bkenobi

No need to blame it on being lazy. HK's compiler makes it so simple you could continue to be lazy AND have a custom built MAME as well.

MAME is one example. I use a GP-Wiz and when I try to start playing a game it will move on to the next game after 3 minutes. I have not tried using keyboard input to see if that would make a difference (didn't think about it until ReFleX pointed out that it might be isolated to gamepads). I don't have any other emulator set up to play in attract mode, so I can't confirm this is exhibited for other emulators.

mamepp.exe is the Intel Pentium Pro optimized build. Make sure you are running an that setup or it will likely give you problems. I personally used the actual vanilla build (non-optimized) and it worked fine. At this point, I compile my own custom version based on the MAME source via HK's MAME compiler.

You are getting an error with your command line because there is a space in it. If you add quotes around the command in the batch file and run it again, things should work, correct? If so, you just need to put quotes around it in the config. EDIT: Oh, I think I see the problem. Find your shortcut for the game and edit it (right click, properties). Make sure you have quotes around the path to the file. You should be good to go at that point.

Naw, I don't want credit since I didn't write the script. I actually stole it from the AHK forums as I recall. However, I'm pretty sure you stole the same code from them as well Or maybe you stole my code that I stole from them. Either way, no worries! Hope Underhill got it working.

Have you tried running the "runitgame.bat" file in your GameEx directory (called "Run Last Game.bat" in the windows start menu)? That batch file contains the exact commands that GameEx uses to launch the game. You might try adding "PAUSE" after the last line of the file to see what's going on. I'm not sure if it will help with PC games, but this is DEFINITELY a good step to use for emulators.

I don't use this feature, but I think when it is turned on, you pick one game from the archive to play. I don't think there's a "Play this game" menu item because there is no single game for GameEx to play. I believe that when you use zipped support, you will get a list of games available in the archive and you then pick the version you want to play. But, like I said, I don't use this feature so I could be wrong.

Did you turn on GoodMerged/zipped file support? I don't recall what it's called but I'm pretty sure you only get the country flags when you enable that feature. If you did and your files aren't goodmerged, then it probably will have issues.

Just change the two paths and you should be good. musicdir := "C:\MyMusic"; <------Change to where your music is stored total = 0 Loop, %musicdir%\*.mp3 total += 1 Random, select, 1, %total% Loop, %musicdir%\*.mp3 IfEqual, A_Index, %select%, Setenv, file, %A_LoopFileFullPath% FileCopy, %file%, C:\Music\IntroSong.mp3; <--------Change to where you want the file to go

Perhaps you turned off the game info page?

This does seem to happen from time to time. I had this happen a few versions ago for some reason. It had been working fine for dozens of versions prior to that point and, after manually installing the update, it's been working flawlessly since then. Not sure what caused the issue, but it doesn't seem to be something that sticks around chronically.

Cool! Now I need to check out that mouse hiding plug-in.

You may need to play with the crop settings as well. Some games have enormous overlays/bezels that when displayed cause the game to be itty-bitty. I don't know if invaders is one such game though.

On my driving cab, I have a pair of 360° steering wheels and a pair of analog pedals. These work AWESOME for 360° games (Sprint series games, Off Road, Danny Sullivan, etc.), but they work like ass for 270° games IMO. MAME handles the optical input in such a way that it basically requires a physical restrictor of some kind to keep things playing correctly. When you start a game that has 270° controls, the wheel is centered. If you turn to the right slightly, MAME sees that movement and accurately turns the wheel. Upon recentering, the game responds correctly. The problem comes in when you turn the wheel past the end of travel. MAME simply throws any movement away that occurs beyond the end of travel. So, as a result, if you turn the wheel to the right several turns and then move it back several turns, MAME doesn't see the wheel as centered, it sees a hard turn to the opposite side. Now, this is probably something that people have just dealt with as something that couldn't be corrected and either accepted or moved on. Well, I did both in the past...but not any more! I have come up with a solution to make 270° steering wheel games in MAME play GREAT with a 360° steering wheel. I'm including the scripts and the GameEx setup as well so that others may utilize what I've found in their setups! In my script, when you turn past the end of travel, the joystick is simply maxed out. When you turn back, as soon as you hit the end of travel, the joystick will start responding and will move with you again. The only way to make this better would be to add a physical restriction for the movement, but that's a LOT more complicated. I think this works intuitively whereas MAME's default motion is confusing. Btw, the other benefit to this is that it will now be possible to play games like Need for Speed, Test Drive, Carmagedon, etc. that need either a joystick or keyboard with a steering wheel and pedals. I'm REALLY excited about this capability, but have not tested it yet. I know it will work, I just haven't gotten that far yet. Follow these steps: Download the attached archive (contains all scripts and configs you need). Download and extract GlovePIE (I use 0.29, but 0.30 might work too...haven't tested it). OPTIONAL: Install AutoHotKey. Put "Mouse_to_270_Steering_Wheel.PIE" into your GlovePIE directory. Download and install PPJoy. Install a Virtual PP joystick with at least 1 analog axis. I have 3 so I can map my pedals to this controller as well. If you don't want to use the pedals this way, you will need to edit the GlovePIE script to remove the last couple lines of code or it could crash. Copy the Init_270.ahk and Init_270.exe files to your MAME directory (or another location if you prefer). If you installed GlovePIE to "C:\Emu\GlovePIE029, then you can use the precompiled script. If you put it somewhere else, you need to edit the AHK script and recompile it (which means you need AHK installed). In GameEx, you need to create an emulator for your MAME with 270 controls. This emulator will be combined with MAME, so you just need enough to make it work (you don't need snap paths and such). I suggest you just use my emulator setup since it has everything worked out to make it work right. You just need to correct the paths once you import it. The file name is MAME_270.ini. Finally, to get the 270° games in the main MAME list to load with this emulator, you need to use the mameemumap.ini file that I've included. Just drop it in your C:\Program Files\GameEx\CONFIG directory if you don't already have one configured. If you do, you will need to combine what I've included with yours. Also, make sure you update the emulator number for these roms to whatever you set this new MAME emulator as. In my config, I have it set as emulator 1 but your setup may vary. I think that's it. Restart GameEx and give it a try. If you have any issues with the scripts or improvements for this guide, let me know! 270_Setup.zip

You have to have one of the 3 name fields matching (nointro, goodname, TOSEC) for things to match. The other name field is what GameEx displays the game as. Correct me if I'm wrong, but AFAIK GameEx only searches those 3 fields for a match. If it can't find one, it just displays the filename with no info (since it's not linked to a database item).

The best thing to check is to see what GameEx is actually running when you launch the game. Edit the "runitgame.bat" file in the GameEx directory to see the exact command line that is being run. This is usually very educational and resolves all questions. I personally don't send any arguments to MAME from GameEx. I put all configuration stuff in a mame.ini file and let GameEx just send "mame.exe [ROM]" as my command line. That way I know any error is with my MAME config and not with GameEx.

The funny thing is, I think I posted this or a very similar script over a year ago for someone else. They didn't seem that interested, so I dropped the suggestion and moved on. Hopefully Underhill will be more receptive to the idea than the last person was. I think this is a very good solution. On the other hand, this could also be dealt with via a GameEx plugin. The code would do basically the same thing, but it would be triggered by GameEx actions rather than setting this script up in a startup event. I don't know the plugin system, so I can't even begin to look into it. The script is very viable as is as well as being easy to update/maintain, though.

How about pinballs? I've seen those virtual pinball tables advertised before and would love to build one. But, if this screen were able to rotate, you would get the same effect with a much more flexible machine!

Some people use XPadder for XBox sticks. You might try using GameEx's built in remapping capabilities though. It might get you what you want without another app.

Looks great. I like the full extension PC tray. Do you have the CP LCD set up to do anything yet? I'd really like to see what it can do.

Looks great! I thought you initially suggested having windows in the lower doors to see the consoles. Has that been scrapped?

Thanks! I had set up a couple different scripts to do this, but it's always been spotty as to whether it keeps working or not after running things for a while. This sounds like a much nicer way to do things.

I was banking on a comment more like: "Pffft...out of focus and over exposed. The compositional is horrible, too."

You can easily export the whole config by loading up the Advanced Configuration Utility. Go to the emulator section and there's a menu item to export the emulator config. I don't know why entries for the same config are all split up in the gameex.ini, but I've noticed the same thing.

Actually, GameEx downloads the full installer during an auto update and saves it somewhere in the C:\Program Files\GameEx\ directory structure. I don't recall where it is, but I found it the other day. Now, if that installer was corrupted somehow, then a fresh download would be best. GameEx launches the installer with some command line options, so running it as a standard install might make a difference. Hope that helps.