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How to reach it
| • | In Settings press the button next to Rom Manager |
How it works
Here you manage your Roms, Diskette images, CD images, Executables etc. for any platform and link them to MobyGames release meta data (if they aren't already linked - most of them will be).
Overview
The Rom Manager presents 3 different layouts for 3 different platform types:
The single volume platform is the most common platform type in Metropolis Launcher. Almost all cartridge based platforms are of that type.
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The multiple volumes platform supports multiple volumes for each game. Almost all diskette/CD image based platforms are of that type.
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The PC - DOS platform is a special type of platform within Metropolis Launcher, it features multiple filetypes:
| • | mount targets - directories, cd images, diskette images |
| • | executables - start executable, install executable, setup executable |
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Game List
The game list on the left shows all your games (Roms, Diskette / CD images etc.).
You can tick the boxes in the Hidden column to hide games in the Games & Emulation Main Screen.
The Game List's context menu (right click) consists by default of the following menu items (most of them are invisible if your Game List is empty):
If you are using the PC - DOS platform, you'll get the following two extra menu items:
Adding games is done in the following steps:
1. Browse for the games (Roms, Diskette / CD images etc.)
2. Metropolis Launcher automatically scans potential tags from the file / directory names
3. The Tag Parser Settings dialog shows you the result of the tag scan and you decide how each tag should be treated and confirm by pressing OK
Most tags should already be known to Metropolis Launcher. If a tag is not known to Metropolis Launcher,
4. Metropolis Launcher adds each game, applies the tags and tries to automatically link the games to MobyGames metadata
[1a] Add Games (Files) ...
You'll browse individual files, multiple selection is supported.
For the PC - DOS platform: Only select packed files containing one DOS game per file with this option.
[1b] Add Games (Directory) ...
You'll browse for a directory containing the games. sub-directories will be scanned too.
For the PC - DOS platform: Select a directory containing packed files with this option. Each packed file should contain one DOS game.
[1c] Add Game (Installed, Directory) ...
Note: This only applies to the PC - DOS platform.
You'll browse for a single directory which contains one installed instance of a DOS game.
[1d] Add Game (Install Media) ...
Note: This only applies to the PC - DOS platform.
You'll browse and select the install media (Diskette / CD image/s) of a single DOS game.
Read more about adding game with the Add Games topic.
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Opens the Edit Game dialog. Only works if everything has been saved.
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Opens the Edit Game dialog in Multi-Edit mode. Only works if everything has been saved.
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You can change the directory entry with this menu item. This is useful if you moved your games to another location (e.g. "c:\Roms\Genesis" -> "c:\Console\Genesis")
Note: This will change the directory entry for all games in the current list that share the same directory.
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Select one or more games in the left list by using CTRL or SHIFT and left clicks and use this menu item to perform a rescan on these games.
The rescan will:
- check if the files still exist and ask if games should be removed if they don't
- perform a scan over all tags, provide the results in the Tag Parser dialog for you to decide how to apply them
- try to automatically link to MobyGames meta data
Pro-Tip: Do a rescan and if you got the time, do a detection of MobyGames links (see below [10]) when there is new MobyGame metadata available due to an update of Metropolis Launcher.
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Select one or more games in the left list by using CTRL or SHIFT and left clicks and use this menu item to tick the Hidden checkbox for each game.
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Select one or more games in the left list by using CTRL or SHIFT and left clicks and use this menu item to untick the Hidden checkbox for each game.
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Select one or more games in the left list by using CTRL or SHIFT and left clicks and use this menu item to link these games to the currently selected MobyGame release.
Pro-Tip: You can also perform a doubleclick on the MobyGame release to link it to the selected games.
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Select one or more games in the left list by using CTRL or SHIFT and left clicks and use this menu item to remove their link to MobyGame release/s.
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If Metropolis Launcher wasn't able to automatically link your games to MobyGames releases, you can use this menu item to automatically find best candidates by comparing file- or directory names to the names of the Moby Releases.
After the analysis, you get a preview of the results where you can decide for which games the linking should be applied.
Read more about finding links to MobyGames metadata using the Detect MobyGames Links feature here.
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Select one or more games in the left list by using CTRL or SHIFT and left clicks and use this menu item to remove them.
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With this menu item you can export the actual game files of one or more selected games. Select one or more games from the left list using SHIFT or CTRL and left clicks, choose the menu item and the Export games dialog is shown.
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Moby Releases List
The Moby Releases List on the right shows every MobyGames release available for the selected platform.
If you select a game in the Games List on the left and that game is linked to a MobyGames release, the respective MobyGames release will be selected and highlighted in bold font on the Moby Releases List.
You can link a MobyGames release to one or more games with the following steps:
| • | select one ore more games in the Games List on the left using SHIFT or CTRL and left clicks |
| • | double click the MobyGames release on the Moby Releases List |
The Moby Releases List's context menu (right click) consists of the following menu items:
Opens the mobygames.com website's page of the selected MobyGames release.
In rare cases the page cannot be found, this is due to a discrepancy between Metropolis Launcher's shipped MobyGames data and the current state of the mobygames.com website. In many cases you'll find a second entry in the Moby Releases list with the same name.
The discrepancy is of little impact because any metadata is shipped with Metropolis Launcher even if outdated.
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With this menu item you can calculate the total coverage of linked Moby Releases.
After a calculation the result will be shown and missing Moby Releases will be highlighted:
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Discs / Volumes List
The Discs / Volumes List is only shown if you are working with a multi volume platform - a platform which allows multiple media volumes per game, e.g. Diskette or CD images.
The grouping of multiple volumes for one game is done while adding games through examination of tags. Read more about this topic here.
In the Discs / Volumes List you can specify which media should represent which volume.
In the example we can see that for the game "1.000 Miglia" there exist multiple media for Side A and Side B. So in total we should have 2 volumes.
Both volumes are currently still the ones automatically chosen during the Add Games process. This can be changed, by using the dropdown in the Volume Number column:
You should always ensure that you don't assign a volume number more than once. In the launch process, the first found media assigned to a volume number will be used:
 
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Files and Directories List
The Files and Directories List is only shown when using the PC - DOS platform.
The PC - DOS platform makes use of multiple files and directories:
| • | mountable files (Diskette / CD images, packed files) |
| • | executable files (main-, setup- and/or installer executables) |
These files are listed in the Files and Directories List.
When you select an entry in this list, it's configuration is shown in the Configuration area. You can also edit the configuration there.
In this example, we added a packed file (DOOM v1.666 [SW] (1994)(id Software, Inc.) [Action].zip) to the collection. During the Add Games process, a working directory has been automatically created. The working directory as well as all executables are also listed here.
The working directory and the .zip file are set to be mounted as drive C. For DOOM.EXE has been chosen to be the main executable (used for launch). SETUP.EXE has been chosen to be the setup exectuable.
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The Files and Directory List's Context Menu (right click) consits of the following elements:
This menu item allows you to rename any file or directory listed.
If you rename a directory, all directory entries for the game will be updated.
If you rename a .cue file of a CD image, you can subsequently let Metropolis Launcher rename the .bin file for you, too.
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Add an archive file (e.g. .zip file) to your game. It can be used as a mount target.
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Add a directory to your game. It can be used as a mount target.
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Add media files (Diskette / CD images) to your game. They can be used as mount targets.
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Further Topics
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