I'm wanting to create a second screen/menu, how do I go about doing this?

[tidyhunger]

Hi,

So my plan is when you run Attract-mode, it will boot into a screen/menu where you first choose the emulator you're wanting to play on. Then once you choose, I would like the second screen to be a list of ROM's you can choose from, which will then boot into the correct game.

My question is, how do I go about doing this? This is mainly for aesthetic purposes as I don't want the emulators and games to be on the same screen; rather than separate screens.

I have a layout of my first menu finished, I just don't know how to implement this within the code? Am I to edit a script file somewhere, or am I to compile Attract-mode from scratch and do it from there?

Thanks for your help.

[tidyhunger]

BUMP, I'd really like to know how to get this done.

Thank you.

[progets]

There is currently a "Displays Menu" that lists your systems/emulators. You can launch Attract-Mode in to the "Displays Menu" by changing this option: Configuration-->General-->Startup Mode = Show Displays Menu.

The Displays Menu is a very basic text menu by default but can be modified by creating a custom layout. You can see an example of this with the ArcadeBliss - Cab Edition layout here http://forum.attractmode.org/index.php?topic=741.0.

There are several people trying to accomplish what you are looking for but currently the "Displays Menu" is the only option. There is no concept of sub-menus/sub-wheels in Attract-Mode.

[TheFirstAv3nger]

I've got an idea to do this. But it depends on running a squirrel script that gets the display name or index, and assuming them don't change, another script to set the display based on index or name.
So basically just figure out the name or index for each display, lets say all the nintendo displays, then you would create a Nintendo display menu and instead of displaying roms it would display each nintendo emulator and just run the script to change to that display.  Kind of like how attract mode setup can run scripts like shut down, retropie setup, etc.

[liquid8d]

As progets said, the Display menu is sort of what you are talking about.. but by default most AM layouts go straight to the list of games for the current "display".

A layout could pretty easily go straight to the display menu - fe.signal("displays_menu") - when it starts, and override the "back" key (add_signal_handler) to show it again.. giving you a similar effect. It would take a bit more customizing to do a "menu > sub-menu > list" style layout, but it could be done. Arcade Bliss Cab Edition is probably the best example of how you can customize choosing displays in a layout.

AM has provided the scripting abilities to do pretty much whatever you want, but everyone is still getting to the point of creating some more powerful layouts. Simple layouts are pretty easy to make, but you need to be familiar with the programming portion to get a bit fancy.

[liquid8d]

Just to add to this, I didn't even realize this was added - but you can set the Startup Mode to be the Displays menu, which would automatically give you Displays > Game Lists, with back showing you the display menu.