Game save not working - file location problem?

[kmancali]

OK. I removed -rompath %romlocation%

i still have the problem that it won't save or load.

When I start MAME by itself I can load and save games without any issues at all.

 

[JoeViking245]

10 hours ago, kmancali said:

When I start MAME by itself I can load and save games without any issues at all.

You said when you start MAME itself ('starting stand-alone MAME'), you also indicated you're actually starting it from a shortcut (which in your case is a file you renamed from mame.exe - Shortcut to just mame, and the whole filename is mame.lnk).  Which is fine. This should technically be the same as starting stand-alone MAME from the actual exe file. (Unless of course you changed some of the Compatibility settings of the shortcut. Which I doubt you did.)

This shortcut is pointing to E:\LaunchBox\Emulators\MAME 0.269\mame.exe

When you edit your MAME emulator in LaunchBox it shows the [relative] Application Path as Emulators\MAME 0.269\mame.exe.  If you click Browse, it opens Explorer to your E:\LaunchBox\Emulators\MAME 0.269\ folder.  Correct?  (just double checking)

 

Continuing with 'starting stand-alone MAME', you can "load and save games without any issues".  This indicates your E:\LaunchBox\Emulators\MAME 0.269\sta\1942\ folder (or '1941' from previous tests) has some files in it.  i.e. 1.sta, 7.sta, a.sta, d.sta... depending on which numbers or letters you pressed when prompted to save.

When you 'start stand-alone MAME' (via the shortcut) and press F6 to save, you can see those previous save states (1, 7, a, d) and can select one of those or press a different number/letter.

 

The fact that you're not seeing those previous saves when starting MAME via LaunchBox (vs stand-alone) and trying to save is a disconcerting. 

You also stated, "I click on Open MAME 0.269...", meaning you right-click the game and select that. Doing so starts stand-alone MAME (via LaunchBox). You then start 1942 from within MAME and save/load does NOT work.  You're also not seeing the 'other' save states as indicated from your screenshots.  Again, disconcerting.

 

To summarize, no matter how you run a game via LaunchBox (launch the game directly or right-click and Open MAME and load a game from within it), saves DO NOT work (nor show previous saves).  But starting from the shortcut .lnk file, all is good.

 

One last ditch effort... as mentioned earlier this week, it appears to be a write permissions thing.  You never did answer if "you use Google Drive or Dropbox or some other cloud syncing service?".  Since you didn't, I'll assume you're not. (But if you are, that's a potential can-of-worms that should have been opened earlier.) With LaunchBox (and MAME) not running, in Windows Explorer right-click your LaunchBox folder and select Properties.  Click the Attributes - Read-only box until it's empty (no black square or checkmark inside it) and click Apply.

Any chance you, at some point manually reinstalled LaunchBox?  If so, does a path exist for E:\LaunchBox\LaunchBox\?  (double 'LaunchBox')  Do you have any other installs of LaunchBox like on a D drive or an F drive?

I'm grasping at straws and am at a loss.  Besides, unless you have a special needs case (hope that doesn't sound derogatory), you shouldn't be saving, let alone pausing an Arcade machine anyway. 

"Back in my day, when we went to the Arcade (walking up hill, in the snow, both directions), we never had the luxury to save or pause our games!" 

 

(side note: I personally always use 1942 in all my MAME tests. You started this with 1941, so I just went with it. )

[kmancali]

We may be on to something here. When I  edit your MAME emulator in LaunchBox it shows the [relative] Application Path as Emulators\MAME 0.269\mame.exe.  If you click Browse, it opens Explorer to your E:\LaunchBox\Emulators\MAME 0.269\ folder.  Correct?  (just double checking)

No, in fact, when I click on browse, it takes me to the location of the ROMS, (and where the actual MAME program does not reside) - which are here:

Should I change this?

As to your other questions:

To summarize, no matter how you run a game via LaunchBox (launch the game directly or right-click and Open MAME and load a game from within it), saves DO NOT work (nor show previous saves).  But starting from the shortcut .lnk file, all is good.

Yes!

"you use Google Drive or Dropbox or some other cloud syncing service?"

I do have google drive and onedrive setup on this computer, but I am not using them to store or play any of my games or related files. All emulators and roms are simply stored on my second hard-drive. I am certainly willing to try turning these services off if you think it would help.

As far as I can tell, there is the one and only launchbox installed on my E: drive.

[JoeViking245]

Welp... I am at a loss.

The only last thing might be (which I tried to avoid [for no particular reason]) is to remove and reinstall MAME.