How do you guys split up Arcade games?

[polygonslayer]

Hey folks,

So I'm considering splitting my arcade games up in Launchbox into seperate entries. Sega Model 3, Laserdisc, PlayChoice-10 etc.

How many "platforms" make sense? Do people lump the remaining games into just an Arcade "general" platform? Basically just seeing what is common for people to do here.

EDIT: Looking at this list here and it seems a bit unrealistic to split it into this many different "platforms"..? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arcade_system_board#List_of_arcade_system_boards

Cheers

Edited October 15, 2016 by polygonslayer

[SentaiBrad]

I only split systems that will require a different emulator because they don't play well in the Arcade platform (MAME). For example, Sega Model 3 games I believe aren't even in MAME Rom packs, so that certainly should be in it's own platform.

[DivinityCycle]

I've got mine broken up (so far) into CPS-1, CPS-2, CPS-3, and NeoGeo for "actual platform" platforms inside of LaunchBox. The other arcade games then either end up in Final Burn Alpha (if they actually work well in the FBA RetroArch core) or MAME (if they do not). Then I have a Custom Filter called "Arcade Games" that shows all those platforms in one listing. Not sure if this is actually a good way to do things, but it works for me so far. One of the reasons I like LaunchBox so much is that it decouples the organizational and application stuff, so you can use whatever emulator(s) you want on the back end and easily switch those around while at the same time doing whatever you want in terms of categorization on the front end.

[Pietro]

To separete I create different plataforms, it's kinda boring to select game by game, but it's worth it
And to big box i create manually the logos too

Spoiler

 

 

Edited November 1, 2016 by Pietro

[SentaiBrad]

Those are awesome clear logo's. You should upload them to our downloads section.

[polygonslayer]

Those logos are awesome I ended up doing a bit of a mixture myself. I added a platform for PlayChoice10, Mega-Tech, Mega Play, Sega Model 3, Triforce, VS System, Naomi. Mahjong, Casino and Laserdisc.

Made some clearlogos as well. I could upload them as well

Edited November 1, 2016 by polygonslayer

[damageinc86]

For my hyperspin setup I had arcade split by the popular manufacturers.  Atari, Capcom, Konami, midway, taito, etc.  But after a while of using it that way, I came to realize that I have to search so much more because I constantly forget what game was from what platform.  So I might go back to just like a greatest hits arcade platform.

[FistyDollars]

I don't split them. My logic is, at no point did you go somewhere to separately play the new Neo-Geo games, then go somewhere else to exclusively play CPS-2 games. You went to the arcade to play arcade games. Just like you turn on your NES to play NES games. 

[SentaiBrad]

Yea, I only split mine up for emulator purposes.

[Charco]

I split mine into Neo Geo, CPSI, CPSII, CPSIII (all using RA FBA cores for shaders and options), Model 2, Model 3, and an arcade folder with a full MAME set. I prefer it this way for emulator purposes, as Brad said, and I like being able to get to those games more quickly from the main menu wheel in Big Box. I am a huge Neo Geo fan and consider it a home console due to the AES. It also has a full set of 3D boxes which look great in Big Box. I got 3D boxes for the three CPS systems too ?

[Phox]

Honestly, I believe its a good idea to split up arcade games because there's just so many of them.  Splitting up arcade games based off of popular systems such as the Capcom Play Systems, Neo Geo, playchoice10/Versus, Sega ST-V, etc. even if they use the same emulator just makes it easier to find my favorite games for me.

[DivinityCycle]

It seems like the main modes of interaction for most people are "All the arcade games in one big list" and "smaller subsets of arcade games". The way LaunchBox currently works, it's possible to accomplish both with the same collection using Platforms and also Custom Filters, so I'd imagine it just ends up being an issue of what makes more sense for the collection and how the user wants to browse their stuff. The main driving factor for me (and I bet others) in making more platforms is that platforms can have artwork associated with them, and I just think it's cool to see the logos for stuff like CPS-1 and Neo Geo.

[JaysArcade]

I split mine by whether the emulator in question does something unique. Daphne for instance or AAE. I also have the standard Arcade platform as well as an Arcade Shooter platform. The Shooter is so I can get straight to games I can use with light-guns on my cabinet. I'm sure there is probably a way to search for these games separately in Launchbox without them having their own platform but its nice to just go to that section and pick a title without the need to think about it.

[Jason Carr]

Hey guys, partially due to James Baker's existing videos for Arcade platform divisions, I'm hoping to add an option to divide up Arcade into separate platforms for 7.0. Anyone have any suggestions as to the approach? I'm thinking of keeping the same general divisions as Hyperspin does currently. I could use a list of the arcade emulators that are typically used for each of those platforms. (Other than MAME, of course.)

[Lordmonkus]

@Jason CarrWhat would be really awesome would be to have the ability to import an entire arcade set such as a Mame set and obviously have all of them in the Arcade platform. From there create custom platforms such as Capcom, NeoGeo or even by genre like Fighting, Vertical Shooters, Horizontal Shooters, Beat Em Ups and so on. Then in the Arcade platform for each game set a "tag" so that game then shows up in the Arcade and the custom platform you set a tag for.

So just as an example Final Fight can be in the Arcade, Capcom and Beat Em Up platforms but only one import of the rom.

[damageinc86]

Arcade is a hard one.  The simple overall way of doing it could easily be the popular manufacturer way that Hyperspin has adopted.  That could really get a lot of beginners started very easily.  Beyond that though I think it might be cool to have a  way to create a platform for people who want a different approach such as Schmups, Beat em ups, fighting (like street fighter), Shooters (gun), etc., etc., and then an option to have a general classics one where people can select all other sorts of games that they feel fall into the classic category.  I stopped trying to do databases with arcade in hyperspin after I got the manufacturers done because it got old having to use donsxmltools to sort stuff, and I wanted to move on.  But launchbox seems like it already has a more interactive way of doing things, and when you create your schmup platform for example, you could do a lot of it within the program itself, especially with scraping and the LBdatabase features. 

[SentaiBrad]

That can be done with Custom Filters, assuming all of the games are properly marked with markers that can sort them out properly.

[damageinc86]

ohh i haven't seen that.  But can you make it a platform of it's own after you filter it to show those?

[Jason Carr]

Hmm...the genre stuff is probably best tackled with one of the other new features planned for 7.0, nested filters. This is planned to allow you to filter the Arcade platform (for example) to a certain genre (for example). Or filter one list by another.

[SentaiBrad]

With custom filters and the upcoming nested filters there's no need to create special platforms for the same thing.