shroud Posted March 6, 2015 Share Posted March 6, 2015 Hello,I have been using and enjoying GameEx (free version) for a couple of years.Recently I encountered this minor problem: whenever switching to the MAME game list in GameEx, the background becomes black, as if the background image is not loaded properly.The fact is, I am not using the MAME-specific section of GameEx, but instead I am using a section for MAME as an emulator like all others (i.e. I have set MAME to "disabled" in GameEx settings, and then added MAME back as another entry in the emulator list, so that in the Setting Wizard I can see MAME under Emulator Setup and Advanced Emulator Setup lists). Because of this, I would expect the menu of MAME to work identically to how it works for all other emulators.Have I possibly deleted an image file that was used as background here? What would be the name and folder of such file? Or do you suspect a different cause for this issue?Thanks in advance! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Draco1962 Posted March 6, 2015 Share Posted March 6, 2015 HI, I moved your thread to the correct forum (From PinballX - General to GameEx - General). You will get better help for your GameEx issue here. When reporting a possible bug or error, please submit a copy of the following files so we may quickly assist you: For GameEx - gameex.ini and log.txt (Click here for additional information on how to find these files and others that may be required).Also, is there any reason you have chosen not to use the integrated MAME support? It is superior to running MAME as a standalone emulator.Please provide the requested files - you can also find in the link I posted instructions for obtaining your emulator.ini file so we can look at your settings for MAME as an emulator. Thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shroud Posted March 6, 2015 Author Share Posted March 6, 2015 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shroud Posted March 12, 2015 Author Share Posted March 12, 2015 Also, is there any reason you have chosen not to use the integrated MAME support? It is superior to running MAME as a standalone emulator.Mostly because I dislike the menus arrangement of integrated MAME. I didn't notice any difference in running the games. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tthurman Posted March 12, 2015 Share Posted March 12, 2015 It's not so much a difference in running the games as it losng things like the filtering options, grouping options, and custom menu's. Really by not using integrated you're just by-passing many of the cool features unique to GameEx. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Draco1962 Posted March 12, 2015 Share Posted March 12, 2015 First problem I see is that you are using version 13.01. We are at version 14.03 now. Sorry, but not sure we can continue assisting with troubleshooting the issues you are encountering since so many changes have occured with the many updates between versions. You will need to upgrade to the latest version and report back with new gameex.ini and log.txt files if the issue persists into the latest version. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shroud Posted March 13, 2015 Author Share Posted March 13, 2015 It's not so much a difference in running the games as it losng things like the filtering options, grouping options, and custom menu's. Really by not using integrated you're just by-passing many of the cool features unique to GameEx.Yes, I think custom menus would be nice, but to my understanding they are available only in the registered version, while I have the free version.I don't actually have that many games in MAME, therefore the additional lists (e.g. two-players games, games with different inputs...) end up being very short lists. Without the ability to customize the menus, if I use the integrated MAME those additional lists end up on the same page as the other emulators, which doesn't look good.Thus since I am turning the additional lists off, at the end I only have the "ALL MAME Games" list, on the same menu level as the other emulators. At this point the difference is only that I cannot change the title of that list, it's always "ALL MAME Games", while I CAN change its title if I use MAME as any other emulator...First problem I see is that you are using version 13.01. We are at version 14.03 now. Sorry, but not sure we can continue assisting with troubleshooting the issues you are encountering since so many changes have occured with the many updates between versions. You will need to upgrade to the latest version and report back with new gameex.ini and log.txt files if the issue persists into the latest version.Yes I am aware of this... I have been reluctant to upgrade often because I am always afraid of losing some configuration work I have done over time. GameEx is so huge with so many features (90% of which I am not using) that figuring out by myself how to adjust things took me a lot of time But there's a chance that the problem would go away with an upgrade, for instance if the reason is that I have accidentally deleted a file or something like that.I will try to upgrade, but before I do it, here's a couple of questions I want to ask, so that I feel less nervous about upgrading 1) I don't think there's an auto-upgrade option, so IIRC I have to download the latest version, and manually install it on top of the previous. I presume that re-installing GameEx on top of itself preserves all custom settings, is that true?2) I would actually like to move GameEx to a different folder in my PC. Can the whole GameEx folder just be moved (cut-paste)? I guess not, because then all paths would be wrong in Windows registry. So what I think I should do, is to install another copy (latest version) of GameEx in the wanted location, and remove the my current (older version); how can I carry all my configurations over to the new GameEx? (I presume that at least I would need anyway to update the data paths in SettingWizards).Thanks a lot for your guidance!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Draco1962 Posted March 13, 2015 Share Posted March 13, 2015 First, check in Setup Wizard > Enable/Disable Features to see if Auto Update is set to Disable Automatic Updates. If you wish to enable them, you can make the change there. Otherwise, you will have to manually download and install the updated version.Next, I would backup the contents of your GameEx directory to preserve everything. I would avoid having two instances of GameEx installed on the same machine as it will cause conflicts. You should be able to move your gameex.ini file from the backup to the same folder in the new installation, however, since you are quite a few versions out of current, there may be issues. Hard to predict how it may behave, so be prepared for possibly manually updating your configuration. Also, it is preferable to have GameEx installed at the root of your c:\ as opposed to another folder. It just seems to behave better there. If you procede with a manual download/install to a new location, you will likely need to re-run your reg key that was given to you via email when you first registered your copy of GameEx. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DazzleHP Posted March 13, 2015 Share Posted March 13, 2015 I think Auto Updates are registered only so in this instance you will have to manually download.If you really want to move your GameEx install to a different location, i would first uninstall it (after backing up your entire directory first as Draco mentioned) and use a registry cleaner such as CCleaner just to make sure all entries are removed, then reinstall using the latest version.Bear in mind it's highly advisable to keep GameEx out of any Windows system folders, ie Program Files, Users, Documents etc as it can cause permission headaches. This is why we advise keeping the main install at the root of any drives/partitions.Once this is done, you can overwrite your GameEx.ini, Emulator configs etc with your backups, BUT as Draco pointed out - you are way behind on your GE version (unlike most programs/apps, GameEx will have 10's of updates between whole versions) so some things might need tweaking afterwards. But as long as your roms, emulators, media etc don't get moved in the process it should all be OK on the paths front Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shroud Posted March 14, 2015 Author Share Posted March 14, 2015 Bear in mind it's highly advisable to keep GameEx out of any Windows system folders, ie Program Files, Users, Documents etc as it can cause permission headaches. This is why we advise keeping the main install at the root of any drives/partitions.Thanks to both! I will try moving it under a non-system folder, something like C:\Retrogaming. The idea is just to have all the stuff (GameEx, emulators, games, assets) inside the same base folder.By the way, I guess it is not possible for GameEx to work with relative paths (so that moving everything wouldn't require to change the path settings), but it would have been handy. Also it would have been great if it didn't require any installation. I guess this would make other things more difficult to implement, but it would allow to stuff my entirely (admittedly very small) collection onto a single USB stick, and make the whole thing portable. Would be neat to just sometimes visit friend and bring it there, plug the USB stick onto their PC and start gaming right away! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Draco1962 Posted March 14, 2015 Share Posted March 14, 2015 We were discussing the Raspberry Pi in the Social Club forum and this came up (should be released this month for a whopping $189). While not powerful enough for running most emulators, if you kept it to MAME and locked down quite a few GameEx features, and there ya go! I am considering buying one myself for similar projects. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shroud Posted March 14, 2015 Author Share Posted March 14, 2015 Upgrade done!So as it was kind of expected, there are now a lot of things to fix... the old gameex.ini generally worked but with scattered inconsistencies here and there, for example:- many MAME games don't get their names recognized (filename is shown instead)- strange duplicates in games list, or titles in strange font- logo and random snap is shown at the main menu level only for some of the emulators *- lost my custom "exit button" for closing emulators... it seems Esc is now the default for thatEventually, at least I found the reason for the problem I originally asked in this thread: I had set (for whatever reason I don't remember) the "Background snap path" of MAME in SetupWizard to an Artwork folder that had no files in it. Now I've removed the path, and GameEx shows the default blue background, as I wanted.* just noticed that this has something to do with using custom logos... I had my own custom logos, and without them now most of the emulators don't have a logo selected. Now I've copied those custom logo pics into the correct folder (they show up in SetupWizard, in the logos list) and selected them in SetupWizard. But when scrolling the emulators list, the logo and the random snaps are not displayed, if the emulator is using one of my custom logos. The weird thing is that the logo is however correctly shown when scrolling the games list of each emulator (in which case the logo is used as a replacement for missing snaps). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shroud Posted March 15, 2015 Author Share Posted March 15, 2015 - logo and random snap is shown at the main menu level only for some of the emulators ** just noticed that this has something to do with using custom logos... I had my own custom logos, and without them now most of the emulators don't have a logo selected. Now I've copied those custom logo pics into the correct folder (they show up in SetupWizard, in the logos list) and selected them in SetupWizard. But when scrolling the emulators list, the logo and the random snaps are not displayed, if the emulator is using one of my custom logos. The weird thing is that the logo is however correctly shown when scrolling the games list of each emulator (in which case the logo is used as a replacement for missing snaps).Well I just fixed this by giving my custom logos the same names that were used by the default logos, and it works. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Draco1962 Posted March 15, 2015 Share Posted March 15, 2015 Glad you got it all updated and sorted! Are you confident to mark this issue as resolved? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shroud Posted March 15, 2015 Author Share Posted March 15, 2015 Glad you got it all updated and sorted! Are you confident to mark this issue as resolved?The original problem YES it is solved. Maybe I should start another thread for the new issues after installation? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shroud Posted March 15, 2015 Author Share Posted March 15, 2015 - lost my custom "exit button" for closing emulators... it seems Esc is now the default for that Found this one too, it was under the "Input Settings" > "Global Exit" in SetupWizard. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Draco1962 Posted March 15, 2015 Share Posted March 15, 2015 The original problem YES it is solved. Maybe I should start another thread for the new issues after installation?Yes please. Makes it much easier track if there is a legit bug that needs to be addressed when it isn't buried in a long thread. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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