Re: database information

[SentaiBrad]

Yea, like I said, writing data directly to the LaunchBox.xml is a thing, has always been (assuming you follow the proper format), but changing the Metadata.xml is a lot more tricky and will get replaced with the set from the Database from time to time.

[CriticalCid]

I thought that maybe the missing database ID would prevent LB from importing anything but I was wrong. I just deleted everything from the current metadata.xml except for 2 games and deleted the LB DB ID's from these games as well. What can I say, the game information's were imported properly anyway. The only issue I had was that the metadata.xml got updated and replaced my custom xml even when I clicked on cancel. So unfortunately you have to disconnect your internet connection while doing is. So if you follow the format of the Metadata.xml (which is almost identical to the LaunchBox.xml ) everything should work quite fine if you do it like I described it in my last post.

[CriticalCid]

@billyc999 I did some more tests because I'm really interested in your metadata collection. This time I did it with the Atari 2600 file you’ve provided and I ran in several issues with it but I got it to work in the end. Unfortunately I had to remove all ">" characters from the info tags because otherwise would the forum software interpret them as HTML code and won't show them. 1. You forgot to add the <Game line before every game entry. 2. Several syntax errors. </Launchbox has to be </LaunchBox and </game has to be </Game 3. Your current method to set empty values doesn’t work and cause problems. The easiest way would be to just completely delete all lines which aren't containing any values. 4. The year value is completely invalid. The date has to be set like this: <ReleaseDateYEAR-01-01T00:00:00-08:00</ReleaseDate 5. Don’t generate/add any DatabaseID’s. They won’t work if they haven’t the proper value and will only cause problems. 6. LaunchBox crashes if it hasn’t the additional data for platforms, emulators, etc in the Metadata.xml. You’ll have to add these at the end of the xml. I attached a file which contains everything you’ll have to add.

[billyc999]

thanks guys. as soon as i get chance to sit down later on today ill put together an xml using the info you've provided

[billyc999]

just found time to get started , quick question regarding what names should i use for the likes of mame,daphne,actionmax ect should it be the rom name or the actual real name, because i thought if i use rom name launchbox would show this rather than the actual name

[SentaiBrad]

There is a separate MAME xml to convert the rom names to game names internally during the MAME importer.

[billyc999]

what about the likes of american laser games,daphne ect how would i deal with them. also what syntax should i use for multi disk games, should i just add disk 1 ,disk 2 ect i just also realised ill be using rocketlauncher for the emulator setups so if i remove the (usa) tags would the roms still launch sorry to be a pain.. just wanna get some stuff setup on bigbox

[SentaiBrad]

If you start using LaunchBox, or look through the Database, it will answer a lot of your questions.

[billyc999]

I think you are right , i just started adding stuff and just googling each step , and low and behold it worked. just seen the edit feature to add images that i may be missing and figured how to use my own.. Damn me.. i feel like an idiot now

[SentaiBrad]

It's alright, don't worry. Using LaunchBox to import a few systems will teach you a lot easier than it would be for us to explain every step though.

[billyc999]

i have come across a problem , that i couldnt find a definate answer for on the forums, but im sure it exsists somewhere im trying to add my ps1 games which are nearly all cue and bin, some multipart, some are iso's ect how do i go about adding these, everytime i go to add them it will find all the tracks so the game is listed several times

[CriticalCid]

Use the windows search to filter out all the files with the .cue and .iso extension and only add those into LaunchBox. The new tutorial from Brad may help: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awH3dzvY2ic

[billyc999]

cool that actually works, i didnt know you could drag to launchbox, only issue i have is multi disk games, it imports both disks but has no refrence in the main window as to which is disc 1 and disc 2, and no refrence at all in big box mode New beta is impressive **edit** doh just relised i can just add the Disc 1's with Brads method

[SentaiBrad]

I put all my PS1 games in to the PBP format recently. Removes the need for cues, compresses them without putting them in to pesky archives and combines multi disc games in to one. RetroArch reads these natively with the Mednafen PS1 core and you can swap discs with a key combination. So that is my honest suggestion for multi disc games. Otherwise, use the additional apps feature so that you have access to the multiple discs in one entry, or do what I did before and just import everything. You can display the file name in the game details bar so you can see which is Disc 1 and Disc 2 easily. There is also the PS1 tutorial that you can watch. I would honestly suggest watching more of the tutorials as well.

[DOS76]

Hey Brad what tool are you using to convert to PBP I'm very interested in making this my next project.

[billyc999]

Thank you, isnt pbp to use with psp's, can i batch convert as it sounds like a great solution, i used to have my ps1 archived in z indexs which was fast but decided to uncompress for whatever unknown reason. yep will be watching more tutorials, normally i dont get chance as my partner goes to sleep early and my pc is run through the bedroom tv , so i cant use audio (not without been kicked), but ive found time to sit down today so will be looking into stuff while i get the chance

[SentaiBrad]

@DOS76 I used PSX2PSPv1.4.2, which was game by game, 1 by 1. It took me forever... Well, like 4 days. I had the stat for how much space I saved, but I had to put my PC back a week with system restore and lost it. It was something like 400GB's across 700+ entries in LaunchBox? @billyc999 PBP's were developed for PSP, which is why they uniquely work. They're just a container with an instruction set, but tailor made for PS1 games that just happen to be ran on a PSP. They run flawlessly with the Mednafen core for RetroArch and you have some actual benefit to using them. It's why I put my PSP and PS2 games in to CSO's as well, just minus the multi disc support. If you have a way to batch convert them then please share. I spent way to frikin long on mine. You probably couldn't batch convert multi disc games, because you need to specify disc 1, disc 2, etc, but that would save someone a ton of time if the compression and method are accurate. With the tools I used (PSX2PSPv1.4.2) you can also convert them back to their bin / cue or iso / cue format as well incase putting the game in the PBP breaks the game.

[billyc999]

thanks ill look into it, i feel the pain of compressing 1 by 1 2401 ps2 games to bz2 was a nightmare, and i did them twice as i got my original pc robbed (Hence why it's upstairs)

[DOS76]

SentaiBrad I'm sorry to ask a bunch of questions but do you have any clue if I have a game with multiple .bin files does the program handle that I see you can add up to five files but I was thinking more that would be for the multi disc games and not forevery .bin.

[SentaiBrad]

Derek, if you mean games that have audio files or extra bin's that are apart of the same one disc game, then no I didn't compress those. I only had a few of those, and just didn't touch them. Everything that was a disc with bin / iso / cue / ccd / sub etc files I converted. @billyc999 Well these are for PS1 games, and it did suck going 1 by 1. As for PS2 specifically there is a tool called MaxCSO that I used, and I got it set up where I used the windows search function to search for "iso", so I renamed the maxcso program to "maxcso iso", and i sorted by size. I then dragged and dropped several games on to the exe at once and it spit out the proper cso file in to the proper folders. Those need to be ISO's, so I had to convert a lot of bin files to iso's first. For PSP CSO games I used YACC which has a batch converter, but doesn't support files larger than 1.9GB (It might be 2.9) because no PSP game gets larger than that.