starbuck

Last weekend I took my 11 year old son to the Houston Arcade Expo. Up this this pouint he was all about the xbox, playstation etc. After playing all day with the various arcade machine and consoles, he fell in love with many of the old consoles. Long ago I removed the old consoles from my Gameex console to make room for the newer systems. He now wants to experience the old school games. I have tried to put back the Atari 2600 on GameEx and for the life of me cannot get it to display using the Z26 emulator. It plays fine outside of GameEx but won't work with in. Below is my Ini file [Emulator_12] Enabled=True System=Atari 2600 Category=Console Emulator=Z26 Version=2.13 Rating= DownloadUrl=http://www.gamesdbase.com/setupwizard/emulators/download/Z26.7z RequiredFiles= Website=http://www.whimsey.com/z26/z26.html Info=Atari 2600 emulator TITLETEXT=Atari 2600 STARTPAGENAME=[Console] Atari 2600 (Z26) StartPageLogo=2600 Command=Z26.exe -r -v6 "[ROMPATH]\[ROMFILE]" ROMFilter= DATABASE= configFile=[Mapping Off] Exit (Process Close) MAPFile= RomPath=I:\Roms\Atari 2600\Roms\No-Intro SnapPath=I:\Assets\Atari_2600\Video_AVI TitlePath=I:\Assets Old\Atari 2600\Titles BoxPath=I:\Assets\Atari_2600\Box CartPath=I:\Assets\Atari_2600\Cart ManualPath=I:\Assets\Atari_2600\Manual ControlPanelPath=I:\Assets Old\Atari 2600\Controls WorkingPath=I:\Emulators\Z26 MapKeys=True WaitBeforeKeys= SendKeys= ReplaceDash=False ReplaceUnder=True Capitals=True RemoveBrackets=False ShowDesktop=True Debug=False AlsoLaunch= OLDatZip= LaunchBefore= LaunchAfter= ExcludedFiles= CustomBackground= PlayMusic=False DontShowInfo=False PlaySelectionMusic=False SelectionMusicFolder= PCGame=False GamesIn7Zips=False PlayInScreenSaver=True ShowMostPlayed=True RandomMostPlayed=True CDCheck=False CDCheckFile= lastgame= RomsInFolders=False UseDbName=False InstructionsPath= TVAdPath= MusicPath= MergeSets=False CustomArtName1=Overlay CustomArtPath1=I:\Assets\Atari_2600\Overlay Thanks for the help

Tried using the current database and it found no match. Durning the early days of emulation. BBS groups made compulation disls with 5 or six or more games on a single disk with a menu. Currently I'm working on setting up Atari 800. So far I have disks from 4 different groups that did this. One group names their disks Gamedisc001, Gamedisc002, etc. Without making a custom database a user has no idea what is on each disk when they show up in GameEx. If I I take the current database and add entrys giving the description for these game disk with what games are on that disk It will solve the problem. I just don't want to update the regular database with these new changes. I want to use a seperate database just for Atari 800 so when I manually update GameEx and have it overwrite my databse for my other roms. This why I want to use a seperate database with a few emulators. As the group updates the normal databse I want those changes so I can use them for my other emulators. (Currently I don't even think Atari 800 is in the databe that comes with GameEx.)

Thanks thats what I want to do. I'm starting to put some computer emulators into GameEx and alot of the files are compulations roms. They have multiple games on one disc. They don't fit in the normal structure No-Intro, TOSEC etc. ON these I want to use a custom database where when you enter the game you will get a description showing what games are in the compulation.

Hi Tom, THanks for the quick reply. Can I do that on a per emulator basis.

Tried a number of them. Atari 800 plus and Altira did the best. In Altira I couldn't set keys to the ones I wanted outside of GameEx but had more options then Atari 800 Plus. Couldn't get either to work in GaMEx.

If I edit or add to the games database and I reinstalled GaMeEx manually, I assume my changes will be overwritten. If I made the database read only,I won't get any of the changes made by the database team. Can an option be added to have a GameEx option setting so each emulator can be told to wheater to use a different database or the install GameEx database and where to look for the different database. This option would be used when for that emulator you don't want to use the database that comes with Gameex. If the option is no that emulator would use the installed GameEx database.

Want to incorporate atari 800 emulation in GameEx. What emulator is the one most of the gameex users using and what is the command line that works best.

While browsing the web I came across a free program called Cheatbook. The gentleman behind the program has been updating it for a number of years. The program also allows users to submit cheats etc for games, DVD's, gamee consoles, etc. The database is updated monthly. It is very well done and has a wealth of cheats availble. Now I know all you true gamers would never think to use a cheat to get just a little further. But it was was cool to play with some of the cheats to get pass that one spot that I was having trouble with,. It was also neat to use one of the codes to get extra lifes, men etc. I wonder if there is a way to bring this gentleman and his program into the folds of GameEx. It would be a feature that currently is not available in any other frontend.I know I can set it up as an emulator but it would be so nice to go to a game or movie and see a option to view the cheat for that game or movie. The link is www.cheatbook.de Try the program and give me your thoughts

Will do Tom. Next time it does it. I will save the log. You are right out of 20 times it may do it once. Have had it happen both on xt and vista.

With the price of external hard drives being so low, I have (Using the Emumovies file structure) put all my cartridge based (including Mame) systems on one external hard drive and all CD based systems on another external drive. I also have a third hard drive for movies and a fourth for mp3s and karaoke. I can connect them to my computer for working on the systems, adding games, tweeking etc. I then can move the drive that I need to either my HD TV or my cabinet as needed. I have the hard drives hard coded to a specific drive letter and on each GameEx installation I have GameEx looking for the different drives. Sometimes (Not always) when I start say, my TV GameEx installation and I don't have the hard drive with say the games on it, the startup will stop saying it can't find the directories for the games because that drive is not connected to the computer. As I said it doesn't always do this but I can't pinpoint why sometimes GameEx reconizeds the fact that the drive with games isn't there and sometime it doesn't. If I want to watch a movie on my TV, I don't want to have to move all 4 drives to the to the TV computer when all I'll be acessing is the movie hard drive. Has anyone else encountered this issue. If so how have you worked around it.

I too have asked for a seperate directory. I've made the assumption that Emumovies will in the future have all the videos for all the mame roms. So, I keep the snaps and videos in 2 seperate folders. Thus also allows me to you the structure that the download utility uses. I use one of the empty folders that Tom has available. I would like to see more slots available so that I can view all the media that Tom and Circo is allowing us to dl with the utility. I have created a seperate directory called assets 2 that I'm storing the media I have that is not available from the dl service. (Such as 3d boxes and personnal ratings) I then use a empty slot and point it at my assets 2 folder. While on the subject of ratings. I have made pngs that have 1 to 5 stars. Then in a slot, I point to the folder and then point to the start rating I want to give that game. If it is a 4 star I rename the png to that gane name and when I go to that media selection, I show a four start rating png. A little bit of work but impresses the masses when they use my cab. Does anyone else do something similar.

Tried to use ParaJVE. Works fine outside of GameEx. Installed the motified bat file and the map file. Used the command line but I get a black screen and I can hear the game running in the background. Tried to set desktop to true and false. Black screen everytime and locks GameEx. Can someone look at my ini file and tell me whats wrong. Thanks Enabled=True System=GCE Vectrex Category=Console Emulator=MESS Version=0.135b Rating= DownloadUrl=http://www.gamesdbase.com/setupwizard/emulators/download/mess.7z RequiredFiles=system.img Website=http://www.mess.org/ Info=Multi system emulator TitleText=GCE Vectrex StartPageName=[Console] GCE Vectrex (ParaJVE) StartPageLogo=GCE Vectrex Command=ParaJVE.bat [ROM] RomFilter= Database=[Console] GCE Vectrex configFile=[Mapping Off] Exit (Process Close) MAPFile=C:\GameEx\MAP FILES\[Console] GCE Vectrex.map RomPath=I:\Emulators\ParaJVE SnapPath=I:\Assets\GCE_Vectrex\Video_AVI TitlePath= BoxPath=I:\Assets\GCE_Vectrex\Box CartPath=I:\Assets\GCE_Vectrex\Cart ManualPath=I:\Assets\GCE_Vectrex\Manual ControlPanelPath=I:\Assets\GCE Vectrex\Controls WorkingPath=I:\Emulators\ParaJVE MapKeys=True WaitBeforeKeys= SendKeys= ReplaceDash=False ReplaceUnder=True Capitals=True RemoveBrackets=False ShowDesktop=False Debug=False AlsoLaunch= OLDatZip= LaunchBefore= LaunchAfter= ExcludedFiles= CustomBackground= PlayMusic=False DontShowInfo=False PlaySelectionMusic=False SelectionMusicFolder= PCGame=False GamesIn7Zips=False PlayInScreenSaver=False ShowMostPlayed=True RandomMostPlayed=True CDCheck=False CDCheckFile= lastgame= RomsInFolders=True

Here they be Had to rename the extention to txt , otherwise it wouldn't let me upload them Thanks

Just ran the new dat when 139 came out. Used the new mame build and used Clrmame to make the dat file. Ran it and it ran fine. It audited all the samples, roms and CHD. I just don't get a missing list or have for samples and CHD. The build from RomSheperd, I just got last week. Same for 3DO, Sega CD etc,

Hi fRequEnCy First congrats on your propotion. I'm tried using the dats from RomShepard for the dreamcast, sega cd etc. They are all using TOSEC naming convention and are iso and cues. I'm making the dat from Mame 139. It does the roms fine but doesn't give me the have and missing CHD. I run the dat from ROM Shepard for the chd and it runs them but says all are all no good. I'm sure I'm doing something wrong. I'll just keep searching the various sites until I figure it out. Thanks, Congratulations again

I have no problem running Clrmame pro on my no-intro roms. But can't seem to get it to run properly on isos such as dreancast,CD-i, Sega CD's etc. Any thing in folders. Even if I run them as zips, it seems to hang. Also when I run ClrMame pro on the mame roms I get no list showing missing or have on CHD's. Have tried runningn a dat file on CHD only and it says the all are wrong even know they run fine. Are anyone running other programs on roms that have iso, cue files etc. THanks

Hi Tom, Been tryng to run my dreamcast roms thru the download service and it never works properly. I have tried it with the roms zipped and unzipped. I have ran them in folders and out of folders. It seems to miss roms no matters what I do. What am I doing wrong. Somethin simple I bet. Thanks Sratbuck

Thanks for the fast reply. Can play both just fine and Circo seems to be updating both. Right now HD space is cheap so keeping both isn't a problem. Before starting to using the service I had 120 plus different systems running thru GameEx. Currently I have reduced it to the 70 in the service. Once I have them all tweaked and have Circo's folder names down pat, I'll start adding some of other systems with the hope that Circo will one day expand his service to include other systems. Circo seperates snaps and movies into seperate folders. I like the idea of having the movie plays as I scroll the game list. When I go to the indivdual game name I then like the snap to be in the list with box, title etc. I do this now with the extra folder slots. As you update Gameex to include the extra folders, it would be nice to sereate the current snap/video folder into 2 seperate folders. Don't know if this is a GameEx or Circo question but I'll throw it out. When I update a game list by adding games (Be it a no-intro, Tosec, Goodrom, etc.), I assume unlike Mame GameEx will automatically update the Game list on start up. But could a label be put on the GameEx screen telling you the last date that that particular game list was run thru the service as a reminder that your media has not been updated to include the new games. Something similar to what mame does when you change your games, asking you to update the game list. I know that currently GameEx won't update your media but a reminder would help us old guys trying to remember to run the service for a perticular system.

As I tweak my cabinet setup using the new download service utility, I have questions popping up. I know that GameEx now uses AVI's or FLV's. Which of these are the one that the group is using. There is no need to have both in my asset directory as they both have the exact same files in each. I know that there are other front ends that only use FLVs, so there may be a benefit if you use more then one front end. But having both movie files doubles the amount of disc space used. Does GameEx handle FLV's as good as AVI's and i so should that be the movie file of choice to keep. When GameEx starts using the Service will it update your files or do we still need to mannually check each folder from time to time for updates to the media.

First a special thanks to Tom and Ciro for the download utility. Been downloading the various systems and tweaking my GameEx to take anvantage of the new utility. With the wealth of media available, I found there is not enough slots available to display all the different media. Would like to see some more added to the config. so I can veiw all the great media that has been made available. Maybe even a few extra slots to take advantage of future media being added. I have alot that I need to find the time to upload to emumovies. Thanks for a great frontend and all you do

Agee with all the above. But am curious. I know in several months past support was made for flv files in GameEx. Is it possible to use a hyperspin theme in GameEx. Or could one be motified (Easily) to be made to work in GameEx.

A neat feature would be the ability for the screensaver to play selections by category. Example: if you are in multimedia, the screensaver would only play movie trailers. If in Mame, the GameEx screensaver would only play Mame games, Atari 2600 would only play 2600 games. Sometimes its cool to have a random type game or movie play but if the machine is running and your only interest at that time is movie trailers, all you want to see on the screensaver is movies.

updated directx. Have now updated video card and now works but way slow. Have turned off alphablending and several other effects and it is at least playable. Guess time for a new computer. Is it possible to go back to an earlier version in the mean time.

Everytime GameEx started it told me it was going to do a auto update. After each update it still was on 10.70. I did a manual update to 11.06 and now gaemEx gives me an error mesage. GameEx LOG ATTACHED.

Hey Stilkdog, Sound works on computer with everything but GameEx. Have updated my codeC and have verified I have the latest drivers for my sound card. I have verifed that its the newest update from Nvidia (Standard card on all new HP notebooks) that is the problem. If I roll back to the prevoius driver it works fine. Problem is that if I leave on automatic updates it updates the driver everytime I boot up and then I have to roll it back each time. Big pain. Thanks