Atari Jaguar - Project Tempest (PT) Emulator Working in LaunchBox

[Red7s]

I'm a newb and just started using LaunchBox recently, and was needing (yes, needing) to get Project Tempest working.

It is working now. In case you are interested, here is how I did it and I hope it helps.

I copy/paste my notes below, from my own Word instructions document; but the text field here doesn't like the copy/paste and I can't find a quick way to fix the text format.

Word doc is attached; enjoy.

 

·         Download PT v0.95 zip

o   This is a specific download that contains Project Tempest version 0.95 and additional items needed to make it work with a frontend like LaunchBox

o   https://www.gameex.info/forums/topic/9199-project-tempest-loader/

§  See entry by Brian Hoffman on December 15, 2010, where he provides a loader he created

·         Thanks, Brian!!! Even though you’ll probably never read this, but hey, I never take credit for things I didn’t do, and I cite where needed to give props where due.

§  I take no credit for making any of the files; I’m simply writing this to try and help other people make sense of making Project Tempest work because I’ve seen many forums of people trying, failing, and giving up on Project Tempest with various frontends… I’m a newbie to frontends (only been tinkering with LaunchBox for about a week) and I was on a mission to make Project Tempest work... because the RetroArch Virtual Jaguar core (for newbies like me that read this, just think of a “core” as like the emulator that Retroarch uses; it’s their terminology) played Tempest 2000 and Raiden horrendously slow with awfully messed up sound on my atom processor beast Asus T200TA netbook, and Project Tempest emulated them at 60 FPS with awesome sound. It was a lot of trial and error with the given instructions, so I hope my instructions/post helps.

·         Extract zip to folder named PT v0.95

o   There should be 4 items in the folder

§  PT.exe

·         This is the Jaguar emulator Project Tempest version 0.95

§  PTLoader.exe

·         This is what you will point LaunchBox to use as the emulator, and not PT.exe

·         PTLoader.exe uses PTLoader.ahk and zlib.dll to allow frontends like LaunchBox to open PT.exe and then open up a Jaguar rom file

·         Without PTLoader.exe (plus PTLoader.ahk and zlib.dll), then PT.exe will just open up to a blank screen

§  PTLoader.ahk

·         This file can be edited in notepad, but likely no edits needed.

·         I saw some forum mention you could change the last value from 100 to 1000 if there was an issue with timing, but I didn’t need to do it

§  zlib.dll

·         This is needed by PTLoader.exe

·         Copy/Paste the 4 items into the proper emulator directory for your LaunchBox

o   My LaunchBox is on my D drive, so I copy/paste the 4 items into a Project Tempest folder (folder actually named ProjTempest)

§  D:\LaunchBox\Emulators\ProjTempest

·         Now go into LaunchBox and import your Jaguar games (ROM files) into its default directory, but before you do that, make sure your directory and ROM names have no spaces in them (I’ve read in a forum that having any spaces anywhere in the directory path can cause issues (notice that my items have no spaces; maybe spaces don’t matter, but I already set it up this way with no spaces and I’m not going to go and tweak things, because my setup is working and I don’t want to mess anything up)

o   If your directory ends up naming a folder Atari Jaguar, go and manually change the folder to Atari_Jaguar

o   My LaunchBox is on my D drive, so my ROMs go into my Atari_Jaguar folder at:

§  D:\LaunchBox\Games\Atari_Jaguar

o   Note that my ROM names are Tempest2000.jag and Raiden.jag

·         Now I will move on here and hope you have the Jaguar games showing in LaunchBox as having been imported, and use Tempest2000 as an example

o   Right click on Tempest2000

o   Click on Edit

o   Now you go down to the Launcher tab, in the field that says ROM File (Emulation is enabled):

o   Type in this field:

§  Games\Atari_Jaguar\Tempest2000.jag

§  Or click Browse and select your game (notice mine has no spaces)

o   Click on Emulation tab

o   Check mark should be marked for Use an emulator to play this game (primarily for console games)

§  Choose an Emulator:

§  Click Add

§  Emulator Name:

·         ptloader

§  Emulator Application Path:

·         Emulators\ProjTempest\PTLoader.exe

·         Or click Browse and get directory for this item, but make sure to select PTLoader.exe and not the actual emulator PT.exe

·         Do not enter anything into the Default Command-Line Parameters; I originally and newbily put the game ROM path here and the different ROMs I had kept opening up as Tempest2000, lol… to the newbs, this field is what command will be run every single time the emulator is run, so, don’t put the rom path here or else you’ll be telling LaunchBox to always run 1 specific game. #winning

§  Click OK

o   Check mark Use Custom Command-Line Parameters

§  Type in:

·         "D:\LaunchBox\Games\Atari_Jaguar\Tempest2000.jag"

·         Make sure you type the quotes at the beginning and end of this entry

o   Click OK

·         Enjoy Tempest2000

o   Hope this helps! It was quite an adventure to seek out forums while passing out, because I can only work on this after my almost 3 year old goes to bed and by then I’m blacking out while trying to figure out how to get Project Tempest to work, lol. My Atari Jaguar is in a shed with Tempest2000, and a working emulator beats having to find the system buried in boxes). The solution to the problem was hidden away in a non-LaunchBox forum, which was a surprise find and I’m happy it worked.

o   If you want Full screen, just go into the emulator’s settings one time and check mark it, then exit the emulator and full screen will be used next time.

o   I haven’t tested it out with a gamepad, yet, but it seems like you can use a gamepad by configuring the emulator’s settings.

LaunchBox Jaguar Project Tempest.docx

[ibbanez]

Is there any possible way to get someone to upload the loader, because all the links in the other post, appear dead and not available.  I would be greatly appreciated.  Thanks.

[dragon57]

The links in the GameEx post still work, you just have to be logged in to the forum first before you can download.

[ibbanez]

Thank you.  When I would click on it before, the website said this file is no longer here, so I didn't think about signing up, because usually it will tell you that you have to sign up to get the file, not that the file is no longer here.  I did find another alternative after looking.  I believe it does the same thing basically.  Its called Closemul.exe  Its more of a generic wrapper, but it works all the same.  Thanks again.

[klepp0906]

anyone used this to any effect lately?  Ive been smashing my head against it for the last couple days.

While closemul is working to launch PT, it isnt as clean as ptloader would be best i can tell (with all the blacking out of the screen etc).  closemul actually has texture from the windows explorer/project tempest pop through the startup screen which looks pretty janky.

ptloader on the other hand does black out the screen properly, opens project tempest, but then opens my start menu and begins searching for the file (is this how its supposed to function O.o?)   I can presumably see this due to having a second monitor with my taskbar there, otherwise i imagine it would be hidden behind ptloaders "blacked out" screen.

Either way, for some reason the search is almost always preceded with an "f" it seems like so its not finding it much of the time and even when it does its not launching it, it then opens an explorer window in through project tempest and stops there more or less. 

Im trying to get it to load atari jaguar cd.cdi games fwiw.
 

Edited October 7, 2019 by klepp0906