ROM Properties Page shell extension

This shell extension adds a few nice features to file browsers for managing video game ROM and disc images.

v2.3

Major changes in v2.3 include:

• xattrs tab on Linux now shows XFS attributes.

• rpcli now supports extracting mipmap levels from most supported texture formats.

  • Mipmaps are now supported for DirectDrawSurface and KhronosKTX.

• Windows: Dark Mode is now supported on Windows 10 1809 and later in the installation program and rp-config.

  • Dark Mode is also partially supported in the properties pages when using tools such as StartAllBack, though it has some issues right now.

• Sparse disc images, e.g. CISO and GCZ, are now handled by the RomDataFactory class instead of requiring each RomData subclass to handle it. This means that all supported sparse disc images can be used for any console.

  • This was originally implemented to support ZISO and PSP CISO for PS2 disc images, but it also allows unusual combinations like DAX and JISO for GameCube disc images.

• Windows Image files (.wim) are now supported. Contributed by @ecumber.

• Game Boy now has special handling MMC01 and MBC1M multicarts. The main header is now detected correctly and used for the thumbnail image. All games in the multicart are now shown as individual tabs.

• Commodore DOS disk images (e.g. for Commodore 1541) are now supported, including icons for GEOS files. File formats supported currently include D64, D71, D80, D82, D81, D67, G64, and G71.

• ColecoVision ROM images are now supported, including the text displayed on the ColecoVision logo screen.

• Intellivision ROM images are now supported, including the game title and copyright year.

• New translations: Romanian and Italian

Translators wanted; if you can translate rom-properties from English to another language, check out the Crowdin project. (If you would like to translate to a language not currently listed on the Crowdin project page, file an issue here on GitHub with the requested language.)

See NEWS.md for a full list of changes in v2.3.

Feedback

This is a work in progress; feedback is encouraged. To leave feedback, you can file an issue on GitHub, or visit the Gens/GS IRC channel: irc://irc.badnik.zone/GensGS

Or use the Mibbit Web IRC client: http://mibbit.com/?server=irc.badnik.zone&channel=#GensGS

Installation

Currently, the ROM Properties Page shell extension is compatible with the following platforms:

• KDE Frameworks 5.x and 6.x
• XFCE (GTK+ 2.x, GTK+ 3.x)
• GNOME and Unity (GTK+ 3.x)
• GNOME 43 (GTK 4.x)
• MATE Desktop (1.18+; GTK+ 3.x)
• Cinnamon Desktop
• Windows 7 (and later)

The following platforms are still compatible, but may not receive as much support:

• KDE 4.x
• Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista

On Windows Vista and later, you will need the MSVC 2015-2022 runtime:

• 32-bit: https://aka.ms/vs/17/release/VC_redist.x86.exe
• 64-bit: https://aka.ms/vs/17/release/VC_redist.x64.exe

On Windows XP/2003 and earlier, you will need the MSVC 2015-2017 runtime:

• 32-bit: https://aka.ms/vs/15/release/VC_redist.x86.exe
• 64-bit: https://aka.ms/vs/15/release/VC_redist.x64.exe

For instructions on compiling from source, see doc/COMPILING.md.

Linux

Install the relevant .deb package, depending on what desktop environment you are using and what your CPU is.

After installing, the plugin needs to be enabled in the Dolphin file browser:

• Close all instances of Dolphin.
• Start Dolphin.
• Click Control, Configure Dolphin.
• Click the "General" section, then the "Preview" tab.
• Check the "ROM Properties Page" item, then click OK.
• Enable previews in a directory containing a supported file type.

If installed correctly, thumbnails should be generated for the supported file type. You can also right-click a file, select Properties, then click the "ROM Properties" tab to view more information about the ROM image.

Windows

Extract the ZIP archive to a directory, then run install.exe. The installer requires administrator access, so click "Yes" if requested. In the installer, click the "Install" button to register the ROM Properties Page DLL.

Note that this will hard-code the location of the DLL files in the registry, so you may want to place the DLLs in a common location.

To uninstall the plugin, run install.exe again, then click the "Uninstall" button.

Current File Support Level

Game Consoles

* Internal images are only present in Wii DLC WADs.
* Sega Mega Drive includes Sega CD, 32X, and Pico.

Handhelds

* The Nintendo DSi TAD parser supports development TADs that are normally imported using DSi Nmenu. It does not currently support DSi exports from retail systems.
* The PSP parser supports both PSP game and UMD video discs, as well as several compressed disc formats: CISOv1, CISOv2, ZISO, JISO, and DAX.

Texture Formats

Texture Codecs

• Assorted linear RGB formats, including 15-bit, 16-bit, 24-bit and 32-bit per pixel.
  • Most of these formats have SSE2 and/or SSSE3-optimized decoders.
  • RGB9_E5 is supported, though it is currently converted to ARGB32 for display purposes. The decoder is also slow. (Contributions welcome.)
• Dreamcast: Twiddled and Vector-Quantized
• Nintendo DS: Tiled CI8 with BGR555 palette
• Nintendo 3DS: Tiled and twiddled RGB565
• GameCube: Tiled RGB5A3 and CI8 with RGB5A3 palette
• S3TC: DXT1, DXT2, DXT3, DXT4, DXT5, BC4, and BC5 codecs.
  • GameCube 2x2-tiled DXT1 is supported in GVR texture files.
• ETCn: ETC1, ETC2 (RGB, RGBA, RGB_A1), EAC
• BC7: Supported in multiple texture file formats.
  • The implementation is somewhat slow. (Contributions welcome.)
• PVRTC: Supported in multiple texture file formats.
  • PVRTC-II: Partially supported. The hard transition flag and images that aren't a multiple of the tile size are not supported.
• ASTC: Supported in multiple texture file formats.

Audio Formats

Media Formats

Notes:

• Commodore DOS currently includes the 2040, 3040, 4040, 8050, 8250, 1540/1541, 1571, and 1581 disk drives, in D64, D71, D80, D82, D81, D67, G64, and G71 formats.
  • File icons for GEOS files are supported.

Other

Notes:

• Internal image refers to artwork contained within the ROM and/or disc image. These images are typically displayed on the system's main menu prior to starting the game.
  • "N/A" here means the ROM or disc image doesn't have this feature.
  • "No" indicates that the feature is present but not currently implemented.
• External scans refers to scans from an external database, such as GameTDB.com for GameCube and Wii.
  • "No" indicates no database is currently available for this system.
  • Anything else indicates what types of images are available.
  • For amiibo, "media" refers to the amiibo object, which may be a figurine, a card, or a plush.
• Windows executables may contain multiple icon sizes. Support for Windows icons will be added once support for multiple image sizes is added.
• Sega 8-bit only supports ROM images with a "TMR SEGA" header.

A configuration program, rp-config, is available to configure rom-properties using a graphical interface. This program allows you to configure which images will be used for thumbnails on each system, as well as other functionality.

External Media Downloads

Certain parsers support the use of external media scans through an online database, e.g. GameTDB.com. This is enabled by default, but you can customize which scans are downloaded for which systems by running the configuration program, rp-config.exe.

Downloaded images are cached to the following directory:

• Linux: ~/.cache/rom-properties/
• Windows XP: %LOCALAPPDATA%\rom-properties\cache
• Windows Vista+: %USERPROFILE%\AppData\LocalLow\rom-properties\cache

The directory structure matches the source site, so e.g. a disc image of Super Smash Bros. Brawl would be downloaded to ~/.cache/rom-properties/wii/disc/US/RSBE01.png. Note that if the download fails for any reason, a 0-byte dummy file will be placed in the cache, which tells the shell extension not to attempt to download the file again. [FIXME: If the download fails due to no network connectivity, it shouldn't do this.]

If you have an offline copy of the GameTDB image database, you can copy it to the ROM Properties Page cache directory to allow the extension to use the pre-downloaded version instead of downloading images as needed.

Decryption Keys

Some newer formats, including Wii disc images, have encrypted sections. The shell extension includes decryption code for handling these images, but the keys are not included. To install the keys, create a text file called keys.conf in the rom-properties configuration directory:

• Linux: ~/.config/rom-properties/keys.conf
• Windows: %APPDATA%\rom-properties\keys.conf

The keys.conf file uses INI format. An example file, keys.conf.example, is included with the shell extension. This file has a list of all supported keys, with placeholders instead of the actual key data. For example, a keys.conf file with the supported keys for Wii looks like this:

[Keys]
rvl-common=[Wii common key]
rvl-korean=[Wii Korean key]

Replace the key placeholders with hexadecimal strings representing the key. In this example, both keys are AES-128, so the hexadecimal strings should be 32 characters long.

NOTE: If a key is incorrect, any properties dialog that uses the key to decrypt data will show an error message instead of the data in question.

Nintendo DS Secure Area

To encrypt or decrypt the Nintendo DS Secure Area, the Blowfish key must be named nds-blowfish.bin and placed in the same directory as keys.conf.

MD5sum: c08c5afd9c6d9530817cd2033e3864d7

Unsupported File?

If you have a file that you believe should be supported by ROM Propeties, or would like to see support added for a new type, file an issue on GitHub: https://github.com/GerbilSoft/rom-properties/issues

License

ROM Properties is licensed under the GNU General Public License v2. Some bundled components have other licenses:

• basisu_astc: Apache License 2.0
• googletest: BSD 3-clause
• GCR_CMake: GPL-3
• inih: BSD-3-clause
• libmspack-xenia: LGPL-2.1
• lz4: BSD 2-clause for lib/; GPLv2 for others
• microtar: MIT
• minizip-ng: zlib
• PowerVR: MIT
• rapidjson: MIT
• TinyXML2: BSD 3-clause
• unice68: GPL-3
• uniwidth: LPGL-2.1+
• zlib-ng: zlib
• zstd: BSD 3-clause

GCR_CMake is only used at build time, and is only necessary for the GTK builds, so I believe it does not make the entire program GPL-3 licensed.

unice68 is linked in during compile time, but can be disabled. All builds with unice68 are therefore GPL-3+. unice68 is only used for Atari ST SNDH files, so this can be disabled if a GPL-2+ build is desired: -DENABLE_UNICE68=OFF

On Windows, the following bundled components are also used:

• GNU gettext: GPL-3+
• libwin32darkmode: GPL-3+

While the use of gettext can be disabled with -DENABLE_NLS=OFF, libwin32darkmode is currently always enabled, so Windows builds are always GPL-3+ at the moment.

Credits

Developers

• @GerbilSoft: Main developer.
• @DankRank: Contributor, bug tester.
• @CheatFreak: Bug tester, amiibo support.

Translators

• @DankRank: Russian, Ukrainian
• @NullMagic2: Brazilian Portuguese
• @Amnesia1000: Spanish
• Slippy: German
• @CyberYoshi64: German
• @maschell: German
• @WebSnke: German
• @TheOneGoofAli: Russian
• @NotaInutilis: French
• @xxmichibxx: German
• @ThePBone: German
• @ionuttbara: Romanian
• @MaRod92: Italian
• Motwera: Arabic
• Chipsum: Arabic
• spencerchris8080: Spanish

Other Contributions

[This list is incomplete; if you think you should be listed here, file an issue.]

• @Tpot-SSL: Assistance with the game.com implementation.

Websites

• GBATEK: Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS, and Nintendo DSi technical information.
• WiiBrew: Wii homebrew and reverse engineering. Used for Wii and GameCube disc and file format information.
• GameTDB: Database of games for various game consoles. Used for automatic downloading of disc scans for Wii and GameCube.
• Pan Docs: Game Boy, Game Boy Color and Super Game Boy technical information.
• Virtual Boy Programmers Manual: Virtual Boy technical information.
• Sega Retro: Sega Mega Drive technical information, plus information for other Sega systems that will be supported in a future release.
• PS3 Developer wiki for information on the "PS1 on PS3" save file format.
• Nocash PSX Specification Reference for more information on PS1 save files.
• amiibo.life: Database of Nintendo amiibo figurines, cards, and plushes. Used for automatic downloading of amiibo images.
• 3dbrew: Nintendo 3DS homebrew and reverse engineering. Used for Nintendo 3DS file format information.
• SMS Power: Sega 8-bit technical information.
• Puyo Tools: Information on Sega's PVR, GVR, and related texture formats.
• Badge Arcade Tool: Information on Nintendo Badge Arcade files.
• Advanced Badge Editor: Information on Nintendo Badge Arcade files.
• HandyBug Documentation: Information on Atari Lynx cartridge format.
• Khronos KTX File Format Specification: Information on the Khornos KTX texture file format.
• Khronos KTX 2.0 File Format Specification: Information on the Khornos KTX 2.0 texture file format.
• Valve Texture Format: Information on the Valve VTF texture file format.
• nocash SNES hardware specifications: Super NES and Satellaview BS-X technical information.
• Homebrew Development Kit for the Tiger game.com by @Tpot-SSL: game.com technical information.
• Low Level Bits: Parsing Mach-O Files for Mac OS X Mach-O binary information.
• Free60.org Wiki archive for Xbox 360 technical information.
• Xenia Project for Xbox 360 technical information.
• Xbox Dev Wiki for Original Xbox technical information.
• .XBE File Format by Caustik for information about the Original Xbox .XBE executable format.
• Cxbx-Reloaded for Original Xbox technical information, including XPR pixel formats.
• iQueBrew for iQue Player technical information.
• maxcso for documentation on the compressed formats used by unofficial Sony PlayStation Portable disc image loaders.
• Basis Universal for the ASTC decoder, which was derived from the Android Open Source Project.
• Godot Engine for documentation on Godot's own .ctex (previously .stex) format.
• Vulkan SDK for Android for the ASTC file format header.
• NEZ Plug for basic GBR specifications.
• xlenore for the PlayStation 1 and 2 cover art repository.
• unusedino.de for its archive of C64 emulator file format documentation by Peter Schepers.