[QUOTE=satoso;50620]Where are the photos with the background?
Thank you!!! :-)[/QUOTE] Can someone here on the forum post instructions on how to use the overlays for Vectrex? What I am looking for. If I boot up Berzerk then the over lay will pull up for Berzerk, If I Boot up Pole Position. Up come the over lay for that and so on…
Instructions are in my first post. There is no current way to have the correct overlay work with every game because I don’t know the directory Retroarch looks for it’s Vectrex config files. If it’s just “Vectrex” then I will add instructions to the first post.
For a quick setup just simply load your Vectrex rom/game as usual then goto the overlay section in Retroarch’s menu and point to where you put the overlays and go from there. There are only a handful of Vextrex games ever released, 20+, so there will only ever be 20+ overlays. I probably won’t do any Public Domain games because I lack the time, and all will require custom home-made overlays.
When I get the time I will upload the finished set, maybe the weekend.
The folder should be named ‘Vecx’.
In case anyone didn’t know already, you can download any/all of the public domain Vectrex games from the ‘add content’ menu.
Well what I was hoping is not going to work based on what you’re telling me. What I was hoping was to get it working on retro arch which I then point over to rocket launcher and through rocket launcher I have a work through hyper spin. but if I understand what you’re telling me there is no way in retro arch for it to auto pick the corresponding game overlay is that correct? What about the config file you mentioned? Cant this configure file be be modified that it will allow the picking of the various overlays? If not then I’m back to rocket launcher and trying to get the overlays to work there
You should be able to use game-specific config overrides, which you can create from the GUI in the latest nightlies. Just load a game, set up the overlay for it and then save the game-specific overlay from the menu.
Going on from what Hunterk said. Create a folder named Vecx in your config folder. Create a vectrex config for one game, get all your settings correct along with the overlay for that game providing there is one (I only uploaded a few), make sure it works then name the config file the same as the rom/game file and put it in the config/Vecx folder. To make sure other games do the same, make copies of the config file you created and name them the same as the rom/game files. Edit them to manually change the overlay to match the game and thats it.
There is no other way to do this so a bit of manual config work is necessary for custom overlays matched to each game. You also have to have per game config enabled in all your config files.
If I get time I will make a few and upload them so they’re ready to go straight from the download. Unfortunately, I am in the middle of changing my main PC’s case, parts, etc… to change it from a Desktop to a Media Centre so I can’t help much at the moment.
I really wish I understood what you said…You should be able to use game-specific config overrides, which you can create from the GUI in the latest nightlies. Sorry right after that I am now lost.
let me say I a really noob at this… I work and learn best by Step By step. I really think you’re idea is the solution I am looking for.
There’s not much to it: Using a recent nightly, just load up the core and whatever game, go back into the menu and go to settings > onscreen display > onscreen overlay and pick the appropriate one for the game. If you need to move the screen around, go to settings > video and set the aspect ratio to ‘custom’ and then use the custom viewport options to move it into place.
Once everything looks the way you want it to look, go back into the quick menu and choose ‘save game overrides.’ From then on, whenever you load that game, it should bring up those settings automatically.
But what’s a NIGHTLY…?
It’s a recent build of RetroArch. We’ve added a lot of features since the 1.3.6 release and creating overrides from the menu is one of them.
Assuming you’re using 64-bit Windows, download this: https://buildbot.libretro.com/nightly/windows/x86_64/2016-11-29_RetroArch.7z Backup/rename your retroarch.exe and retroarch_debug.exe and then copy the ones from that archive into your RetroArch installation directory. That will get you updated.
This doesn’t work i go to load core… vectrex
Load content…select file find a rom…Berzek. And that will have the game start… so I go to settings On screen display…on screen overlay…and I get a menu display overlay on or off auto prfuered over lay on or off hide overlay ovelay preset. Where do I pick the over lay. I tried clicking on preset and parent directory No items and the overlays are in there
this doesn’t work
overlays need a cfg that contain a few lines of metadata. Look at the other border overlay cfgs to see what it looks like.
I am in the Overlay file and there is NO CONFIG FILES there just my Vectrex overlays!
I was referring to ones like this: You can see that in there it has a line that points to a png and some other lines that tell RetroArch how to display the image. You need to make one like that.
And how do I do that in retro arch as I have explained earlier where I go through the menus in retro arch there is no place for me to pick the overlay. so do I just take a text editor and type it up I’m sorry I am totally confused by what you are telling me it is not clear. As I explained earlier I tried to make a CFG file using Retro Arch. And can’t make a CFg file. I understand once I make one CFG file then I could then use the text editor and make clones of the original to reflect all of the games that I have and those CFG files would then go on to the overlay file, I get that, but I cant get retro arch to make one CFG file to start with. It seems to me that if I go through the menus of retro arch to set up a game and an overlay that a CFG file would be created make sense? But I can’t get Retro Arch to do that!
RetroArch doesnt make overlay .cfg files. Users create those themselves to match their images and the whole host of other things overlays can accomplish.
Open your retroarch folder
go to overlays-> borders (So long as you have gone to Settings- Online Updater and updated your overlays in RetroArch)
Now look at the borders folder and the images/cfg files. That is what you are aiming for with the Vectrex stuff. “gamename”.png “gamename.cfg”
Here is an example from the pack in the 1st post of this thread
The contents of the .cfg file is very simple
This is what it should have[B]
overlays = 1
overlay0_overlay = Vectrex_Blitz.png (Change the name in each one to match the game specific png)
overlay0_full_screen = true
overlay0_descs = 0
[/B]
Next step is to get all your config files sorted so when you launch the game the correct Overlay image comes straight up
Ok let’s say I was making. A cfg file for Berzerk
[B]
overlays = 1
overlay0_overlay = Berzerk (World).png
overlay0_full_screen = true
overlay0_descs = 0
Is the File name " Berzek (World).cfg"?
and if the is correct…I would repeat the process. For the next game. Example Pole Position…
[/B][B]overlays = 1
overlay0_overlay = Pole Position (World).png
overlay0_full_screen = true
overlay0_descs = 0 [/B][B] #########################
Am I correct?
and this new Cfg is aldo stored in the Overlays folder…?.. correct?
and what commands in the menu for retro arch am I to click on to Load Berzerk… and at the same time load the Overlay? [/B]
Yes you are correct.
The file name is unimportant for the cfg file. The png file name MUST match the overlay0_overlay = in the cfg as you stated above.
So to load the Berzek one
Drop the Berzerk png and cfg into your overlays folder
GO To Settings -> Onscreen Overlay
Display Overlay = ON Overlay Preset = (Navigate to and select the Berzerk.cfg file)
Those are the steps for loading an overlay BUT If you do what I have just explained this will load the Berzerk overlay for EVERY game you load with the Vectrex core.
To get it to load different Overlays for eaxh game you will need to do exactly the same thing AND also create a per game override that will change the .cfg file retroarch will look for when loading the overlay.
I dont fully know how to do that so cant help you with that step
The rough process IF you are using a recent Nightlie versions is built into the RetroArch menus
Now do that for all your games
Okay so if I grasp what you were telling me, is that if I load in Pole position The CFG file Will bring up that overly, but if I ask for a new game (Berzerk example) It will bring up the same overlay From the previous game, I would have to them manually change it to the overlay that I want , And if want to go back to Pole position the overlay for Berzerk will come up…is this what you’re telling me?
yep you got it.
Its fairly easy now to avoid this situation with the new config structure. I just have not done it yet.
It is just a couple of settings to change then you will get it how you want it.
What exact version of RetroArch are you using and what device are you using??
You need to make another cfg file for each game. This cfg file will tell retroarch the name of the overlay specifc to each game. They have to be located in the “config” folder but thats about all I really know at the moment