Best Genesis emulator for cab...

[Odonadon]

Well, I've played around with Gens and Genecyst, and they're both good, but I have to use the keyboard if I want to quit the stupid game.

Does anyone know of a Genesis emulator that takes the ESC command as quit?  I have a SNES and TG16 emulators that behave properly, for christ sakes.  There must be one somewhere!

And no, I'm not using any of Howard's wrappers, or Lazarus for that matter.  I don't have the time to figure those out

Odonadon

[Minwah]

IMO Gens is THE Genesis emulator.  But yes, it is a pain not being able to exit on escape - I guess this is at the bottom of priorities for the programmer...

Use Howards commandline wrapper, it takes 5 minutes to setup and you don't have to use Lazarus...

[Superdude]

Use M.E.S.S.  Supports everything with MAME key settings.

[Jakobud]

Gens is the best, but yes, you have to use the stupid mouse to right click in the screen and choose quit.  Howard has some sort of wrapper that is suppose to make this a one click procedure but I couldn't figure it out.  Other here have though.

[Minwah]

Use M.E.S.S.  Supports everything with MAME key settings.

Not sure what it's like now, but last time I tried it Genesis emulation was very limited.

Gens is the best, but yes, you have to use the stupid mouse to right click in the screen and choose quit.  Howard has some sort of wrapper that is suppose to make this a one click procedure but I couldn't figure it out.  Other here have though.

Alt+F4 *may* be easier for some (most people have a button for Alt at least).

For Howards wrapper:

1) Download it,
2) Bung 'cmd-launch.exe' and 'lconfig.ini' into your emus directory,
3) Edit 'lconfig.ini' and alter accordingly,
4) Setup your emu in your FE but substitute the .exe name for 'cmd-launch.exe'
5) Try it ('log.txt' is created for debugging)

Note that I have been using v3.0, I just realised Howard has released v4.0.  Also, I'm using XP, I seem to remember having more trouble when I used '98 and wrapper v1.0.

FWIW I don't think a dedicated Genesis emu exists that natively allows exiting using the escape key

[Odonadon]

For Howards wrapper:

1) Download it,
2) Bung 'cmd-launch.exe' and 'lconfig.ini' into your emus directory,
3) Edit 'lconfig.ini' and alter accordingly,
4) Setup your emu in your FE but substitute the .exe name for 'cmd-launch.exe'
5) Try it ('log.txt' is created for debugging)

Well, I got the wrapper working.  I'm not sure how to tell it to use my ESC key as the exit key, however.  Can anyone give me a hand?  I can't find any documentation on Howard's site for this

Odonadon

[visciouslymamed]

I'm not sure how to tell it to use my ESC key as the exit key, however.

If you are using the wrapper then it should kill the gens window when the wrapper closes (when you press ESC ).

It seems that any request for cmd line options or remapped exit key has been largely ignored in the forum. General replies are why would you ever want to use a cmd line. Or one of my favs

Gens is for windows, not dos.

What??

Now that Gens is open source, I was hoping that one of the talented programmers here could take a look at the source and hopefully add some cmd line switches and remap the exit key.

Probably the most useful switch would be to load different gens.cfg files. I have several cfgs for different setups SegaCD_iso, SegaCD_disc, PerfectSynchro, 32x, gens (default), etc. It would be great to load the correct cfg from the cmd line, instead of having to use the gui.

I have never gotten a reply from St

[Odonadon]

If you are using the wrapper then it should kill the gens window when the wrapper closes (when you press ESC ).

It seems that any request for cmd line options or remapped exit key has been largely ignored in the forum. General replies are why would you ever want to use a cmd line. Or one of my favs

In Gens, the ESC key pauses the game.  It doesn't matter how long I hold it down for, it won't quit - only pause.  Am I doing something wrong?

Thanks,
Odonadon

[Minwah]

I think in V2.0 or maybe 1.0, you had to pass something like -keyx 27 (27 being the keycode for escape).

But in V3.0 it seems to do it automatically on mine...anyone else?

I think I emailed Steph too once about the escape key thing...basically the response was that he didn't plan adding it anytime soon.  Which is fair enough, I'm sure he has enough to do...

[Odonadon]

I think in V2.0 or maybe 1.0, you had to pass something like -keyx 27 (27 being the keycode for escape).

But in V3.0 it seems to do it automatically on mine...anyone else?

I think I emailed Steph too once about the escape key thing...basically the response was that he didn't plan adding it anytime soon.  Which is fair enough, I'm sure he has enough to do...

I was using the command line wrapper 4.0 .  And ESC only paused Gens.  No quitting .  I'll try version 3.0.

Odonadon

[Odonadon]

Just tried version 3.0 - same thing.  ESC just pauses it.  Is there another quit key combo accessable through MAME default key layouts?

Thanks,
Odonadib

[Odonadon]

I'm not clear on the purpose of the wrappers if it won't let me quit the emulator using ESC.....  Am I missing something?

Odonadon

[Howard_Casto]

Since I'm such a nice guy, I downloaded the gens emulator just to try it with my wrappers.  It works with every version of my wrappers so I'm not sure what you guys are doing wrong.  (Or differences in setup, gens version ect....) My best guess would be you have auto pause turned on and it's causing issues.  I couldn't get it to not exit though so it's rather hard to troubleshoot.  


Btw odonadon the documentation is in the lazarus online manual under "wrappers."  (who'd have thunk it)  It's probably not up to date but it should explain what you are asking about and the purpose of the wrappers.  

[Odonadon]

Btw odonadon the documentation is in the lazarus online manual under "wrappers."  (who'd have thunk it)  It's probably not up to date but it should explain what you are asking about and the purpose of the wrappers.  

Well, to clarify, I wasn't aware the wrappers were part of Lazarus as they are a separate download.  Which is why I didn't look in the Lazarus manual, which may also be why ESC isn't working for me - I'm not running Lazarus.  At least, that's what I gather from the documentation

"My wrappers take the standard mame-style command line sent by Lazarus and translate it into data that the emulator can understand be it via simulated key presses for windows emus or translated command line options for command-line-based ones. "

Since there's no Lazarus to send commands to the wrapper, it won't work?  But Minwah said I don't have to use Lazarus for it to work...

Since I'm such a nice guy, I downloaded the gens emulator just to try it with my wrappers.  It works with every version of my wrappers so I'm not sure what you guys are doing wrong.  (Or differences in setup, gens version ect....) My best guess would be you have auto pause turned on and it's causing issues.  I couldn't get it to not exit though so it's rather hard to troubleshoot.  

Is auto pause an option in Gens?  If so, I didn't see it when looking through the options.  I've tried the escape command from my arcade setup (Ipac) and from the keyboard - no dice.  It just pauses the game.  Nothing more.  All I've changed in the ini file is the executable name.

Thanks,
Odonadon

[joeblade]

Howard, just for my own curiosity, how does your code work, with regards to the command line wrapper intercepting the key strokes, checking if its the 'exit'' key and then terminating the child process.

I did a minimum of windows coding quite a long while ago (hence consider me knowing very little about windows programming then), but I assumed that all keystroke event messages would go to the current active window, which would be the emulator. How does the command line wrapper intercept or know of the key press ?

Feel free to not answer this question (for whatever reason, too complex, top secret etc ..), I will live without knowing the answer, just curious (as I get, a lot).

Oh, and well done on lazarus .... great FE.

 

[Howard_Casto]

Btw odonadon the documentation is in the lazarus online manual under "wrappers."  (who'd have thunk it)  It's probably not up to date but it should explain what you are asking about and the purpose of the wrappers.  

Well, to clarify, I wasn't aware the wrappers were part of Lazarus as they are a separate download.  Which is why I didn't look in the Lazarus manual, which may also be why ESC isn't working for me - I'm not running Lazarus.  At least, that's what I gather from the documentation

"My wrappers take the standard mame-style command line sent by Lazarus and translate it into data that the emulator can understand be it via simulated key presses for windows emus or translated command line options for command-line-based ones. "

Since there's no Lazarus to send commands to the wrapper, it won't work?  But Minwah said I don't have to use Lazarus for it to work...

Since I'm such a nice guy, I downloaded the gens emulator just to try it with my wrappers.  It works with every version of my wrappers so I'm not sure what you guys are doing wrong.  (Or differences in setup, gens version ect....) My best guess would be you have auto pause turned on and it's causing issues.  I couldn't get it to not exit though so it's rather hard to troubleshoot.  

Is auto pause an option in Gens?  If so, I didn't see it when looking through the options.  I've tried the escape command from my arcade setup (Ipac) and from the keyboard - no dice.  It just pauses the game.  Nothing more.  All I've changed in the ini file is the executable name.

Thanks,
Odonadon

You can replace "lazarus" with game launcher or any other fe capable of sending mame style syntax.  What you pass to it is the rom name/path you just don't have to translate anything so the portion between the cmdlist brackets of the ini can be deleted.  


The option is in gens misc options.  But I don't think that's it either as i turned it on and was still able to exit.  Something is off somewhere, I just don't know what.  

[Howard_Casto]

Howard, just for my own curiosity, how does your code work, with regards to the command line wrapper intercepting the key strokes, checking if its the 'exit'' key and then terminating the child process.

I did a minimum of windows coding quite a long while ago (hence consider me knowing very little about windows programming then), but I assumed that all keystroke event messages would go to the current active window, which would be the emulator. How does the command line wrapper intercept or know of the key press ?

Feel free to not answer this question (for whatever reason, too complex, top secret etc ..), I will live without knowing the answer, just curious (as I get, a lot).

Oh, and well done on lazarus .... great FE.

 

The keystrokes of any app must first pass through the keyboard buffer.  I passively check the buffer for the keys I am looking for.  I first try a manual exit "simulating alt-f4" and then I systematically close all apps and child apps of the emulator I launched.  The only problem is some apps (particularly those that started thier life in dos or with a dos library) don't respond to the message sent to close the app. (As they aren't coded with a m$ language they don't evne know wtf to make of the message.) This is why they don't work 100% of the time on 100% of the emulators out there.  They work on a great deal of them though.  

I hate to point the blame to the emu devs, but it's actually the way they coded their apps that causes some of them not to work with the wrappers.  Having 100% windows compliance isn't a top priority for them or they are not aware that the coding lang they chose doesn't fully support all external messages.  I'm not saying that's a bad thing, or that this is a fault of bad code (they are simply too good for me to even joke at that), it just seems like many of these console developers who preach "this is a windows app" should actually put their money where their mouth is.  

[joeblade]

Thanks for the speedy response ... curiosity satisfied !

 

[Odonadon]

The option is in gens misc options.  But I don't think that's it either as i turned it on and was still able to exit.  Something is off somewhere, I just don't know what.  

That's odd.  I'm using Gens 2.11 launched from Game Launcher.  So everyone is saying ESC should work?

Odonadon

[Cave]

I have just tried using this wrapper myself and it works perfectly, I only had to adjust two lines. Do exactly as Minwah says then edit your fe config, change gens.exe to cmd-launch.exe and in the iconfig.ini change to this exe=gens.exe.

Thanks Howard and Minwah

[Odonadon]

I have just tried using this wrapper myself and it works perfectly, I only had to adjust two lines. Do exactly as Minwah says then edit your fe config, change gens.exe to cmd-launch.exe and in the iconfig.ini change to this exe=gens.exe.

Thanks Howard and Minwah

Yep, done.  Does not work for me.  I do not get it.  When you press ESC, it quits right away?  Or do you hold down ESC for any length of time?  

Someone PLEASE clarify for me that we are using the ESC key and nothing else.  I'm the only one mentioning this key here

Odonadon

[Howard_Casto]

Dude I told ya to read the docs....  Yes escape is the default exit key.  

[Thumpa]

I have the same problem running Gens via GameLauncher.I want it to work and I know it will with H.C's wrapper , but like many others i just can't get it to escape back to Gamelauncher.I have wasted 4 weekends trying.
Can someone please,please post there wrapper config and put us out of our misery.Ive given it a honest go but can't get it to work.
Also now Gens is open source ,does anyone think they can make a version with MAME default keys?.Life would be perfect then!!

Thumpa

[Amra]

I dont know if there is anyone here who is any good at API, I am, but I no longer have Visual Studio.  It would seem to be quite easy to make a VB that runs in the Background (using less resources then even the Idle thread on XP) and simply does macros.  I.E. A keypress does a series of keypresses, or application specific presses.  

Heck, give me a copy of Visual Studio and Ill make it!  

[Odonadon]

Okay, well I copied my Gens folder from the arcade to my WinXP machine and tried it from the command line - ESC quits Gens.  It works.  

Then I thought it was a Game Launcher thing.  So I copied that too and tried it.  Works like a charm!  

It's either a Win98SE thing, or has something to do with my i-pac.  It's very weird.  I'll do some more fooling around and see what I come up with.

Odonadon

[Howard_Casto]

I dont know if there is anyone here who is any good at API, I am, but I no longer have Visual Studio.  It would seem to be quite easy to make a VB that runs in the Background (using less resources then even the Idle thread on XP) and simply does macros.  I.E. A keypress does a series of keypresses, or application specific presses.  

Heck, give me a copy of Visual Studio and Ill make it!  

This is essentially what my wrappers already do.

[Howard_Casto]

Okay, well I copied my Gens folder from the arcade to my WinXP machine and tried it from the command line - ESC quits Gens.  It works.  

Then I thought it was a Game Launcher thing.  So I copied that too and tried it.  Works like a charm!  

It's either a Win98SE thing, or has something to do with my i-pac.  It's very weird.  I'll do some more fooling around and see what I come up with.

Odonadon

I have 98 users, so my guess is the ipac..... however I have an ipac and it works fine with it.  A nuesance about 98 is that timers created in 9X are very inaccurate.  In other words in the lconfig make sure the check time is fairly low (like 100 or less.)  

The calls I use are backwards compatable with 98 and I originally wrote many of them in Me! So there must be another factor you aren't seeing.

[Minwah]

Note that I have been using v3.0, I just realised Howard has released v4.0.  Also, I'm using XP, I seem to remember having more trouble when I used '98 and wrapper v1.0.

I never did figure why I couldn't get it to work in '98, sorry

[Thumpa]

So does any one have a working Gens wrapper they would like to share??
I just can't get it to work
I am using 98Se and both Gamelauncher + Mamewah and can't get it to exit back to Front end after playing gens.
Im using default paths for all emus.

Will the new version of mamewah include a wrapper in its setup?
So close and yet so far.
Other info: using jpac+arcadevga on a 29" horizontal Namco cab.

 

[Howard_Casto]

So does any one have a working Gens wrapper they would like to share??
I just can't get it to work
I am using 98Se and both Gamelauncher + Mamewah and can't get it to exit back to Front end after playing gens.
Im using default paths for all emus.

Will the new version of mamewah include a wrapper in its setup?
So close and yet so far.
Other info: using jpac+arcadevga on a 29" horizontal Namco cab.

 

The whole point of the wrappers is that third party fe's do't have to be coded specifically for them.  They were originally designed for Lazarus though.  

[Thumpa]

Here is my wrapper Iconfig.ini I put into my Gens Dir.
I point my FE's to cmd-launch.exe instead of Gens.exe.
The game launches but does not quit when I press Esc.It just pauses.Any idea's  from anyone?Win 98se + GL & Mamewah.
 

#this is a config file for the command line launcher wrapper program
#turn on wordwrap for best viewing results

#put the two titles of the emu's window following these comments in the "handles" brackets

# number 1 should be the caption of the emu at ilde
# number 2 is optional and is the caption of the emu in full screen mode with a game running (using ctrl-alt-delete while running a game is the best way to determine this
# please fill in number 2 if possible as it adds to the launchers stability and efficiency. If it's non-standard (some emus tack on the game name making each instance have a diff caption) put a "null" on the line following the first entry.

{handles}
Gens - idle
null
{/handles}

#each command in an emu is usually followed by a delimeter (in mame it's a "-" for example)  put this deliemter in the following line

delimeter=-


#put the mame command followed by a ";" and the command that does the same thing in the emu your launching (like in zinc to launch a game you type it's number so sfex;1 would launch sfex for you)

{cmdlist}
{/cmdlist}

#put the name of the emulator you wish to launch immediately following this comment
exe=gens.exe

#Some emus don't like spaces in the filenames or paths
#turn this on to send a short filename to the emu
Short=0

#that's it! enjoy!  if you are using this wrapper in conjunction with Raging Dragon, please be sure to setup your emulator.cfg file.  Oh and don't forget to make/download a catver.ini file and a clrmamepro file for your emulator and regenerate your gamelist.  

[Howard_Casto]

Here is my wrapper Iconfig.ini I put into my Gens Dir.
I point my FE's to cmd-launch.exe instead of Gens.exe.
The game launches but does not quit when I press Esc.It just pauses.Any idea's  from anyone?Win 98se + GL & Mamewah.
 

#this is a config file for the command line launcher wrapper program
#turn on wordwrap for best viewing results

#put the two titles of the emu's window following these comments in the "handles" brackets

# number 1 should be the caption of the emu at ilde
# number 2 is optional and is the caption of the emu in full screen mode with a game running (using ctrl-alt-delete while running a game is the best way to determine this
# please fill in number 2 if possible as it adds to the launchers stability and efficiency. If it's non-standard (some emus tack on the game name making each instance have a diff caption) put a "null" on the line following the first entry.

{handles}
Gens - idle
null
{/handles}

#each command in an emu is usually followed by a delimeter (in mame it's a "-" for example)  put this deliemter in the following line

delimeter=-


#put the mame command followed by a ";" and the command that does the same thing in the emu your launching (like in zinc to launch a game you type it's number so sfex;1 would launch sfex for you)

{cmdlist}
{/cmdlist}

#put the name of the emulator you wish to launch immediately following this comment
exe=gens.exe

#Some emus don't like spaces in the filenames or paths
#turn this on to send a short filename to the emu
Short=0

#that's it! enjoy!  if you are using this wrapper in conjunction with Raging Dragon, please be sure to setup your emulator.cfg file.  Oh and don't forget to make/download a catver.ini file and a clrmamepro file for your emulator and regenerate your gamelist.  

That's a config file for the very first command line wrapper.  Try a newer one as they exit better.  (The latest would probably be best)

[Jakobud]

Why doesn't someone just edit the stupid Gens source code since it's open source now.  I would love it if someone did this...

[Howard_Casto]

Why doesn't someone just edit the stupid Gens source code since it's open source now.  I would love it if someone did this...

Honestly... because most people here are more interested in arcade emulators (myself included).  Maybe you should ask on the gens board?

[Jakobud]

I have suggested on the board that it would be nice to have programmable keys or press ESC = exit program.  Little or no responses from anyone on there

[Rahzel]

Anyone get this figured out?

[Odonadon]

Anyone get this figured out?

The solution seems to be Howard's wrapper.  Some of us can't get it to work, however.

Odonadon

[joeblade]

Alternatively there is my attempt at a command line wrapper ... I quite happily have gens configured to exit with it.

Refer to the following thread for more details:

http://www.arcadecontrols.org/yabbse/index.php?board=3;action=display;threadid=6741

Cheers

[Rahzel]

Cool I'll download it and see if it works! Do you use Win98 or WinXP? I was just experimenting with Howards wrapper and it works fine in XP, but no luck in 98. This was with a few tested emulators too, not just Gens :( (my cab runs off Win98)

[joeblade]

I use XP ... give it a go on 98 though, as if it doesn't work, I will fix it pronto.

I have a 98 partition at home, so I will give it a whirl myself aswell.

Cheers