Anyway to not exit to windows?

[javeryh]

I'm running mame with Game Launcher (finally!) and I was wondering if there was a way to stop someone who is playing from exiting to windows using the esc button.  When a game is running you hit exsc once to exit the game and go back to the game selection screen but if you hit the esc button again from there you go back to windows which kills the "arcadeyness" of the whole thing.  Is there a way around this?

[Samstag]

Remap either the gamelauncher quit key (don't know how to do that, sorry), or the mame quit key in mame.ini.  I think it would be simplest to change the gamelauncher quit key to something that isn't even on your control panel so you have to use the keyboard to get to windows.

[SirPoonga]

What Samstag said, then the only way to get to windows is use a keyboard.

Or if you don't need windows at all there's information around on how to make your FE the windows shell.

[javeryh]

What Samstag said, then the only way to get to windows is use a keyboard.

Or if you don't need windows at all there's information around on how to make your FE the windows shell.

Thanks.  Ok, so if I make game launcher my windows shell that should eliminate the problem because there wouldn't be anything to exit out of, right?

[jcrouse]

If you don't change the ESC key it will still take you back to Windows. It's just that windows will be a solid light gray screen if you use your FE as the shell. From that screen you can then hit CTRL-ALT-DEL to open task manager, then click on File, Run and type in explorer.exe if you get stuck in a corner.

John

[SirPoonga]

oh yeah, you'd get that blank screen. It still wouldn;t look like windows but it will be annoying.

Yeah, best bet is make the exit key for the FE it's own keypress that isn;t mapped to anything on the control panel.

[javeryh]

OK, so I can (1) map the esc key to a button on my CP to exit a game and go back to the games list and (2) map an entirely different button (perhaps hidden) to exit to windows.  Won't I have to somehow tell game launcher that a different button is being used to exit game launcher than is being used to exit a particular game?  Maybe I'm just confused...

[SirPoonga]

Right.  I don't recall if game launcher's keys are configurable.

If they aren't then you change the emulator's quit button to something that you map on your control panel and not have "esc" available on your control panel.

Basically, get it so your quit on your control panel is different than that of game launcher.  This will may or may not require 1) remapping the controls on the control panel 2) remapping keys in game launcher 3) remapping keys in your emulators

[Todd H]

Game Launcher's keys are configurable.  I've set mine to exit by pressing "Q" on the keyboard.  In the config file, look for this...

quit_key =

There is a file included with Game Launcher called scancode.txt.  It is the list of keyboard scancodes.  For me, the scancode value of the "Q" key is 17.  So in my config file I have the following line...

quit_key = 17

Works like a charm.   

[javeryh]

Game Launcher's keys are configurable.

[lucindrea]

set your windows shell to a batch file that "calls" the emulator , then runs it'self ..

what this will do is run your emulator , then sit in the background ( taking a whole 8k of memory ) , then when the emulator ends the batch file will end by running it's self ,  and the new "self" calls the emulator ... etc ...

that or if the emulator allows you to run a program on exit have it run it'self.