What ROM is picked in a 7z/ZIP/RAR complete rom set?

[DiegoBRRSPF]

Hi! I'm sorry if this isn't the right place to put that question. It's not exactly a problem, but a doubt. I've imported NES, SNES and Sega Genesis complete ROM sets. Each game is a 7z file with all the existed rom dumps (including demos, hacks, bad dumps, etc.), and the "correct" versions (represented, as I know, by a "!"). LaunchBox have imported the games flawlessly. But, as I have several ROMs in each 7z file of each game, when I play a game through Launch Box, what is the chosen ROM inside the 7z file? My point is: there is no possible to have a bad dump selected? :) Thanks!!

[DOS76]

7zips with multiple games usually won't work.

[Lordmonkus]

If it did work I would imagine it would pick the first readable rom it finds. Personally I keep all my roms extracted (except for Mame for obvious reasons). You really don't save much drive space with those tiny old cartridge based games. The larger CD based games I can see compressing but I have yet to see those come with multiple dumps / versions in one archive.

[SentaiBrad]

Well in the case of CD, ignoring the long wait times before playing, if a game has a bin / cue sheet it should prefer the cue sheet in most cases. The better alternative I think is CSO for PSP / PS2, WBFS for Wii and GCM for GameCube.

[Lordmonkus]

PBP is now a valid option for PS1 games especially since it supports merged disk images.

[SentaiBrad]

I'm still a bit skeptical, but I a curious now.

[Lordmonkus]

I asked over on the RA forums and got a response from Hunterk, a forum admin saying that the latest Mednafen PSX core does support multi disk PBP images. http://libretro.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5009&page=2 If someone has a save file for either of the Lunar games at a point right before the disk swap I would be happy to test it out. I have merged my Lunar disks and the PBP files do in fact load but I have no save games that far along to test the swap point.

[SentaiBrad]

You can probably find that save. I am also not skeptical of RA support, I believed you asked them, I am skeptical of the benefits. There are a lot of games in PBP / eboot format for the PSP that just don't work. I am unsure if it's from the PSP or putting the game in that format. A lot of the time it can be an easy swap and fix that Sony or the dev would need to make, but sometimes it's a lot harder than flipping a switch. So I am more just hoping that a lot of the problems with the format have been worked out and that it was just the limited power of the PSP. It's similar to the 3 PSP GTA games that should not be CSOed because of errors, or the error you get at the end of Chrono Cross when you turn on fast disc loading (the credits FMV is glitchy). I am curious how many issues, if at all, we get. Needs to be ironed out. :P

[Lordmonkus]

Oh I knew you weren't skeptical of me asking. I knew you were saying you were skeptical of the support and if it actually worked. I would imagine the problems with the PSP playing PS1 games in PBP format would be due to the emulation or the fact it's not a native game to the system. But yeah I am interested in if there will be any issues with the PBP formats. I hope it's all good though just for the fact it would be nice to have multi disk games in single image format to remove the need for disk swapping, just to simplify things. I will have to look around some more for a save game file at the disk swap, I took a short look but did not find anything.

[weltall]

The reason the OP is using 7z files, is probably not to save a little space, but probably something like 2/3's ot 3/4's of the uncompressed size. Merged packs with solid 7z can compress alike roms as you know almost to the point they all have the size of one of them being compressed by itself. Sadly those merged packs are not the way to go for sure, since indeed the emulator catches the first rom, not caring if it is bad, Japanese or hacked so the main character walks on his hands while singing Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. Definitely avoid merged packs if you at least want to control what you are playing. I am talking as a person always being a cheapskate on my remaining HDD space, but honestly only the GBA and N64 might be worth the 7z format. Another merit is that in those merged packs, games that are same, but have a different name, are all grouped in a single file. That way people do not have duplicates scattered all around the folder, so it is more organized.

[DiegoBRRSPF]

After doing some tests with 7Zip ROM files (with multiple ROM files inside), what I found is: - SNES games: SNES9X pick the first ROM file, even a bad dump. Higan don't support 7Zip files. - Sega Genesis/Mega Drive Games: Kega Fusion pick the first ROM file, even a bad dump. - NES games: the Nestopia emulator has, IMO, the best behaviour: it opens a little window with all the files, and let you choose the one you want So, it seems the "zip ROM packages" treatment is emulator-dependent. (Besides) A message for the LaunchBox developers: I just purchased the premium version and have been playing with the software the last few days and I'm enjoying more and more. All emulation, Steam, DOS and Windows games already imported. Thank you and congratulations for the brilliant work.

[MesonW]

It sounds to me like the 7zip files are the "Good" full-sets available from some sources. These contain *all* variants, including all bad dumps, overdumps, hacks, trainers, etc. I've been writing a shell script to process SNES games in particular, to extract and single out a single Japanese, single US and single European version of the game. My intention is to then log what it finds in each, and use a Powershell script I wrote to add the necessary XML to LaunchBox's main file in order to make the alternative versions appear as right-click options. Hey, it's a little project of mine lol. But the point is that without some sort of processing, those "complete" sets will just cause you issues, as like you've discovered, the first listed ROM is picked by any emulator that supports the archive. Can I assume that if you're using an emulator that doesn't support 7z (I don't have an example right now), would Launchbox's own archival extraction result in the same? Ie. does it unarchive the files to a tmp location and pick the first listed alphanumerically?

[SentaiBrad]

Just download No-Intro sets or TOSEC sets, they're already designed with this in mind. They do not have all the extra clutter crap. I had even found a Japanese to English No-Intro pack. Essentially like a regular No-Intro set, but with the fan translations instead. If you wanna put your games in an archive that is fine, but we also don't really suggest anyone put their games in archives. Instead, opting for system specific compression where available (like CSO files for PSP and PS2), and never use rar or 7z for disc based systems honestly (just in terms of performance). Single file or cart based systems don't provide you with extreme space saving. My entire SNES collection (which is more than complete) only saved me 3 or 4GB? It's still personal preference, but throwing that out there.

[MesonW]

Yeah it's a fair point on the minimal space saving, but not I leave disc games unhindered... even the fastest of setups is too slow to decompress half a gig of archive before launching the game. I wasn't aware of these TOSEC sets mind, I shall have to investigate. Looks like I have some reading ahead. The one advantage left with the archives of fullsets I have, is that it means the region-variants are in one package ready for me to process and associate via right-clicks. I would like to for example, be able to right-click the US version of a SNES game and select to play the Super Famicom version, which may be an entirely different name.

[SentaiBrad]

If they are entirely different games then I would tend to keep them myself too, but chances are you're not going to play them all (this is coming from my own experience with a 20k LB library and not an attack or anything), but I totally get why you want them. I try to keep the NTSC versions of multi-region games first, then the regional exclusives and I trade out Japanese games with Fan Translated ones. No-Intro and TOSEC has seriously made my rom grabbing a whole hell of a lot simpler. I used to manually sort out all that extra crap in the archive with Windows Search... it was a nightmare.

[MesonW]

Oh I'm well aware I'll never play even 10% of the full collection :) (I own over 2000 physical games, and it dawned on me a few years ago I was running out of years to cover them all even if I stopped collecting!) It's chiefly a library in LaunchBox as I'm sure you probably view it similarly with 20k games on tap. I think I just need to learn more on what TOSEC and No-Intro would offer me. The only time I saw mention of No-Intro was with Game Boy Advance sets and I thought to myself "but I WANT intros!".

[SentaiBrad]

It started out on the GBA scene because it was rife with groups putting those banners and website ad's for their shitty websites before the game would start, effectively ruining the rip of the game. It started there and grew to include more systems and it more or less now means a set of every game, but just 1 good / perfect rip for every region available. TOSEC is an acronym and I came across it with DOS, it was an almost 700GB set and includes actual disc images as well where needed which is rare. Also comes with documentation for games that need it / have it as well. Great quality. It is designed for specific software / a front end... but I got it to import in to my LB with no extra effort really.