Bob

Mega SD (and SSDS3) Thumbnail Manager

Posted on by Bob

Terraonion has just open-sourced the “CartDBManager” that allows you to show box art and game information in the game select menu:  https://github.com/Terraonion-dev/GameDBManagerMD

UPDATE:  Looks like Terraonion released the software for the SSDS3 as well:  https://github.com/Terraonion-dev/GameDBManagerPCE

Mega SD:  https://bit.ly/terraonionmegasd
SSDS3:  http://bit.ly/ssds3ode

Adding games to the library seems to be about the same as most other methods I’ve seen for other devices:

  • First, prepare a 64×40 screenshot for each game you want to add
  • Go to the very last list entry, marked with an *, and write the game name in the first column. A new row will be created for your game.
  • Fill in the year and genre.
  • Press the button in the “Screenshot” column and select the PNG file you want to appear in the MegaSD menu
  • Press the button in the “Hashes” column. In this screen, select “Add Hash”, and then point to the cd .cue file or rom (.md,.bin,.32x…) you want to associate with this game. A game can have more than 1 hash attached for different versions or region variations, and they will all share the same screenshot.
  • Repeat these steps for all games you want to add.
  • Once finished adding games, press “Convert Imgs” button. This will convert your png files to console tilemaps. It will only convert the new files, so if you change the image after generating the tile cache, just delete it from the cache and then regenerate images.
  • Once the database is built, it can be used to generate the game images, or to distribute it.
  • For distribution, you must distribute the db.xml file, the executable, and the TileCache directory. The original images aren’t needed, as they have been converted to tile data previously.

This can be a giant pain in the ass, so the next time you download a pre-configured pack, please stop and take a moment to reflect upon all the work that went into creating those packs.  Also, while adding game art isn’t necessary, my personal opinion is that it ads a really nice feel to the menu…as long as it’s not slow to load!

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