LaunchBox for Android New Version - Beta Testing

[TechBoi]

15 minutes ago, Vader said:

@TechBoi, Like @neil9000 said, the games datebase is a community effort, so not everything is going to be perfect, nor should we expect it to be. We have to take it for what it is, and if you want to upload a wheel with the correct file name to fix an issue, than I guess you can do so. 

@Jason Carr is doing an awesome job and I tip my hat off to him for all he has done on this project. Keep it up, Jason!

I hear you and I'm by no means shitting on the work in progress android beta but for a paid app/sub I expect a little more effort for developers to fix these sorts of things and not lean or depend on the paying community to fix such things.  I've also asked how and or where this shared database is located or accessed.

[faeran]

9 hours ago, TechBoi said:

I hear you and I'm by no means shitting on the work in progress android beta but for a paid app/sub I expect a little more effort for developers to fix these sorts of things and not lean or depend on the paying community to fix such things.  I've also asked how and or where this shared database is located or accessed.

Here's a link to the games database: https://gamesdb.launchbox-app.com/

You can also click on the GAMES DB link at the top of the page. 

[TechBoi]

8 minutes ago, faeran said:

Here's a link to the games database: https://gamesdb.launchbox-app.com/

You can also click on the GAMES DB link at the top of the page. 

Thank You! 

[usuallee76]

On 10/27/2021 at 11:17 PM, Vader said:

@TechBoi you might be getting a lot of Japanese games because no-into romsets have games from different regions i.e. Japan, Europe, etc. Most games from these other regions are just duplicates of North American games, but some games are exclusive to just a particular region. It is recommended that you clean your romsets to remove non-North American region duplicates so that only North American region games are left. Once this is done, you can then add back any region-specific games you might want in your collection. This should eliminate a lot of the Japanese games.

I agree with @neil9000 that there seems to be an issue with the file naming convention used on some of the wheel images, which is probably causing Japan wheel logos to display. After looking closer into both the games you mentioned, Kung Fu and Kid Icarus, I noticed that both have North American wheel images available but the file names for these wheels lack a region name i.e. (North America).  Since those images lack the region designation, this could be why those images are not downloading and displaying properly. Changing the rom file name  won't fix this either, because I believe that the scraper looks for the files for the region you specify. I don't know if something can be done about this, but I think that in the meantime, the easiest solution is to download those wheels that are incorrect and manually copy them to the wheel folder. 

Just my 2 cents

Hi, I hope this is relevant, just wanted to suggest that if there are problems with sets and different regions, etc. I've been using the Hearto 1G1R collections to begin setting up my Shields, and have had good results so far: ((REMOVED LINK TO ROMS))

These sets prioritize the USA region, then World > Europe > Japan, etc. In other words, it will only provide a Japanese rom if there are no USA, World, or European releases of the game. It has basically done the work for you that Vader suggests.

Also, to those adding entire sets of thousands of games and experiencing scrolling issues, as Jason says these Shields and other Android devices have a fraction of the CPU and GPU processing power of a gaming PC. Thus, it might be better, with less headaches, to take a more curated approach to setups with low powered hardware. I think curated is better anyway, having added every single game for every platform on other setups. Too many games, too much junk I'll never play. For the Shield setups I've been adding, depending on the system, anywhere from just a dozen or two key games to around 175 for the SNES, so far. Basing it on games I like/have heard of, plus those mentioned in various top 100, top 50, or hidden gems-type lists available online from Racketboy, Retro Sanctuary, Ranker, AtariAge forum, and elsewhere. I get a well rounded collection of legit games. For cartridge-based consoles I've set up a folder for each system with an archive of all games in it, and a folder called Added to LB where the imported games are. I just read the lists and drag/drop games from the master to the Added to LB folder. That way, I can have just the "hits" plus select hidden gems for each platform, eliminating a lot of garbage, keeping the total number of games manageable, but can easily sprinkle in some new games for each platform from the master archive later on if desired. Not saying everyone has to do it this way, just a suggestion.

But curation is where it's at, for consoles anyway. For Arcade I understand it's harder to do that as you need non-merged and also the abbreviated file names make it hard to know what a game actually is. I've never been able to find a list of Final Burn roms with the real game name. If anyone know of one please let me know. Anyway, cheers! And thanks to Jason and staff for all the hard work in rapidly developing LB for Android.

Edited November 1, 2021 by Retro808
Please Do Not Post Links to Roms

[C0ntrA]

That was a good post.

But the issue with wheel scrolling can't be swept under the rug like that.

I have a specific "other front-end" that has literally zero issues with scrolling through my thousands of game titles.

Calling it an "Nvidia Shield limitation" is a poor excuse.

Honestly it's the primary issue that I am struggling to get past, especially with no attention from development, and excusing it that way does not help the situation.

I'll repeat, other front-ends do NOT have this issue. Cutting down your library so that Launchbox won't freeze and freak out while force closing your application is not a viable "resolution".

 

Now I am no app developer (I am a business man and an investor of businesses), but if I was to hazard a guess. The issue may be to do with the "image downloading" when entering a selected system. Is there not a way to have those images saved so that any time after the fact, a user can simply have those images locally stored and saved so that there is no "download" process involved every time?

Excuse my assumption that the images download every time if that is not the case. But that in of itself seems to be a potential problem then. Something to do with the images and data scraping process/downloading most likely.

My other front-end...let's call it "Turbospun" has ZERO issues with lag caused by scrolling through thousand of titles. No front-end is without issues, but being that front-ends are for mostly convenience and aesthetics, the current state of Launchbox and it's wheel issue seems to be a MEGA problem that is becoming "acceptable" by those who may not realize that ain't normal...

If Launchbox and its team aspires to be "top-dawg" of Android front-ends, it's time to both recognize and DEAL with that very obvious issue.

Otherwise, Launchbox is going to have to settle for about "third place", falling behind products that don't create a "hassle" when trying to find a game to play while enjoying the visuals and convenience of an expected and professionally designed front-end.

 

Edited November 2, 2021 by C0ntrA

[Jason Carr]

2 hours ago, C0ntrA said:

That was a good post.

But the issue with wheel scrolling can't be swept under the rug like that.

I have a specific "other front-end" that has literally zero issues with scrolling through my thousands of game titles.

Calling it an "Nvidia Shield limitation" is a poor excuse.

Honestly it's the primary issue that I am struggling to get past, especially with no attention from development, and excusing it that way does not help the situation.

I'll repeat, other front-ends do NOT have this issue. Cutting down your library so that Launchbox won't freeze and freak out while force closing your application is not a viable "resolution".

 

Now I am no app developer (I am a business man and an investor of businesses), but if I was to hazard a guess. The issue may be to do with the "image downloading" when entering a selected system. Is there not a way to have those images saved so that any time after the fact, a user can simply have those images locally stored and saved so that there is no "download" process involved every time?

Excuse my assumption that the images download every time if that is not the case. But that in of itself seems to be a potential problem then. Something to do with the images and data scraping process/downloading most likely.

My other front-end...let's call it "Turbospun" has ZERO issues with lag caused by scrolling through thousand of titles. No front-end is without issues, but being that front-ends are for mostly convenience and aesthetics, the current state of Launchbox and it's wheel issue seems to be a MEGA problem that is becoming "acceptable" by those who may not realize that ain't normal...

If Launchbox and its team aspires to be "top-dawg" of Android front-ends, it's time to both recognize and DEAL with that very obvious issue.

Otherwise, Launchbox is going to have to settle for about "third place", falling behind products that don't create a "hassle" when trying to find a game to play while enjoying the visuals and convenience of an expected and professionally designed front-end.

...and now we wait and see if "certain mods" express maturity in the face of consumer demand and participation (moving forward).

This is on the list. No, images are definitely not downloaded every time they are needed. I am not dismissing any performance issues, only tempering expectations to be realistic ones. Often times in the past we've worked hard at fixing performance issues that were completely unnoticeable to most people, only to find that one person was upset about a microscopic hiccup that was like 2 or 3 frames long. For that reason I do have to temper expectations, but you don't need to worry that I'm ignoring any issues. I would hope that our past track record is at least enough to prove that.

We're already doing wonderfully in sales with the Android app. We don't need to compare ourselves with any other frontend, and we generally don't compare ourselves, outside of getting an idea every once in a while. For what it's worth, comments like these are rather discouraging, not at all encouraging, and honestly really not very useful to me as a developer. I don't say that to offend or start drama, and I pray that it doesn't; I only say it to help make clear the kind of feedback that we need in the future.

[Jason Carr]

Just now, Jason Carr said:

...and now we wait and see if "certain mods" express maturity in the face of consumer demand and participation (moving forward).

Also, comments like these are unacceptable. Please consider this a warning.

[faeran]

I think at this point let's try and bring this thread back on track.

• Performance issues are noted and have been added to the list to work on.

And for anyone else, we are reading your posts of any suggestions and will always do our best to accommodate.

 

[wiseHowl]

On 9/24/2021 at 5:05 PM, Jason Carr said:

Sorry for the delay here, guys. I've had my head down in the desktop app for a bit, but I'm headed back to Android development next week, back to working on the next major release.

No betas have been released since the last official release (largely because I'm working on some larger features). I'll look into Dreamcast here soon to see if I can replicate any issues.

I'll add that to my list of emulators to look into. That might be one of those problematic emulators though that doesn't properly work with frontends, if my shaky memory is correct. Regardless, I'll check to confirm.

You can delete games, yes. There's no automatic duplicate scanning currently, though.

How did you overcome them?

Thanks, yup, all that is on the list here.

 

[usuallee76]

I just want to say as a brief counterpoint to some of the recent posts here, as someone who has played with a variety of similar-ish media projects like Plex, Emby, Roon, etc. - the Launchbox devs are UNBELIEVABLY responsive to the community by comparison. If you want to experience what true "sweeping under the rug" feels like, I recommend Plex. I bought their lifetime pass 3-4 years ago now, due to their promise of a working DVR for over-the-air TV. Still waiting for it to actually be fully functional all these years later. Myself and many others have repeatedly requested assistance which is typically ignored or paid lip service to at best. Roon ripped out many features that people used with absolutely no warning, and only restored them after howls of protest from paying customers.

So Launchbox's responsiveness to the community, open-mindedness, and total lack of the arrogant "we know best" attitude displayed by some of these other outfits is very refreshing to me. Not to mention the insanely fast development. I'm sure any performance issues not related to a user's hardware or the read speed of their storage media will be ironed out in due time.

LB in its Android development infancy is already "top dawg" as far as I'm concerned. I'm not sure where these supposedly better Android front ends are, I thought I'd tried them all. Anyway, I realize this is off topic - sorry.  Feel free to remove if desired. Keep up the good work, cheers!

 

[SumTxDude]

Bought the full licence a couple months ago and LB Android has worked great for me so far!

Suggestion or request.. Would like to have the ability to list the systems on the main home page in the order I want as apposed to alphabetical. Like by release such as NES, SNES, N64, Ect.. then all Sony, then all Sega etc. 

Great App.. Thanks again.

 

[Goodmango]

I used the free version of launchbox to play games on mupen64 . It keeps saying failed to load . I really want to buy launch box today on black Friday . Could you fix this problem because it is the only reason i didn't get launch box till now. I now for sure that this problem was fixed on other front end . Why don't you ask other developers for a help. I think mupen64 will help you on this problem.

[Ratbagz]

9 hours ago, Goodmango said:

I used the free version of launchbox to play games on mupen64 . It keeps saying failed to load . I really want to buy launch box today on black Friday . Could you fix this problem because it is the only reason i didn't get launch box till now. I now for sure that this problem was fixed on other front end . Why don't you ask other developers for a help. I think mupen64 will help you on this problem.

Don't think this is a launch box issue. It's Android eleven scoped storage. I had to find an old version of mupen that worked with dig and other front ends.

[Goodmango]

Believe me it is launch box issue. I have another front end that launching mupen64 and PPSSPP on their last update . Didn't you read what mupen64 programmer write on his last update . The thing he wrote is related to the fix he implanted for front end apps.

10 minutes ago, Ratbagz said:

Don't think this is a launch box issue. It's Android eleven scoped storage. I had to find an old version of mupen that worked with dig and other front ends.

 

[Goodmango]

Here you can read this.

[Ratbagz]

10 hours ago, Goodmango said:

I used the free version of launchbox to play games on mupen64 . It keeps saying failed to load . I really want to buy launch box today on black Friday . Could you fix this problem because it is the only reason i didn't get launch box till now. I now for sure that this problem was fixed on other front end . Why don't you ask other developers for a help. I think mupen64 will help you on this problem.

He hasn't fixed it, at least on Android eleven. I just tried the latest version with dig and it didn't work. You can snag an older version that works. Specifically, v3.0.222_(beta)-222. That's what I did.

I've had emails back and too with the developer and he was adamant there was nothing he could do. It's an Android eleven thing, not his issue.

I don't know enough about these things to know why the likes of pizza boy and retroarch can work on eleven. 

[Goodmango]

You didn't understand me . The developer fixed the problem on Android 11. But, front end apps should implement this fix on their apps. DiG developer didn't update his app to make it work with this new method. Actually DiG app has more problems than launching games on new updated emulators . It can't launch scummvm games and won't let you choose what files extensions to install . The front end I meant that fixed this problem is another front end. By the way I have  the paid version of DiG app and I couldn't find a way to communicate with it's developer to ask him if he is going to support DiG or not .

[Ratbagz]

19 hours ago, Goodmango said:

You didn't understand me . The developer fixed the problem on Android 11. But, front end apps should implement this fix on their apps. DiG developer didn't update his app to make it work with this new method. Actually DiG app has more problems than launching games on new updated emulators . It can't launch scummvm games and won't let you choose what files extensions to install . The front end I meant that fixed this problem is another front end. By the way I have  the paid version of DiG app and I couldn't find a way to communicate with it's developer to ask him if he is going to support DiG or not .

Ok I confirmed with the dev, it's fixed his end so launch box needs updating to fix. Doubt dig will ever see a fix as development seems to have stalled on it.

[Goodmango]

I told you it's launch box problem . The developers should communicate with emulators developers to solve this problem. I think launch box must be the leading app for other front ends . because they have the resources and developers.

[Ratbagz]

12 hours ago, Goodmango said:

 I think launch box must be the leading app for other front ends . because they have the resources and developers.

This is true. It's one of the reasons I didn't upgrade my launch box licence as I'm concerned they haven't been quick enough to keep up with new developments. I don't really blame the launch box team, Android is a very fragmented system to work with and keep up with.