Current Release: arcadeEIP latest release (v0.4.2.0 beta)arcadeEIP is a custom front-end and launcher I wrote for my arcade machine over a period of several years due to nothing else like it being available. The main reason for writing it was to reduce the amount of "friction" that conventional front ends can add to playing a game. Thus, rather than make a user *always* have to navigate a menu, choose a game, and wait for it to load, I wanted to make the arcade machine *always* immediately playable--more like the way a real arcade machine works--while still supporting game switching as desired.
The answer to this was two-fold: First, make the operation "game-first" rather than "menu-first". Thus, in arcadeEIP there is always a live game running in its *native* attract mode while in standby, This game can be made to change periodically, but the key is that whatever game you see on the screen is always immediately playable by just dropping in a token and/or pressing the start button, just like real arcade machines.
Second, when a user "exits" a game, rather than having to wait for the game to literally exit and then enter another menuing environment, a game selection menu is instead *immediately* shown as an overlay over the current game. When the user selects a new game from this menu, arcadeEIP then exits the current game and loads the new one in a single step, making the game switching experience more like changing channels than changing a DVD. In fact, one does not even need to use this menu to switch games since games can also be hot-switched directly by using an Elgato Streamdeck, dedicated control panel buttons, or even a phone.
arcadeEIP can be used stand-alone; however, it also has integrated support for LaunchBox, enabling you to use LB as a scraper/content manager for its game lists, images, and metadata. You can also pair it with a conventional Front End like BigBox so that arcadeEIP's hot game switching, game-first standby, AND access to a conventional graphical front end can be integrated together to get the best of all worlds (that's actually the way I use it).
A short overview of arcadeEIP's fuller list of features includes:
- Instant gameplay in standby;
- Direct hot game switching via an overlay menu or button device;
- A launcher for all your games in most emulators;
- Standard front end features including run before/after apps, support for loading custom control panel profiles, etc.
- Support for custom lists,metadata, favorites, and star-ratings;
- Display of images such as control panel maps and mame history/mameinfo text on pause;
- Game startup and exit screens;
- Native support for multiple parallel versions of emulators such as MAME;
- Dynamic marquee monitor support with display of high scores on the marquee;
- A custom rules engine;
- Easy command line game launcher.
- All coded in AHK 2.0 and published on GitHub for easy customizability.
Lastly, although arcadeEIP isn't technically open source, the source code is available upon request for personal/hobbyist (non-commercial) use and modification.
Here's a general introduction video (a bit long and a very early build, but you'll get the idea
):
See MAME Quick Start.txt in the download to get up and running with MAME, then see the documentation for configuring other emulators.
MAME Quick Start (Tutorial #1)
Updated 12/14/2021 - (v.0.3.0.1) Added dynamic marquee feature.
Updated 12/17/2021 - (v.0.3.0.2) Basic support has been added for
hi2txt.
Updated 1/4/2022 - (v.0.3.1.0) Big update. Added formal BigBox support and several important bug fixes.
Updated 1/11/2022 - (v.0.3.1.1) Small update with bug fixes for BigBox and an enhancement for high scores.
Updated 1/13/2022 - (v.0.3.1.2) Important update with support for images (like control maps) on pause, fix for missing icons in game menu, etc.
Updated 2/09/2022 - (v.0.3.2.0) Major update with support for more information on pause, and critical bug fixes.
Updated 2/16/2022 - (v0.3.2.1) Important update with full support for the Elgato Stream Deck. See the following video demonstration.
Updated 5/17/2022 - (v0.3.3.0) Major update. Please do full/from scratch re-install since much has changed. See update.txt for details.
Updated 7/04/2022 - (v0.3.3.1) Hotfix. Fixed discrete menu toggle feature (= and - now work again).
Updated 2/16/2023 - (v0.3.3.2) Hotfix. A couple minor bugs fixed (re-posted 2/27).
Updated 2/28/2023 - (v0.3.3.3) Small feature update. Added discrete quit_key= setting for improved Stream Deck support.
Updated 5/19/2023 - (v0.4.0.0) Ported AHK code from 1.1 to 2.0. Moved source to GitHub (new release location).
Updated 5/24/2023 - (v0.4.0.1) Hotfix: Added missing icon files to ..\Resources\Icons needed for marking favorites and star ratings.
Updated 7/11/2023 - (v0.4.0.2) Feature and Documentation update. Added volume normalization, game lock, better LEDBlinky support, bug/doc fixes.
Updated 1/28/2024 - (v0.4.1.0) Major update with many bug and stability fixes, the additon of manual high score entry, better hot switching, many quality of life changes, etc.
Updated 3/19/2024 - (v0.4.2.0) Major release. Stability fixes, XInput, Scorecard improvements, MAME pre-filtering, Favorites/Star-Ratings import.
Current Release: https://github.com/gildahl/arcadeEIP/releasesDocumentation: https://github.com/gildahl/arcadeEIP/wikiDiscussion: Here on ArcadeControls.com,
LaunchBox forums or
GitHub