u-man

exactly KRC... but there are some ancient, logical "errors" that makes the theme-editor a painfull experience, if you want to do a theme in a certain way. my hope is, that these "errors" will go away with the new release. that is the reason, why i think, we could help Tom and Ben to do it better this time .

When has Tom noted this? For me this are no good news. IMO it would be good, if all (at least registered) users would contribute on the theme-editor. so we could decide together which changes would be the best for the theme-editor. this way Tom and Ben would have a focus on the really importing stuff. at this point, i would like to say, that i was very disappointed for deleting my last post, regarding the exact same thing Gimmeclassic is posting in this thread . but ok... i can understand a lot behind this. do not speak about something, which is not ready.... but i will. i did not want to contribute in the theme-contest, because of the so called "flaws". i always thought my theme is not "really" complete. i dont want to make promises, but i am sure that something will be changed, when i release my theme . i just want to say, i will release it this month and it will have options, for at least 3 emulators and it will look like no other before, mainly because it is much more "animated". do not get me wrong, IMO the theme-editor has much more power than most of "us" can think of.... and that is what i want to show with my theme... but with a little changes it would be perfect. with my theme i encountered the borders. for some of them, i did found a solution (thanks to draco and other "good" guys in the forum), but for some "flaws" there is simply no "good enough" solution. my last words would be like Gimmeclassic´s one: Good luck to Tom and Headkaze: I can't waint for the results

more great news and many thanks for this release.... somehow it is compiling faster, but maybe just imagination.

hahaha.... yeah good question

check if your rom-path is correct. your current is: C:\Emulators\Mame32\roms looks like the default one. 00:01:16.9 12/15/2012: Running: C: C:\Emulators\Mame32\Mame32.exe -verifysets -rompath "C:\Emulators\Mame32\roms" > C:\Emulators\Mame32\verify.dat 00:01:58.6 12/15/2012: Opening Verify.dat 00:01:59.6 12/15/2012: Processing Verify.dat 00:01:59.6 12/15/2012: Total verifyable roms: 135 maybe something went wrong with your verify.dat file. delete it to create a new one. or leave that option at all.

great news, from our great code-hero.... thank you very much, for this .

update your list in GameEx not in setup-wizard. start GameEx, go to your MAME section and update list.

after that... you need to update your list again in GameEx inside your MAME section. ".... the Galaga folder is sitting right next to the Galaga88 folder which works fine in Gameex." dont know what you mean with this

Hello and welcome to the forums... it seems that you havent configured GameEx with the setupwizard (its inside your GameEx folder). your MAME Rompath is currently: RomPath=C:\Roms\MAME\Roms i guess your Galaga rom is somewhere else, but not in "RomPath=C:\Roms\MAME\Roms" first setup your GameEx properly with the setupwizard and tell us what happens then.

Yeah i know, that GimmeClassic asked for the GameEx Maximus Arcade Theme, but you said that no frontend is capable of switching foreground masks and i showed you only, that this is not true.... thats all. I think some constructive critic is not bad at all and dont hurt anyone . I like GameEx very much, i wouldnt buy a license if it would not be that reason. You guys rocks it very hard and i thank you all for your effort to make the best MAME frontend.

Draco I absolutely understand what you mean, but the Maximus Arcade Frontend can switch foreground "masks" based upon the ROM's display orientation. How this Frontend achieve this... i dont know. If you dont believe, you can watch this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-xVc0U2LyY'>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-xVc0U2LyY Also the Marquees always fit perfectly AND if there is no image available, than a standard MAME Marquee is displayed. The same is true for the snapshots. The only way to achieve this in GameEx, is to get rid off of ALL your other media for MAME, like Titles, Flyers, CPs etc. This is really sad and a main reason, why in every GameEx-Theme you will see a simple, plain display of Snapshots and Titles... which is boring. As we have allready the option to filter horizontal or vertical games, i think it can not be so hard to switch foreground "masks" based upon the ROM's display orientation. This would be a big relief for every Theme-Creator. This is really a thing I dont understand, as GameEx is mainly a Frontend and at its best to use it in a real Arcade-Cab. But the focus (e.g. updates) is not there. We get really nice features, no doubt, but GameEx would have much more fans and customers, if the focus would be on a nice, nifty and beautiful interface, as this is what a customer most want and expect from a Frontend. Here is the culprit, as we get features no one request and the features that are requested especially for theme-creation are only on a "to do" list. My biggest hope is the announced Theme-Editor Upgrade , as GameEx is superior in all other aspects for a Frontend. I can only recommend, to have a look at the Theme-Editor of Maximus Arcade. Its simple, nicely organized, have a .swf import (with this alone, you could do unbelievable stuff), usage of more than 2 fonts etc. etc. Its just the stuff, every Theme-Creator would like to see in GameEx .

Regarding the Frontends and the horizontal and vertical screens... this is not true. Maximum Arcade is capable of doing both, horizontal and vertical screens. This Frontend uses 2 different masks, depending on the kind of game. The problem is, that GameEx dont use centered image scaling for the image fields . If GameEx would use this, than all images would be treated the same way and you could make a correct screen-display with a simple alpha mask (ok, some border would be cropped, but the illusion would be looking right). Anyway Draco, i like your approach or workaround for this problem. @:GimmeClassic: Yeah, you need to understand the Theme-Editor for your approach. Its not enough, just to choose a default theme and expect that this theme, will work with your background. GameEx will offcourse show the movies from Emu-movies in a correct way, but not in the way you want it. Not inside a screen AND with a Marquee.

Either there is something wrong with your setup or you are not carefully watch the changes with the "Change-View" option. The Background is easily done. You will need to get familiar with the THEME-EDITOR. As it seems, you have not even setup a theme and therefore there is no way for GameEx to know, what background you want. Other thing is the Marquee-stuff... it is like Draco said, the Marquees have different sizes and GameEx can NOT compensate all the different scales. Another thing is, as we dont have Marquees for all MAME games, you will get in trouble with games that dont have a Marquee... GameEx will showing up the next thing it can find (e.g. Flyer, Title, ControlPanel etc.) regarding the choosen game... sad but true. The other problem will be the Snap-screens inside the cab. As MAME has horizontal and vertical Games, GameEx will only be able to show one thing correctly, either horizontal or vertical screens, but not both... sad but true. I recommend to use horizontal screens for the start, as this will cover ALL console Games plus the MAME horizontal Games (approx. 2700). If you dont like this, i suggest to post your wishes in the feature-request-thread, like many, many others allready did. Its beyond my scope, why this is so hard to program, but it is like it is . The good thing is, all the rest, can easily be done with a little practice

Thank you Tom for the information. How I can run GameEx in DirectDraw Mode? Is there an option to do this in the Setup-Wizard? I always thought that I can only run MAME in the DirectDraw Mode. I am using a 7800GT -nvidia with Soft15khz and Windows XP SP3. If I use the 384x288 progressive Resolution, everything is fine and looks right. I just want to know, at what resolution I should keep my Theme and thought 768x576 interlaced is a bigger screen and can handle more "presenting stuff". Error-Description: The black thin lines, dont cover a whole line, only a portion. So you have small, thin black lines over the whole screen, more like artifacts in line-form.

As i try to Finish my Theme, I came into some trouble. I try to use a 768x576 interlaced Setting for the Resolution with a Common 15khz Arcade-Monitor. It Works so far, but in GameEx i have some garbaged thin Black Lines across the Screen. Now i Need to ask, if interlaced resolutions are possible in GameEx? If someone with a Cab could check, if he has the Same Problem, i would be happy. THx in advance u-man

yes... pin it please.... good job by the way

Yes, I started with 1920x1080, but now I have a Cab and I want to custom it on my own. There is also the advantage of the Low Resolution, so animation-movies dont need to render that long and are more fluently by the way. So I needed to make some changes again, mainly because of the different aspect ratios 16:9 vs. 4:3. If I can complete my theme in time, it will be followed by a HD Resolution, but at the moment I just try to finish the theme in Cab-Resolution. I have searched for "updateani1.gif" and found it directly in the GameEx/Media folder, but not in any theme. So I guess it will work, if I make my own "updateani1.gif" and put it in your suggested place, am I right here with my thoughts? Anyway, thanks for the tips... another nice gimmick which can be changed .

Indeed... I use 2 Screens for the Cab, as I am on a setup-route here and not finished with this. Arcade Resolution is not a easy handling on Windows . It is the same here, i got work to do, but I am sure I can post something tommorow... and I will. Just to be sure... you mean I should disable the Intro at all? It is not so annoying for me, it is just something I realized. But maybe I will try this setting for the Cab .

Hell i like this countdown thing, especially the gif-animation. how we can achieve the same in our themes? i dont get it, how you replaced the tapper-guy+the whole loading screen. may sounds like a noob-question, but i would like to know it. Good Job Draco.... I dont know, if i will have the time to contribute right in time for the theme-competition, as i changed a lot in the progress creating my theme. the funny thing (that is the reason why i am writing this), that my theme will have some aspects of your theme, but in another way. my cab is using a euro-arcade-monitor running at 50Hz, so i want to use 768x576i pixels (PAL) as the resolution for the theme. mainly because of bigger space, maybe i will reduce it to 384x288 to avoid flicker. question is, will there be problems for NTSC resolutions like 640x480 (or 320x240p)? would you guys use my theme anyway?

i have the same experience, but only on my cab. maybe a reoslution switching thing, which maybe is not a GameEx only related thing. also i have never seen a fluent intro animation start (where the GameEx logo zooms in), not on my cab and not on my PC. ok i have a huge collection and the loading databases could be a issue, but then the intro should be handled in a other way, just my opinion.

jesus.... daily updates and christmas is only next month thx Tom

still cant believe its true..... what amazing news. yeah you guys really, really rock. it comes so right in time... i can tell ya

its like a running joke... from me. sorry, didnt want to make someone angry .

long time ago... that someone posted something. so here is my contribution: http://arcadeartlibr...cat_id=3&page=1 Fonts and Logos nicely done. still hoping for something new, regarding the theme-editor . come on guys, give us animations... gif, png, swf, flv..... whatever. and the option to decide what image 1+2 is showing.... thx.

if you have a huge collection and old pc components (especially your HD), this can happen. also defragmenting your HD can help. but if it worked before, i am clueless... sry