FPLaunch MOD: Pause and Loading screens...

[jdsabin1]

Thanks man - much appreciated. Gonna go fire it up this afternoon .

[jdsabin1]

I only ran across one question/problem so far that hopefully someone can help with:

I have the hotkey application itself installed and I created a executable (plaved in my startup folder so it would be alive all the time) that essentially allows me to re-start Hyperpin upon a few button presses on my cab (left ctrl + G actually). The reason I did this was becaue some of the heavy hitter FP tables like Three Angels hogs memory and won't give it back. Eventually a table will open up that won't have any textures showing and when it does that I wanted to exit HyperPin (release the memory) and reopen it with an easy button stroke like I mention above.

The problem though is that this creates problems with HyperPin itself when I exit tables that I am playing in HyperPin. There are times when I will exit a table and I will see a large empty window over HyperPin and in the title bar it is referencing the hotkey program I compiled and put in my startup folder. I can esc out of that and the window will disappear and HyperPin works fine but obviously I don't want to do that.

Any ideas? Perhaps there is another 'hot key' like program that will do something similar. I do know I need something because there are times when I need to restart HyperPin for whatever reason.

Thanks in advance.

[blur]

i have new version of fplaunch manual on first page, second post

everybody please check it for errors

jdsabin if you need this hotkey only in tables and not in hyperpin you can add it to fplaunch script and have only one ahk script running

but i dont see how restart of hyperpin.exe could help with releasing memory taken by future pinbal.exe?

Edited May 18, 2011 by blur

[me-mike]

Thanks for the latest release, and the updated instructions for us nanotech/pinball wizard folks. I'll download the new version tomorrow and let you know if I encounter any issues. Thanks for all of your help in the past, it was greatly appreciated Blur!

[jdsabin1]

i have new version of fplaunch manual on first page, second post

everybody please check it for errors

jdsabin if you need this hotkey only in tables and not in hyperpin you can add it to fplaunch script and have only one ahk script running

but i dont see how restart of hyperpin.exe could help with releasing memory taken by future pinbal.exe?

You have a valid point blur. FP actually completely exits upon exiting a table and going back to Hyperpin right?

[blur]

thanks mike

jdsabin yes fp and vp exit completely, you can check it with task manager

even if it doesn't you have some other problem

there are cases when fp and vp don't exit immediately - you can see this by slow hyperpin - but then what i do is - I just go left and right in hyperpin until i see that HP is fast again and that means that vp/fp is finally closed and released all it's memory. I get this only on some tables, and on that tables i get this after every exit of the table. You could even think oh no hp is doing something and it is slow again - BUT this has nothing to do with HP. It is just that vp closes some tables very slow on exit.

[jdsabin1]

There is definitely something wrong with this script as it relates to Big Score. I can get the game to load, the coin and start remappings work, but I was getting erratic behavior using the right and left ctrl keys being remapped to enter. I do have a button on the cab mapped to the '2' key so I mapped that to enter instead (and commented out the right and left ctrl keys and recompiled) to see if it was just the ctrl keys that created the problem.

I did get farther in the game, up to the point of starting the game but the ball never does load. The table is just stuck on start waiting to plunge the ball but the ball isn't there.

The game works perfectly fine when launched natively. Any ideas?

[blur]

well i didn't play much on big score, i tried once and the view and perspective is little awkward (there is no true arcade mode), i don't like it

keys are working fine for me, but keys are something everybody should fix for them self, and experiment what's best depending on what keys you have on your cab

did you used 5 and 1 to start the game?

did you selected the role - game will not start if you don't select the role with flippers and then enter (L/R control)

[jdsabin1]

well i didn't play much on big score, i tried once and the view and perspective is little awkward (there is no true arcade mode), i don't like it

keys are working fine for me, but keys are something everybody should fix for them self, and experiment what's best depending on what keys you have on your cab

did you used 5 and 1 to start the game?

did you selected the role - game will not start if you don't select the role with flippers and then enter (L/R control)

Thanks blur. I know this feature isn't something that you spent much time on and that's cool. It's great that this is in there at all . Yeah I did select the player and press enter but the ball never loads. I am next going to try your suggestion using the '~' to have the enter key do double duty and see if that helps at all.

[HyphyCus]

I'm still having that issue apparently with the DMD. I made a short video (FS and 720p you can see it good) so I can show you what is going on. No audio though, and not the best quality but I hope it conveys the message still. I tried it with the wip3 after (found it while browsing through the posts) and it's still the same. Just tested with the old 1.1 and the DMD shows up fine.

http://youtu.be/mjJ2DjhmLmo

Edited May 21, 2011 by HyphyCus

[blur]

try to change

WinWaitActive, ahk_class VPPlayer

with

WinWait, ahk_class VPPlayer

[HyphyCus]

I tried 10 different tables and it only worked on the 2nd try, but once I reloaded that table it didn't work again.

[jdsabin1]

The Big Score functionality problem is definitely in either HyperPin or fplaunch. If I load the table outside of those, it works fine (using the keys on the cabinet that correspond to the default keys in the game).

It just never loads the ball in HyperPin/fplaunch even though the game is sitting there waiting for the game to start (and DMD reads 0, etc).

Strange.

[blur]

I tried 10 different tables and it only worked on the 2nd try, but once I reloaded that table it didn't work again.

you have nt4sp5 comp mode set?

i've heard from some people that remove of nvram also helps, even with original wip3 script

[HyphyCus]

you have nt4sp5 comp mode set?

i've heard from some people that remove of nvram also helps, even with original wip3 script

Ya, I have VP, HP, and FPLaunch set to NT4 compat. One thing I found out was once I'm in the table, and the DMD isn't showing I can F3 and refresh and it will pop back to the front, and I can play the table. I'm wondering if there is something you can put in the ahk to make it auto reset once the table is loaded. So it's pretty much instant and you don't even notice it, but for a split second.

[blur]

Ya, I have VP, HP, and FPLaunch set to NT4 compat. One thing I found out was once I'm in the table, and the DMD isn't showing I can F3 and refresh and it will pop back to the front, and I can play the table. I'm wondering if there is something you can put in the ahk to make it auto reset once the table is loaded. So it's pretty much instant and you don't even notice it, but for a split second.

i've found the source of the problem

this happens because vp is started minimized

and vp is started minimized to be hidden

if i do winactivate of vpplayer early enough in the script then dmd will show up

still have to test it a little bit more to see how it influences no-nag part of the script and everything else

Edited May 22, 2011 by blur

[blur]

The Big Score functionality problem is definitely in either HyperPin or fplaunch. If I load the table outside of those, it works fine (using the keys on the cabinet that correspond to the default keys in the game).

It just never loads the ball in HyperPin/fplaunch even though the game is sitting there waiting for the game to start (and DMD reads 0, etc).

Strange.

I tried again and everything works

5 mapped to 1

1 to s

enter to down

controls to enter

mapping enter with ~ did not help much cause on the menu for example you get down key sent first and then enter and you end up entering second menu item instead of first one

Edited May 22, 2011 by blur

[jdsabin1]

I tried again and everything works

5 mapped to 1

1 to s

enter to down

controls to enter

mapping enter with ~ did not help much cause on the menu for example you get down key sent first and then enter you end up on the second option instead of first one

Thanks for validating.

Are the keys mapped in the order that they appear in the download of fplaunch then? And do you use an ipac2? Would hyperpin have anything to do with this at all?

There *has* to be something I am missing and it's in the way that fplaunch is remapping the keys. On my cab, Big Score is confused about something. Perhaps it is Windows 7 64 bit? Grasping at straws I know ....

Edited May 22, 2011 by jdsabin1

[blur]

This is the order:

RControl::Enter

LControl::Enter

Enter::down

5::1

1::s

what keys do you use?

you can always map it different

ipac and win7 can both be source of the problems

make one ahk file with only key mappings and see if it works

[jdsabin1]

This is the order:

RControl::Enter

LControl::Enter

Enter::down

5::1

1::s

what keys do you use?

you can always map it different

ipac and win7 can both be source of the problems

make one ahk file with only key mappings and see if it works

Great idea. I created a file with these key remappings in it:

RControl::Enter

LControl::Enter

Enter::down

5::1

1::s

Compiled it and then ran the game outside of HyperPin using the cabinet buttons.

It worked perfectly.

There is something amiss in either the FPLAUNCH file or in HyperPin itself.

Not sure what to do next but it feels good to at least be narrowing it down some.

[Guest tornado]

i dont see blue text on screen only in wheel menu

[blur]

This is complete source for bigscore, so there is not much that can be wrong:

  if(tableName = "BigScore") {
   Hotkey, $%exitEmulatorKey%, CloseSlam
   ;Remap some keys (enter to down arrow for plunger, 1 to s for start, 2 to 1 for insert coin, both ctrl to enter.
   ;setworkingdir, "..\SlamIt\BigScore.exe"
   Run, "..\slamit\go.bat", "..\SlamIt"
   WinWait, ahk_class SlamIt Pinball - Big Score
   Gui, destroy
   #IfWinActive ahk_class SlamIt Pinball - Big Score
   RControl::Enter
   LControl::Enter
   ~Enter::down
   5::1
   1::s
   #IfWinActive
   Process, WaitClose, BigScore.exe
 } else {

try to put all this to your new small script (remove if, add closeslam code), and see if it works

if it doesn't maybe remove blanks from the beginning of lines

[blur]

i dont see blue text on screen only in wheel menu

yeah, and during the night is colder then outside

did you checked manual?

[Guest tornado]

there no manual

[blur]

Ya, I have VP, HP, and FPLaunch set to NT4 compat. One thing I found out was once I'm in the table, and the DMD isn't showing I can F3 and refresh and it will pop back to the front, and I can play the table. I'm wondering if there is something you can put in the ahk to make it auto reset once the table is loaded. So it's pretty much instant and you don't even notice it, but for a split second.

Hipi this is a great find and it works. Check you code and after:

WinWaitActive, ahk_class VPPlayer ;Wait for vp to be Ready before killing Gui blackScreen

just add:

Send {F3}

I've tried to add winactivate of vpplayer in loading screen loop but it completely breaks nag screen removal functionality. I've tried also clicking on mame window and on vpplayer but it is so unreliable

So try this and let me know if it works on all tables, and i will put it in next release.

Edited May 23, 2011 by blur