which frontends will play attract videos and startup intros?

[Wenis]

Could someone please tell me which frontends allow

[elvis]

AdvanceMenu supports MNG+MP3 combinations to make intro videos.

Crashtest has a huge collection (~4GB) of compatible "videos" on his website:

http://crashtest.retrogames.com/shots/

They look great when used in "screensaver" mode instead of still images.

[Howard_Casto]

1.  Those aren't videos. 

2.  Those are an inefficient and bulky way to get attract animations. 

3.  Literally nothing but advancemenu (makes sense as they are linux freaks)  uses them. 

It's kinda like adding support for ogg vorbis in a front-ends bakground music system.  It's great that it's an open-source alternative to mp3s, but nobody gives a crap as mp3s are the standard, mp3 creation is far easier, and in general, due to their popularity, you can do a whole lot more with mp3s than oggs and it's a whole heck of a lot easier to add mp3 support.

On a final note, mngs are a replacment for animated gifs, NOT mpeg videos.  Do you know how huge a 3 minute attract mode is when converted to uncompressed frames? (Gifs are 256 color while pngs are generally uncompressed 24 bit with an alpha channel)  Even mpegs are smaller.     

We've went over this, but nobody listens to the guy who's right. 

The videos you should use are of the mpeg/avi/divx variety and are floating around the net in bittorrent form.

Literally every single major front end supports them.  The same goes with intro movies. 

 

[elvis]

Wow... anyone else feel a cold draft in here?

What's your definition of a movie?  Animated frames with music? (dot dot dot).

So a WMV encapsulated in AVI framework with mpeg2-layer3 (ie: MP3) embedded audio is somehow different to a series of PNG frames with an mp3 file attached?  Think about it.

MNGs are uncompressed and "un-ugly".  If you want divx/xvid/mpeg/whatever with compression artifacts, be my guest.  Each to their own.  Personally I think it looks extremely poor.  But if that's what you want on your cab, then the choice is entirely yours.

15 seconds of video (yes, crashtest's MNGs are usually 15 seconds - nice and short) without artifacts is plenty for my screen-saver mode.  And kudos to crashtest for building the collection and making the effort.  He puts a bucketload of effort into his site's contents, and I for one am grateful for the stuff he provides for free.

Furthermore, I'm sure I spotted you not less than a week ago giving some other poor sod a blasting because "harddrives were cheap and space doesn't matter".   My apologies if that wasn't you, but I do remember the cause of that argument was that Windows was bulkier than linux, yet hard-disks are cheap and plentiful so it doesn't matter.  So I guess on the same front, 4GB of MNGs really doesn't mean squat to an 80GB hard disk.

Yes, there are plenty of sites that have libraries of AVI's, and plenty of frontends that can use them.  I thought I'd give the non-obvious answer first, and let the rest of you give the answers google could easily provide.

Choice is a wonderful thing.  If only more folks decided to give their opinion, and not bag someone else's in the process.  Different doesn't mean it's wrong.  And hey, if no-one wanted to use MNGs, they wouldn't exist, would they?  Same goes for AdvanceMAME/AdvanceMenu (and linux too). 

And meanwhile, we "linux freaks" aren't wasting our hard-earned beer money on substandard software.  Or maybe that's just me not listening "to the guy who's right".  Silly me.

Or is this a case of "he who shouts loudest is rightest"?

Flame away.

[Minwah]

Howards facts are right, but I have to agree while they do a great job the AVI movies are usually pretty ugly.  I guess it's worth remembering that these are usually 3dArcade videos - ie originally for use with the 3d cabinet models in 3dArcade - I presume the quality/size chosen was based on this.

I'm interested in which 15 seconds Crashtest picks...does it start with the title screen or gameplay demo?  (retrogames.com seems to be down atm)

I would maybe use MNG's if it didn't mean writing support for it in my FE 

[)p(]

I would maybe use MNG's if it didn't mean writing support for it in my FE 

has anybody investigated if there is a direct show filter for mng files?
i know there is a open source mng filter for quikctime that someone a long time ago used in my fe to playback mng's  in the info screen. but i never bothered to look myself if there is a directshow version too. if there is one all fe's that use directshow to show attractmode video's will be able to play the mng's too without any code needed.


about the quality of the attractmode video's. the reason is threefold. the older ones where converted from the older realmedia video's.  the second is as howard pointed out size...in their current form with just a fraction of all mame games done its already a nightmare to distribute them in a reliable manner... third its up to the person who caps the video to decide on the compression rate. Most seem to have used rather high comppressions. Howard did experiment with a few very long ones with low compression but they came out almost as big a chd game 

peter

[Howard_Casto]

I looked )p( 

The centiment with the directx guys (even the non-m$ kind) is pretty much mine. Namely mngs aren't standardized enough and even if they were, the format is kinda dead.  (Let's face it, even the animated gif, which is farily easy to support is pretty much dead except for the web.)  Basically there isn't enough interest for anyone to make a filter.  It wouldn't be terribly hard for someone who knows what their doing to make one though as directshow already supports mp3s and pngs. 

Note:  I don't know what I'm doing as far as filter making is concerned. 

I don't think the quality of the mngs are bad at all, quite the opposite.  It's just that the prettiest car in the world is useless if it doesn't run.  Mngs do offer a better quality, they are just akward, relatively large, and aren't easily supported. 

And btw... saying that there isn't any difference between a compressed streaming image (compressed movies have "virtual frames") and a 24 bit png with an alpha channel just shows you don't know anything about image and video elvis. 

I have nothing against linux users, they are just determined to use file formats that are open source, even if it sacrifices cross-compatability and function.  So they make files that nobody but linux users can easily read and since 98% of the free world has something other than linux on their desktop, they made files that only a limited amount of people can use. 

I wasn't knocking the mngs crashtest made at all.  It's just that the poster asked about attract mode vidoes and startup videos.  He had no clue about either option and you jumped towards the most impractical one.  That's just illogical.  We are here to help people, not give cheap plugs for a format that simply isn't ready yet. 

Just use your head man, do you reccomend the files that only have 15 secs of the attract videos that'll work on only one front end to the average user or do you reccomend the files that are supported by several fes and are generally the full attract mode.  Not only that but they can easily be used in a video screensaver, as textures for peter's models or whatever you can think of. 

If the poster said " I'll be using advance menu" then it would have been great advice, but considering he's here, he'll probably use one of the big 5.  Since none of them support it, he would have downloaded 4 gigs of files for nothing. 

Explain to me how I'm bashing your option again?  From where I sit it's not an option unless you are using advance menu.

So no, whoever's loudest doesn't win.  However, who ever is making the most sense does. 

[elvis]

And btw... saying that there isn't any difference between a compressed streaming image (compressed movies have "virtual frames") and a 24 bit png with an alpha channel just shows you don't know anything about image and video elvis. 

I didn't say there was no difference at a physical level.  I'm well aware of how the majority of the "popular" video formats and framework do work (you'd probably be surprised if I told you what I did for a living).  I was speaking philosophically.  But if you want to persist arguing, go ahead.  I'm not here to prove anything, and I am aware the point is lost on you by now.

I have nothing against linux users, they are just determined to use file formats that are open source, even if it sacrifices cross-compatability and function.  So they make files that nobody but linux users can easily read and since 98% of the free world has something other than linux on their desktop, they made files that only a limited amount of people can use. 

98%?  You'd be suprised by the real numbers.  Let's see... Germany, India, South America, Thialand, China... all Linux.  Wow!  That's more than the entire USA!

But again... keep arguing if you like.  I've found there's no point arguing the finer points of operating systems and standards development with an application-building VB/VS user. 

Explain to me how I'm bashing your option again?  From where I sit it's not an option unless you are using advance menu.

You, my friend, have much to learn about tact.  I understand that after years of answering the same questions you may get a little frustrated (hell, I feel your pain there, trust me!), but I'm not the first you've had a little outburst at, just browsing your post history now.  Or maybe it's just that where I come from folks are a little more subtle and held back in their rantings.  That's probably it.

So no, whoever's loudest doesn't win.  However, who ever is making the most sense does. 

I tell you what, instead of writing yet another post about how I'm so obviously wrong, why don't you take the opportunity to provide a link to the original poster to give them access to the files you claim are that much better than MNGs?  My first post gave a link for further research... two posts later you're far busier stomping on me than helping the poor lad in question.

URLs are tasty for the question-hardy.  So far I'm the only one who's attempted to help the poor soul, who's probably totally disinterested in the thread by now.

[biron]

I have nothing against linux users, they are just determined to use file formats that are open source, even if it sacrifices cross-compatability and function.

[elvis]

I'm interested in which 15 seconds Crashtest picks...does it start with the title screen or gameplay demo?

[Wenis]

The reason I asked this question was that I have dled a bunch of attract videos in a torrent. I was fooling around with some frontends and was wanting to know if anyone knew which FE's would play attract videos. The ones I have  are mpeg4 not mng's. I also would like when I start my cab and my frontend loads up for the frontend to play a short intro movie. That is why I asked which ones would do that.

[Wenis]

I also have tried these attact videos in a Frontend called Ultrastyle and they play fine

[Minwah]

I also would like when I start my cab and my frontend loads up for the frontend to play a short intro movie. That is why I asked which ones would do that.

Well Howard said 'every major front end supports this'...to be more specific hows Dragon King, 3dArcade, Kymaera and MAMEWAH for starters.  Ultrastyle you already mentioned...I'm sure there are others...

[Silver]

Hmmm has anyone run across a MNG  to mpeg/avi convertor? I was thinking for converting Crashtests 4 gig collection into something a lot more usable as Advance mame is not an option for me. I've looked round at several apps but most seem either to only deal with the first 'frame' of the MNG. The only one to claim MNG -> AVI support - MNG Construction set - rejects Crastest's MNG files.

[Lilwolf]

There was a torrent a few months ago that had them all converted.  They are all AVI files and decent quality.

annoyed me since I have support in my frontend... I thought... Ended up that java had to remove avi and many others a while ago because of licensing... I was about to rip it all out (because a 3mg file converted to 20mg to make it work in my frontend)...

but then a week ago I found a AVI codex for java... and it works.. .but I broke my frontend about the same time and still haven't got it working again...  Love giant changes...

[ErikRuud]

I also downloaded the torrent and have been using them with Kymaera.

Some of the larger videos tend to cause the list scrolling in Kymaera to pause for a few seconds.  If I am trying to scroll from game 1 to game 3 in a lsit, it won't go to game 3 until the video for game 2 is loaded.  The screen saver mode in Kymara also tends to cut off the longer videos, because it only displays each game for a certain amount of time.

[Lilwolf]

for the new jfront, I didn't load them for 2 seconds...

and if there isn't a movie file, it will then flip though all snapshots (if you have more then one directory, or if you hit the screen dump in mame (001, 002)...

anyway, the 2 second wait was a requirement to be useable...

[lucindrea]

Hmmm has anyone run across a MNG  to mpeg/avi convertor? I was thinking for converting Crashtests 4 gig collection into something a lot more usable as Advance mame is not an option for me. I've looked round at several apps but most seem either to only deal with the first 'frame' of the MNG. The only one to claim MNG -> AVI support - MNG Construction set - rejects Crastest's MNG files.

i havent worked with mng's but i have done alot of mpegs and a few other formats .. it's never a good idea to go from one compressed format into another , that just makes the video quality drop .. if you MUST convert then it's best to go from compressed -> fully uncompressed ( this normlay ends up a HUGE HUGE file ) -> re-compress in new format. .. but their are a few decent converters out their that sort of do this interneraly , and this isnt HDTV we are talking about so if you find somthing that works then go for it.

[Minwah]

i havent worked with mng's but i have done alot of mpegs and a few other formats .. it's never a good idea to go from one compressed format into another

Shouldn't matter in this context as the MNG's are basically perfect quality.

[Silver]

Cheers for the tips lucindrea - although I'm fairly adept at video compression stuff...

But yes Minwah is correct, MNG's are best thought of as a sequence of PNG images. I don't believe there is any frame-to-frame to compression in MNG's (each frame is stored independently) so is fortunately completely free of any video compression artifacts....


ANyway seeing as someone has done this already...Anyone care to indicate where this torrent for the AVI's is lying around? Cheers....

[Howard_Casto]

i havent worked with mng's but i have done alot of mpegs and a few other formats .. it's never a good idea to go from one compressed format into another

Shouldn't matter in this context as the MNG's are basically perfect quality.

Exactly!  And that's why I hate em.  I've said it 3 times already, here goes the 4th. 

Mng's are a sequence of 24 bit pngs with a true alpha channel (making them 32 bit actually).  That makes em frikkin HUGE!  To put things into perspective, if you were somehow able to compare apples with oranges a virtual frame of a mpeg file with moderate compression would be about 16 bit with no alpha channel and no transparency.  That cuts the file size in half and then considering the mpeg frame can actually be compressed and only add changed data the mng ends up being anywhere from 5 to 20 times larger. 

But I got off-topic there....

lucindrea, you got your wires crossed....

We are converting from an image format to a video format, so as the others said compression is completely irrelevant.  And as pngs generally have no compression, it wouldn't matter anyway. 

[Wenis]

lol

I guess I opened up a can of worms didnt I?
 

[Silver]

I agree - It really would be a lot more sensible to have all these in a compressed format.

In which case - where can I track down this torrent of the MNGs converted to avis? Anyone? Pretty please?

[Silver]

Just want to bump to this to ask if someone has the torrent for Crashtest's videos converted to avi's? or is it too late....

or any other sources?

thanks