Development of module-script generator for lr-mess, lr-mame and mame standalone

Folly

@DTEAM said in Development of module-script generator for lr-mess, lr-mame and mame standalone:

@Folly said in Development of module-script generator for lr-mess, lr-mame and mame standalone:

@DTEAM

Here is some news about handheld vfd games :
https://forums.bannister.org/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=97003&page=397

Looks like we need to update our roms in the next version.

Unfortunately, I lost my password and did not leave any information to recover it when creating the account. It was a google account that I opened on the fly.

To do that, I'll have to clone the data to a new account or go back to my notes and try to find that password.

Have you found your password again ?

I am a bit busy with making background overlays for the dual-screen gameandwatch handhelds.
I did gnw_bsweep and gnw_dkong2.
At first it did seem straight forward pasting both top and bottom in a new file.
To some degree that was the case with gnw_dkong2, sadly the others have been zoomed in the regular mame artwork so for these others this means quite some work.
Though, I found a way with gnw_bsweep and I am hoping I can use the same trick with the others.
If you have access again we can add them to the artwork files on google-drive.
I will place the artwork files with newly created Background.png files here :
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1YkISUXfKsdHvMv6HACwKhsVHBiGGHCjv

It took me quite some time to get the trick needed, so I figured to test the regular artwork of mame again for lr-mess, placing it in /home/pi/RetroPie/BIOS/mame/artwork.
To my surprise some of them worked now (I used 248 now).
I also tried kgradius but that did not work out of the box, making "Screen Focus" the default in the layout did work, so it looks it can be working in the future.
Sadly the frame-rate drops to 40% in kgradius and with gnw_sweep it drops to about 80% (both with frame-skipping 10).

So the conclusion, for now, is that it's not yet suitable for the pi4 as it is too slow to get good results.
So we still have to use "Background overlays" for lr-mess to get the frame-rate to 100% (with frame-skipping 10).

DTEAM

@Folly said in Development of module-script generator for lr-mess, lr-mame and mame standalone:

Have you found your password again ?

Unfortunately no, but I'll create a new account and and a new Google Drive to transfer all those files. I'll keep the actual structure, only the Google Drive link will change.

Folly

@DTEAM

Ok, a new one is good too.

DTEAM

@Folly
I received an answer from Google. I was able to reinitiate my password. I’m good to continue with my Google drive.

Folly

@DTEAM

You are a lucky man.
Nice that we don't have to change all the links in the script and the posts ;-)

I have done 6 handheld backgrounds now, hopefully I can do some more this week.
I also noticed a few missing artwork files like, gnw_pinball (which I added now).
So we should check for more if we can.

DTEAM

@Folly

Sure, give me a download link when you are ready and I'll put all those files on the Google drive. I'll be available to do that Wednesday.

Folly

@DTEAM

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1YkISUXfKsdHvMv6HACwKhsVHBiGGHCjv

Progress :

DTEAM

This post is deleted!

DTEAM

@Folly
Done!

Folly

@duglor said in Creating ES gamelists with media for MAME/lr-mess:

@Folly @DTEAM @testudo Does the Mess-Archimedes work now with .adf (not the amiga type) files such as Hamsters? I have not been able to find a bios file or files that have made it run. :(

Yes, you can use commands to get all information from MAME as MESS is part of this and lr-mess/lr-mame are basically the same source but libretro-cores that run in RetroArch.
For more information on commands you can see here :
https://docs.mamedev.org/commandline/commandline-all.html

This is an example on how to get information about what media is supported by a default system :

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ /opt/retropie/emulators/mame/mame -listmedia aa310
SYSTEM           MEDIA NAME       (brief)    IMAGE FILE EXTENSIONS SUPPORTED
---------------- --------------------------- -------------------------------
aa310            floppydisk       (flop)     .mfi  .dfi  .hfe  .mfm  .td0  .imd  .d77  .d88  .1dd  .cqm  .cqi  .dsk  .ima  .img  .ufi  .360  .ipf  .adf  .apd  .jfd  .ads  .adm  .adl  .ssd  .bbc  .dsd  .st   .msa

The .adf format seems to be supported for the archimedes aa310.

Not sure how you run Archimedes but I assume you use this project or the older Valerino approach.
You can find bios roms in mame-merged. (do a google search)
For aa310 you should find aa310.zip and archimedes_keyboard.zip.
When using this project place it in :
/home/pi/RetroPie/BIOS/mame
When using the Valerino module-script, place it in :
/home/pi/RetroPie/BIOS

This command will give the BIOS info of aa310 :

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ /opt/retropie/emulators/mame/mame -listroms aa310

Or you can find the information in the verbose log, when the are missing, in (after trying to run a game) :
/dev/shm/runcommand.log

Folly

@duglor

Try reading the first post and view the animated gif on how to install a particular system.

If you can't figure it out then we are here to help.

Such a help discussion is useful because if something is missing in post 1, for first users, the I can add some useful information.

duglor

@Folly Ok- will do--- meanwhile, are you aware of problem where if you load an overlay for the mess-vectrex emulator, it remains there for all further mess programs in different emulators and you have to keep removing the overlay no matter how many times you remove it and save the core file with no overlay in it.
the tmpmess core or whatever it may be called :) Every mess related game (no matter what system) loads up with the armor attack vector game background from Vectrex :p

Folly

@duglor

First make your own image, just like @mitu says :
https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/33443/what-file-tells-the-various-mames-to-use-their-artwork-cfg-files-with-their-matching-name-roms/4

duglor

@Folly said in Development of module-script generator for lr-mess, lr-mame and mame standalone:

@duglor

Try reading the first post and view the animated gif on how to install a particular system.

If you can't figure it out then we are here to help.

Such a help discussion is useful because if something is missing in post 1, for first users, the I can add some useful information.

IT WORKED! I HAVE HAMSTERS AND THE OTHERS WORKING! Thanks for your great help. One thing, though, you forgot to tell me I had to download the .sh file and install it into the pie first :D

Thanks so much!!

duglor

@Folly Well....i have worked with mame since the 90s and helped make 2 drivers with sound emulation. It cannot be that hard. It has to be a cfg or ini file here or there. I just need to know which one and where and i can take it from there as all the art (pngs and cfgs) are there on the pie with the matching rom names. It should be something that autoloads, but it doesn't nor is there something within mame that does it. There is a crazy long 1 by 1 way to it within the retroarch that would take me 4000 minutes do do 1000 games. hehe. ANyway...I'll find the culprit ini or cfg if it's the last thing i do. I wish the guy that built it would just tell me where it is, but he's been hard to get a hold of.

Folly

@duglor

Check your /dev/shm/runcommand.log.
You might find which overlay is loaded.
(turn on verbose mode in the qui => press a key just before a game starts)

Check the overlay folder for default overlays :
/opt/retropie/configs/all/retroarch/overlay
Check your retroarch.cfg if overlays are loaded :
/opt/retropie/configs/all/retroarch.cfg
Or check the driver specific one :
/opt/retropie/configs/<driver>/retroarch.cfg

Or indeed check your ini's.

duglor

@Folly Thank you. The Archimedes Emulator is running great. I've remapped things to the joypad is well. Very great job there! @testudo

Folly

@duglor

Very nice indeed ;-)

Folly

@bbilford83

I had a look again at your default.cfg for the button mappings.
As I can recall button 9 is used for opening the mame gui.
Button 9 is my "start" button is yours the same ?

What I am missing is that when a joystick button is set in the default.cfg the keyboard tab key will probably not work anymore or am I wrong ?

Btw.
@Retrodade wants to share some button mappings for all_in1.
His post in "Tutorial: Handheld and Plug & Play systems with MAME"
Would you like to test them with your 8bitdo/PiBoy when he shares it ?
Then we could merge the configs.

bbilford83

@Folly I don't recall just by the numbers but I know that for me the button to open the MAME UI is the R3 button... like when you push down on the right analog stick. I think, but am not sure, that for me 10 and 11 are start and select. Maybe that means the .cfgs won't be too helpful after all :(.

I actually don't have the all-in-one games setup on my build, so at least as of now I couldn't test them. It seemed like a lot more work for scraping and such because there are so many and honestly I like the Konami/Tiger ones because they're all so similar and the same manufacturer. I could try to get my act together and add them though.