GameBase Changelog

What's new in GameBase 1.3

• New features:
• New Documentation
• You can now stick .wav files in your database's /Splash folder. GB will play a random one as it displays the splash screen
• Can now specify how long (in seconds) each splash screen is displayed (see updated docs)
• Clicking on the splash screen will now close it
• Can now set the default Picture sizes per database
• Added new fields: Artist, Developer, License, Rarity, Original, Playable, TitleScreen, Info WebLink, Version WebLink, CloneOf, Review Rating
• Views can finally show more than 2 columns!
• Now able to set the order of custom views
• Added new Default View: to complement the new CloneOf field
• Can now hide/show/re-order fields in the details tabs (tabs themselves will be hidden if no fields are shown on them)
• Added 2 new 'Extras' types: URL (opens extra in default web browser), and MUSIC (uses the configured Music Players)
• Added new Sidebar, showing all "launchable" items such as game file, music file, weblinks and extras
• New "Import Personal Info..." feature under Tools menu. You can import personal data (favourites, highscore, difficulty, rating, times/last played etc) from another (e.g. previous) database
• Added 2 fields for database settings: "DatabaseName" and "GameBaseWindowTitle", editable from the GBToolbox (right-click the mdb file and select "Database Settings...")
• Can now edit the FirstLoadGemusAsk and FirstLoadMessage fields from the GBToolbox (right-click the mdb file and select "Database Settings...")
• RomLister Export - Now you can export GB databases and run them in a variety of popular arcade cabinet frontends
• New App: GBLauncher.exe - runs games using GEMUS silently via command line
• New App: GBRegRun.exe - re-registers required COM dlls and runs GameBase.exe (can be used to register other DLLs and run other apps too)
• Added per-database option to show 'image' extras (png/jpg/gif/bmp) in the screenshots area
• GEMUS:
• Archive unpack/repack routines completely reworked employing 7-Zip command line utility to do all the hard work. :)
• Can now unpack the following archives (thanks to 7-Zip): .7Z, .ZIP, .GZ, .GZIP, .TGZ, .BZ2, .BZIP2, .TBZ2, .TBZ, .TAR, .LZMA, .RAR, .CAB, .ARJ, .Z, .TAZ, .ISO, .LHA, .LZH
• Can now repack the following archives (with/without sub-archives) (thanks to 7-Zip): .7Z .ZIP .GZ .GZIP .TGZ .BZ2 .BZIP2 .TBZ2 .TBZ .TAR
• Dropped legacy support for .LNX and ZipCoded files (C64)
• Now keeping the folder structure intact when extracting archives
• Can now use environment vars in key=value pairs (values only). E.g. foo=%emupath%
• Can now use empty values in key=value pairs and Set_* functions
• Added following environment vars: �driveletter%, %storedgames(x)%, %storedpictures(x)%, %storedextras(x)%, %storedmusic%, %storedphotos% (see updated docs)
• Introduced global key=value pairs, and key=value sets (kvsets) for grouping related key=value pairs (see updated docs)
• Updated per-game "key=value" editor to manage kvsets and batch-update key=values for all games in the current view
• Can now (officially) put comment lines where you enter key=value pairs (lines starting with ; are comments)
• New script function Show_KV() added to let you see the key=value pairs applicable to the running GEMUS script (see updated docs)
• New script function Run_Emulator_Send_Keys() added to enable sending of keystrokes to the emulator after is has been launched (see updated docs)
• New script function Kill_Process() added to kill all running processes matching a given filename (see updated docs)
• New script function Wait() added to pause the script for a specified number of milliseconds (see updated docs)
• Can now specify the location of the "GBGame" folder
• Can now specify the runnable file in archives for GEMUS-based Extras
• Now logging all GEMUS activity (when running a game) to Gemus.log
• Added "Discard Script changes?" warning when quitting the GEMUS Script edit window if the script has changed
• Changes:
• Split Options window into "frontend" options and "per database" options
• Removed the "File Not Found or not PSID" message on the Music details tab
• Now saves/retrieves last-browsed picture path in the Picture Selector (when adding games, or when current game has no picture file assigned)
• Changed tab 3 in About screen to the loaded database's name, instead of "GameBase"
• Increased field sizes to 255 chars for: Cracker, Difficulty, Language, Musician (+Nick, +Grp), Programmer, Publisher, Genre, ParentGenre, Comment, Version Comment
• Yes/No fields are now Yes/No/Unknown for the following fields: Loading Screen, High Score Saver, Included Docs, True Drive Emu
• Changed contact email address to [email protected]
• Various UI tweaks to account for new fields (and field sizes), and 7-Zip integration
• Removed CRC checkbox on "Verify Available Files" as it is currently unused
• Picture Selector is now resizable, plus added refresh buttons
• Game Selector is now resizable
• Extras Properties Window is now resizable
• Increased size of "Select Folder" window
• Increased size of Database Paths window
• New default "no picture" images
• GameBase main window title changed to utilise custom database name field (if set via GBToolbox)
• Added panel to the main window status bar showing the ID of the currently selected item
• Moved game name and icons out of the details tabs, so they still show when details tabs are hidden
• All Registry settings now saved to HKEY_CURRENT_USER instead of HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
• Zoomed screenshots stay in-front of main window properly now if the option is checked
• Updated credits in about screen
• GameBase documentation removed from install
• Fixes:
• Fixed crash when adding 20th filter for a custom view
• Fixed issue with custom gfx GameTab4_16x16.gif, now tab 4 is working (use GameTab4_16x16.gif [no text] and optionally GameTab4a_16x16.gif [some text])
• Fixed crash when checking if a file exists, when the full filepath is over 128 chars long (limitation of winapi function OpenFile())
• Fixed "Could not open file. File already open" error when a D64 file had an empty Dir Entry or Disk Name
• Fixed bug where LightPen was not being read correctly in GEMUS scripts
• Fixed bug where list font/colour changes were not happening on all views
• Fixed bug where files larger than 2GB could not be linked via the Game Selector
• Fixed crash when selecting to edit a linked "extra" and there are some invalid paths set in Paths.ini
• Fixed Text.ini bug where Field_ParentGenre was not being loaded
• Fixed crash when pressing OK when editing fields after "filtering" returns no results