Bezel project mame some dual screen and vertical bezel help

[ChickenGeorge]

Hey guys / gals so I ran the bezel

prjwx integration it appears to have downloaded a lot of game themed bezels I’m running mame 239. I’ve noticed a few dual screens and vertical games won’t load a bezel and I’ve tried to enable in mame but it just changed the aspect . 
 

for example dual screen side view bezel won’t load 

cyberball( not cyberball 2072) 

tecmo bowl shows both screens on my display but no bezel 

 

vertical dual views that won’t load 

arm wrestling 

punch out 

super punch out 

I launch the game select tab

video options 

if I select screen #0

bezel artwork it will enable but change the screens to 4:3 . I believe these games are set to dual over under so it fits on one screen but the bezel won’t launch with the games. 
 

 

[dragon57]

The Bezel Project files only support the single screen version of its games at 4:3 aspect ratio. You will have to replace any existing 4:3 artwork files with multi-screen versions from other sources.

Perhaps when we circle back to MAME and expand support for more games we can look at multi-screen options.

[ChickenGeorge]

41 minutes ago, dragon57 said:

The Bezel Project files only support the single screen version of its games at 4:3 aspect ratio. You will have to replace any existing 4:3 artwork files with multi-screen versions from other sources.

Perhaps when we circle back to MAME and expand support for more games we can look at multi-screen options.

So the bezel project has a bezel for arm wrestling/ punch out but it won’t launch. It’s because of the config file? 
See visual support 

launch game.

tab video options 

screen 0 

select bezel then that happens. It can see the file that came from the project plug-in. But when enabled it goes full screen . It enables but reverts for the upper 4:3 screen as main when bezel enabled. 

[Headrush69]

20 minutes ago, ChickenGeorge said:

So the bezel project has a bezel for arm wrestling/ punch out but it won’t launch. It’s because of the config file? 

Yes. The layout config file determines the number of screens and how they are laid out.

MAME includes some default layout built in (like the dual screen layout). You would have to grab the layout file from the MAME source, and modify to add the bezels for each screen if you wanted, saving your custom dual screen bezel layout.

[ChickenGeorge]

Thanks for the reply I’m not completely following your workaround?

1. Where does the bezel save by default if I used the newest LB download feature to use it? What’s the file path to the bezels/ config files?

2. I need to modify the config file for each game that having the issue? 
 

3. am I change a setting to a 0 or 1 or true or false? What do I need to change?

thanks for your replies and help. 

[Headrush69]

1 hour ago, ChickenGeorge said:

Thanks for the reply I’m not completely following your workaround?

1. Where does the bezel save by default if I used the newest LB download feature to use it? What’s the file path to the bezels/ config files?

2. I need to modify the config file for each game that having the issue? 
 

3. am I change a setting to a 0 or 1 or true or false? What do I need to change?

thanks for your replies and help. 

As dragon57 mentioned, currently the Bezel Project only includes bezels for singe screen games.

When using LB to download from the Bezel Project, it downloads an image and a matching MAME layout file that it puts in the MAME/artwork file.

MAME handles the work of displaying the bezel using that downloaded layout file. Within that file it points to the included png which displays the bezel. 

To get what you want, you would have to design and modify that layout config to reference all the screens used by a particular game and include images need to create the look you want. This isn't a trivial task or someone without experience, but it's not overly hard either.

Yes you would have to do that for every game that had a unique screen layout. (Unless you just wanted to use generic bezels for each setup. (2 - screen, 3 screen, etc)

Hope that makes things clear.

The MAME layout documentation provides more detailed information.

Edit: I totally misread what you wanted. You want the bezel on a single monitor using the dual screen layout on the same monitor?

Edited July 2, 2022 by Headrush69

[ChickenGeorge]

14 minutes ago, Headrush69 said:

As dragon57 mentioned, currently the Bezel Project only includes bezels for singe screen games.

When using LB to download from the Bezel Project, it downloads an image and a matching MAME layout file that it puts in the MAME/artwork file.

MAME handles the work of displaying the bezel using that downloaded layout file. Within that file it points to the included png which displays the bezel. 

To get what you want, you would have to design and modify that layout config to reference all the screens used by a particular game and include images need to create the look you want. This isn't a trivial task or someone without experience, but it's not overly hard either.

Yes you would have to do that for every game that had a unique screen layout. (Unless you just wanted to use generic bezels for each setup. (2 - screen, 3 screen, etc)

Hope that makes things clear.

The MAME layout documentation provides more detailed information.

Edit: I totally misread what you wanted. You want the bezel on a single monitor using the dual screen layout on the same monitor?

Right the game works & loads as dual screen lay out, but the bezel will not load automatically for those few games although a bezel downloaded. I can enable it through Mame, but the. It only uses one or the other screen with the bezel enabled. So it works like picture one as expected. I then enable bezel and then I have to chose either or screen to display. If I need to add more photos I can 

[Headrush69]

1 minute ago, ChickenGeorge said:

Right the game works & loads as dual screen lay out, but the bezel will not load automatically for those few games although a bezel downloaded. I can enable it through Mame, but the. It only uses one or the other screen with the bezel enabled. So it works like picture one as expected. I then enable bezel and then I have to chose either or screen to display. If I need to add more photos I can 

This is just a quick rough draft, (the bezel image doesn't fit), but if you go into your MAME/artwork/spunchout directory, rename the current default.lay file and create a new one with the following:

Quote

<mamelayout version="2">
  <element name="bezel">
    <image file="bezel.png" />
  </element>
  <view name="Headrush69's Dual Bezel Artwork">
    <bezel element="bezel">
      <bounds left="0" top="0" right="16" bottom="9" />
    </bezel>
    <screen index="0">
      <bounds left="6" top="0" right="10" bottom="4.5" />
    </screen>
    <screen index="1">
      <bounds left="6" top="4.5" right="10" bottom="9" />
    </screen>
  </view>
</mamelayout>

Start the game and go into video options, Screen #0 and pick this view. Is that the idea?

[ChickenGeorge]

Yes sir looks like your rough draft does allow the game to run into dual over the top but it slimmed the image down. Any knowledge on what to tweak so it fill out the space it runs in without a bezel like the first pic in my post above. 

[Headrush69]

5 hours ago, ChickenGeorge said:

Yes sir looks like your rough draft does allow the game to run into dual over the top but it slimmed the image down. Any knowledge on what to tweak so it fill out the space it runs in without a bezel like the first pic in my post above. 

If you look at the layout file it's very simple.

I chose a 16:9 ratio so you see the width is 16 and height is 9. (The bezel element takes the entire screen space.)

From there it is just a matter of editing the bounds parameters to fit the other elements as you required. The MAME layout system is very flexible and you could also use pixel/resolution units for placement. So for example the bezel bounds would be 

Quote

<bounds left="0" top="0" right="1920" bottom="1080" />

All other elements could be adjusted the same.

So there are 2 options on how to fill the screen:

1. You keep the original arcade cabinet screens in the same ratio. In this case you would need to find or create a bezel that matches and fills the extra empty space.
2. You change the bounds parameter for each screen and you stretch each screen to fill the extra space.

I don't think #2 is a good option, but I'm not very artistic and I'm not the person to do #1 for you.

That should give you enough of the building blocks to play with it and see if you can come up with something you like. ☺️

Edit: I prefer using a coordinate system that matches my cabinet (1920x1080), so here is a modified layout file that keeps the two game screens at their correct 4:3 ratio and fills the area a little better using the current bezel.

Quote

<mamelayout version="2">
  <element name="bezel">
    <image file="bezel.png" />
  </element>
  <view name="Headrush69's Dual Bezel Artwork">
    <bezel element="bezel">
      <bounds x="0" y="0" width="1920" height="1080" />
    </bezel>
    <screen index="0">
      <bounds x="600" y="0" width="720" height="540" />
    </screen>
    <screen index="1">
      <bounds x="600" y="540" width="720" height="540" />
    </screen>
  </view>
</mamelayout>

 

Edited July 5, 2022 by Headrush69

[ChickenGeorge]

These settings are alot better. Thanks for help. Im afraid to mess with it anymore and break something to fill the space.  I found a generic bezel pack on emu. Is there a certain default folder for the generic aracde bezels or do i need to create a folder? Thanks again for your assistance. 

[Headrush69]

8 hours ago, ChickenGeorge said:

 Im afraid to mess with it anymore and break something to fill the space. 

All you would be editing is the picture and not the layout file if you want to keep the proper aspect ratio. 

8 hours ago, ChickenGeorge said:

I found a generic bezel pack on emu. Is there a certain default folder for the generic aracde bezels or do i need to create a folder? Thanks again for your assistance. 

 In your mame.ini file there is a setting (artpath) that lists directories where MAME looks for artwork. By default, that directory is set to the artwork folder in the MAME directory.

You can add any other directories you want there and they will all be searched Here is the line from my mame.ini

Quote

artpath                   artwork;artwork_mame;artwork_custom

As you can see I have 3 artwork directories: artwork for Bezel Project bezels, artwork_mame for official mame artwork, and artwork_custom for artwork I have customized.

This structure keeps it nice and tidy and no issues when updating that I might overwrite from other sources.

 

Edited July 6, 2022 by Headrush69