Emulators 2 - BETA - 19/08/12 (1 Viewer)

[Brownard]

cubit:
I'm going to add options to specify commands to run before an Emulator starts and after it exits which should enable you to do what you want.

twinking:
The plugin uses a slightly modified version of the MovingPictures scraper engine, scraper scripts are in xml format so it's easy to add new sources - currently the scripts are stored internally in the plugin but I'll move them to a directory to enable them to be easily added/edited. Do you know of any other good sources?

Making lot's of improvements to the plugin at the mo so the release is going to take a little longer but it'll be worth it.

Edit: I've just updated the current release with MP 1.3 Alpha compatibility. It is exactly the same version as you are currently using. You can get it from the 1st post or through the Extensions Installer.

 

[jimmyo]

Thanks for your great work on the plugin.
I hava added about 40 different systems now and here are some bugs I found and some feedback on the plugin

Bugs:
Configuration, Games, Details: When I resize the window: ID, Play count, Last Played is in wrong place
Configuration, Emulators, Details, Arguments: %ROM% don't work
Gamefaqs doesn't scrape boxart as it should (Seems to take it from main game page)
When dragging console pictures (.png) into window, it adds black around the picture (it resizes the picture), doesn't look good

New Features/improvements:
Scrape better results
Import only selected platform
Add more platforms
Results from different scrapers mixed together
Local scraper for screenshots, videos, artwork ...
Video preview in MP
View game manual in MP
Search game by name
Make own groups (Console, Arcade, Handheld, Computer etc..)
Only show first file when multiple files are present for same game
Scrape more sites (archive.vg, giantbomb.com)
Special Mame view for marquees and cabinets
Use boxart as background (fanart) option
Ability to have two different start icons in Basic Home Menu to go directly to PC games or Emulators (Online Videos has it for youtube, Apple trailers...)

Biggesst problem is the scraper results that needs tuning.
I can't scrape consoles like megadrive because it's all over the place (about 70 of 1000 results approved).
Things to make it better is to only use results from selected platform.

Looking forward to the new version

Jimmy

 

[Brownard]

Thanks for the feedback, a lot of those are already implemented for the next version -

• Scraping has been fine tuned to only show results from the selected platform, you can also select a scraper preference for each of the artwork types allowing you to mix scraper results
• Image saving moved to png format to preserve transparency (that's the issue you are seeing with the black border)
• Multi-disc support allowing you to merge multiple files into 1 game and select which disc to launch.
• A groups editor allowing you to create own custom groups comprising of any combination of games/emulators/dynamic results using sql queries.

I'll have a look at adding the other scrapers and a search feature and also fixing preview vids - you'll have to wait for the other features though

The version you are using does support startup parameters though allowing you to create multiple buttons on the basic home screen, details on the syntax is here. The StreamedMP editor (and probably other skin home screen editors) aren't aware of these parameters so you need to manually edit the Baisic Home skin file and insert the appropriate parameter yourself.

 

[jimmyo]

Thanks for the support, I manually edited BasicHome.xml with starting parameters and it works.
Great that most of the wanted functions will be present in the next version.

 

[erichzann]

I am having the following error message when trying to launch a goodmerge .7z file.

2012-07-24 19:01:24.580143 [ERROR][MPMain(1)]: Emulators 2: Goodmerge: Error loading archive 'C:\Users\Andrew\Emulators\GoodGen3.00\FULL Sega Genesis -- Mega Drive -- 32X (GoodGen 3.00)[GoodMerged]\Paddle Fighter (SN).7z' - Can not load 7-zip library or internal COM error! Message: failed to load library.

I suspect it is a problem with the 7zip dll. Has anyone else had this problem?

Thanks

 

[Brownard]

Which version of 7z are you using? The plugin doesn't support the x64 version.

 

[erichzann]

I had the x64 version installed. I have replaced it with the regular version and now everything is fine.

Thanks

 

[powermarcel10]

Hello,

I'm testing the new version of this plugin under MP 1.3.

It works very good! So thanks for all your hard work in the first place..

2 questions:

-Is it right that this version doesn't have multi language support yet? There are no files here in the language folder under: C:\ProgramData\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal\language\Emulators2

-Is there a way to let the plugin do everything automaticly? So when you select a folder with shortcuts of games, the plugin scans it and get automaticly info? That would be very awesome..

 

[Brownard]

There are currently no other translations (I'm relying on you guys for that ) and there's a bug in that version where the installer copies the english xml to the old directory (MediaPortal\language\myEmulators) but the plugin looks for it in the new directory.

I've added exactly what you've described for PC Games in the next version, you can specify a directory and filter (most likely *.lnk for shortcuts) so the plugin will pick them up automatically.

I'm testing a release at the moment so barring any major problems shouldn't be too long...

 

[powermarcel10]

There are currently no other translations (I'm relying on you guys for that ) and there's a bug in that version where the installer copies the english xml to the old directory (MediaPortal\language\myEmulators) but the plugin looks for it in the new directory.

I've added exactly what you've described for PC Games in the next version, you can specify a directory and filter (most likely *.lnk for shortcuts) so the plugin will pick them up automatically.

I'm testing a release at the moment so barring any major problems shouldn't be too long...

Offcourse we will! I will make a Dutch translation asap.. The problem was that the language folder of Myemulators 2 was empty, so there was also no English file to translate.. But I'm happy that the plugin does support multi language.. So I can copy the English.xml file into C:\ProgramData\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal\language\Emulators2 right? Than I will work to a translated version..

Also very good to hear that you are working so hard to a new version.. This plugin was looking death for a long time.. I'm really happy that it isn't!

Thanks!

EDIT: Dutch language file added!