A new approach to screensaver/attract-mode?
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Hey all, I’m wondering if there can be a new approach to the Screensaver for those that want attract mode (showing games while not in use, not Attract-Mode the front-end).
Couldn’t a shell script be run at boot that monitors inactivity and uses mplayer to randomly play mp4 videos? Normally the esc key exits it but I would think that could be changed for any input (any key on the keyboard, controller, joystick, button, etc). That could also be “counted” as a sign as activity and the script would kill the mplayer process.
I’m not sure if MAME has any sort of attract mode functionality but that would ideal if it does. If we’re stuck with mp4s that’s ok as you can get them from emumovies, youtube, progettosnaps, or even record your own. There’s even a way with mplayer to play videos muted, fullscreen, and lots of other options.
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C'mon scripters this should be easy, no?
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@DJQuad mame (and i guess most console games) have attract modes, so really what would be best is to launch a random game as your 'screensaver'. that idea has been floated around for ages but since no-one has coded it i guess it's not so easy :)
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I've found several scripts that I think could be adapted to work if anyone is familiar with scripting, at least for playing videos -
https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2043619
https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1368224
https://www.jwz.org/xscreensaver/faq.html#mpeg
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