within that path. That’s why I said that you should create a screenshot folder and move the other 2 folders within it

I just tested it with PS1 and N64(which doesn’t have any CRC values at all) and both were imported without any problems! But I also noticed that the “License” field from the filename scraper and the “Gametype” field from the synopsis scraper are containing more or less the same info. It would be great if the data from the “Gametype” field could be integrated within the “License” field instead of being a redundant entry. And in case you forgot my question: CriticalCid said Another question. What exactly are these System Ini files? Can you give an example where I can find one?

The problem is that LaunchBox only supports one path for the screenshots. Nonetheless if you create a screenshot folder and move your snaps and titles folders in it you should have both within LaunchBox.

I don’t know if there’s documentation for it. Before I discovered your tool I didn’t even know about synopsis. Like I said I guess the easiest way would be to add the option to customize what kind of Custom Fields should be imported. So you can just skip the CRC values. The CRC values are always in the first line of each game entry. Even if a game doesn’t have a CRC value the line is there and blank. So the simplest solution could be to just skip always the first line of an entry.

I tested SNES and PS1. SNES now works like a charm but the PS1 synopsis file still gives me an error. I uploaded the synopsis file so you can test it yourself. I also have a request. It would also be nice to have the option to choose what kind of Custom Fields I want to add with the synopsis files. I only care about Controller and Alternative title. Another question. What exactly are these System Ini files? Can you give an example where I can find one?

Thanks for the update! I will definitely test it soon.

If I look at the GUI I guess that this would be absolutely no problem. I think you only have to set the “Front Images” path to the folder which contains the marquees and everything is fine.

Yes, MAMEUIFX does export a listxml file. I use it with Clrmamepro and all the extra games are detected there. I searched for a dedicated info file which contains metadata for arcade systems but I didn’t find any. But the history.dat does include some data for very few systems. I guess the missing ones must be filled in manually.

Awesome! I was hoping that you already did it that way. I kinda feel bad that with each post I give you more and more feature request but I noticed some more: 1) I miss “Namco System 22” and “Sega ST-V” as platforms. Both are standard Systems within HyperSpin so I'm used to them. 2) Does your tool import metadata for the platforms themselves as well? I know that the history.dat offers metadata for various arcade boards. 3) Will your tool import the MAMEUIFX extra ROMs too if I choose my mameuifx.exe as mame.exe? http://mame32fx.altervista.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4

It’s awesome to see how fast you are making progress with your tool. As you have Sega Model 2, 3, Naomi and Atomiswave integrated in your GUI, do you plan to make these platforms importable with your tool too? It would be awesome to have all these extra information’s from the various .ini files for these systems as well. As for your question what you should import as version. I would say you should do it the same way as the LaunchBoxAnnotator Tool by Mathflair. It imports information’s like the Version Number, Revision, Proto, Beta, etc. as "Version". Information’s like Bootleg, Unlicensed, etc. it imports it in a custom field called “License”. Other information’s like Special Edition, Fan Translated, Hack, etc. goes in “Miscellaneous“. And in case of MAME I think some extra custom fields for like the display orientation or needed special controllers (for example Lightguns, Trackballs, etc) would be useful too. Edit: I just found out that there exists a language.ini. Maybe you could support that as well so that your MAME importer can fill all the same extra information’s as the Filename scraper from the AnnotatorTool Some screens as example for the LaunchBoxAnnotator Tool information's:

Here's the ticket you are looking for: Platform image background across all menus in Big Box

Thanks for the newsflash! I’m really glad that we don’t have to say goodbye to MAMEUIFX.

That’s bad. But I hope that it only means that the parser for this would take longer and not that you won’t add this feature at all. One of the main reasons I prefer LaunchBox over other FE’s like HyperSpin is that it can save and handle more precise metadata for the games. To know the year of a game is quite good but having a more accurate or even the exact date is way better. Sometimes I’m more interested in the history of gaming or specific games itself than just actually play a game, so a precise date or trivia is sometimes quite interesting for me. I think the more metadata, qualitative and quantitative, the better. But I don’t know how other LB users see this, maybe I’m in the minority with this opinion.

This looks amazing! It looks more like a complete MAME GUI with all the artwork and game info’s than a normal filter tool. I will definitely try it out when it comes out.

Wow, this looks really great for now! But I have one flaw with it. I guess all the games have 1/1/YEAR as release date because the databases only have the year itself as date. Nonetheless has the history.dat the month of release for many games in the trivia section listed as well. Would it be possible to get the month from there so we would have a more exact date within LaunchBox? Also it would be nice to have the extra information’s of the history.dat like technical, trivia, tips and tricks, staff, etc imported to the notes as well. I thought of checkboxes in the GUI so that everyone can choose what kind of extra information they want to be imported to their notes.

Great work. I will definitely use it in my setup

I didn’t know that something like the NPlayers.ini exists until now. I only knew that it's included as extra info in the history.dat notes. But yes that’s exactly what I mean! Unfortunately there is no standard field for it in LaunchBox. That’s why it didn’t get scraped from the importer. I would like to be able to filter for multiplayer games within LaunchBox, so when some friends come by I could easily find some games we can play against each other or in co-op. So it has to be its own field. For example, the LaunchBoxAnnotator Tool from mathflair imports that info from the EmuXtras synopsis files into the play mode field. But as a extra custom field it would work as well. I definitely support the idea to add other extra information’s like the orientation or the display mode as you already mentioned. But I suggest adding these as extra custom fields, so we would be able to filter these games too.

This tool looks really promising. Looking forward to it! But I have two questions: - What does the filter “Other junk” specifically filter out? - Will the number of max. players imported in a custom or the play mode field? It’s something I still highly miss in LaunchBox’ own importer.