How do you guys split up Arcade games?

[damageinc86]

That's cool.  But then I wonder if you can say something like " convert current filter level to it's own platform", ENTER, and voila! your schmups are their own platform without any of the hassle that has plagued us before now.  I guess i'm confused.  So does the filter stay on for the entire arcade genre?  So if I want to go to beat 'em ups, vs. shoot 'em ups, then i have to deselect the current line of filters and then re-select the filter to show the next set of games I want to play?  If so, then that would be cumbersome for people who just want to have those all ready to go without having to select the appropriate filter each time.   Unless it was a pretty quick process, I guess it wouldn't be that bad, like a pop up menu with a rolling list you select to filter and bam, it's done. But then also people who like having cool artwork for those different platforms might still want the platform option.

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Edited November 8, 2016 by damageinc86

[Jason Carr]

I hadn't planned that, but that is an interesting thought. Perhaps once we clean up custom filters, we could add an option to include them in the platforms list.

[Lordmonkus]

I may have to take a deeper look into the custom filters but whenever I have looked into in the past I found it really cumbersome and too much of a shotgun approach. I would much rather have more fine control on a game by game basis.

[Jason Carr]

I'm still torn on this whole concept though. Honestly I've been back and forth since the beginning on Arcade stuff. I can't seem to make up my mind on anything. We've got several problems to solve:

- Arcade *is* the platform name, but obviously it's too big to leave it by itself and is difficult to navigate at that size

- Dividing up by emulator seems to make the most sense to me, but it bugs me because MAME, for example, is obviously not a platform

- I do like Hyperspin's method of dividing up by developer/publisher, but I dislike the concept of having games in more than one "platform" at the same time

- It's good that LaunchBox is flexible and allows any number of emulators per platform, but I do think the easiest thing is if there is one emulator per platform

- Dividing up by developer/publisher may be nice for some people, but people who are not familiar with arcade games have no idea which games came out from which companies, so it's useless for them

I think that's the gist of my thoughts here. Obviously there will never be a perfect solution but it would be really great if we could come up with a better solution than the existing ones (for example, Hyperspin's).

[Jason Carr]

@lordmonkus We plan to revamp custom filters to more of a playlists feature instead. That is planned.

[damageinc86]

Playlist concept with tags seems like it might be a good way to approach this.  It would be even cooler if when you were in a certain playlist chosen from within the Arcade platform, LB would have a set of artwork stuff for that playlist so it sort of felt like you just went to a different "platform" for a while.

[Lordmonkus]

Well I am sure you have something in mind on how to handle it.

But for me I like the idea that I presented earlier. Import a whole Mame set and then make custom platforms based on how the user wants them. Then right click and edit a game and much like the associated platforms tab for an emulator let you set platforms for the game to show up in besides the Arcade platform. This way there is no messing around with the custom filters window which is cumbersome. It also just seems like a more end user friendly way of doing it.

No idea how difficult that would be to implement for you though.

[Jason Carr]

What about non-MAME games though? That's another thing; not every game is supported by MAME or included in a MAME romset.

[Lordmonkus]

Well the way im thinking wouldn't matter on what it is.

Again as an example you could set up a custom platform like say RPG. Then you could go into each system like NES, Snes, Genesis, etc and for each RPG game you have and want to have show up in the custom RPG platform just edit each game.

[DOS76]

Hopefully you will be able to bulk tag them if some thing like that was added any solution that has you have to edit individual games isn't optimal

[Thatman84]

Sorry guys for chipping in here as if you don't know I use Android (Hyperspin). I have been battling with the same issue of how to split MAME up but can't decide on a way forward so this conversation is of interest to me.

Because Hyperspin and MAME are both based on database's and MAME Arcade roms are of fixed names is there a way to use databases with LB to split stuff up. Maybe higher level users could create filtered lists to cover the majority of options users would like. Genres, manufactures, emulators etc. I guess this is very Hyperspin like and have no clue how LB deals with platforms and scrapping artwork. 

Think I'm going to have to get LB installed so I can understand more here

[damageinc86]

The more I think of it, the better a "playlist" function sounds to me.  Like, if you had a keyboard/button press in bigbox that would bring up a window of the playlists you created in launchbox previously.  Then you could easily choose which one to go into, or to go back out to the "all games" playlist of your main database.  Maybe the games from each playlist could have a little spot that says "member of "Schmups" playlist" for example, when you are in the all games list.  Then another option to "Go to "Schmups" playlist", if you want to go to the playlist itself once you see that this game is a member of that list.  Heck, you could just have that be an all-platform option for people who want to make RPG playlists in the NES platform or something.  That way you can move in and out of this stuff quickly and easily.  Have a "return to main list" button or something to jump right back to where you started.

[angelobodetti]

LaunchBox does the console systems perfectly and I think Hypersin still does Arcade stuff a little better. Reason being the XML. I like the ability to use XML files to define which games show up in a specific list.

That's why I run LaunchBox and Hyperspin with the only "systems" in Hyperspin being the Arcade games. I even created custom wheels for entire categories like "Street Fighter" "Contra" etc... 

Perfect world would be the ability to load all of the MAME roms once and use a custom XML (or something to that effect) to set up other "systems" if you wanted. The reality is that there are entirely too many Arcade games to keep under 1 platform roof.

[damageinc86]

Yeah i hear you on the  different xmls.  But I think you could pull that off in launchbox as well, because I made platforms for the homebrew/hack games I have, called NES Homebrew, SNES Homebrew, etc.  You just make a new platform and do all the naming and import your games.  But I guess with arcade it would be a bit harder since there are so many games even for a single "platform" that you have taken out of the main xml.  It would be so nice if you could import an xml made by the don's xml splitter, and then launchbox would just look up those romnames, names, and info stuff to make your new platform.

[Zombeaver]

I divide my arcade games up into platforms of CPS1, CPS2, Neo Geo, Sega Model 2, and Arcade (everything else). I don't have one for CPS3 simply because I thought it a bit silly to have an entire platform for 6 games, so those are in Arcade. I can understand why someone would divide their library up by emulator for simplicity's sake, I don't though, personally. My Arcade platform is a mix of RA / Final Burn Alpha, MAMEUI, and RA / MAME. I test every game in my library so I try to find what works best on a per-game basis. For some platforms that's a simple choice, but it's not quite as clear-cut for Arcade. I even use multiple emulator entries for CPS1/CPS2/Neo Geo, not for different emulators but for different controls - I like to have universal controls for every arcade game (primarily for shmups - I want one button to always be fire and another to always be bomb and another to always be whatever other button is used if applicable) but not every game uses the same button layout so I have separate "emulators" for each layout and switch between them as needed when I add a game - that way I don't have to setup per-game controls, I just switch to the appropriate variation.

I can't wait for the playlist feature! I had hoped custom filters would serve that purpose but I find it a bit unwieldy to be honest. What I really want is something akin to Plex's playlists where I can just right-click a game (or multiple games) in my library and simply "Add to playlist -> select existing or create new" and boom you're done. I'd love to have a cross-platform playlist of all my shmups, RPGs, etc. That'd be killer.

[Manuel Leiria]

I always liked the separation by board type. It's as if you have several different consoles, and several different handhelds, and several different computers, you also have several different arcade boards. Things like Neo Geo, Capcom Play System, Cave, Sega Model.

I understand it might be obtuse for people who might be unnaware of the differences, but if a good search function is implemented, I think they would learn more easily. It would also provide more appreciation for arcades, instead of merely lumping everything together.

I think we agree that there are big differences between Capcom Play Systems, Neo Geo, Sega Model 3 or Taito X-2, to name a few.

[Mandoo]

Im thinking about do a split based on time. like

classic. (pacman galaga centipede)

Old. (8 bit ich)

Modern. (final fight ttetris. Streetfighter2 16bit ich)

New. streetfighter3. mybe neogeo)

 

Or something in that order.

Thats the way i work when getting hungry for some game action. im not offen going for a title. more in the mode for a time period.

 

[80sarcadeboy]

I suppose it depends also on whether you are running a 'no filler' type of setup. No filler in one arcade list is managable. I can see how 6000 games in a platform isn't ever going to be anything but problematic.

Thinking ahead, I'd love an IMDB ratings type of thing where I could filter/sort arcade games by the average user score submitted by all of us. That would definitely give us all a great games list and a great sort mode.

[Zombeaver]

2 hours ago, Mandoo said:

Im thinking about do a split based on time. like

classic. (pacman galaga centipede)

Old. (8 bit ich)

Modern. (final fight ttetris. Streetfighter2 16bit ich)

New. streetfighter3. mybe neogeo)

 

Or something in that order.

Thats the way i work when getting hungry for some game action. im not offen going for a title. more in the mode for a time period.

 

Well, therein lies the beauty of Launchbox - you can divide them up however you choose. Not everybody has to take the same approach.

The only issue with doing something like this is you're limiting yourself on user-created media like clear logos, banners etc. since they typically follow more traditional divisions. You could of course create your own though (or request them), if you're so inclined.

[InfinityFox]

You guys mention splitting your mame sets which essentially is what I aim to do, but how on earth do you know what games are from what systems. All the mame roms are abbreviated names and I've googled splitting mame rom sets but not found any info on how to go about it.  Where do I start I order to split the mame collection up?