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fromlostdays

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    RocketLauncher use..?

    in Emulation

    Posted

    Long time Rocketlauncher user. 

    If you're not running multiple front ends, the useful of Rocketlauncher is dwindling  specifically because of launchbox. Other front ends still rely on it heavily.

    It's list of exclusive features used to be pretty comprehensive, including things like unzipping roms , rom mapping, and keymapping program organization. Launchbox now does all of this (though handling keymappers is the one thing that I think is easier in RL than in Launchbox). Bezels are now better handled by RetroArch (for systems that it supports), so RL Bezel is only exclusive for systems that have emulators that don't support it natively. RA covers a lot of systems, and well, so for average use it is the better alternative for bezels.

    Rocketlauncher can also introduce more problems to your setup. If you don't have or want to have at least a working knowledge of AHK, you'll probably run into some road blocks along the way (ironically, mostly with RetroArch). The RL Module that handles RetroArch is, as one would expect for such a comprehensive emulator, complex. I've had to edit it myself a couple of times now. Not huge edits, but an example would be that the RL module for RetroArch doesn't recognize the system name "Arcade", only "MAME". So I had to go in and edit the module (which is an ahk script) to include Arcade. Not too difficult, but definitely not something you have to do if you just use launchbox.

    It still has some exclusive features:

    Extremely customizeable fade screens. You can basically do anything you want with fade. It supports animations, so you can set it to display a progress bar for unzipping roms., animated loading screens, spinning discs etc. You can also have custom sounds  during the fade in. (Not for fade out yet, but I read the other day they are trying to implement it). Example, I found a soundbyte of a bunch of people yelling "start the game already!" and it plays when the fade in screen disappears and the emulator launches. It's actually annoying and I'm getting rid of it. :D

    Suspend Front End. You can have rocketlauncher suspend launchbox or any other supported front end when a game is launched. It frees up computer resources, however, I find this feature can sometimes cause launchbox to lose focus when a game is closed. I basically only use it for new steam games which are resource intensive.

    Pause. I think people understate how cool this one is . The Pause menu is  also completely customizable, but some of the things it can do: Pause any emulator any time, load up artwork directly from launchbox directories (Thanks to both Jason and the RL Dev for making these two programs sync so well), look at and zoom in and out of manuals, guides etc (my favorite feature), save a state directly from the pause menu or load one (it populates a list of states for you).  You can have it play game specific music, or a single default song every time, same with all of the art etc. It's pretty nifty and if you enjoying the actual setup of this stuff, it's pretty fun to mess around with it. 

    Multidisc screen. If set up, RL will display an interactive screen for multi disc games on game launch, allowing you to choose which disc to load. 

    Instruction Cards. These operate along with Bezels, mostly for Arcade games. You can have an instruction card pop up with extra information (typically people will use this for arcade key binding information etc.) 

    Another overlooked feature is the log viewer. You can set RL to make extensive logs on launch. This doesn't interface directly with an emulators logs, but once you get used to using them, it can be a very useful tool for troubleshoot emulators regardless.

    Automatic mount/dismount isos. I never use this so I actually don't know how launchbox or Rocketlauncher handles it.

    There are a few really niche things RL can do on a per system basis, but you have to find these things yourself most of the time. For instance, I use RL to launch exodos games straight from the zip files, which launchbox can't do. It wasn't easy to set that up though.

    In summation, there are some really cool cosmetic stuff that is RL exclusive and fun to mess with. However, it is a time sink, and is an extra layer where something can go wrong. You do not need Rocketlauncher to get the full launchbox experience, and launchbox is natively much simpler to use.  If you're going to hardcore build a cabinet and you're wanting to get the bells and whistles and go the extra mile, I'd recommend  learning RL. If you're a casual or even serious retrogamer that wants to set up it up quick and streamlined and get started playing awesome games, skip RL.

    That said, I'm here if you have any questions.   

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

      

     

     

     

     

    Universally bad Star Ratings for Arcade Games

    in Troubleshooting

    Posted · Edited by fromlostdays

    Over time the ratings will level out, like Monkus said. Typically the first people who are like "OH I CAN VOICE MY OPINION AND MAKE EVERYONE LOOK AT IT" are the ones with strong opinions.

    EDIT: you could have a discord channel of people who police bad ratings. Get about 20 people on board to 5 star games that deserve better. :D

      

    Launchbox does not import all MAME ROMs

    in Troubleshooting

    Posted

    And yet another possible workaorund. :D I think setting mame as the emulator on import is actually what triggers launchbox to do it's magic. I noticed this because I have rocketlauncher as my main emulator, and even if the system is named MAME or Arcade, it doesn't trigger the mame options. I've been importing random games under the arcade system like this without problem. 

    Launchbox does not import all MAME ROMs

    in Troubleshooting

    Posted

    Well there's some backstory to that. Launchbox used to scrape an existing metadata website, I forget the name, but it was really unreliable. So instead of giving up on the idea of scraping, the community and dev was like, we'll just make our own database, and have be doing just that, but its a huge undertaking, especially for something like Mame that changes. But launchbox can import anything. Some things just shouldn't be synced to the database.

    I hope it works out. Let me know how it goes. I know for a fact the above methods would work for pretty much any other system, but I can't be totally sure with mame. I'm one of those people that imported a set years ago, told launchbox to ignore like MOST of the roms and had no idea any were missing haha. I'm only slightly concerned because launchbox doesn't ignore stuff that isn't in the database for other systems, so I'm wondering just how special mame actually is.  

    • Like 1

    Launchbox does not import all MAME ROMs

    in Troubleshooting

    Posted

    You can update the metadata for just one system, or just one game. Select a system - mame for example - and control A to select all the games. Go to tools, download media and metadata, which will give you three options: replace all metadata, fill in only fields with missing metadata, or skip games with existing metadata.

    I'm a little confused by what you're asking in terms of importing. The database isn't perfect, but if you select a mame rom or Group of mame roms that didn't import, and then drag them into launchbox, tell it to add them to mame and don't sync them to the database, then they should import just fine. You can then right click it and select "edit" and try and download any media from there.

    If its too many roms to go through individually, you can delete all your mame games and reimport them all without syncing to the database. This should get them all in, then just use the tools option above to download metadata etc. I'm pretty sure you don't lose your media by doing this.

    You might even be able to just select your whole mame collection drag into launchbox, and import it again over the existing one. This time choosing not to sync. When the box pops up listing what is imported, it shouldn't try to reimport any existing games... so it should only import any that are missing from your current xml. (In theory, and I'm pretty sure I've done this before, actually, for a different system).  

    • Like 1

    Android Emulation

    in Emulation

    Posted · Edited by fromlostdays

    Honestly, I have no idea. I don't know that any run through launchbox. I'm sure it's possible, but it probably requires some command line or AHK. Sounds like a fun thing to figure out though. 

    • Like 1

    Android Emulation

    in Emulation

    Posted

    When I was into it (probably about a year ago) I was using koplayer with no complaints. I don't know how portable it is though. I just know it seemed a lot less invasive than Andy or Bluestacks. (layman opinion, bluestacks in particular had processes running at all times). 

    • Like 1

    Launchbox Database & EmuMovies - Colon in the Title & Missing Video

    in Noobs

    Posted

    No problem. It's worth noting that this issue can run deeper, as it is tied to your rom names.

    First, yeah emumovies may be missing some vids, and those vids may in some few instances be available elsewhere like the emumovies ftp, because they are still in the user submission phase. In other words, they still have to go through quality check. (I think that's how that works). But there will be a few games with art just missing, more on obscure systems.

    Also the downloading isn't 100 percent. It's pretty close, but its been my experience that for whatever reason (maybe server issues) launchbox might miss some available art or vids from emumovies.

    Most importantly, launchbox has to recognize your rom, and filename and link it to its own database. The database isn't complete, but its pretty comprehensive even now, so when you right click and edit a game, the first thing you want to check is if it's matched with an entry in the LB database. IF it is, you'll see a lb database number in the top right of the edit screen. If it isn't, you can try changing the title in the search bar up top in the edit screen. There were a few games that the filename of my rom just missed the mark completely. 

    I'm making this up, but as an example: Nolan Ryan Baseball All Stars.sfc might be the rom name. Searching for "Nolan Ryan" might yield no results, but searching for "Baseball All Stars" might find the game. So always try to change the title a bit and see if you can find the entry in the database if it isn't linked. If you do, you'll get all the artwork no problem. 

     

     

    Launchbox Database & EmuMovies - Colon in the Title & Missing Video

    in Noobs

    Posted

    You can right click the game, click edit, then down at the bottom "Download Images/Media" and see exactly what launchbox can download from emumovies. I just checked, and the colon in the title doesn't seem to be affecting what videos are available. At least, not all the time. But sometimes things do get missed on import. Try that method and let me know if under the emumovies tabs, you see the vid available. 

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