Possible to out a game in the map file?

[Nightlife]

Subject line says it all! Very random question, I know. I swear I have my reasons!

Is it possible to comment out a line in a .map file, so the game does not show up in GameEx?

[fRequEnCy]

Subject line says it all! Very random question, I know. I swear I have my reasons!

Is it possible to comment out a line in a .map file, so the game does not show up in GameEx?

Simply remove that line from the map file and that game will not show up in the list.

[Nightlife]

Simply remove that line from the map file and that game will not show up in the list.

Haha yeah I know that... But I want to be able to keep a handful of games because I toggle them on/off occasionally. I know, like I said, weird request. Possible?

[fRequEnCy]

Haha yeah I know that... But I want to be able to keep a handful of games because I toggle them on/off occasionally. I know, like I said, weird request. Possible?

If you know that then I don't get your reason for asking?

Why not just delete from within GameEx or add to the Excluded Files option in Advanced Emulator Setup and then can remove from there when you're wanting to show again.

[Draco1962]

<shaking head and muttering something incomprehensible> Huh.. what? You don't want the game to show up but you do want it accessible sometimes? Why not just setup a folder with those ROMs you don't want to show in your main emulator population and setup a separate emulator for those that you want available only occasionally? That way, they appear in their own map file.

[nullPointer]

I dunno, I think it’s a valid question. It would certainly be the most simple means of managing something like this. Managing a single map file would be easier than managing multiple map files encompassing several directories. It would also be easier than adding/removing entire lines/sections from a single map file as needed (i.e. commenting/uncommenting sections would be easier than adding/removing those sections). I don’t think I would use it personally, but it would be nice to know that I could.

For that matter the ability to add comments to map files would occasionally be useful in ways beyond simply commenting out lines in the map file. I mean sometimes you might just like to leave yourself a trail of breadcrumbs explaining how and why you did what you did (particularly for those just getting started).

To answer the OP, no I don’t think it’s currently possible. If you’re really interested in this functionality it wouldn’t hurt to add it as a feature request.

Also to the OP, you might want to change the title of the thread as currently it sounds like you’re trying to force your games to come out of the closet.

[fRequEnCy]

Try commenting out with "#" or with a ";" before and see if that works. Years ago I would do this to add a header to my map files and they weren't listed. I don't remember the exact character but give it a try. I am not at my machine so am unable to test.

[Adultery]

Personally I thought it was a # ...

[fRequEnCy]

Personally I thought it was a # ...

As did I but years of remembering is just too much for me right now. LOL.

[Nightlife]

Darn... tried ; : # <!-- and anything else I could think of, no love. No worries...

[fRequEnCy]

Darn... tried ; : # <!-- and anything else I could think of, no love. No worries...

Another thing to try is change the pipeline character "|" or quotes depending on map file to something else so it doesn't match the criteria used by GameEx.

[Tom Speirs]

Another thing to try is change the pipeline character "|" or quotes depending on map file to something else so it doesn't match the criteria used by GameEx.

I think removing "|" may work if I recall.

Thanks.

[Nightlife]

BRILLIANT!!!!! This worked!!!! THANKS TOM!!!!!!!!!

For the record, this is to make a really amazing and wonderful .map file for Visual Pinball. The quirky issue with VP is that there are two exe's, one for VP8 files and one for VP9 files, and the tables only work with the exe they are created for. On top of that, there are often 3-4 versions of a table (sometimes from different authors, some widescreen, some are mods, etc.) of which no table is *better* than the others, they're just different. I like my setup clean, so I only want one version (my fav) for each table in my game list.

So, I'm creating a map files for VP8 and VP9 that contain ALL tables from head-to-toe BUT in GameEX it only shows one candidate if there are multiple ones (the others are disabled using this "|" trick), and if you want to switch the table, you simply modify the map file to make it easy for people to pick swap in their favorite ones.

Using the GameEx group feature to join VP8 and VP9 + these custom map files should make the most up-to-date and efficient way of having a clean and awesome VP setup!

I think removing "|" may work if I recall.

Thanks.