request (Plugin Request) Steam Scrapper

[fawkesyeah]

Hello all! Loving the new plugin community, so many great ideas are being developed lately and it's really exciting! I have a plugin idea, but I didn't know where to post it, as there isn't a subtopic dedicated to requests.

This is the idea I had: A plugin that scrapes Steam for images, content, etc. I don't always buy games on Steam, I'll get them from GOG, Humble Bundle, etc. but since the game is almost always on Steam too, it's a treasure trove of info.

 

Situation: I download and import a game, but then I have to spend time going to grab all the images, description, etc from Steam.

 

It becomes time consuming with multiple games, and especially when so many other things in Launchbox have already been optimized, it seems like a great idea!

I wouldn't imagine it could be too hard to do this, as I've already seen a couple plugins that scrape YouTube and even Google images.

Anyway, if anyone else sees this as a valuable plugin/feature, please post to keep the thread alive, and maybe a crafty coder will make it so!

 

Side note, in case Launchbox devs see this: Is there any way I can import shortcuts as Windows games directly, instead of only Rom or MS-DOS? Thanks!

Edited June 10, 2017 by fawkesyeah

[SentaiBrad]

If you run the Steam importer this happens. If you import from another method it doesn't pull from Steam as it's not using the API.

[fawkesyeah]

2 hours ago, SentaiBrad said:

If you run the Steam importer this happens. If you import from another method it doesn't pull from Steam as it's not using the API.

Exactly. But because I'm not importing from Steam, I'm importing games manually, I still want to benefit from the Steam images, info, etc. I was hoping someone crafty would know how to write a Steam Scraper that can pull all that as if the game was imported directly from Steam.

Edited June 11, 2017 by fawkesyeah

[SentaiBrad]

Sure, just a point for anyone unaware.

[neil9000]

16 hours ago, fawkesyeah said:

Side note, in case Launchbox devs see this: Is there any way I can import shortcuts as Windows games directly, instead of only Rom or MS-DOS? Thanks!

Of course, just use the add button at the bottom right of the window, or drag and drop a shortcut onto the launchbox window, Just make sure you tell it to import to the correct platform.

[fawkesyeah]

3 hours ago, neil9000 said:

Of course, just use the add button at the bottom right of the window, or drag and drop a shortcut onto the launchbox window, Just make sure you tell it to import to the correct platform.

I tried that, hmm maybe I'm missing something? Ok I drag and drop a Windows game shortcut, it asks to import as a Rom or MS-DOS, if I choose Rom then it asks the platform, if I choose Windows then it asks for an emulator on the next screen and disables Next button until I pick an emulator. If however I choose MS-DOS to import, it will let me import it, but at the end it automatically assigns MS-DOS as the platform, and automatically enables "use DOSbox" and I have to manually fix these for every game imported this way.

So then let's say I use the Import > Windows games option, it will search (the whole computer) for them automatically, but it doesn't always find all of them, particularly ones that I don't have a shortcut for (i.e. ones downloaded straight from a devs website (not from GOG, etc)). I was hoping when you drag and drop a shortcut, there would be an option "Windows" below "Rom" and "MS-DOS". Or, when you select Windows game import from the menu, that you can do something like, search all .exe files from a specifically chosen folder only (i.e. D:\Games) so it'll help find games that may've come from different sources, or the shortcut was deleted. Does that make sense; am I missing this as a feature already?

[neil9000]

When you use the add button you will get this window, there is a application path, just use the browse button next to it to navigate to your shortcut. Then at the top right of that window is a platform dropdown change that to windows or whatever you want it imported as then use the search to find the game. look at this screenshot to see what i mean it's just application path, platform and then search for game.

[DOS76]

When it ask for an emulator you can put in any emulator or you can create a dummy text file then change the name to whatever you want to call it. If you choose an emulator you are already using you will have to edit the platform by using ctrl+a to select all games and then ctl+e to edit them this will open the bulk edit wizard from the drop down choose emulator and then leave it blank this will make the emulator to null and then if you are using .exe or shortcuts they will both launch. If you go with the dummy emulator it is simply an empty text file that won't do anything and the exe or shortcut should just run

[fawkesyeah]

3 hours ago, DOS76 said:

When it ask for an emulator you can put in any emulator or you can create a dummy text file then change the name to whatever you want to call it. If you choose an emulator you are already using you will have to edit the platform by using ctrl+a to select all games and then ctl+e to edit them this will open the bulk edit wizard from the drop down choose emulator and then leave it blank this will make the emulator to null and then if you are using .exe or shortcuts they will both launch. If you go with the dummy emulator it is simply an empty text file that won't do anything and the exe or shortcut should just run

Actually this was a great idea! It's still a workaround, but it's the best one so far. Compared to what I was doing before, the platform is already input correctly, and the names of the games are automatically input too. Thanks for this!

 

Anyway, sorry to derail my original post for all this. I'm still interested in having a Steam Scraper plugin, because as of now I still have to go manually grab images, descriptions, details, etc for each game.

[mr 2fngrz]

I would love for someone to create this plugin too. I'm somewhat in the same boat as I don't always buy my PC games from Steam. I already add the ones I don't buy from Steam manually so I know how to get the images. I really need the video clips. This would help so much. 

[neil9000]

you can use youtube download software to download trailers from youtube.

 

[mr 2fngrz]

6 minutes ago, neil9000 said:

you can use youtube download software to download trailers from youtube.

@neil9000 what would you recommend. That might actually work better as I don't have anywhere NEAR the number of PC games as I do emu games. 

I would love for someone to create this plugin too. I'm somewhat in the same boat as I don't always buy my PC games from Steam. I already add the ones I don't buy from Steam manually so I know how to get the images. I really need the video clips. This would help so much. 

[shinra358]

A better approach for importing pc games is to get rid of the steam and windows specific methods, bring back the extension selection in the importing process, and just use the game exe's for importing, scraping, and identifying pc games (like nvidia control panel or gedosato).