Author Topic: HyperFE (Working Title)  (Read 9787 times)

theherooftime796

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HyperFE (Working Title)
« on: February 11, 2018, 05:48:44 PM »
I've noticed a lack of theme development on this sub lately, and although the theme I'm working on is far from complete (it pretty much requires manual configuration per collection in order to have artwork display the way I want it), I thought I should share my progress to stimulate some discussion.

I'm currently calling the theme "HyperFE", as it is bringing a lot of the design from my favourite 16:9 Hyperspin themes while leveraging the increased functionality and native widescreen support of RetroFE. While similar in intention to the existing static RetroSpin theme (which I used as a base), it is rather different in execution and contains 99% original code.

True to its HyperSpin roots, it is an artwork heavy theme with a lot of flash.

Any constructive criticism would be greatly appreciated.

Video: https://youtu.be/Ga0ojB5OyWE
Screenshots:






(Full Album - https://imgur.com/a/krzCt)


Please Note that some artwork and videos are still missing.

Additional credit goes to:
  • CriticalCid from the LaunchBox forums, for his guidance in designing menu videos in After Effects
  • the designers of the original HyperSpin themes (mainly Stypelus)
  • dougan78 for the RetroSpin Static theme

Also, any reason why [spoiler][/spoiler] tags don't work on this forum?
« Last Edit: February 11, 2018, 07:51:46 PM by theherooftime796 »

Pieter Hulshoff

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Re: HyperFE (Working Title)
« Reply #1 on: February 11, 2018, 09:19:58 PM »
Looks very good. I’m happy to see new themes being developed for RetroFE. Let me know if you’re missing theme features.

Consider adding menuScrollReload=“true” to the index display so it updates during the menu scroll. I still need to add that 0.8.14 feature to the documentation wiki.


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theherooftime796

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Re: HyperFE (Working Title)
« Reply #2 on: February 12, 2018, 10:39:04 AM »
Oh yeah, I remember reading that menuScrollReloaded got added but haven't grabbed the new executable yet. Must do that now. In regards to new theme features, how difficult would it be to have horizontal reloadableScrollingText to only scroll when the length of the string exceeds the length of the container (you know, for those pesky longer titles). I'm sure there's more useful features but I can't think of any at the moment.

Pieter Hulshoff

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Re: HyperFE (Working Title)
« Reply #3 on: February 12, 2018, 11:55:38 AM »
Oh yeah, I remember reading that menuScrollReloaded got added but haven't grabbed the new executable yet. Must do that now. In regards to new theme features, how difficult would it be to have horizontal reloadableScrollingText to only scroll when the length of the string exceeds the length of the container (you know, for those pesky longer titles). I'm sure there's more useful features but I can't think of any at the moment.
It wouldn't be too hard to add; I'll just have to think of a good attribute name to control it.

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juan9999

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Re: HyperFE (Working Title)
« Reply #4 on: February 14, 2018, 05:10:21 AM »
Thanks for working on this!  I love how clean it is!

My only comments (and I have this issue with a lot of themes). 
- I wish the cartridges and covers don't cover the menu titles when you stop scrolling;  Sometimes I pause to look at the titles, and they get overwritten too quickly; possible having smaller versions of them near the videos would be simpler (non popup)
- It would be good to know which playlist you're scrolling

Again these are personal preferences...

Can't wait to try it out!

theherooftime796

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Re: HyperFE (Working Title)
« Reply #5 on: February 14, 2018, 07:39:24 PM »
Quote
Thanks for working on this!  I love how clean it is!

My only comments (and I have this issue with a lot of themes). 
- I wish the cartridges and covers don't cover the menu titles when you stop scrolling;  Sometimes I pause to look at the titles, and they get overwritten too quickly; possible having smaller versions of them near the videos would be simpler (non popup)
- It would be good to know which playlist you're scrolling

Again these are personal preferences...

Can't wait to try it out!
I've been considering implementing a playlist indicator but haven't exactly decided where such a thing would be located without cluttering the interface too much. Although, to be fair I haven't exactly messed around too much with playlists in general. Ideally, RetroFe (or RetroFest?) would be able to generate playlist files automatically from a particular variable (by genre or age rating, for example).

I have actually discussed a possible implementation for more convenient, automatic playlists before:
http://retrofe.nl/SMF/index.php?topic=214.0
I'm not exactly sure how feasible such a feature would be, but I'd be very willing to discuss it in more detail with Pieter.

As for the cover/cartridge art obstructing the wheels, I can't say it bothers me too much. The larger art which leaves little negative space is much more to my tastes, but I'd be willing to take suggestions considering alternative versions of the theme when the primary one is released (no ETA on that though, I'm just slowly working away whenever I have free time).

Alternatively, I could make it so that the art does fly in until the game wheels have totally faded out (and perhaps extend the time it takes for them to do so). However, with my current implementation, this would make the time until you can start a game substantially longer (as the animation would have to complete before any action is taken). The current anim duration is already pushing it, and is a definite weakness of my theme (which could perhaps be remedied with onMenuIdle animations?? Can these be interrupted to start games / scroll menu / enter submenu) - Pieter? Something I should definitely look into anyhow.

Pieter Hulshoff

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Re: HyperFE (Working Title)
« Reply #6 on: February 16, 2018, 05:41:16 PM »
Automatic playlists are still on the to-do list.

Animations can be interrupted for menu scrolling, but not for selecting a game or menu entry.


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theherooftime796

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Re: HyperFE (Working Title)
« Reply #7 on: February 16, 2018, 09:52:54 PM »
Quote
Automatic playlists are still on the to-do list.
Nice! Definitely near the top of my list of anticipated features
Quote
Animations can be interrupted for menu scrolling, but not for selecting a game or menu entry.
Unfortunate, but not unexpected.

Somewhat off-topic, but I'm interested as to what other big planned features are currently in the works?

Pieter Hulshoff

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Re: HyperFE (Working Title)
« Reply #8 on: February 17, 2018, 08:37:18 AM »
Somewhat off-topic, but I'm interested as to what other big planned features are currently in the works?

My main focus at the moment is to make things a bit easier on the users, so menu options including configurability, playlists, and search are at the top of my list. I just wish I had more help and/or spare time.

theherooftime796

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Re: HyperFE (Working Title)
« Reply #9 on: March 18, 2018, 03:48:05 PM »
I've been messing around with the menuScrollReload attribute and it's given me a few ideas for possible features to improve my theme (and hopefully others).

Firstly, a way to manipulate the volume of reloadableVideo elements. I am trying to make it so that videos fade to black when I scroll the menu. This is all well and good, but you can still hear the sound! Ideally, videoVolume would be an attribute (with values 0 - silent, to 100 - full volume) which could be applied to a game video, and changed using the existing animation facilities within retrofe.

e.g :
   <reloadableVideo imageType="screenshot" alpha="1" x="204" y="310" height="585" width="765" layer="2" videoVolume=100>
      <onHighlightEnter>
         <set duration=".25">
            <animate type="alpha" to="1" algorithm="easeinquadratic"/>
            <animate type="videoVolume" to="100"/>
         </set>
      </onHighlightEnter>
      <onMenuScroll>
         <set duration=".25">
            <animate type="alpha" to="0" algorithm="easeinquadratic"/>
            <animate type="videoVolume" to="0"/>
         </set>
      </onMenuScroll>
   </reloadableVideo>



Secondly, the ability to play an animation upon a reloadableScrollingText attribute finishing scrolling would be great. You could use onMenuIdle animations to cause game information (title, year, manufacturer, etc.) to fade out after a period of time, and then story text to appear in its place. Then, when the story text finishes scrolling, another animation would be triggered to cause the story text to fade out and other details to fade back in.

The animation type would be "<onScrollFinish>" or something similar (ideally linked to a specific scrolling text element with an attribute) - e.g. <onScrollFinish scrollingText="story"> would cause an animation to be played only once the story text finishes scrolling.
 
Hope this makes sense and even if you think these are halfway sensible features, don't feel any pressure to implement them right away.

Pieter Hulshoff

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Re: HyperFE (Working Title)
« Reply #10 on: March 18, 2018, 09:31:08 PM »
I’ll give it some thought.

theherooftime796

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Re: HyperFE (Working Title)
« Reply #11 on: March 19, 2018, 06:40:30 PM »
Cheers!  :) Although I've reassessed my menu and I'm not sure I want to fade the current video out when scrolling anymore, the option for an "onScrollFinish" animation is still very relevant to me.

latreides

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Re: HyperFE (Working Title)
« Reply #12 on: March 30, 2018, 02:00:54 PM »
Is there any progress on this skin or a place to download an early beta?

theherooftime796

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Re: HyperFE (Working Title)
« Reply #13 on: April 06, 2018, 03:30:53 PM »
I'm still slowly working on it but I wouldn't expect a release anytime soon (every collection has a platform video which is constructed in After Effects, and i've only done about 6 or so of them)