CaptainGreenhat

Every since the last update launchbox has occasionally become non-responsive when it launches a dialogue window. This doesn't happen every time and I can replicate it on demand. It launches the dialogues just fine but every 5 or so dialogues, the dialogue will disappear behind the main launchbox window, and since the main program is waiting on the dialogue I am unable to do anything other than force quitting the entire application. I am running launchbox v13.8 from a Samsung 990 SSD with the following system specs: windows 11, an MSI AM5 Meg ace mobo, 92 GB DDR5 Corsair RAM, MSI 7900xtx, and amd 7800 x3d CPU. I also have a full premium license if that makes a difference or not. This is an inconvenience for sure but I am not exactly asking for a fix, just making the issue known. I don't have this problem in any other software and I triple-checked that all my firmware and bios are fully updated as well as checking for excessive RAM usage, viruses, drive health, etc usual troubleshooting steps. Thanks for making such an awesome front end everyone.

I am thinking about getting a windows 11 mini pc for my living room box and I'd like everything to have one massively unified interface akin to launchbox... actually I plan on using launchbox for this. I've had android apps running before but it was a pain in the but, however, with windows 11 including an android subsystem it should be as easy as launching any exe from launchbox. Does anyone have any experience with the windows 11 android subsytem? Alternatively, does anyone know of the perfect browser for this? Something I can install strong ad blocking stuff on, that can be launched into full screen, has great controller integration, and can be exited with button combos like retroarch or anything else launchbox can shut off that way? I basically want to use platform categories in big box as my entertainment platform Example Category flow (Thanks for adding nesting by the way!!) Games Arcade Console Etc etc Videos TV Shows Anime Cartoons Streaming etc etc Library Books Comics Manga etc etc Audio Live OTA iHeart etc Streaming Spotify etc etc etc etc etc The subsystem follows command prompts I think (I'm still researching) and android apps tend to work well with controllers thanks to the nvidia shield being so abundantly adopted so android apps would be idea (and let's be honest, look a lot better) but I don't want to buy a shield and be limited to just android. And I want everything in one go. I don't mind the obvious fact I could just use kodi but wellll um, like hyperspin, kodi beats me upside the head when I am setting it up at that level of intricacy. Any advice or recommendations are always super appreciated. PS. This is why I keep requesting a "next button" on the metadata edit screen, like calibre has (for example)

Played a little further. Pretty cool to know that GPT knows how to use retroarch and launchbox. A bit scary though bc I have been emulating things since the days of No$Gb and boycott advanced and I know absolutely nothing next to a chat bot. "In Launchbox, the command line arguments for RetroArch are typically set within the emulator configuration. Here's how you can configure RetroArch with the desired settings for launching a Super Nintendo ROM using the BSNES HD core and loading a Game Boy cartridge using the Super Game Boy subsystem: Open Launchbox and go to the associated Super Nintendo game entry. Right-click on the game and select "Edit". In the Edit Game window, navigate to the "Emulation" tab. In the "Emulator" field, make sure RetroArch is selected. In the "Default Command-Line Parameters" field, enter the following: arduino Copy code -L "PATH HIDDEN" "{file}" Make sure to adjust the paths to the core, Game Boy ROM, and Super Nintendo ROM according to your system. The {file} placeholder is a Launchbox variable that will be replaced with the path to the Super Nintendo ROM. Save the changes, and try launching the Super Nintendo game again through Launchbox. This should pass the correct command line arguments to RetroArch, launching the Super Nintendo ROM using the BSNES HD core and loading the Game Boy ROM using the Super Game Boy subsystem. If you have any further issues or questions, please let me know."

Well this was a frustrating one. A lot of cores are listed in the libretro docs that simply are not available on the core downloader. In this case it was the NSide SNES core. It is supposed to have robust support for super gameboy but I couldn't find it. So this led me to getting BSNES to work. Sweet, that was easy but no sound. Wait, bsnes is a retroarch core, maybe I can play around with that I thought. Turns out you CAN load a gb rom using the super gameboy inside of retroarch. It is in the main menu listed under subsystems. Gameboy emulation in a super gameboy with CD audio worked great after finally getting the load sequence right. Of course we can't be bothered to do that from an arcade cabinet, I want make cake and I wanna eat it to!!!!! Ok, long story short, I tracked down a list of command line arguments for retroarch, and with a little help from ChatGPT I now have it figured out and thought I would share. The command line is: retroarch -L /path/to/bsnes_hd_libretro.so -f --gameboy /path/to/gameboy_rom.gb /path/to/snes_rom.sfc And Here's a breakdown of the command line arguments: -L /path/to/bsnes_hd_libretro.so: Specifies the path to the BSNES HD core (bsnes_hd_libretro.so). Replace /path/to/bsnes_hd_libretro.so with the actual path to the BSNES HD core file on your system. -f: Launches RetroArch in fullscreen mode. --gameboy /path/to/gameboy_rom.gb: Specifies the path to the Game Boy ROM file (gameboy_rom.gb). Replace /path/to/gameboy_rom.gb with the actual path to the Game Boy ROM file you want to load. /path/to/snes_rom.sfc: Specifies the path to the Super Nintendo ROM file (snes_rom.sfc). Replace /path/to/snes_rom.sfc with the actual path to the Super Nintendo ROM file you want to load. Make sure to replace the file paths with the correct paths to the respective ROM files on your system. I hope this helps others. Happy memorial day!

I've been watching another modern retro style handheld from indiegogo/kick starter off and on for a while now. The handheld itself features a highres black and white screen and a hand crank (that is used to great effect in some games). Seems they have finally started releasing games and getting units into peoples hands. The main website for the platform has a free SDK that includes a simulator and there is a browser based game design tool which is a basic drag and drop game creator. Itch.io also has a ton of games/tools/programming functions available. The games on itch are in .pdz format but they need to be in .pdx for the simulator/handheld. I am still trying to figure that out as I haven't actually got a unit in my hands yet. There is also an emulator in development but it is not in a playable state and has no releases on github yet. Lastly I have no clue if there are command line hooks for the simulator or anything that launchbox can use to launch and exit games like we are used to. I searched the forums but found no mention of this so I figured I would start a thread. If anyone has any ideas on how to emulate this either in general or using launchbox I'd love to see them and get this working. Edit: I did some playing around and got the games loading. It isn't a one file and run rom though. The simulator is looking for a pdx folder. You can drag and drop a game pdx folder in the open simulator to launch them though. Is there a way to make launchbox do this without using something complicated like rocket launcher?

Thanks for replying and pointing this out. No wonder it seemed like a crap ton of games were missing.

Couldn't figure out what I did still but I did remember that the xml backups are super robust so I can just redo some work before my mistake with no issue. Soooooo I guess problem solved but I still don't know what I did or how to disable ctrl+shift+v.

Accidentally hit ctrl+shift+v and now it seems like a lot of stuff in the platform I was working is missing. It Brought up a progress bar and started listing off games for every platform alphabetically but I pressed canceled. Also seems the games aren't properly sorting by the "arrange by" function. Does anyone know exactly what happened? I was meaning to press ctrl+shift+c to combine two games. And maybe after this if there isn't one already we need a list of keyboard shortcuts. Anyways, what happened and how do I undo it?

I like this, I make similar for myself but my approach is way sloppier than yours. Whats the hardest part for you? For me it is the games that have no media because I really like there to be a disc, 3d cover, 2d cover, gameplay screenshot,title screen, and clear logo. I actually keep 3 2d covers for each, the normal one that exists (stored in box art) a cover that identifies the system (stored in reconstructed) and one with just art and the name of the game (stored in fan art cover). Actually now that I think about it.... clear logos are the biggest pain. Pain.net and plugins really help ALOT. Add in bezels and videos (I prefer trailer or commercials) and it really seems like I will never make any progress past # and A just as yourself. Really nice work, I am very impressed, looks like you can get through stuff kinda fast too.

That works for loading different save states, Thanks. Not that we needed more launching options, but this also works great for directly loading racing tracks in various games (assuming you always pick the same car, lol). Also works for directly loading mario party minigames. I found both of these " "savestate_auto_load = "true" savestate_directory = ":\states" " but am too much of a noob to have figured out the -appendconfig to make it work. Thanks!!

I saw that option but I can only get it to work per instance/rom for lack of terminology. As it is I am able I have to clone the rom and make a separate instance to do what I want but not one rom and several loading pointers. Not undoable but eats a lot of space eventually. I guess I will go read through any command line docs I can find for libretro/retroarch and see if I can do it that way (very preferred). time to play with it some more. Thanks for taking the time to respond to my random thought.

I was watching video about all the various pinball video games and thought to myself, "some of those unlockable tables look really fun". Then my next though was "I wonder if there is a way to force retroarch or another emulator to load a particular save state on command from launchbox or rocket launcher". Basically I was wondering if it is possible to force load a save state. That way I can unlock the tables and make a save state at the unlocked table and launch "the table" from launchbox. Could work for mini games or whatnot that are within games like mario party or geometry wars. Random thought more or less. I looked around and I couldn't find an answer so I thought I would ask here.

Long time problem for me as I have an m.2 and several portable launchbox setups on external drives and the old school/ocd in me makes my feel warm and fuzzy when launchbox is installed to the root of the drive named launchbox. Been manual updating since about version 7 or 8.

I do this with my launchbox. I am rebuilding it at the moment so if I get something wrong I apologize ahead of time. 1. Download portable version of sumatra pdf viewer. Put it somewhere convenient I put it in an "applications" folder inside of the launchbox directory. https://www.sumatrapdfreader.org/download-free-pdf-viewer.html 2a. Open sumatra and drag it to the screen you want it to open on then click the hamburger menu (three lines) in the upper left corner of sumatra. 2b. Go down to settings and then select "options". Untick everything (unless you want one of those options but you don't need them if you want a seamless experience) 2c. Next go back to settings and select advanced options. A settings.txt document will open in your default text editor. Now we get to edit some lines in the cfg line 4 "EscToExit" change from false to true line 33 "ShowMenubar" change from true to false (use can always press "alt" to bring up the menu bar if you need it) line 52 "ShowToolbar" change from true to false line 58 "DefaultDisplayMode" change from automatic to fullscreen (the important edit is this one, the rest are just in case something breaks fullscreen (usually something like an emulator taking focus away) line 65 "ShowStartPage" change from true to false Go to "file" and select "save". You can now exit sumatra. 3a. Go to tools\manage emulators and then click "add..." 3b. Name the emulator something obvious 3c. Click browse and select the .exe for sumatra portable 3d. Make sure to disable the startup and pause screens then close the emulator management window. 4. Select Game and press ctrl+e 5. Go to additional apps tab and click "add application" 6a. In the add application dialog name it whatever, I always just name it "game name Manual" but anything works. For example: Sonic the hedgehog 1 manual" 6b. Click "browse..." to select the aplication path. 6c. This time, instead of the usual .exe you want to select "all files" from the drop down on the lower right side of the download window and then navigate to where you have the manual saved. (It should show up if you have it set to all files, if it doesn't appear then you don't have all files selected) 6d. Click open and it will close the download window. Now you need to tick the box for use emulator. Select whatever you named sumatra in step 3a then tick "automatically run before main application" (before because otherwise the manual opens after you close the game) Seems like a lot but only step 6 needs repeated for each game. It is ghetto but you can use this to do other novel things like open a jpg or animated gif on a third monitor/marquee when nothing else works. You are also not limited to manuals, You can print pretty much any website as a pdf document. I for example combine move lists, the manual, and sometimes the games wikipage. I used to include controller mapping but I am working on adding them to pause screens. You can use auto-hot keys and command line arguments as well but that requires a different process. It is simpler but I find the method described above as much more reliable. Command line arguments for sumatra in case anyone wants/needs them. https://www.sumatrapdfreader.org/docs/Command-line-arguments.html

Command line worked like a charm. And I agree, I don't like relying on windows to pass anything. Thanks!

Hello and thanks for reading. I use a dedicated computer with launchbox as an all in one media front end. To launch websites such as forums, social media, netflix etc etc I use saved links. I have been using firefox but I want to use brave browser but I am not getting the behavior I want. I am trying to use chromium/brave command line arguments to do a few things. 1. --new-window (to launch link in it's own unique window) 2. --start-fullscreen (to launch the link as if I had pressed f11) 3. I'm using AutoHotkey to launch a BAT file to close the window when I press escape so it returns to the launchbox UI. (only thing working) The BAT only contains "taskkill /F /IM chrome.exe /T > nul" There are two ways for me to launch the link. 1. As a .url, this uses windows to launch the link using specified default browser. This launches the link fine all of this works in firefox no problem. I can open the link with brave as my default browser and it works fine but with no extra options like full screen or it being its own window. any time I try opening the link through brave it returns plain text. (by dragging the saved shortcut onto brave.exe or by setting brave as an emulator in launchbox to open the link as an application file ran inside of brave.exe.) returned text is as follows. [{000214A0-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}] Prop3=19,11 [InternetShortcut] IDList= URL=https://forums.launchbox-app.com/ HotKey=0 I get the same results if I create the link using the windows interface or by dragging the lock icon from the browser to an open folder/desktop empty space. Am I stuck using firefox or can anyone think of a solution?

Yes, thus the need for an efficient way of going about it. Granted not every game uses every image file entry but even editing the typical 5-10 images I typically keep for each system + music + video + Manual etc etc ends up being a lot of tiny individual edits if you have a bunch of systems. Alternatively you can edit the platforms.xml file directly but that also takes time, albeit a lot less. Macros in notepad++ can assist greatly which is what I ended up doing but none of that is efficient. Don't get me wrong though, I am in ❤️ with Launchbox. Everyday I find some new tweak or setting that greatly improves my gaming experience and I continually have my mind blown with the capabilities we have in 2018 as gamers.

Sorry to necro post. I was just reinstalling my setup on a new computer and using tricks I've learned over the years and I was looking at how playlists show up nested under a platform and didn't like it. I have avoided using playlists for this reason and instead just using genres as defacto playlists since a game can be in multiple genres. This isn't a good solution if you like big box themes so I came up with another. If you click the + to add a new platform without importing roms, you can then add a platform named "Playlists". Then when you edit a playlist check the box to include in platform lists then as the platform category select the newly created "Playlists" platform. There you go, no more using a hotkey to switch. You can indeed have your cake and eat it too! Now if I could just figure out an easy or effient way to store the media gribbles and a separate drive or folder than launchbox.

Sorry for the slight necro post. The newest updates kind of support this with "categories". If you want to add a new one you have to go into the ini for the platform and add it with launchbox closed then you should see the category off to the side. For example.. I have anime as a category and each series as a platform under the category header. You will have to add your own images and metadata of course but this works great for me. You can click the category too and see all your anime etc. Works wonderful when using the pick random game feature. For movies, I just did a movie category and then made a platform for each letter ("A" "B" "C" etc) I even have a category for streaming but Linking too each movie under each service was unfeasible so I just made each streaming site it's own rom and changed streaming to a platform. I'd love to double the categories but that doesn't want to work. For example... Media---->then the other categories (Anime, movies, tv shows, etc)----> Then the platforms as described above