Doom Runner (yet another graphical Doom launcher)

[youda008]

Great launcher , but seems to freeze (not responding) while trying to load pwads from my maps folder

The fact that I have over 3000 files in the folder may be causing the issue , maybe ?

Is there a way to overcome the issue , or a way to speed up reading perhaps ?

The ability to read .txt files provided with the wad before choosing it is great

Thanks and best regards

This should hopefully be solved in the next version.

[youda008]

You can save file with another name and after ensuring its correctness rename it. Or save backup. Or both.

done

[youda008]

Hello loayal followers. After a long time i was able to get back to it and finally finished version 1.5.

The highlights are:

• Most buttons got icons instead of character symbols.
• Added a button to add a whole directory of mods instead of just a single file.
• Added a button to create a new config file from an existing one.
• Added launch modes for recording and replaying demos.
• Reworked the map file list updating mechanism so that it should do less disc reading when loading a directory with huge number of files. Additionally the disc reading now runs asynchronously, so it should not lag the application even if there is a lot of reads.
• Improved the options file saving mechanism, so you should no longer lose your data if the app or OS crashes during the file saving.
• Fixed non-existing files not being correctly removed from the saved options, which means the same "This file no longer exists" errors should no longer show repetitively.

Thanks for having almost as big patience with this project as with completing Project Brutality 3.0

Download at https://github.com/Youda008/DoomRunner/releases

Please note that this is probably a penultimate feature release, which means after this one there will be one last feature version (1.6) and then only bug fixes. So this is your last chance to post your thoughts and ideas about the launcher overall design and mechanisms. After that i will only keep fixing discovered bugs and maybe add small easy features.
I'm sorry for that, but this project consumes too much time, and i need to reduce the amount of programming in my life.

[mamaluigisbagel]

I haven't gotten a chance to use it much but have to say:

Added a button to create a new config file from an existing one.

THANK YOU OMG THIS IS GOING TO BE RIDICULOUSLY USEFUL TO ME!

And obviously thanks for the bug fixes, that last one on the list was a close deal-breaker for me. Now this is the perfect launcher imo.

Also:

Thanks for having almost as big patience with this project as with completing Project Brutality 3.0

Ain't that the truth The waiting was worth it, though!

EDIT: Found a bug, at least for pre-update presets. By default, this preset had a map selected. But after de-selecting it and moving a mod around in the right list (via dragging and dropping) the map re-selected itself.

EDIT 2: Made a GIF, hopefully it'll explain it better. (doesn't play on forum, seems you have to click the image to see the animated part of the GIF.)

[youda008]

thanks, will look at it

[Lippeth]

Have been using 1.4 exclusively for a while now, and while I outright ignore the map pack section so I can change the file order, and don't plan to use the mod directory features at all because of the way I organize files, the top selling points are presets and being able to uncheck loaded files but keep them in the list. One bug I occasionally noticed that seems to have been fixed in 1.5 is that removing a file from the original directory but keeping it in the list will actually remove it from the list now instead of bringing up a prompt every time saying that it's been removed, causing me to just delete the preset and start over. All in all I consider this a vital launcher for my flow, It's simple and clean like ZDL but modular. Great job!

One criticism I have is actually the graphical buttons. I really liked the simple look of 1.4 and think the colorful buttons of 1.5 make it look like a Windows XP program. That might be part of the charm, but I find the bright colors distracting enough that I might consider sticking with 1.4 until I can get over my hangups with it. If going that route I would suggest going all the way and giving it a Windows 3.1 graphic style.

One feature suggestion would be to have the ability to resize the window to fit into a smaller space. I keep it tucked into the bottom right corner for an easier drag and drop process, but it still takes up so much vertical space and 1.5 is even larger. Being able to resize it down to at least the middle of the screen would be amazing.

Update: The mod list and the final launch command parameters in 1.5 don't seem to fully cooperate after un-ticking or removing files from the mod list, causing the need to delete presets and start over. Sometimes the removed file is removed from the launch command list, sometimes it isn't.

[youda008]

One criticism I have is actually the graphical buttons. I really liked the simple look of 1.4 and think the colorful buttons of 1.5 make it look like a Windows XP program. That might be part of the charm, but I find the bright colors distracting enough that I might consider sticking with 1.4 until I can get over my hangups with it. If going that route I would suggest going all the way and giving it a Windows 3.1 graphic style.

The problem is, the simple character symbols don't have enough expressiveness for all the needs. I need to have a button to add a mod file and a different button to add a mod directory, simple '+' is not enough here. Also 'C' as "clone" was kinda suboptimal. So the button icons are not there for the aesthetics, but mainly for practical purposes. And i don't think appearance a deal-breaker in this case, the launcher was never meant to look beautiful, it was meant to be practical in the first place.

One feature suggestion would be to have the ability to resize the window to fit into a smaller space. I keep it tucked into the bottom right corner for an easier drag and drop process, but it still takes up so much vertical space and 1.5 is even larger. Being able to resize it down to at least the middle of the screen would be amazing.

I understand, but this is hard to achieve. Qt's resizing algorithms are kinda black magic for me and making them do what i want is always very difficult. Also, if you look at the second tab, it's already pretty crowded and there is not much space to shrink. I can try some tricks, but it probably won't have very good results.

Update: The mod list and the final launch command parameters in 1.5 don't seem to fully cooperate after un-ticking or removing files from the mod list, causing the need to delete presets and start over. Sometimes the removed file is removed from the launch command list, sometimes it isn't.

Can you please provide me with some exact working example? I'm trying to tick/untick add/remove mods all over the place and everything seems working correctly.

[youda008]

Alright, by twiddling with the size policy widget properties i was able to save like 100 pixels horizontally and 20 vertically. The biggest vertical blocker is simply how many elements are on the second tab. Maybe in the next version i will create a third tab and move some of them there, but for now this is all i can do.

[mamaluigisbagel]

Just to add onto my bug report in case it helps, it seems like it'll automatically select any of the maps in the map list if you have them in the mod list on the right. ie You can see in the GIF I posted that it automatically selects Valiant and Sunlust, and on the right side you can see both files are present there too. After further testing, this seems to happen any time you have a map/file from your maps directory on the right side.

[youda008]

Ok, in that case i think i know where the problem is. It's little misunderstanding of Qt parameters.

[Lippeth]

I couldn't get imgur to display it properly, so I made an unlisted video. I think the problem I'm having might be with drag and drop, it seems to occasionally add it twice. Deleting the options file didn't clear things up either.

[youda008]

I see. It's the same issue as mamaluigisbagel reported. The map file is in the command line, because it's selected in the map pack list, which it shouldn't. I already fixed that, and given the severity, i think i will make a bugfix release very soon.

[Lippeth]

Aha, I wasn't even thinking about the map pack list so I didn't think it was quite related to that issue, but reading it again makes total sense and I'm able to deselect it from the map list. The case is so rare that I would ever want to load a map before anything else that I tend to dismiss that entire section, and just load any map pack in the mod window.

And one minor thing: Is is possible to have the minimum player count set to -host 1 for multiplayer? I like to test co-op features by myself and it would be very convenient to simply select it instead of typing in the parameters every time.

Also thank you so much for making this, it's one of the few programs I keep pinned to the taskbar!

[youda008]

Sure, that's the least of a problem. I thought that playing multiplayer alone does not really make sense so i left that out, but if there is a valid use-case.

[TheRatCircus]

Double appreciation post, not just for catching the only feature I had considered requesting - selecting multiple mod files at once - but also because I just noticed that there's a way to shell script export. Cheers for both; this is my new launcher of choice.