ItchyRobot

@JoeViking245 @JaysArcade Do either of you have issues with BixBox losing focus after you exit a table, and re-enter Bigbox? About half the time I exist with Esc, I will have to wiggle my mouse and click on the screen to regain control of Bigbox navigation.

Yes I have. Actually been spending too much time googling that topic today when I should be working ? Do you have a full scale table build? I am just playing in desktop mode now and having a lot of fun. But I can imaging the full pinball table setup would be amazing! The artist and programmers doing all this voluntarily really blows my mind. The attention to artistic detail and physics really has me dumbfounded. I can't believe I stumbled into this hobby ... no looking back now.

Awesome sauce bro. That worked. Now Im in Pinball heaven ... VPX is amazing

Hey Jay, Your YouTube video inspired me to learn Visual Pinball X. It was a bitch of two days, but I have it mostly figured out, with a hand full of games playing well in landscape. Now I am trying to figure out how to get it setup in Launchbox. I have experience with the consoles games, but with Virtual Pinball X, I assume I will need to type in a specific code line into the "Command-Line Parameter". If so, can you give me an example of the code you have for one of your games? If that's not how you do it, I would love to know how you get it to launch specific games and not just open the program. Thanks for the great write up ... it really makes sense now that I rammed my head through the front door and learned it all by trial and error.

Same issue here. Latest Launchbox release with the default theme stutters when starting up program. Sometimes it starts with no stutter, but most times it is choppy. Running a pretty beefy system with plenty of horsepower.

He's working two accounts, one to post the topic, another to agree with it. We was annoying in the Reddit thread, now he is bringing it here. As a devout non-believer myself, I have no issues with this bible quote. It's called respecting the original authors wishes. He is the artist creating this software. He can do as he pleases; If you have issues ignoring a simple quote in an unused dropdown menu, then you are obsessive compulsive. You would be better off focusing on that issue rather than a random bible quote hidden in software code.

Damn son, you are not a half-asser are you? Looks great! Can you explain your reasoning for the button layout? Does it help when playing console games? I was thinking about using my arcade buttons/stick for console games, but ended up opting for an Xbox One joystick since it makes hitting the left/right bumpers more natural.

Do you know what filters you checked/unchecked? I could have sworn I chose to filter out all the crap, but ended up with a monster size set too. I'm going to have to start over like you I suppose.

Neil9000, If he cancels it, will he need to manually delete all the old Image/Video folders? Or is there an automated clean up function built into LaunchBox? Also, if there ends up being a game that does not import (gets filtered out), but he wants to add after import, what is the correct way to manually add an individual game to an already imported MAME set and also get the art for it to download?

It really depends on storage space available to you, and personal preference. Some OCD people cant handle having all these extra unused and un-arted ROMs sitting in their library. If you have plenty of space and don't care about having a mamoth collection of possibly unused games in your Arcade collection, then you should be fine. Though, you should have been able to reduce the imported size a bit. MAME is a collection of all kinds of games and hardware configurations. There should have been a few filters you could toggle on/off during the import process, like Fruit Machines, Dance/rhythm games, foreign games, etc. I cant remember all the names of the filters right now. But this would have whittled down the list a good amount and kept you from downloading too much media. Though, a full set of MAME roms, even with the filters on will take a long time. I think mine took a couple days to download if I remember correctly. I also imported a full set, but with a lot of the filters on, as described above. The way I deal with it is to create an "Arcade Favorites - Alex" playlist that only has the games I want to play. I like to keep the whole set available for future use. There are all kinds of little gems of game that I keep coming across-other people recommendations- that I add to my Favorites playlist. Don't quote me on this, but you may even be able to hide the Arcade platform once you have a solid Arcade Favorites playlist created. This would help clean up the library a bit more. I'll give that a try tonight since I am in the same boat as you. I just finished my favorites playlist and may try to hide the larger-full set that shows up as "Arcade" platform. I am new too, so hopefully i didn't confuse things more than helping.

I cant remember which one I am using (at work now), but I may have used the older stable build. Thanks for the tip; and thanks for the RetroArch update tool suggestion.

Thanks for advice. I'm new to emulation, so any of these tips are appreciated. Does Dolphin and RetroArch allow me update within the software, or will I need to manually install the new builds and migrate setting/config files/folders each time I update?

Hey guys, I finally got my PC built, and have imported a couple sets of consoles, and MAME into LaunchBox ... pure awesomeness! I am using RetroArch for NES, SNES, N64, and Intellivision games (pissed that Dragonfire is broken...grrrr). I am using MAME 0.198 for arcade games. And I am using Dolphin for GameCube games. I have no interest in keeping MAME up to date since it plays all the games I want to play perfectly. Though, after messing around with a couple N64 and GameCube games, I realize that there is still room for improvement on those emulators. That gets me to my question ... What is the best methods for updating my emulators? Overwrite/or new folders for each version? With the fact that updates to emulators is a continuing process, and can break working games accidentally, I assume I will want to have a completely knew folder for each new version of Dolphin and RetroArch as they come out with major updates. That way if a new update breaks a game that I like, I can always fall back to a later working build. Is this the correct approach, or do you guys go "all in" with your updates and just deal with the accidental breaks in hopes that they get fixed with time? Any tips for updates and best practices to saving controls/game saves/graphic setting/etc for emulators would be appreciated

So much great info in here, thanks! Anyone here try the Intellivision core for RetroArch? It seems to work decently, but gets a bit difficult due to the way Intellivsion uses its number pad. Beauty and the Beast and Astrosmash worked great, but Dragonfire was impossible to get working well. It loaded fine, but when I pick the number of players (1), and then the Level, the game starts but i am unable to see my character or move him. Maybe it's less about the core, and more about me not knowing how to get Dragonfire setup correctly.

I finally got around to building a new computer, so I'm finally going to start building my emulation station. Before I go all in, I want to make sure I am structuring my files in a smart manner. See folder structure below for how I plan on doing this. Even though my C-drive is a faster SSD drive, I am still planning on putting all my data on my slower internal 4TB storage drive, the Z-drive. The reason for this is because I want to be able to back it up easily to my external drive. If I have the emulators, images, videos on the C-drive and my roms on the Z drive, it could be tough managing an easy drag and drop backup. Plus, having it all on one drive will make it much more mobile, to be used on other PC's, like at a friends house. Also, the reason I made my internal 4TB drive the letter Z is to make sure I don't have any rom path issues when I do use this build on other PC's ... I ran into this issue with my MAME build sometimes when playing on other PC's ... I assume this could be an issue with other emulators too. Let me know if anyone has any thoughts on my plans, or any tips from past experience. I'm just trying to get my ducks in a row before a go all in and set all my emulators up. Thanks! Z:\ ... (traditional 4TB drive) \Emulators\ \PlayStation 2\PCSX2\pcsx2.exe \Nintendo DS\Desmume\desmume.exe etc... \LaunchBox\ \ROMs\ \NES\ \SNES\ \N64\ \DS\ \GBA\ \MAME 0.198 CHDs (merged)\ \MAME 0.198 ROMs (non-merged)\ Etc...

Thanks @Lordmonkus What are some decent Nvidia cards for emulation that wont break the bank? I was thinking about the 1060 6gb, but I don't want to spend more than I need to if it is overkill.

Hey @Lordmonkus, I am researching on buying one of the new Ryzen 5 chips. I am specifically looking at the Ryzen 5 3600 since it is only 65Watts and is getting great reviews. Do you know of any weaknesses with these new AMD chips when it comes to emulation. Also, I have read that Nvidia is the way to go when it comes to graphics cards, when building an emulation PC. Is this still true, even with the newest AMD graphics cards? My goal is to emulate flawlessly up to Gamecube, then anything after that will be icing on the cake.

Great info, thanks! I will try that setup this weekend.

After being screwed by my own ignorance on how exactly all the control saving per game work with MAME, I am a bit gun shy to try an use that file. A little background on my MAME controller layout issues ... In the past I set up my two player custom arcade stick in a custom manner to best use all the buttons. For example, I have set up a bunch of two button sequences that allows for multiple actions for buttons. For example, my coin1 button has a secondary function of bringing up the Menu if I hit another button first... and my coin2 button has a secondary function of pausing the game). I have a bunch of these set up for saving game states, loading game states, resetting the game, etc. Once I got that setup, I decided I wanted to include an Xbox One controller so I could play a few single player consoles games through MAME. The bumper buttons make it much easier to play games like F-zero. I ended setting up the MAME controls so that I could either use the Arcade stick player one controls or the Xbox One controls to play games. I also set up a bunch of special control layouts for certain games, like Discs of Tron, Stargate, Defender, fighting games, etc. After getting all this set up, I decided to find bezels for all the games I play. I got that set up and resized the gameplay screen to fit within each bezel (Orions angel realistic bezels) and played the games for a while. Then I decided that I didn't like those specific bezels and wanted some that focused on a bigger gameplay screen. I deleted the old bezels and CFG text files and brought in the new bezels, only to find out that all the game specific controls were tied to the text files for each game, stored along with the CFG folder. Luckily I had a backup, so I was able to get the old text files that store the game specific controls (one text file for each game). I learned a lesson there. But I did have to go in to each game and reconfigure the sliders settings to fit the gamelay window within new bezels. It was either that or reset up the controls for each game which I didnt want to do. So now I am tying to figure out if i use one of these files you suggest, if it will somehow screw my setup again. I assume it will not over ride my game specific control settings that I have already setup (MAME calls it Machine), but I am very hesitant due to my past experience in the wonkiness in how MAME stores saved game controls in multiple locations... per game is in the Artwork folder, while universal control setting in the Default file. And I didn't even mention the problems that arise in starting MAME without a controller attached and how that overwrites the Default file unless you set it to read only. That MAME weirdity also screwed me in the past. That's why I have it set to read only now. I am sure there is a rhyme and reason why the Devs have MAME set up this way, but god damn it makes it tough for new people to learn it without taking one step forward and one step back all the time. I am basically learning from my "mistakes", over and over again =(

For what it is worth, I too ended up use the read-only method to get my setup to stop forgetting my controls. I have an old school custom arcade stick that is made for two players (Street Fighter 2 layout - two player), and an Xbox One controller that i use for a few console games. I set it all up so player1 can use either the arcade stick player one, or the Xbox controller. I ended up creating my own button layout for the Xbox One controller that can navigate through the MAME menus, but it is still a work in progress. What is your default layout for you Xbox One controller for the common controls (anyone)? for example ... Coin 1, Start 1, Menus, Pause, Exit, Enter, etc

This YouTube channel did a 5 part series on MAME trackball games. I picked the ones I found most interesting. If I remember, I will add a post later (at work now) showing the games I chose to pin to my favorites. FYI - he created some videos showing spinner games too. part 1: part 2: part 3: part 4: part 5:

Thanks @joelfabiani This helps a lot

@joelfabiani Can you explain the way you are organizing your folders a little better for us noobs? I couldn't really follow the previous posts instructions =( I am going to start adding other emulators soon and want to organize it correctly the first time. I currently only have MAME set up.

May I suggest ... - Trackball Games - Spinner Games - Vector Games

I have this same issue. Green and grey pixelation on my videos that were automatically downloaded from Emu. This is making Launchbox pretty useless to me =( Anyone find a fix yet?