Extras (Screenshots etc.)

Extras are image files containing Screenshots, Cover-Art, Media scans etc.

The supported file types for extras are .png and .jpg images.

In the extras root directory the following directories are expected:

The movie directory doesn't have any subdirectories.

Metropolis Launcher distinguishes between MOBY Extras and USER Extras, see below.

MOBY Extras

Metropolis Launcher is able to download and show extras from the mobygames.com site under the condition that the game is linked to mobygames meta data (which it should be in most cases). These downloads take place on-demand, i.e. an extra for a game is downloaded when the game is selected or the next extra is accessed by clicking the viewer or triggered by a slideshow event.

The sub-directory moby of the extras directory (see Settings screen) will be used to cache all downloaded extras. They will be organized by extra type (screenshots, cover-art etc.) and platform (c64, dos, gen, snes etc.).

You can deactivate the automatic download in the Settings screen.

You can manage MOBY Extras in Games & Emulation Main Screen by hovering your cursor over the currently shown image (or even the empty space if your game doesn't have any), open up the context menu (right click) and choose Open MOBY Extras Manager.

The MOBY Extras Manager allows you to rearrange and hide extras of the game.

USER Extras

USER Extras are provided by the user and are organized in the emulation directory. It has a subdirectory for each supported platform, to see a full list, check the Short Name of each platform within the Platform Settings dialog.

Each platform subdirectory should contain one or more of the following extra type subdirectories:

The following example shows how the extras directory structure would look like:

With this example, the extras directory in the Settings area should be set to G:\Frontends\MetropolisLauncher\extras.

Info on the USER Extras file names

Metropolis Launcher searches for appropriate files in the extras directory structure when a game is selected in the Games & Emulation Main Screen.
 

Note: if more than one extra exists of the same type, Metropolis Launcher uses the suffix starting with "_001".

Search for missing USER Extras

Metropolis Launcher helps you to find games that have no USER extra (either any extra or an extra of a certain kind) by following these simple steps:

1. Open the Games & Emulation Main Screen

2. (Optional) Set up filters

   If you want to only check games of a certain platform, choose the according platform

3. Open the context menu of the game list (right click) and choose Search for missing Extras

   In this example, we'll search for missing extras in SEGA - Genesis / Mega Drive games.

4. (A Dialog pops up) Choose the Extras category and press OK

   In this example we choose any (Search for any missing extra)

5. (After a while) Every game having missing extras is displayed in bold in the games list

6. (Optional, but very useful) Make sure that the "Highlighted" column is visible and filter by its checked state

   Every game in bold is "highlighted", that means, the "Highlighted" field will be checked, every other game's "Highlighted" field will be left unchecked. We can filter by the "Highlighted" column in order to display only the games whose Extras are missing.

6.1 Find the "Highlighted" column in the list or, if not visible, drag and drop it from the Customization form by opening the context menu (right click) on the column headers and choose "Column Chooser"

6.2 Filter by "Highlighted" = checked by clicking the checkbox in the auto filter row (top most)