SteamLauncher

[Lucoshi]

It's working and I'm so glad it does! 👍

[Drakorex]

I just tried booting emulators that I know were working before, nothing works as it should. Except if I fresh install it, then things work. Can anyone explain this?

Edited October 4, 2023 by Drakorex

[Lahma]

On 10/2/2023 at 12:01 PM, Drakorex said:

I just tried booting emulators that I know were working before, nothing works as it should. Except if I fresh install it, then things work. Can anyone explain this?

I'd be happy to help you out but I'm going to need a lot more details than what you provided.. Tried booting emulators that were working before what? "Nothing works as it should" meaning.. what exactly? Things (the plugin, LB, ??) work if you fresh install what? The plugin? LaunchBox? Or do you mean when you re-setup/install an emulator or game or rom? I'm the author of the emulator so I can probably point you in the right direction and/or help you troubleshoot an issue you're having but please provide as detailed of an explanation as you can and ideally, provide some logs as well. If you don't know how to collect logs, there are instructions on the plugin download page describing how to do so but I will copy/paste those instructions below for your convenience. Please do not just provide log files though. They can only tell me so much so I will need a detailed description of the issue as well.

Logs

To provide help with any technical problems or to investigate a bug, I will need a copy of the debug log that is generated whenever 'Log Level' is set to 'Verbose'. To enable and collect 'Verbose' debug logs, do the following:

• Open the SteamLauncher settings dialog.

• Click the dropdown box under 'Log Level' and select 'Verbose'.

• Click the 'Save' button.

• Restart LaunchBox/BigBox.

• Now simply repeat whatever behavior was causing the issue and/or bug, and after you're sure you've replicated the behavior, close LaunchBox/BigBox.

• Look inside of the SteamLauncher directory for a file named 'debug.log' (there may be more than one sequentially named log file if there was an enormous amount of output but this is unlikely if verbose logging was turned on just briefly).

• Open this 'debug.log' file in a text editor, copy its entire contents, and paste/upload it to pastebin.com.

• In the SteamLauncher support thread, provide the PasteBin URL, the details of the problem you encountered, and the particulars of your setup (Windows version, 32-bit or 64-bit, LaunchBox version, Steam version, SteamLauncher plugin version, etc). The more information the better.

[Drakorex]

1 hour ago, Lahma said:

I'd be happy to help you out but I'm going to need a lot more details than what you provided.. Tried booting emulators that were working before what? "Nothing works as it should" meaning.. what exactly? Things (the plugin, LB, ??) work if you fresh install what? The plugin? LaunchBox? Or do you mean when you re-setup/install an emulator or game or rom? I'm the author of the emulator so I can probably point you in the right direction and/or help you troubleshoot an issue you're having but please provide as detailed of an explanation as you can and ideally, provide some logs as well. If you don't know how to collect logs, there are instructions on the plugin download page describing how to do so but I will copy/paste those instructions below for your convenience. Please do not just provide log files though. They can only tell me so much so I will need a detailed description of the issue as well.

Logs

To provide help with any technical problems or to investigate a bug, I will need a copy of the debug log that is generated whenever 'Log Level' is set to 'Verbose'. To enable and collect 'Verbose' debug logs, do the following:

• Open the SteamLauncher settings dialog.

• Click the dropdown box under 'Log Level' and select 'Verbose'.

• Click the 'Save' button.

• Restart LaunchBox/BigBox.

• Now simply repeat whatever behavior was causing the issue and/or bug, and after you're sure you've replicated the behavior, close LaunchBox/BigBox.

• Look inside of the SteamLauncher directory for a file named 'debug.log' (there may be more than one sequentially named log file if there was an enormous amount of output but this is unlikely if verbose logging was turned on just briefly).

• Open this 'debug.log' file in a text editor, copy its entire contents, and paste/upload it to pastebin.com.

• In the SteamLauncher support thread, provide the PasteBin URL, the details of the problem you encountered, and the particulars of your setup (Windows version, 32-bit or 64-bit, LaunchBox version, Steam version, SteamLauncher plugin version, etc). The more information the better.

Since your last update, I set up all my emulators, and everything worked great. After a few days, everything went back to not launching when using the plugin. First I figured that Steam broke it again. So I deleted the plugin and extracted a freshly downloaded copy I had backed up, and everything worked again. I went and copied the settings I had before and everything still works fine. I just don't get how after several days of having everything set up and not messing with anything, it broke itself.

[Drakorex]

Sorry to sound like a broken record, but Steam Launcher is having issues again. Sometimes it stays running, more often than not, it crashes as soon as Yuzu boots up. This is happening on the latest freshly extracted plugin.

Edited October 31, 2023 by Drakorex

[Drakorex]

It seems to have a problem consistently working with yuzu. Can anyone else confirm this? Is there anything that can be done about it?

[HTPCei]

Hi, Happy New Year all!..
Is this Plugin still working at the moment? I've been away for months, just re-installed, but can't seem to get it to "Steam-Launch" anything..
Any answers welcome, thanks!

[skizzosjt]

On 1/4/2024 at 7:00 PM, HTPCei said:

Hi, Happy New Year all!..
Is this Plugin still working at the moment? I've been away for months, just re-installed, but can't seem to get it to "Steam-Launch" anything..
Any answers welcome, thanks!

I've never used this before but was meaning to check it out. tried it now and it does work....but not very gracefully for my setup. doesn't seem to integrate smoothly with startup and shutdown screens. but it did do it's main intended purpose and that is add an entry into your Steam Library, launch said game and give you options to use any Steam feature, I could pull up the overlay and enable Steam Input ok for ex. It also deleted the entry after I exited the game. It creates a window showing Steam Launcher is running called "SteamLauncherProxy" and said window stole focus too, so I would have to ALT+TAB into the emulator each time I launch a game.

So functionally, I'd say the plugin works, thumbs up.

Visually/cosmetically, it might break some stuff though or requires non desired user input to continue using it. thumbs down

This was like 10mins testing some NES games running through Retroarch so pretty limited scope of testing done on my end.

[HTPCei]

EDIT No.2: Everything I wrote before is pretty much irrelevant, so I've started again, but for anyone else searching for this issue..

My problems were all to do with having Steam-Input enabled for X-Box controllers, in the Steam settings... (and some from being too lazy/ignorant to remap my 8BitDo controller in Retroarch; I assumed it was recognised as a 360 controller, but it was working under Steam-Input)

For whatever reason under the hood; SteamLauncher wouldn't seem to launch anything. The shortcut for the game would be created, but shut down right away, or sometimes timed out, according to the logs..

The other symptom of this, for any non-SteamLauncher users searching for a fix, is that controller input in BigBox was double pressing every input; moving or clicking twice for every button press; once with the controller, and once from the Steam-Inputs "Keyboard".

Insanely annoying, and I couldn't find any help when searching myself, hopefully this helps someone else.

 

Edited January 19 by HTPCei
Remove irrelevant ramblings, present more helpful info

[HTPCei]

Hi all, I found something interesting...

I've been looking into ways to try to make the startup process a bit smoother, starting with trying to find a way to stop the Steam Pop-up, and I found this https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/1/6516193260174637803/  thread, which seemed promising.

However, after applying the Registry Edit solution mentioned in there, the Steam Pop-up is still happening, but it's silenced/hidden the "Steamlauncher Proxy" window instead, which is nice, but not what I was expecting.

So, I no longer see the "Steamlauncher Proxy" window at all, it seems to run in the background, and the startup process looks a lot cleaner.

I've been testing with BigBox and Retroarch, and it seems to work perfectly for me, except for a few instances of losing focus; mainly on the BigBox pause screen, and when I exit the game through BigBox Pause or Retroarch; exiting games using the Steam menu sems to work fine.

 

 

Edited January 20 by HTPCei
Removed the attached file

[Lahma]

Sorry everyone, I haven't checked in on the thread in a long while. Just been really busy. Since I haven't received Steam messages from anyone complaining the plugin has stopped working, I assumed everything was fine. Reading the last few messages, it sounds like the plugin is still working ok? Can someone confirm if that is indeed the case? I will run it myself tomorrow and check to make sure everything is still working properly as well.

In regards to the startup process (proxy window, Steam game launch window, Startup/Shutdown windows, etc), it is an extremely sketchy process because I'm having to battle with Steam and LaunchBox/BigBox in order to maintain Window focus when needed, and prevent it when not needed. It would be great if there was a more elegant way to handle things but I've spent literally dozens upon dozens of hours trying to tweak it and improve the process as much as possible. That's not to say it can't be further improved but there are always going to be some edge cases that likely don't work properly. However, if something has changed and Startup/Shutdown screens and game window focus aren't working on the vast majority of titles, then I will definitely look into the issue and fix it. Like I said, I'll take a look tomorrow and see what things currently look like. In the meantime, if you guys have any feedback or things to look out for, please let me know. Thanks!

P.S. I'll read all of your posts more carefully tomorrow and specifically respond to each of you (if needed).

[HTPCei]

This might not be the right place for this question, (I'll delete or move it if that's the case) but,
does anyone know a way to get the steam guide button overlay working in the BigBox menu, without breaking SteamLauncher?
I'd like to be able to access Steam Chat etc in Big Picture Mode, from the BigBox menu, as well as the Guide Button Chords to access Discord overlay, and maybe Parsec overlay too if possible..
Any thoughts appreciated, thanks

[skizzosjt]

10 hours ago, HTPCei said:

This might not be the right place for this question, (I'll delete or move it if that's the case) but,
does anyone know a way to get the steam guide button overlay working in the BigBox menu, without breaking SteamLauncher?
I'd like to be able to access Steam Chat etc in Big Picture Mode, from the BigBox menu, as well as the Guide Button Chords to access Discord overlay, and maybe Parsec overlay too if possible..
Any thoughts appreciated, thanks

Guide button chords will work 24/7 as long as Steam is running....take note, running, it does not need to be in focus for the various Guide button chords to work

I think you're calling the Game Overlay the Steam Guide button overlay, default keys are SHIFT+TAB or the Guide button on controller. This only opens when a Steam game, or non-Steam game in your library is actually running. So if you want that to appear while using Big Box then you would need to add Big Box as a non-Steam game to your Steam library. This does not break SteamLauncher, or at least, I don't know why you think so? Steam to my surprise lets you run multiple games simultaneously, at least from the same system, I have not tried this across multiple systems signed into the same Steam account for instance. But my point being if you had Big Box running as a non-Steam game and then launched for ex some NES game using SteamLauncher, it by theory, should work as normal. I test this theory just now, and does seem to work as I described. I can still launch a NES game with SteamLauncher while I have an official Steam game or Big Box already running through Steam. Image here for some proof

If you wanted to access Big Picture Mode there should be shortcuts for that. I don't use it but also have opened it on accident many times. From what I can tell it's by default holding down the Guide button. It also seems Steam needs to be in focus for that to work though. But, there is also a setting to make Steam come to focus with a press of the Guide button, so between using both of those settings you should be able to bring up BPM with just the Guide button.

 

 

On 1/20/2024 at 7:52 AM, Lahma said:

However, if something has changed and Startup/Shutdown screens and game window focus aren't working on the vast majority of titles, then I will definitely look into the issue and fix it.

Hey Lahma, I can tell from skimming through this thread you have put in lots of blood sweat and tears into this project. Things just keep getting changed that are out of your control and you gotta find the next solution each time, it sounds, frustrating to say the least. So it honestly pains to report something isn't working right for Startup/Shutdown screens. I've really only tested with Retroarch games, cores for mainly 8bit and 16bit systems like NES, SNES, Sega Genesis and Master System. What happens is it seems the SteamLauncherProxy window yanks focus away from the emulator after a few seconds pass by, forcing me to ALT+TAB back into the emulator. I changed some setting in the plugin to delay that ("Prevent Steam Focus Stealing") but it just sort of delays the inevitable. So that's really my main gripe, it requires this extra user intervention step to get back into the emulator/game being launched by SteamLauncher. This doesn't occur if I disable the Startup Screen. The issue with Shutdown Screen is mostly cosmetic, just a bunch of flashing back and forth between the frontend, emulator, and Shutdown Screen. So doesn't require user intervention, just looks pretty bad.

The reason I'm digging this plugin is due to I recently got myself familiar with using Steam Input and it just makes any and every remapper I've ever used look like a kiddie toy lol. It's so powerful what it can do! Seems only your imagination is your limit with that tool. So I would love the ability to make better use of Steam Input and this plugin allows that to happen but I'm bummed about the Startup/Shutdown screens not working quite right. Should you find the time to look into this and better yet, resolve it, you will make some stranger like me quite the happy gamer!

With that said, I thought I should do a couple other systems real quick that aren't using Retroarch. I tried Cemu and Yuzu and both of these emulators suffer some issues, mostly the same way too. Neither forced me to ALT+TAB into the emulator, so that's a plus. However, it still does a bunch of flashing between emulator, Startup Screen and frontend though. And it also did that flashing of windows routine at exit of the game/emulator. The Shutdown Screen seems pretty delayed when using SteamLauncher too for any of these emulators, Retroarch, Cemu or Yuzu. Couple secs go by before it initiates, it's normally instantly. This lends to flashing back to the frontend when it should instead go directly from the game/emulator to the Shutdown Screen. So by comparison, Cemu and Yuzu work one notch better not needing to ALT+TAB but the process of windows flashing back and forth at game launch and exit is ugly looking. 

I understand this can be considered nitpicking, as I must give credit where it's due. Functionality of the plugin does check all the boxes and work as it's supposed to for what I've tried so far. Besides Retroarch needing the extra ALT+TAB input, this is just all ugly cosmetic issues.

[strich]

@Lahma what are your thoughts on getting the Remote Play Anywhere feature enabled for this plugin? I'm not exactly sure what checks Steam does to turn it on, but I suspect that it simply needs to be told that the game (or proxy in this case) supports Remote Play. Is that something that can be done?

[HTPCei]

@skizzosjt
"Guide button chords will work 24/7 as long as Steam is running....take note, running, it does not need to be in focus for the various Guide button chords to work" This I didn't know, thanks..
I tried adding BigBox as a non-steam game, and I got the overlay working in BigBox, but games wouldn't launch, although I only did minor testing, will have another go tomorrow...
Edit, 09/02/24: After lots of testing, adding BigBox (and/or Kodi too btw) as a non Steam game.. the overlay works, but causes some really bad graphical errors.

Edited February 10 by HTPCei

[Lahma]

Hey @skizzosjt , sorry it has taken me so long to get back to you. Most of the behavior you're describing is outside of my control. The reason it is doing that is because I am having to fight with LaunchBox which is simultaneously trying to manage window focus at the same time my plugin is. The explanation is pretty long winded so I don't really want to go into specifics but it really is just the nature of how my plugin is forced to trick LaunchBox into launching the proxy exe, instead of the game EXE. The LaunchBox plugin architecture does not allow for interception of game launches so my plugin is essentially having to swap things around under LaunchBox's nose. If I can coordinate with the LaunchBox devs at some point to implement some new functionality into the plugin API, pretty much all of these problems could be solved. I've tried doing that on a couple of different occasions but I was never able to get the full implementation I needed.

With all of that being said, if you shoot me a message on Steam, I would be happy to work with you to fix the issue of having to alt+tab to get Retroarch back into focus. That is definitely something I should be able to fix. There must be something that changed because that wasn't happening with Retroarch before. Definitely shoot me a msg on Steam though and we will figure out what the issue is and get it resolved. My Steam contact info is on the plugin download page. When you msg me, just give me a quick reminder of who you are as I tend to get lots of messages.

[Lahma]

Hey @strich , as far as I'm aware, there aren't any restrictions on what games you can play over Remote Play. I think Steam automatically applies a filter, showing only the list of games that will work best on the given device you're using, but I think that filter can be disabled. See below:

That part shouldn't be an issue... However, the issue that I foresee (and I could be wrong) is that my plugin doesn't add a list of games to Steam's library. When you launch a game from LaunchBox with the plugin it enabled, it creates a new temporary non-Steam shortcut in Steam's library and then launches that newly created shortcut. In other words, if you're browsing your Steam library from say your Steam Deck, to try to remote play a game from your PC on your Deck, I don't really know how you're going to pick a title for the plugin to create a shortcut for. Do you see what I'm saying?

It may be possible to add LaunchBox as a non-Steam shortcut in Steam and launch that using Remote Play but I doubt that is really going to work either because it probably isn't going detect the LaunchBox UI as a game window. Even if it did, the issue is then going to be that LaunchBox is going to be detected as the "currently running Steam game". If you then try to launch a game within LaunchBox with the plugin enabled, it is going to add a new non-Steam shortcut to Steam, and then it is going to try launch that shortcut as a new game session... but LaunchBox is already a running Steam game.. See what I'm saying? Although, according to @skizzosjt, you can apparently run multiple Steam games simultaneously so maybe it will work?? I'm pretty sure that didn't use to be the case so maybe something has changed amidst all of the new updates that have been implemented recently (in bringing the Steam Deck UI to PC). I'm almost certain that previously you couldn't do something such as running BigBox as a non-Steam shortcut and then running a game within BigBox with the plugin enabled to run another game. If that is indeed now possible, that is pretty cool.

If there's anything else I can do to help out or if I misunderstood what it was you were trying to ask, please shoot me a message on Steam and I'll do anything I can to help out. You're likely to get a very quick response from me on Steam whereas it (obviously) might take me a while to get back to you if you respond here in the support thread (I try to keep tabs on the support thread as often as possible.. I really do.. but I'm obviously not doing a very good job).

[skizzosjt]

On 2/17/2024 at 8:46 PM, Lahma said:

Hey @skizzosjt , sorry it has taken me so long to get back to you. Most of the behavior you're describing is outside of my control. The reason it is doing that is because I am having to fight with LaunchBox which is simultaneously trying to manage window focus at the same time my plugin is. The explanation is pretty long winded so I don't really want to go into specifics but it really is just the nature of how my plugin is forced to trick LaunchBox into launching the proxy exe, instead of the game EXE. The LaunchBox plugin architecture does not allow for interception of game launches so my plugin is essentially having to swap things around under LaunchBox's nose. If I can coordinate with the LaunchBox devs at some point to implement some new functionality into the plugin API, pretty much all of these problems could be solved. I've tried doing that on a couple of different occasions but I was never able to get the full implementation I needed.

With all of that being said, if you shoot me a message on Steam, I would be happy to work with you to fix the issue of having to alt+tab to get Retroarch back into focus. That is definitely something I should be able to fix. There must be something that changed because that wasn't happening with Retroarch before. Definitely shoot me a msg on Steam though and we will figure out what the issue is and get it resolved. My Steam contact info is on the plugin download page. When you msg me, just give me a quick reminder of who you are as I tend to get lots of messages.

no apology required. I figure so much that it's a lot of programs more or less trying to play a digital version of king of the hill to see who is in focus lol.

thanks for taking the time to get back and offer more help.

[Lahma]

5 minutes ago, skizzosjt said:

no apology required. I figure so much that it's a lot of programs more or less trying to play a digital version of king of the hill to see who is in focus lol.

thanks for taking the time to get back and offer more help.

You said Retroarch is what is giving you problems with window focus, right? Are you using just the standard, updated version of Retroarch? If so, I will test it out to see if I'm experiencing the same problem on my machine. If I am, I will fix it and post an update.

Edit: If I'm not experiencing the same issue, I'll probably need to chat with you to assess the issue so that I can fix it.

Edited February 19 by Lahma

[skizzosjt]

1 minute ago, Lahma said:

You said Retroarch is what is giving you problems with window focus, right? Are you using just the standard, updated version of Retroarch? If so, I will test it out to see if I'm experiencing the same problem on my machine. If I am, I will fix it and post an update.

Edit: If I'm not experiencing the same issue, I'll probably need to chat with you to assess the issue so that I can fix it.

Yes, Retroarch was the emulator that lost focus at startup and needing to ALT+TAB as a result. I'm not sure of exact timeline of my testing I previously detailed because I did recently update Retroarch to newest stable release at time when I downloaded it, which I know is 1.16. nightly/dev version was at 1.17 but I went with stable release - I see 1.17 is now the stable release

I will do some more testing because unfortunately for me, my memory is a little hazy on if I tested anything since this Retroarch upgrade. To be thorough on my end, I'll need to test some more on my up to date version of Retroarch. I can come back with some more feedback after I get that completed. I know when I made my first post I was def not on a recent version so I'll do my due diligence here for sure by testing with the recent release version.