Amiga Emulation / FS-UAE: A Comprehensive Tutorial + Launchbox Integration

[Zombeaver]

On 5/22/2021 at 8:35 AM, Morris Schaffer said:

Is that what I need to import into Launchbox as a so-called rom

Yes. You need to direct it to a separate emulator entry setup as FS-UAE UUID as I show in the video though, if you're not already. UUIDs require different checkboxes than just directing the raw files or custom configs to FS-UAE, that's why they're mutually exclusive.

Is there some particular reason you're not using WHDLoad roms? That's going to make your life a lot easier and make the play experience significantly better.

There really isn't much to the process from beginning to end - import into FS-UAE, export the UUIDs, import the UUIDs into LB, direct them to the right emulator entry. The majority of the time spent is in the initial setup. If it isn't working correctly, chances are you haven't setup something correctly with the emulator entry. My suggestion would be to look there. You don't need the custom launcher anymore, the bug that that was meant to address has since been patched, you just direct it to the normal FS-UAE .exe. You still have to have separate emulator entries for FS-UAE (custom configs or raw rom files) and FS-UAE UUID (exported UUIDs) though because, again, the checkboxes used for each of these scenarios are different.

[Morris Schaffer]

On 5/25/2021 at 3:29 PM, Zombeaver said:

Yes. You need to direct it to a separate emulator entry setup as FS-UAE UUID as I show in the video though, if you're not already. UUIDs require different checkboxes than just directing the raw files or custom configs to FS-UAE, that's why they're mutually exclusive.

Is there some particular reason you're not using WHDLoad roms? That's going to make your life a lot easier and make the play experience significantly better.

There really isn't much to the process from beginning to end - import into FS-UAE, export the UUIDs, import the UUIDs into LB, direct them to the right emulator entry. The majority of the time spent is in the initial setup. If it isn't working correctly, chances are you haven't setup something correctly with the emulator entry. My suggestion would be to look there. You don't need the custom launcher anymore, the bug that that was meant to address has since been patched, you just direct it to the normal FS-UAE .exe. You still have to have separate emulator entries for FS-UAE (custom configs or raw rom files) and FS-UAE UUID (exported UUIDs) though because, again, the checkboxes used for each of these scenarios are different.

I'm vaguely familiar with the term WHD load roms, but not knowledgeable enough to know the ins and outs.  I will try again using the above info and see if I can get it to work.  Thanks

[Zombeaver]

6 hours ago, Morris Schaffer said:

I'm vaguely familiar with the term WHD load roms, but not knowledgeable enough to know the ins and outs.

There's nothing to know. It's just a different format that entails no disk swapping and faster loading times. There's really no reason to use .adfs unless there's no WHDLoad version available. Just Google WHDLoad roms and you'll find them. My specific suggestion would be to use Retoplay's WHDLoad set, you can find it on the EAB here:

https://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=61028

[Morris Schaffer]

9 hours ago, Zombeaver said:

There's nothing to know. It's just a different format that entails no disk swapping and faster loading times. There's really no reason to use .adfs unless there's no WHDLoad version available. Just Google WHDLoad roms and you'll find them. My specific suggestion would be to use Retoplay's WHDLoad set, you can find it on the EAB here:

https://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=61028

Thanks I will give that a try.  I was under the assumption the whole reason you made that video explaining the UUID and such was precisely for the reason that disk swapping could be avoided when running FS-UAE via Launchbox.  Because as you said in an earlier post to someone else, to make sure Launchbox starts directly with a default configuration that you created, you could find that bit in the video itself.  The whole reason for me to create default configurations is so that I can create one configuration with all ADF files already set up per game.  But as I understand it now, thanks to WHDload this wouldn't even be an issue any longer.  So now I'm a bit puzzled as to what the added value is of creating an additional emulator in Launchbox called UUID.     

Edited May 27, 2021 by Morris Schaffer

[Zombeaver]

Because, as is explained in the video, UUIDs specifically launch the internal configs from the OAGD/OpenRetro. That's well and good until you run into a scenario where those are wrong or don't exist to begin with, in those cases you need a custom config. And the UUIDs and custom configs require separate emulator entries to work - because they have to have different checkboxes checked. You direct UUIDs to one and custom configs to the other.

[Zombeaver]

On 5/27/2021 at 3:00 AM, Morris Schaffer said:

I was under the assumption the whole reason you made that video explaining the UUID and such was precisely for the reason that disk swapping could be avoided when running FS-UAE via Launchbox. 

I have no idea what you're talking about here by the way. I definitely never said anything of the kind, in the video or here.

FS-UAE has its own configs database that you link to when you scan your games into it. That includes both adf and WHDLoad games. But that doesn't cover 100% of the library, and sometimes the games it does cover have configs that aren't actually correct. I go over examples of both in the video. In these cases you need to make your own configs. So both are necessary.

Disk swapping has nothing to do with any of that, honestly. If it's multi-adf format you're still going to swap disks. If your disk images are recognized on scanning and there's an existing config in their database for it, it'll have all the disks attached appropriately, but you'll still need to swap when prompted. If they aren't recognized or a config doesn't exist, you'll have to make your own.

The entire point of UUIDs, custom configs, and separate emulator entries is that you need to be able to accommodate both scenarios, both cases where you can use FS-UAEs own configs and cases where you can't.

[Morris Schaffer]

Thanks for clarifying, appreciate it.

[zikan]

This is an exceptionally in-depth and useful guide! I've been using FS-UAE arcade predominantly for Amiga games but have decided to import FS-UAE into LaunchBox.

I'm up to the part about setting about FS-UAE UUID, but the links in the description to the UUID Exporter and Launcher are dead. Is the UUID still needed in newer versions of FS-UAE?

[Zombeaver]

16 hours ago, zikan said:

the links in the description to the UUID Exporter and Launcher are dead. 

No, they're not. You just have to be logged into the forums to download attachments. The exporter is still there. I just downloaded it again. The custom launcher is no longer necessary, just the exporter. You'll still need separate emulator entries for both custom configs and UUIDs, they'll just both be directed to the same standard launcher.

Technically you don't have to use UUIDs but you still should in order to have everything import into LB in such a way that it can match against the DB for metadata. That won't work properly if you just drag the games into LB.

[Cavey]

I used your video when I originally set-up Launchbox and I never got around to saying thanks. It made the whole process very simple and I really appreciate it. I'm not sure I'd have bothered adding most of my Amiga collection without it.

[Morris Schaffer]

Hello Zombeaver,

Hope I can bother you for some additional advice after we spoke here back in May 2022.  I let Amiga emulation rest for a while, but have now been back at it and I come back to your video each time.

As per your earlier suggestion, I'm not bothering with ADF's anymore, decided to go full WHDload.  Imported Superfrog WHDLOAD into FS UAE (scanned directory, and the game pops up as it should), started it up on the A1200 model in FS UAE directly and it works.  Fast as hell, no disk swapping.  Bliss.

Then I went ahead and as per your instructions created the 2 separate emulators in Launchbox, used eirulan's exporter, basically followed the vid from start to finish.  I import the game in Launchbox. Well, it's in fact this file '14f12873-1ff6-529c-bd92-13639df2b033' which is in a temp folder just as in your the vid.  And the import process seems to go well (I used the UUID emulator in this case, not standard FS-UAE which I also created), I see my Superfrog box art.  All seems well.  But when I click the game in LB, the game doesn't load like it does when I tried the game in FS-UAE directly with the A1200 model.  I think I know why.  Because somehow FS-UAE is using the A600 model but not the A1200 model to launch.  I know this because the screens I see are exactly the ones I see when I launch Superfrog directly in FS UAE with the A600 model.  

For some reason I'm not sure how to make sure FS-UAE is using as standard the A1200 model.  Because as your vid states this is the best bet model to use for lots of games.  I can create a new configuration in FS-UAE called 'Superfrog' for example and make sure it uses the A1200 model, but in the drop down menu in top left corner you can also select 'games' and there Superfrog is always shown with the A600 model. Which I presume is what's being used in LB.

If some screens would help please let me know and I'll supply them.

Thanks man!

[Morris Schaffer]

I got an update on my previous post.  My A600 kickstart, even though I had several A600 roms in my kickstart folder, did not become a green check mark when I scanned my file directories.  In essence, I guess I did not have the right version. So I went online looking for other versions, found a bunch of A600 ones, rescanned and bam!  The checkmark was there.  Now, upon clicking Superfrog in LB the game does launch as I expect it to.  Which is awesome.  Here's where I'm still a bit confused.  For WHDload games, the A1200 is the best one I understood.  Does this mean that Superfrog is a rare example where the A600 ks rom is quite sufficient also?  So what about other WHDLOAD games I want to play?  My feeling right now is that I still am not asking FS UAE to boot up with the A1200 KS rom as standard.  Clearly for Superfrog it was looking for the A600 since that is what FS-UAE and it only worked in LB when I finally found the right A600 KS rom and rescanned the directories.

EDIT: think i get the hang of it.  Imported a few more WHDLOADs and noticed with some of them in the games category the model shown is not the A600 but already the A1200.  So I suppose it depends on the WHDload itself which KS rom is shown and whatever is shown will work.

Beats me why a super simple 1989 game like Switchblade would show the A1200 KS rom as a default.  I can understand Tean 17's Assassin, but the other one is beyond me.  I guess that is how the WHDLOAD has been compiled.

Edited December 26, 2021 by Morris Schaffer

[Zombeaver]

It's based on whatever's specified in the Open Retro (formally Open Amiga) database first (the database that you connect to once you setup FS-UAE) and then what's in the WHDLoad itself second/if there is no config on Open Retro. Some use A600, some use A1200, etc. It just depends on the game.

[Flames]

First of all let me congratule you, about a so excellent video. Incredible!! I have no words to explain how did I feel when it worked.

But I have another issue, I don't how to solve it. I use Munt for ROLAND MT-32 emulation. It works great with DOSBOX games, but I don´t know how to set up it with FS-UAE. Munt can not detect FS-UAE signal.

I read the FS-UAE documentation, and for Windows it says:

Using Munt for MT-32 emulation

With mt32emu-qt from Munt on Linux, use option serial_port = midi:Standard to enable MIDI output via emulated serial port and route to the ALSA sequencer set up by mt32emu-qt.

On macOS, the MIDI device is different, so you can use the option serial_port = midi:Mt32EmuPort.

On Windows, yet another name is used: serial_port = midi:Mt-32 Synth Emulator.

But double-check that the device name is correct for yor system. See the section "Finding the MIDI device name".

Finding the MIDI device name

You can list the midi device names with fs-uae-device-helper:

./fs-uae-device-helper list-portmidi-devices

If you are using FS-UAE Launcher, you can go to Prefs -> MIDI and this will also list the MIDI device names for you!

So, where are the "Prefs -> MIDI" in the FS-UAE emulator? I go through all options, and I can not see them.

Edited September 11, 2022 by Flames

[Javier Ramos Fariña]

Greetings, this is my first message here. I have been working with Launchbox for almost two years and I am getting a really nice configuration. A few days ago I integrated FS-UAE without any problems but I saw the wonderful Bezel “1084x_night_wall_white_1.0” and I am crazy to be able to use it. It doesn’t seem complicated but I follow the steps and it doesn’t find it when loading the games. Could someone help me? Thank you very much!
@Zombeaver you are my only hope

Edited July 23, 2023 by Javier Ramos Fariña

[Stevie Mac]

Just going through this vid now but seems you can't make an account with https://openretro.org/ anymore.
Does anyone have a work around for this or know another site that offers the same?

Thanks

Edited July 26, 2023 by Stevie Mac

[kiddanplay]

Not to Necro and old thread, but wondering if i could beg for a little help 🙂 I have LB pointed to FS-UAE Launcher however, when launching from LB it goes straight into the actual FS-UAE Launcher and not directly into a game as it should. Maybe i missed something however, would obviously like when clicking on a game that the launcher fires up the actual game as intended. Any thoughts on what i may have missed? 

 

[launchretrogirl2562]

23 hours ago, kiddanplay said:

Not to Necro and old thread, but wondering if i could beg for a little help 🙂 I have LB pointed to FS-UAE Launcher however, when launching from LB it goes straight into the actual FS-UAE Launcher and not directly into a game as it should. Maybe i missed something however, would obviously like when clicking on a game that the launcher fires up the actual game as intended. Any thoughts on what i may have missed? 

 

Did you configure FS-UAE completely? It's a long while ago since I configured this.
Follow Zombeavers tutorial to configure FS-UAE.

You also need an account on https://openretro.org/  to get all the game configs.
But I do know you need FS-UAE fully configured (kickstart roms, amiga gamefiles directories set, scanned available games,...). Once you done all that, and also your game database with available games is filled u are ready for the next step.

I use the UUID launcher

This creates the pointer files which U can use to import your games.
 

My launcher settings then are : 


The games I launch are just simple pointers which FS-UAE uses to find the corresponding game (they are made by the FS-UAE Exporter) 


As you can see from the directory where the pointer files are created. (i have three here, but was just from testing. Only one will be there if you start fresh)

Edited 10 hours ago by launchretrogirl2562

[kiddanplay]

2 hours ago, launchretrogirl2562 said:

Did you configure FS-UAE completely? It's a long while ago since I configured this.

You also need an account on https://openretro.org/  to use in FS-UAE launcher. (to get all the game configs)
But I do know you need FS-UAE configured. Once you done that, u should have a file list with those pointer files on disk which the launcher uses to start the game automatically with all configured settings.

See the example for 'The addams Family'
https://openretro.org/amiga/the-addams-family/edit#09f31e16-4091-57d6-92f3-c6bac08a8604

My settings thus are different than yours.

My launcher settings are : 


The games I launch are just simple pointers which FS-UAE uses to find the corresponding game


As you can see from the directory where the pointer files are created

OK, so i did some digging, for a little context, i am using an old preconfigured Hyperspin build drive and transferring everything over to LB. That being said I was able to finally get the games to launch directly however, i think this file structure might be throwing things off, as well as how I'm importing into launchbox. Screen shots below. I want to preface with I can open the launcher and launch games so all the file paths are correct in that regard and for all intents and purposes the emulation is working. It is only the direct launch that is not working. That being said here is what i have found: 

CURRENT STATE: ROMS are in D:\Arcade\System roms\Amiga CD32\roms and they are all CHD or Zips. When importing from this folder to Launchbox, I get the full scrape and everything has containing artwork, and media. However, when launching from this type of input, i launch directly into the launcher and not the game: 

File Structure

Launching from Launchbox using the above imported ROM's brings me direct to launcher

Using AKIRA as an example, my launcher is obviously different and here is where it is trying to launch from 

 

WHAT I FOUND: I ended up finding the files you referenced above located in E:\eXoDOS\Emulators\AMIGA FS-UAE\FS-UAE_uuid\Roms (again this is an old LB drive I'm trying to rework) now in this file i have the following structure and when i drill into the AKIRA folder i do see the file

If i take that file path and i put it in the launcher section of LB as shown then my game WILL launch directly as intended and bypasses the launcher which is great and exactly what we all obviously want. 

 

HOWEVER, i have tried to scrape from the folder path and it returns no metadata or artwork because the file names are not standard. so i guess its either update each game to point to each roms respective path as shown above and things will work which is obviously tedious with 170 games (not counting amiga CDTV lol) or im at a loss on how to import so these launcher fields are populated with the correct data. 

 

Thoughts?

[launchretrogirl2562]

28 minutes ago, kiddanplay said:

OK, so i did some digging, for a little context, i am using an old preconfigured Hyperspin build drive and transferring everything over to LB. That being said I was able to finally get the games to launch directly however, i think this file structure might be throwing things off, as well as how I'm importing into launchbox. Screen shots below. I want to preface with I can open the launcher and launch games so all the file paths are correct in that regard and for all intents and purposes the emulation is working. It is only the direct launch that is not working. That being said here is what i have found: 

CURRENT STATE: ROMS are in D:\Arcade\System roms\Amiga CD32\roms and they are all CHD or Zips. When importing from this folder to Launchbox, I get the full scrape and everything has containing artwork, and media. However, when launching from this type of input, i launch directly into the launcher and not the game: 

File Structure

Launching from Launchbox using the above imported ROM's brings me direct to launcher

Using AKIRA as an example, my launcher is obviously different and here is where it is trying to launch from 

 

WHAT I FOUND: I ended up finding the files you referenced above located in E:\eXoDOS\Emulators\AMIGA FS-UAE\FS-UAE_uuid\Roms (again this is an old LB drive I'm trying to rework) now in this file i have the following structure and when i drill into the AKIRA folder i do see the file

If i take that file path and i put it in the launcher section of LB as shown then my game WILL launch directly as intended and bypasses the launcher which is great and exactly what we all obviously want. 

 

HOWEVER, i have tried to scrape from the folder path and it returns no metadata or artwork because the file names are not standard. so i guess its either update each game to point to each roms respective path as shown above and things will work which is obviously tedious with 170 games (not counting amiga CDTV lol) or im at a loss on how to import so these launcher fields are populated with the correct data. 

 

Thoughts?

About scraping, that shouldn't happen.
Cause you are only importing those UUID files but you should be using the FOLDER name as name of the game.

So in your library of amiga games it should have the correct game name.
And when you scrape in LB it should use the game name to find the correct artwork.

So steps are to import ROMS
U can either choose your entire GAME FOLDER with the UUID's in them

Or you can choose import single files. Just browse to your directory, choose *.* and then only select the UUID files

Scrape as Commodore AMIGA

Custom OPTIONS

Make sure to check the 'user folder names' checkbox

Now it's ready to Import

As you can see...it adds the UUID files but using the FOLDER name as name of the game to import.

I just did a test with the scraping and it correctly finds all artwork

 

Edited 8 hours ago by launchretrogirl2562
minor edits