The Back Button takes you back to the initial screen of Metropolis Launcher.

The Platform Dropdown allows you to pre-select a platform. This helps in reducing loading times from the database. You can, however, keep it at "All Platforms" and filter the platform on the main table in the Platform column.

When you use the button, the Platform Settings dialog opens where you can decide, which platforms should be visible within Metropolis Launcher.

The Filterset Dropdown allows you to save and load Filtersets based on the filters of the main table.

Use the button to add a new Filterset.

Use the button to delete the current Filterset.

Use the button to edit the current Filterset.

The Developer Dropdown lists all available developers (individual persons). When you select a developer from the list, the main table will list all of your games the developer has worked in.

Use the button to open the Developer Info dialog for the current developer.

The Group Dropdown lists all available Game Groups. When you select a Game Group from the list, the main table will list all of your games that are organized in that Game Group.

Use the button to open the Group Info dialog for the current Game Group.

While you can use the Find Panel of the main table (CTRL+F) to search any data in any column, the database-wide search allows to do a combined search over the following fields (the ones in bold can't be searched with the Find Panel):

When you performed a Similarity Calculation and saved the results, you can load them by selecting an entry in the list of the Similarity Selector.

Select a challenge here and you will only see the games associated to this challenge. If your user is bound to a certain challenge, you won't be able to select another challenge or deselect it.

Use the button to edit the challenge.

The checkbox allows you to also view games of previous tiers of the selected challenge.

Read more about RetroAchievements and Challenges here.

The Quick Filter area is hidden by default, you can open it up by clicking the spacer on the left. The Quick Filter allows you to easily filter by relevant meta-data.

Read more about filtering and the Quick Filter here.

The Main Table lists all your games. Read more about tables including sorting, grouping, filtering here.

Launch a game by double clicking or pressing Enter.

Open up the context menu by right click, MENU button on the keyboard or pressing SHIFT+F10 in the table area or a game entry. See below for details on context menu entries.

Left click the image viewer to cycle through available images.

Open up the context menu of the image viewer by performing a right click. You can:

The Details area is divided up in tabs. You can select the tabs by either clicking the tab headers or cycle though them by pressing Ctrl+Tab. Read below about each tab within the Details area.

Summary

The summary shows the following information (if available)

Technical Specs

If technical specs meta data is found for the current game, it will be presented in a tabular form. Hover with your mouse over an entry and you get a more thorough description.

Statistics

If you have Statistics enabled (see Settings), you will get the following information:

Note: You can set up a minimum playtime for a session to be added to the statistics in the Settings.

Rating

Rate your games by Gameplay, Graphics, Sound, Story and/or Personal slant. Just click and drag the stars to the right. If you want to remove a rating, click and drag the stars to the left.

You can also edit Rating Weights here.

Groups

MobyGames allows the definition of arbitrary groups and the organization of multiple games within each group. If the currently selected game is part of one or more groups, you'll have them listed here.

Via context menu (right click) you can open the Group Info or apply a filter by the selected group.

Staff

Every individual developer that worked on the game is listed here.

Via context menu (right click) you can open the Developer Info or apply a filter by the selected developer.

Achievements

Provided

- the game (and platform) is supported by RetroAchievements

- you have an account at https://retroachievements.org

- you set up the login credentials in the Settings page

the Achievements tab lists the available achievements for the currently selected game. The achievements are grouped by Remaining, Unlocked (Casual) and Unlocked (Hardcore) achievements.

If you selected or are bound by a challenge, the Achievments tab shows any open achievement for the selected game necessary for the current challenge / tier to be completed.

Press the Launch menu item to launch the game with the default emulator defined for the game's platform.

You can open up the sub menu to get a list of available emulators to choose from:

In the example above you see multiple emulators configured for the SEGA Genesis / Mega Drive platform. The global default emulator is RetroArch with the Picodrive Genesis core. The game has a game-specific default emulator set up, which is the BizHawk 1.9.4 (this emulator would also be launched by doubleclick or pressing Enter on the game's entry or by pressing the Launch menu item).

You can define the global default emulator in the Emulator Settings.

You can define the game specific default emulator by opening Edit Game.

On generic emulated platforms:

Hold the SHIFT key and Metropolis Launcher shows the complete command line used to launch the game.

On PC-DOS platform:

Hold the SHIFT key to launch the setup executable. If no setup executable is defined, you'll get a list of executables to choose from.

Hold the CTRL key to launch the install executable. If no install executable is defined, you'll get a list of executables to choose from.

Don't hold any key to launch the main executable. If no main executable is defined, you'll get a list of executables to choose from.

Pro Tip: if you consider multiple executables as main, setup or installer executables, go to Edit Game or open the Rom Manager to define multiple executables there. If multiple executables of the same type are defined, you always get the list of them to choose from - which is handy if you treat a collection of games as one game entry:

If you press this menu item, a randomly selected game of the current list would be launched with the default emulator. Any filter on the main list would also be regarded. For example, if you filter by Action games, you would launch a random Action game.

Opens the Edit Game dialog.

When multiple games are selected (with SHIFT or CTRL) this menu item says Edit Multiple Games and opens the Edit Game dialog in Multi-Edit mode.

In Metropolis Launcher you can define which executable is used as main, setup or installer executable. To quickly reset these settings you can use the Clear Executables Config menu item.

With this option you can create a DOS native menu with the Total DOS Launcher. This menu item opens the Create Total DOS Launcher Menu dialog

Read more about the process here.

With this menu item you can add a runtime-based achievement of the selected game to a challenge.

Read more about RetroAchievements and Challenges here.

Start the Similarity Calculation feature.

Opens your web browser with the MobyGames page of the selected game. This menu item is only accessible if the game is linked to MobyGames meta data.

Opens your web browser with the MobyGames page for contributing technical informations of the selected game. This menu item is only accessible if the game is linked to MobyGames meta data.

Opens the Emulator Settings window.

Opens the DOSBox Templates window.

Opens the ScummVM Templates window.

Open the Rom Manager.

Opens the RomBase Manager.

Perform a search for missing extras (snapshots, box art etc.).

You'll have to select which extras category should be checked:

After the search is complete, any game missing extras of the chosen type will be highlighted. They will be shown with bold font and the Highlighted column's checkbox will be checked:

The Multi User menu item has 3 sub menu items:

[a] Add selected games to restricted user

[b] Remove selected games from restricted user

[c] Show Games of restricted user

You can export your game files as well as the game list with this sub menu:

[a] Export selected Games

[b] Export List to CSV

[c] Export List to Excel (XLSX)

[d] Export as Total DOS Launcher Collection... (PC-DOS platform only)