How can I sort games in a platform into categories based on their folder?

[Bri Bri]

I have a large collection of SNES ROMs (rom hacks specifically) that have been sorted into several different folders. I want to add them to a set of subcategories in LaunchBox / Big Box that's separate from normal SNES games and other consoles, with each ROM sorted into a subcategory based on its folder on disk.

So something like:

Consoles
--- NES
--- SNES
--- etc.
ROM hacks
--- SNES hacks
------ folder 1
------ folder 2
------ folder 3
------ etc.

However, I can't figure out a good way to do this that doesn't involve making a separate platform for each of the folders. And LaunchBox explicitly advises against doing that.

I can't use playlists because there's no way to automatically sort the ROMs into the right playlist based on their path or folder, at least not that I've been able to find. Plus I don't want a massive list of games to appear under the "SNES hacks" category, just the subcategories for each folder.

If I create categories underneath of the SNES platform, or any platform for that matter, there's no way for me to sort ROMs into it. It looks like categories can only contain platforms and other categories.

So it looks like the only thing I can do is create an "SNES hacks" category, then create several new platforms underneath of it that are all set to use an SNES emulator and have their "game" folder set to whatever their corresponding subfolder on disk is, going against what I'm apparently supposed to do with LaunchBox.

Is there a better way to do this?

Edited June 19, 2022 by Bri Bri
making it more clear the folders aren't sorting the games alphabetically

[fromlostdays]

31 minutes ago, Bri Bri said:

So it looks like the only thing I can do is create an "SNES hacks" category, then create several new platforms underneath of it that are all set to use an SNES emulator and have their "game" folder set to whatever their corresponding subfolder on disk is, going against what I'm apparently supposed to do with LaunchBox.

Is there a better way to do this?

Thats the best method. You can import them as individual platforms, right click them, and set them only to show under the custom SNES Rom category. I'm not sure where you read this is a bad method, but I have custom platform categories for series, misc. and even favorites all of which have custom platforms in them that I arranged only to show up under those custom platform categories.

Edit: just to be clear if the roms are already seperated into folders, import a folder as a platform and give it a name. Then do the same for the other folders. Then right click the system names in launchbox one by one, click edit, go to the "parents" tab, uncheck "root" and check the custom platform category you created.

 

Edited June 19, 2022 by fromlostdays

[fromlostdays]

Sorry, lets be clear on terminology as well.

The highest level is "Platform Category". The standard ones are Console, Handheld, etc. You can create custom Platform Categories and nest "platforms" under them.

The lowest level is "Platform." This is typically a full console set or handheld set, e.g Super Nintendo Entertainment System. Since this is the lowest level, you can't nest more categories under this.

However, if you wanted all of your roms in one platform, you could feasibly add a custom tag and and then sort by those tags, and because you can technically treat a playlist like a platform, you could put each set into a playlist and then set the playlist to show up under the Platform Category... but the above method of just importing them as multiple platforms and then using Platform Categories is easier just in terms of sorting the roms.  

Edited June 19, 2022 by fromlostdays

[Bri Bri]

Okay, I've gone ahead with the multiple platforms method. It was a bit tedious to add, but it works well enough.

One complaint: I tried making all of the platforms ahead of time, but apparently if you run the "import ROMs" wizard, then after it finishes LaunchBox automatically deletes any platforms you created that have no ROMs in them, so I had to redo all of that.

And when I mentioned LaunchBox saying you're not supposed to use multiple platforms like this, I'm referring to the attached dialog box. However, it works, so I'm sticking with it.

[fromlostdays]

I think that's probably just for regular users as the auto import has features that makes importing easier for newbies and for people for whom that functionality is enough. And yeah, you can't have an empty platform. I think it keeps all the settings, but it won't display in LB/BB if its empty. Either way, I'm glad you got it working. 

Edited June 20, 2022 by fromlostdays