Coinops Next PC Arcade Frontend

[Arn X Treme]

With a lot of chat going in the Retroarch thread i thought it was maybe time that this got it's own thread. 

 

Basically CoinOPS FW is a front end all in one emulator for just about any system emulated and is currently Windows only.

 

You can see some of the stuff at the youtube channel here:-

 

https://www.youtube.com/user/BS1ukNinja/videos

 

 

I openly admit i am personally yet to get the thing working on my own PC but people on the forum speak very highly of it, and i can't wait to experience it myself.

[Goose]

I came across it purely by chance. I know it was on the original Xbox but it's only recently that's it been released on PC. 

 

It is incredibly easy to set up and use - provided you've got the file structure in place once unzipped. I assume you can get just a pure front end version, but everyone I've seen so far comes with at least some roms. With some tinkering, you can add almost anything to it. 

 

My current setup is a ridiculous 154GB. This includes arcade games, 2600, 7800, Intellivsion, Coleco, NES, SNES, GC, WII, N64, Master System, Game Gear, Megadrive, Dreamcast, Amiga, C64, Amstrad, Zx Spectrum, Pinball FX Tables, PSX, PS2, Sega Naomi, Cave shooters and more I've surely missed (oh, Dragons Lair and Space Ace). It runs on numerous emulators, displays videos and logos of most game, and much more. To install, I unzipped all the files, clicked one batch file to set it up to show all games, then launched it. 

 

It also comes pre-configured to work with an xbox pad. And it's also setup to accommodate twin stick shooters like Smash TV. You can play with bezels, without, full screen, windowed and about another 20 options - all of which are configured by running a specific batch file. 

 

I can't link to the files but have a look at this post - 

Here it is setup on the TV. 

 

[gone fishin]

That looks pretty good, but those overlays are absolutely horrendous. Why are they obscuring some of the "screen" and why not just stick to the original arcade artwork? 

 

I get it that you don't have that for console games, but that's not even the right image for Robocop (which is from an Ocean advert for Robocop 2) 

 

 

https://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=9343

 

This is why the publishers should get their shit together and produce releases that are curated with passion! I want to experience as much nostalgia as possible - including the waft of fried donuts and chips in the background.

 

 

 

[Arn X Treme]

So after fucking around in newsgroups i have finally gotten it to work to some respect.

 

I have a lot of arcade games installed with some lovely artwork.

 

But now how do i add new Emulators and Games to it?

 

I popped the C64 emulator in the folder and even made a .conf file

executable = emulators\C64\x64.exe
arguments = "%ITEM_NAME%"

 

But I don't know if the roms are in the wrong folder or something. 

 

Nothing seems to work and the documentation is pretty fucking awful. 

 

 

[jonathanhoey]

27 minutes ago, gone fishin' said:

That looks pretty good, but those overlays are absolutely horrendous. Why are they obscuring some of the "screen" and why not just stick to the original arcade artwork? 

 

 

There are two different things going on there. The Q*Bert screenshot is from what I suppose you would call 'attract mode'. Basically for every single game on the game select screen, there's a big 16:9 graphic with a little postcard-sized window that plays a video clip of the game.

 

The other screenshots are once the games are actually loaded up to play. Those are preconfigured as 4:3 pillarboxed screens, with a scanline effect etc, and some sort of static graphic on either side. It may or may not be original arcade artwork, I'm sure it varies from title to title.

 

I haven't seen any that obscure the screen in play.

 

I've had a bit of a play with it and it's clearly been a massive labour of love for someone. I haven't spent long enough with any of the games to know how it handles things like save states, custom controls etc.

[Nobuo's Organ]

The fake screen reflections on the default setup make me feel like I'm about to have a migraine and the shimmering caused by every type of fake scanline I've tried on an LCD at desk distance from my face feels like an oncoming headache.

 

But do click away on the "Screen No Curvature" files in Advanced Configs if you just want to get rid of the silly fake curve which cuts off some of the screen.

 

Advanced Configs/LCDSoft (4x3).bat for life, embrace the blur!

 

[Goose]

Yes, the pictures were taken on the first time I booted it up with everything set to default. 

[Arn X Treme]

So straight out of the Zips with a little fucking around I have got a few games on it and had a play.

 

Id really like to get other things like C64 & Dreamcast going on it, does anyone here have a simple straight forward step by step for this please?

 

ive looked at YouTube and some forums including some RetroFe stuff but to no joy.

[Goose]

I’ve found if you grab the addin packs, they’re all configured to go. Just unzip them into the same Coinops directory and the program should find them on the next boot up.

 

In my experience, adding systems manually was fiddly, but I admit I gave up fairly quickly. The documentation is pretty poor and even going to the RetroFE site, which Coinops runs on in the background, still didn’t really help.

[Mr Majestyk]

Likewise I've only ever used the add on packs to expand it. With the Dreamcast it's pushing 300gb now. Any issues I've had with packs usually get resolved by going to the discord group, as sometimes there are unpublished fixes. 

[Goose]

I almost need to re-download the Naomi 2 stuff again. I've no idea what I've done to it. Works fine if I run Demul outside of Coinops, but doesn't work if I run it inside coinops.

 

Any one get it to work? Could you post your settings file?

 

 

[Arn X Treme]

Just unzipped and dragged and dropped the folders in and booted up and nothing new is there. 

 

Theres no instructions (shocker) could it be we both need some bios files or something? 

[ScouserInExile]

Have finished downloading this and unzipped it. I'm only at the stage where I've flicked through to see what's on there, but I'm wondering: what does anyone use as a controller for this? I have a couple of wireless 360 controllers, but I'm having problems with pairing them with the wireless adapter I have. Is it worth finding a wired 360 pad? Or is there something else I should be looking for?

 

Is something like this just going to be shit?

https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.co.uk%2Fulk%2Fitm%2F190569793297

 

[Goose]

I bought a cheap wired xbox pad - not official. It's not the best but for 20 minutes blasts on this, it does the job.

[ScouserInExile]

I've actually managed to get my wireless pad working now. I just need to work out the key maps for stuff like the C64. Are there guides anywhere?

[dave7g]

Any idea how to set controls for Dragon's Lair and Space Ace? No buttons do anything so I can't even start a game.

[Mr Majestyk]

There's very little docs out there. Discord group seems to be the place to go - I had same issue with Space Ace etc, but just left them.

[Goose]

I seem to recall my Dragon's Lair worked straight out - but to be honest, with a game like that it's actually hard to tell if it's working or not.

[dave7g]

There was no way to insert coin or start.

[Goose]

Just tried mine. I found if I clicked the right hand stick, it came up with a screen of text telling me to insert coin etc. Then if I pressed 5, you could hear a coin accept noise. Pressing 1 then started the game.

 

Worth noting that the game wouldn't let me quit, and gave me a black screen that locked up the whole computer. 

 

 

[Goose]

Does anyone know how to get the Naomi stuff working? 

 

I noticed today there's a new version out (might have been out for some time) called Coinops Next. Basically the same thing, but there's a few new packs, including Jaguar Games. 

 

I grabbed the Naomi pack, and all the files are there, all the artwork and jpgs, but when I launch one the screen goes black and returns to the list. 

[MpM]

Incorrect Dreamcast/Naomi BIOS names?

 

 

[Goose]

Looks like the bios was missing - but I can't get it to correctly integrate into Coinops. Usually the emulation is flawless, but this one you see it opening DEmul and I'm having to mess around with that before the game loads. 

[MpM]

Dreamcast/Naomi Emulators have different names for the BIOS files.

 

These are the correct Naomi BIOS and naming conventions for use with DEmul

 

 

 

 

[Goose]

Thank you very much! Managed to get it working right now.

[Goose]

I grabbed the 145gb Coin Ops next yesterday, with a plan to consolidate everything in there with the separate packs. It’s a shame you can’t pick and choose the downloads (instead of 200 odd rar files) as there’s a fair few PS2 games in there that are easily 50gb of the overall total.

[Goose]

Some crazy bastard has made a 700 game Amiga pack

 

 

[Goose]

There's a new version of Coinops Next out, called Diamonds. It aims to recreate the arcades of old. It currently runs around 400 games and comes with near full cab artwork , with attract modes and even the background sound of other machines. It looks great and the game selection is solid. It's sorted into classic, shoot'em ups, beat'em ups and run n gun. Currently it's only available via the Coinops Discord server but I imagine it'll show up on the likes of Arcade Punks soon. You can play in game with or without bezels and scanlines and such. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Dudley]

Sounds pretty similar an idea to Neo Retro Arcade.

 

https://store.steampowered.com/app/465780/New_Retro_Arcade_Neon/

[Angles Morts]

I'm such a curmudgeon that I run the mame64 exe directly to get keyboard searching instead of browsing all the pretty artwork.