MedLaunch

A Windows Front-End for Mednafen

https://medlaunch.info/

MedLaunch is a .NET (Windows only) front-end for the excellent Mednafen multi-system emulator.

Production Releases

• Latest Production Version: 0.5.25.3
• Direct Production Download: LATEST
• Compatible with Mednafen: 0.9.39.x - 1.21.1

Official production releases happen when the team are happy after testing. The frequency of these releases has decreased over time, so users should look to the dev builds to get new features and compatibility early.

Development Releases

A rolling development version of MedLaunch is now automatically built and released everytime a change is pushed to the dev branch on GitHub.

• The latest development build can always be found HERE
• 

The development releases should usually be stable, but it is advisable to backup your MedLaunch directory before upgrading.

Note: Development builds do NOT currently appear within GitHub releases and are NOT available through the MedLaunch internal updater.

Documentation

Please see the REQUIREMENTS and QUICK SETUP GUIDE documentation portal pages.

Bugs/Suggestions/Feature Requests can be posted on the GitHub Issue Tracker, or connect to our Discord Server and let us know there.

Features

• No installation required (and no data is written outside of the MedLaunch folder)
• Local (SQLite) auto-generated database where all settings are saved
• Can import existing mednafen configuration options
• Responsive UI
• Customizable color scheme
• Scaleable to aid usability on a wide range of resolutions
• Supports versions of Mednafen 0.9.39.x - 1.21.1 (latest)
• Nearly all Mednafen config parameters are supported and configurable through the launcher
• With the exception of control configuration parameters, all config settings are stored internally on per-emulated system basis
• On game launch a {system}.cfg file is generated (so that per-system configurations can be utilized outside of MedLaunch)
• Built-in update checking (with manual ability to grab the latest MedLaunch and supported Mednafen x64 binaries)
• Customizable games library
• Hide/show individual mednafen emulated systems and games library columns
• Multi-column sorting and dynamic search
• Library sorting and column sizing/positioning state saved on a per-filter basis
• Sidebar that shows game information, boxart, screenshots, manuals etc. (once the game has been scraped)
• Auto scan and import of ROM based games
• Imports all standard ROM formats that mednafen supports
• Extended archive support - will import single or multiple ROMs from within .zip or .7z files
• Auto scan and import of Disc based games (PSX, Saturn, PCFX & PCE-CD)
  • Auto-generation of .m3u playlist files for multi-disc games
• DAT data lookup on import
  • MedLaunch ships with a DAT database that combines NoIntro, Tosec, PsxDataCenter & Satakore information that enables detailed information (Country, Year, Publisher etc) to be populated in the games library upon import
  • ROM (and some disc-based system) files are matched based on MD5 hash
  • PSX and Saturn discs are matched based on game serial number lookup (that is obtained by interogating the disc image itself)
• Online scraping of game data/media/docs
  • Auto and manual scraping of data from thegamesdb and mobygames
  • PDF manuals downloaded from replacementdocs
• Configuration of mednafen controls
  • DirectInput and XInput are fully supported - covering keyboard, standard gamepads/joysticks and XInput devices (xbox/playstation controllers etc.)
  • Configure nearly all emulated gamepad/joystick/wheel etc. devices for all virtual input ports for every emulated system
  • Standard mouse bindings can be inserted using pre-defined templates
• Extended game launch functionality
  • Last played and total game time stats recorded on a per-game basis
  • Option to remember mednafen window/screen position (on a per-emulated system basis) and re-apply this on game launch (useful for people with multi-monitor setups)
  • Choose the CD image that should be inserted when mednafen starts (in the case of multi-disc games)
  • Edit the mednafen launch string before running the game
  • Option to copy launch string to clipboard (for use in other frontends or batch files)
• Built-in netplay server list (with pre-populated servers)
• Browser control with links to the mednafen and medlaunch websites

This upcoming changes (and many others) can be found in the current roadmap here.

Requirements

• Microsoft .NET Framework 4.5.2
• Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 x86 Redistributable (MedLaunch will prompt you to auto-install this if you do not have it)
• At least Mednafen version 0.9.39.x - 64-bit version required for Saturn games
• Tested on Windows 7 (SP1)/8/8.1/10. It may work on Vista but has not been tested but will certainly NOT run on XP

Download

You can always get the latest release build of MedLaunch on the GitHub Releases page. I am actively working on code in the Dev Branch and you can see the active changes for the next release on the ChangeLog. These pre-release changes will be released when I am happy with them, so please do not ask for builds ahead of the official releases. You can of course get yourself a copy of Visual Studio Community installed and build it yourself from the Master branch.

! You can download the latest version of Mednafen from the Mednafen website.

New Install

• Extract this release to a folder, run the 'MedLaunch.exe' executable and choose your Mednafen directory (must be 64-bit version if you want to emulate Saturn games).
• You are then prompted to choose whether to import all config settings from your Mednafen folder into the MedLaunch database (this is recommended).
• If you currently use system-specific config files with Mednafen the settings from these will be imported with the above process. However MedLaunch will write to these files when you launch a game - so back them up somewhere if you are not happy with this.

Upgrade

Preferred Method:

• Automatically download and upgrade using the 'Updates' tab within MedLaunch itself.
• Once MedLaunch has upgraded, go to the 'Configs' tab and click the 'IMPORT ALL CONFIGS FROM DISK' button

Manual Method:

• You can safely extract this new release over an existing MedLaunch folder (providing you do not have MedLaunch running at the time)
• Once extracted run the MedLaunch.exe executable and your current database will be upgraded before the application starts proper.
• Once MedLaunch has upgraded, go to the 'Configs' tab and click the 'IMPORT ALL CONFIGS FROM DISK' button

Download

Check out the Releases page or the project on GitHub.

Build From Source

The project has been built using Visual Studio Community 2015. It may or may not work with previous versions.

• Clone the Dev (or Master) branch (or download as zip)
• Open MedLaunch.sln in VisualStudio
• Restore NuGet packages
• Cross your fingers?