Saieno Posted June 16, 2023 Share Posted June 16, 2023 (edited) Hello all! This is my first theme I've created and I'm still working on aspects of it. For the most part I wanted to create themes for each platform I personally use and make them based on the mini consoles that have been released so far. I then envisioned what other mini consoles might look like, as well as what each company might do differently to represent their consoles. For newer consoles (PS3/Xbox 360, etc) I based the themes off of their user interfaces and dashboards to try and mimic their look and feel. For PS2 and Xbox I made alternative views that mimic the demo disks of the time as I know I personally used a bunch of demo disks around that time and remember those fondly. I dunno if anyone else would be interested in a theme like this (its mainly for the platform views specifically at the moment). Please excuse any performance issues you see in the video, this was recorded in a virtual machine for development purposes (works great on my emulation system when testing). If anyone would be interested in a theme like this, I'll release it once its completed but figured I'd get some ideas/feedback/thoughts on it. Thanks! Edited June 16, 2023 by Saieno 6 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bundangdon Posted June 16, 2023 Share Posted June 16, 2023 Excellent work! This is extremely detailed and polished, especially for a first theme! I'd really be interested to see what a 'generic' version looks like, for the platforms that aren't available in there. Also, the game details screen for each platform is a really nice touch too! Keep up the good work and look forward to seeing the release once it's completed and ready for the public 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
C-Beats Posted June 16, 2023 Share Posted June 16, 2023 Welcome to the wild world of Big Box theming! Your theme looks pretty awesome! I'd echo what @bundangdon was saying, themes like yours look GREAT when you have the supporting artwork, but tend to fall apart really quickly if you have a platform you haven't made a view for, you're missing artwork, or the artwork in that platform utilizes drastically different artwork between regions (ie SNES). I'd do what you can to mitigate that. Outside of that the only thing I found somewhat "off' was a few of the bezels looked a bit out of place because of the placement of the control elements. For example in the DS image the controls (D-Pad and face buttons) were smushed in really close in the middle leaving a lot of empty space on the left/right. Think it'd look a tad better spaced out. I admit though this is being ridiculously picky though and as I said before overall I can see your theme being enjoyed by many should you choose to publish it. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saieno Posted June 16, 2023 Author Share Posted June 16, 2023 14 hours ago, bundangdon said: Excellent work! This is extremely detailed and polished, especially for a first theme! I'd really be interested to see what a 'generic' version looks like, for the platforms that aren't available in there. Also, the game details screen for each platform is a really nice touch too! Keep up the good work and look forward to seeing the release once it's completed and ready for the public Thank you! I'm a little hesitant to make a generic version as I personally feel like the default theme really fits those needs. Ultimately I'd love to make a theme for every platform that makes sense tho obviously there are a lot of very obscure platforms. If I did do a generic platform view it would probably be based on my custom emulation system and I don't think it would be something many would want to use. Or I suppose I could make a kind of generic console looking view though I customize everything specifically for the platform so I'm not sure how well that would fit. I do intend on doing PS Vita, WiiU, Wonderswans, and Colecovision currently. And maybe CD-I. 10 hours ago, C-Beats said: Welcome to the wild world of Big Box theming! Your theme looks pretty awesome! I'd echo what @bundangdon was saying, themes like yours look GREAT when you have the supporting artwork, but tend to fall apart really quickly if you have a platform you haven't made a view for, you're missing artwork, or the artwork in that platform utilizes drastically different artwork between regions (ie SNES). I'd do what you can to mitigate that. Outside of that the only thing I found somewhat "off' was a few of the bezels looked a bit out of place because of the placement of the control elements. For example in the DS image the controls (D-Pad and face buttons) were smushed in really close in the middle leaving a lot of empty space on the left/right. Think it'd look a tad better spaced out. I admit though this is being ridiculously picky though and as I said before overall I can see your theme being enjoyed by many should you choose to publish it. Thank you! So I did take into consideration other regions platforms, so I do have Famicom, Super Famicom, Mega Drive, Mega CD, Mega 32X, etc made (just incase). In regards to the Nintendo DS controls on the bottom, I do agree tho I did want it to somewhat fit with the other Nintendo handhelds as well. Although the design is more accurate to the actual DS UI, I still wanted to think what Nintendo might do if they had made a mini console for it I suppose. Of course its all subjective but still really good feedback. I know its a long video but there's a lot of little details that I dunno would be worth covering in an actual release video once the theme is more complete, mainly to show where certain aspects are and how the theme is expected to work. Regardless thank you for the great feedback and if you notice anything else that can be improved please feel free to let me know! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
C-Beats Posted June 17, 2023 Share Posted June 17, 2023 2 hours ago, Saieno said: if you notice anything else that can be improved please feel free to let me know! I realize this may happen with some systems simply because the box - front images don't ENTIRELY match the UI you are creating (namely 3DS) but you have some platforms where the artwork is cut off quite a bit. I noticed it with 3DS, Sega 32X, and Nintendo Switch. May be possible to adjust those image types to sit in the UI a tad better without cutting off as much of the image. Not trying to discourage you or insult your work, I think what you've gotten done is pretty amazing and is no small feat (poor @faeran STILL has nightmares from his CoverBox days where he too made a unique view per platform lol). You seem eager to learn and take the constructive criticism and I just want to make sure you have the tools and input to make this theme as awesome as your vision is for it. As a work around for some systems where the media type used in the UI doesn't EXACTLY match the front image (like the Nintendo systems that use a square icon instead of the box) Big Box DOES support theme overrides and could be possible for the theme to either be packaged with or use images specific to this theme that would work a bit better for those platforms. I personally would love to get a square image set for my library as there are several solid use cases for them. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saieno Posted June 17, 2023 Author Share Posted June 17, 2023 12 minutes ago, C-Beats said: I realize this may happen with some systems simply because the box - front images don't ENTIRELY match the UI you are creating (namely 3DS) but you have some platforms where the artwork is cut off quite a bit. I noticed it with 3DS, Sega 32X, and Nintendo Switch. May be possible to adjust those image types to sit in the UI a tad better without cutting off as much of the image. Not trying to discourage you or insult your work, I think what you've gotten done is pretty amazing and is no small feat (poor @faeran STILL has nightmares from his CoverBox days where he too made a unique view per platform lol). You seem eager to learn and take the constructive criticism and I just want to make sure you have the tools and input to make this theme as awesome as your vision is for it. As a work around for some systems where the media type used in the UI doesn't EXACTLY match the front image (like the Nintendo systems that use a square icon instead of the box) Big Box DOES support theme overrides and could be possible for the theme to either be packaged with or use images specific to this theme that would work a bit better for those platforms. I personally would love to get a square image set for my library as there are several solid use cases for them. You're absolutely right about the artwork being cut-off and needing to manipulate it in odd ways. For example with Sega Saturn I had to treat NA boxes differently than EU/JP, and tried to dynamically use the boxart and logos to make a sudo box art essentially. Was thinking or trying to use the width and height to see if I can trigger off that but still working on it for sure. With the 3DS one, you're correct and I'm having a strange issue with that particular wheelbox so I'll be revisiting that one and making it better, but for the Switch, Sega Genesis, and Sega 32X, there are drastically different boxart shapes that are giving me a headache lol. For example, some 3DS games aren't in physical boxes but are app icons instead, same for Nintendo Switch. For Sega gensis and 32X, some box art has the hanger tab on the art and others are just basic art, and I'm attempted to make all examples fit as well as possible. If there's a better way to do this I would love to know a better approach cause its difficult to work around hahaha. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saieno Posted June 18, 2023 Author Share Posted June 18, 2023 21 hours ago, C-Beats said: I realize this may happen with some systems simply because the box - front images don't ENTIRELY match the UI you are creating (namely 3DS) but you have some platforms where the artwork is cut off quite a bit. I noticed it with 3DS, Sega 32X, and Nintendo Switch. May be possible to adjust those image types to sit in the UI a tad better without cutting off as much of the image. Not trying to discourage you or insult your work, I think what you've gotten done is pretty amazing and is no small feat (poor @faeran STILL has nightmares from his CoverBox days where he too made a unique view per platform lol). You seem eager to learn and take the constructive criticism and I just want to make sure you have the tools and input to make this theme as awesome as your vision is for it. As a work around for some systems where the media type used in the UI doesn't EXACTLY match the front image (like the Nintendo systems that use a square icon instead of the box) Big Box DOES support theme overrides and could be possible for the theme to either be packaged with or use images specific to this theme that would work a bit better for those platforms. I personally would love to get a square image set for my library as there are several solid use cases for them. Woo! Okay so I think I have Nintendo 3DS in as good a spot as I can with boxart and clipping, etc. Let me know what you think! (There's a weird issue where in CTC it looks correct but in bigbox the size is completely off and the mask doesn't interact as I expect so this was really tricky to nail down). For Switch I really dunno what to do. This was the best I could do. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saieno Posted June 18, 2023 Author Share Posted June 18, 2023 Taking a break from that, Colecovision is done. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zetec-s-joe Posted June 18, 2023 Share Posted June 18, 2023 Superb theme, thanks for sharing, excited to see how far you take it 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
C-Beats Posted June 19, 2023 Share Posted June 19, 2023 On 6/17/2023 at 10:19 PM, Saieno said: For Switch I really dunno what to do. This was the best I could do. I can't help you with CTC settings as I've never used the app but I could potentially help with the XAML. What are you attempting to do? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saieno Posted June 19, 2023 Author Share Posted June 19, 2023 1 hour ago, C-Beats said: I can't help you with CTC settings as I've never used the app but I could potentially help with the XAML. What are you attempting to do? I think I have Sega Genesis and derivitives all fixed as well, just not overly happy with Nintendo Switch. Essentially I can make it look good with normal box art but some games just have app style icons. For example: And I can get one or the other to look decent, but not both. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saieno Posted June 19, 2023 Author Share Posted June 19, 2023 Quick update as well. WonderSwan and WonderSwan Color, as well as WiiU are done. Wonderswans (Detail view is the same, just Wonderswan in Black and White) WiiU 1 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darkseekerliu Posted June 19, 2023 Share Posted June 19, 2023 (edited) I do really appreciate the effort to replicate the original menu for the systems. Wii U looks fantastic and brings back a lot of good memories for me. Regarding the view for obscure platforms, I suggest you to take a look on the theme Flat and Classic Mini by exodus_cl 1.5. His theme also has a similar approach to create a mini console view for systems that don't have a mini yet. His default view is pretty decent. Edited June 19, 2023 by darkseekerliu Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saieno Posted June 20, 2023 Author Share Posted June 20, 2023 (edited) 4 hours ago, darkseekerliu said: I do really appreciate the effort to replicate the original menu for the systems. Wii U looks fantastic and brings back a lot of good memories for me. Regarding the view for obscure platforms, I suggest you to take a look on the theme Flat and Classic Mini by exodus_cl 1.5. His theme also has a similar approach to create a mini console view for systems that don't have a mini yet. His default view is pretty decent. Heya @darkseekerliu that theme was actually the reason I wanted to make my own since the project files weren't available. The actual implementation and functionality is very different from that one, especially if you've used it before or watched the theme demo at the top. I haven't thought of anything yet for some views, so I'm not sure how I'll tackle that. Edited June 20, 2023 by Saieno Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saieno Posted June 20, 2023 Author Share Posted June 20, 2023 And finally, Playstation Vita is completed. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saieno Posted June 21, 2023 Author Share Posted June 21, 2023 On 6/19/2023 at 2:10 PM, darkseekerliu said: I do really appreciate the effort to replicate the original menu for the systems. Wii U looks fantastic and brings back a lot of good memories for me. Regarding the view for obscure platforms, I suggest you to take a look on the theme Flat and Classic Mini by exodus_cl 1.5. His theme also has a similar approach to create a mini console view for systems that don't have a mini yet. His default view is pretty decent. On 6/16/2023 at 3:35 AM, bundangdon said: Excellent work! This is extremely detailed and polished, especially for a first theme! I'd really be interested to see what a 'generic' version looks like, for the platforms that aren't available in there. Also, the game details screen for each platform is a really nice touch too! Keep up the good work and look forward to seeing the release once it's completed and ready for the public Alrighty so I went ahead and made a platform view, and stylized it with custom sprites (most made by Grim from Sprite Database, along with some of my own) for the following platforms: For all others I have the usual Platform images that you might see in most themes, but here's how it looks with the appropriate images. I also made a Default Coverflow View that changes the background based on the Platform to give it some personality, utilizing the Background library from the Unified theme, so every platform should be accounted for if I didn't make a custom view for it. For example: 3 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darkseekerliu Posted June 23, 2023 Share Posted June 23, 2023 On 6/21/2023 at 8:58 AM, Saieno said: I also made a Default Coverflow View that changes the background based on the Platform to give it some personality, utilizing the Background library from the Unified theme, so every platform should be accounted for if I didn't make a custom view for it. For example.... It is amazing to see how you are motivated Saieno. Very impressive what you have made so far. As I said, I am looking forward to test your theme. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saieno Posted June 25, 2023 Author Share Posted June 25, 2023 On 6/23/2023 at 10:43 AM, darkseekerliu said: It is amazing to see how you are motivated Saieno. Very impressive what you have made so far. As I said, I am looking forward to test your theme. Hopefully you won't have to wait much longer, just trying to make sure its as complete as it can be but obviously while keeping it to the original purpose for why I wanted to make it. For our European and Japanese fans, here are the alternate region system views for NES, SNES (Still need to do the player count controllers so they are absent at the moment), Genesis, Sega CD, Sega 32X, and Sega Saturn: 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saieno Posted June 26, 2023 Author Share Posted June 26, 2023 I have submitted the theme which you can download here. Please let me know if you have any issues. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
C-Beats Posted June 26, 2023 Share Posted June 26, 2023 Locking thread at the request of @Saieno. Please use the new thread to report any issues. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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