7.2 KiB
EmulationStation Desktop Edition - User Guide
Note: This document is intended as a quick start guide, for more in-depth information and details on how to compile EmulationStation and perform more advanced configuration, please refer to the INSTALL.md document.
Note: This guide is currently under construction!
Getting started
Getting started with EmulationStation is very easy, just make sure to install the software properly, either manually as built from source code or using one of the supplied packages. On Windows you'll use the installer instead of a package.
Upon first startup, ES will create its home directory, by default the location is ~/.emulationstation.
On Unix this defaults to /home//.emulationstation/ and on Windows it defaults to C:\Users<username>.emulationstation\
A settings file, es_settings.cfg will be generated with all the default settings, and a es_systems.cfg file will also be copied from the program resource folder, that contains the game ROM and emulator settings.
There's a log file in the home directory as well named es_log.txt, please refer to this in case on any errors as it should provide information on what went wrong.
Upon startup with the default settings, ES is set to the gamelist view style AUTOMATIC. In this mode the application will look for any game media files (videos and images) and set the view style accordingly. If at least one image is found for any game for a certain system, the view style DETAILED will be shown and if at least one video file is found, the view style VIDEO will be selected. The gamelist view styles are described in more detail later in this document.
Main screen
When starting EmulationStation with the default settings, you will see the main screen first. From here you can navigate your systems and enter their respective gamelists. If there are no game systems installed, you will not see this screen but rather an error message will be displayed, informing you that no games could be found.
Depending on the theme, the system navigation carousel can be horizontal or vertical. The default theme rbsimple-DE provides horizontal navigation, i.e. you browse your systems be scrolleft left or right.
Help system and general navigation
There is a help system available throughout the application that provides an overview of the possible actions and buttons that can be used. It's possible to disable the help system, but it's enabled by default.
Main menu
This menu can accessed from both the main screen, and from the gamelist views. It contains the scraper, the quit/restart/power-off menu as well as the application settings.
Here is a breakdown of the complete menu, with a brief explanation for each entry.
SCRAPER
SCRAPE FROM
FILTER
SYSTEMS
CONTENT SETTINGS
SCRAPE GAME NAMES
SCRAPE RATINGS
SCRAPE OTHER METADATA
SCRAPE SCREENSHOT IMAGES
SCRAPE BOX COVER IMAGES
SCRAPE MARQUEE (WHEEL) IMAGES
SCRAPE 3D BOX IMAGES
OTHER SETTINGS
REGION
LANGUAGE
OVERWRITE FILES AND DATA
INTERACTIVE MODE
AUTO-ACCEPT SINGLE GAME MATCHES
UI SETTINGS
GAMELIST TO SHOW ON STARTUP
GAMELIST VIEW STYLE
TRANSITION STYLE
THEME SET
UI MODE
DEFAULT SORT ORDER
SORT FOLDERS ON TOP OF GAMELISTS
SORT FAVORITE GAMES ABOVE NON-FAVORITES
GAMELIST FILTERS
QUICK SYSTEM SELECT
CAROUSEL TRANSITIONS
ON-SCREEN HELP
SHOW START MENU IN KID MODE
SCREENSAVER SETTINGS
SCREENSAVER AFTER
SCREENSAVER CONTROLS
SCREENSAVER BEHAVIOR
VIDEO SCRENSAVER SETTINGS
SWAP VIDEOS AFTER (SECS)
STRETCH VIDEOS TO SCREEN RESOLUTION
PLAY AUDIO FOR SCREENSAVER VIDEO FILES
SLIDESHOW SCREENSAVER SETTINGS
SWAP IMAGES AFTER (SECS)
STRETCH IMAGES TO SCREEN RESOLUTION
BACKGROUND AUDIO
USE CUSTOM IMAGES
CUSTOM IMAGE DIR
CUSTOM IMAGE DIR RECURSIVE
CUSTOM IMAGE FILTER
SOUND SETTINGS
SYSTEM VOLUME
PLAY AUDIO FOR VIDEO FILES IN GAMELIST VIEWS
NAVIGATION SOUNDS
GAME COLLECTION SETTINGS
AUTOMATIC GAME COLLECTIONS
CUSTOM GAME COLLECTIONS
CREATE NEW CUSTOM COLLECTION FROM THEME
CREATE NEW CUSTOM COLLECTION
SORT FAVORITES ON TOP FOR CUSTOM COLLECTIONS
GROUP UNTHEMED CUSTOM COLLECTIONS
SHOW SYSTEM NAMES IN COLLECTIONS
OTHER SETTINGS
VRAM LIMIT
FULLSCREEN MODE (REQUIRES RESTART)
POWER SAVER MODES
WHEN TO SAVE METADATA
GAME MEDIA DIRECTORY
PER GAME LAUNCH COMMAND OVERRIDE
SHOW HIDDEN FILES AND FOLDERS (REQUIRES RESTART)
SHOW HIDDEN GAMES (REQUIRES RESTART)
CUSTOM EVENT SCRIPTS
ONLY SHOW ROMS FROM GAMELIST.XML FILES
DISPLAY GAME ART FROM ROM DIRECTORIES
SHOW FRAMERATE
SHOW "REBOOT SYSTEM" MENU ENTRY
SHOW "POWER OFF SYSTEM" MENU ENTRY
CONFIGURE INPUT
QUIT
QUIT EMULATIONSTATION
REBOOT SYSTEM
POWER OFF SYSTEM
Game options menu
This menu is opened from the gamelists, and can't be accessed directly from the main screen. The menu changes slightly depending on the context, namely whether a game file or a folder is selected, and whether the current system is a collection or a normal game platform.
JUMP TO..
This provides the ability to quick jump to a certain letter.
SORT GAMES BY
FILTER GAMELIST
EDIT THIS GAME'S METADATA / EDIT THIS FOLDER'S METADATA
ADD/REMOVE GAMES TO THIS GAME COLLECTION
Scraper
The scraper supports downloading of game metadata and media files from the Internet. Currently two scraper services are supported, ScreenScraper.fr and TheGamesDB.net.
Getting your games into EmulationStation
For most systems, this is very straightforward, just put your game files into the folder corresponding to the system name. These names can be found in the end of this document.
Supported game systems
Here is the list of supported game systems:
3do
ags
amiga
amiga600
amiga1200
amstradcpc
apple2
arcade
astrocade
atari2600
atari5200
atari7800
atari800
atarijaguar
atarijaguarcd
atarilynx
atarist
atarixe
bbcmicro
c64
cavestory
channelf
coco
coleco
daphne
doom
dos
dragon32
dreamcast
famicom
fba
fbneo
fds
gameandwatch
gamegear
gamecube
gb
gba
gbc
genesis
intellivision
chailove
lutro
macintosh
mame
mame-advmame
mame-libretro
mame-mame4all
mastersystem
megadrive
mess
moonlight
msx
msx1
msx2
n64
nds
neogeo
nes
ngp
ngpc
odyssey2
openbor
oric
pcengine
pcenginecd
pcfx
ports
ps2
psp
psvita
psx
residualvm
samcoupe
saturn
scummvm
sega32x
segacd
sg-1000
snes
solarus
stratagus
supergrafx
tg16
tg-cd
ti99
trs-80
vectrex
videopac
virtualboy
wii
wiiu
wonderswan
wonderswancolor
x68000
xbox
xbox360
zmachine
zx81
zxspectrum