Custom menu questions

[mviars]

Can Zinc be added to the custom menu list like mame and daphne? there does not seem to be a selection for it. is the only way to add is as an emulator? It is setup in the wizard like mame and daphne and not as an added emulator.

My next question is about making a list file of games under mame. I would like to have a selection under mame menu for "all games" thats no problem but i would also like to have "fighting games" and "classic arcade games" etc. I dont really see how to do this or add the specific games to it.

I did read the pin post about making custom menu but did not really see anything about this.

Thanks

[nullPointer]

Hi mviars, and welcome to the GameEx forums! Sorry your post has gone unaddressed thus far. I'll chip in with my two cents and see where that gets us.

Can Zinc be added to the custom menu list like mame and daphne? there does not seem to be a selection for it. is the only way to add is as an emulator? It is setup in the wizard like mame and daphne and not as an added emulator.

I believe that in order to create a dedicated menu item for Zinc, you would need to add it as an emulator. I may be wrong there, as it's been quite a while since I've used Zinc. Space Fractal created a utility awhile back called ZincCab which may help to facilitate the inclusion of Zinc as an emulator in GameEx.

My next question is about making a list file of games under mame. I would like to have a selection under mame menu for "all games" thats no problem but i would also like to have "fighting games" and "classic arcade games" etc. I dont really see how to do this or add the specific games to it.

Classic Arcade Games are already grouped within GameEx to some extent. If you look within your MAME menu there's a section entitled, "Golden Era Of Arcade". that list contains a really good list of classic arcade games. Fighting games on the other hand are a bit tougher to categorize. I mean technically you can already do this if you sort by category within your All Games list, but the trouble is that catver.ini contains so many types of fighting games:

• Fighter / 2.5D
• Fighter / 2D
• Fighter / 3D
• Fighter / Field
• Fighter / Misc.
• Fighter / Multiplay
• Fighter / Versus
• Fighter / Versus Co-op
• Fighter / Vertical

To really customize a fighter list to your liking, you would probably need to create a custom map file using a utility like ROM Lister (here's a guide to get you started). At that point you may need to dedicate an emulator slot to that map file, at which point you could incorporate a dedicated list item into your custom menu structure.

Those are my thoughts anyway. If anyone else has an alternate approach I'd love to hear about it.

Good luck mviars, and please keep us posted on how this is going for you.

[mviars]

Thanks. I havent gotten around to playing with Zinc yet. The reason I was asking is that my Zinc runs from the GameEx main Zinc setup but not through added it as an emulator. I am sure I can figure it out with some more time as I have been concentrating on the mame and console end of it. I have already done as you suggested and made a custom menu for each of the categories I wanted and assigned an emulator slot for each. It does take a ton of time going through all the roms and picking out what games I want in each category and then making a .map file for them but at least it has only what I want in them. Right now my menu structure has a main menu of Arcade Games and Console Games then a sub menu for Arcade Games with all Games, Fighting games, Sports Games, Racing/Flying Games, and my favorite one the Cool & Unusual Games. Then my Console sub Menu has Atari 2600, NES, SNES, Genesis, and Turbograx 16. This menu structure seem to be the simplest for new players to understand. Now I need to figure out how to layout a virtual control panel that can show them what all the buttons do for each situation.

[nullPointer]

Hey just a quick word on Zinc. It's rather notoriously difficult to setup, and I believe all of the ZN1, ZN2 and System 11 games are now emulated directly in MAME. So if you have a relatively modern system and your MAME version is somewhat recent you might consider that.

Now I need to figure out how to layout a virtual control panel that can show them what all the buttons do for each situation.

There are two solutions here. One is relatively easy, and one has a bit of a learning curve (but is ultimately more rewarding once configured)

• For 'standard' emulators there's a field in the setup wizard where you can specify the path for controller image(s). It's the Controls Path field on the Advanced Emulator Setup screen. You can so this one of two ways. You can have a directory full of controller images which match your ROM names. Or you can specify a single image which will display for all games for that emulator (in this case you need to specify the full directory path and file name). If you're looking for a little 'artistic inspiration' for your controller images a few of our members have put together some controller image kits to help you get started. Here's one that I put together a while back, and here's a super-cool one that Adultery made as part of his MegaMAME theme. We've got a ton of super-creative people around here, so it's entirely possible you can turn up other similar projects if you do some digging. Both of the kits I mentioned feature layers that you can move, modify, and replace using either GIMP or Photoshop.
  
• For your MAME games, I'd recommend using CPWizard for displaying controls. CPWizard is a really neat utility written by our very own headkaze designed to dynamically display the control layout for the currently loaded MAME game. That means you don't need to create a ton of controller images, as CPWizard will generate the appropriate image(s) on the fly. It does take a bit of configuration, but once you've got the pieces in place it's super slick. Here's a brief tutorial that might help you get started using the tool.
  
  Once you get CPWizard setup, you'll notice that it has native integration with GameEx. On the MAME Settings screen (near the bottom of the screen) you'll see various fields related to CPWizard integration.

Good luck with all of this mviars! Let us know how it's working out!

[mviars]

Great info nullPointer. Thanks for taking the time to type it out cant wait to give it a try.