From ExoticA

Welcome to Lost In Translation (LiT) FAQ. This set of notes is designed to help make all our lives easier when editing the LiT pages.

Contents 1 Arcade Games 1.1 Lost In Translation Infobox 1.1.1 Beginning the Infobox 1.1.2 title 1.1.3 subtitle 1.1.4 marquee 1.1.5 screenshot 1.1.6 developers 1.1.7 publishers 1.1.8 year 1.1.9 input 1.1.10 cpanel 1.1.11 cpu 1.1.12 sound 1.1.13 video 1.1.14 screens 1.1.15 MAME 1.1.16 Ending the Infobox 2 Screen Shots 2.1 Emulator Video Filter 2.2 Wrong Size 2.3 Bad Scale Filter 2.4 Badly Scaled Image 2.5 Perfect Scaled Image

Arcade Games

A well-populated page should look like the one created for Out Run. Typically, almost all arcade games referenced in this section should be emulated by MAME and as such it should be easy for you to obtain nearly all the details needed for the Lost In Translation Infobox. (We are hoping to have most of the technical contents of this infobox automated since most of it comes directly from MAME.)

Lost In Translation Infobox

1943 The Battle of Midway
Manufacturer	Capcom
Released	1987
Control Method	8-way Joystick 2 Button(s)
Main CPU	Z80 (@ 6.000 MHz) Z80 (@ 3.000 MHz)
Sound CPU	(2x) YM2203 (@ 1.500 MHz)
Video Details	Raster (Vertical) 256 x 224 pixels 60.00 Hz 256 Palette colours
Screens	1
ROM Info	{{{roms}}}
MAME ID	1943 · 1943j

This infobox should be the first piece of text on the wiki page to ensure it appears at the top of the page, an example for "1943 - The Battle of Midway" is shown opposite.

Beginning the Infobox

You begin the infobox with the following: -

{{Infobox Lost In Translation

title

This field contains the full name of the game without the sub-title, e.g: -

|title=1943
|title=Out Run
|title=The Ninja Warriors

subtitle

ExoticA’s rule regarding titles is that if an hyphen ( - ) or colon ( : ) is used in the title, then what follows it is typically the sub-title. If a game doesn't have a sub-title, this field can be skipped.

"1943 - The Battle of Midway" has a sub-title, the title is as above but the sub-title is as shown below: -

|subtitle=The Battle of Midway

marquee

This field is purely for the use of a single graphic image. The image should be of the marquee that is displayed near the top of the arcade cabinet if the game used one. If an image isn't available you can skip this field.

|marquee=[[Image:Out Run (marquee).png|center|300px|Out Run marquee.]]

screenshot

This field is purely for the use of a single graphic image. The image should be the title screen of the game in PNG format and adhere to the rules stated below. If a relevant screen shot is not available you should use the "Missing In Action - Arcade.png" image. Example mark-up is shown below: -

|screenshot=[[Image:Out Run title (arcade).png|center|300px|Out Run arcade title screen.]]

|screenshot=[[Image:Missing In Action - Arcade.png|center|300px|No Screenshot Available.]]

developers

(At some point, the developers and publishers fields will be combined into a manufacturer field.)

This field should contain the name of the developer(s).

|developers=Capcom

publishers

(At some point, the developers and publishers fields will be combined into a manufacturer field.)

This field should contain the name of the publisher(s).

|publishers=Capcom

year

This field should contain just the year of release for this game.

|year=1988

input

This field contains multiple items of data separated by <br/> tags. It should list each item of input, e.g. 4-way Joystick, Trackball, etc., and end with the number of buttons if applicable.

|input=8-way Joystick<br/>2 Buttons

cpanel

This field is purely for the use of a single graphic image. The image should be a picture of the control panel as used by this game. If an image isn't available you can skip this field.

|cpanel=[[Image:1943 (cpanel).png|center|300px|1943 control panel.]]

cpu

This field contains multiple items of data separated by <br/> tags. It should list each non-sound CPU used by this game in the format "CPU Name (@ CPU Speed Mhz)".

|cpu=68010 (@ 8 Mhz)<br/>TMS34010 (@ 6 Mhz)<br/>TMS34010 (@ 6.25 Mhz)<br/>ADSP2100 (@ 8 Mhz)

sound

This field contains multiple items of data separated by <br/> tags. It should begin with either Mono or Stereo and then list each sound CPU in the format "CPU Name (@ CPU Speed Mhz)".

|sound=Mono<br/>Z80 (@ 3 Mhz)<br/>(2x) YM2203 (@ 1.5 Mhz)

video

This field contains multiple items of data separated by <br/> tags. It should begin with either Raster or Vector followed by (Vertical) or (Horizontal), then the screen dimensions, screen refresh rate and finally the number of colours in this games palette.

|video=Raster (Vertical)<br/>224 x 256 pixels<br/>60.00 Hz<br/>256 Palette Colours

screens

This field simply showns the number of screens used by this game.

|screens=1

MAME

This field lists all of MAME's 'gamename' (identifiers) relevant to this game separated by the "·" character. It should begin with the parent 'ROM set' and then list all the 'clones'.

|MAME=1943 · 1943j · 1943kai

Ending the Infobox

To close the infobox simlpy add the following to the mark-up.

}}

Screen Shots

Ideally, each LiT page will have plenty of screen shots, since this is really what this project is all about! But before you start getting trigger-happy with your choice of emulator, please take into account the following before you proceed to upload your screen shots: -

Emulator Video Filter

Most emulators have a facility to try and show how a game would have looked on an arcade monitor or television by simulating artefacts such as scan lines, NTSC/PAL colour schemes or aperture grille. When providing screen shots, please ensure they don’t contain these artefacts.

Another feature of certain emulators is to provide various filters to try and smooth the graphics so they don’t look as blocky. Please also ensure that this feature is disabled prior to creating your screen shots.

For the sake of Nintendo64 and Dreamcast screen shots, the video quality will vary depending on your 3D card. Don’t worry about this, as any screen shot is better than none at all!

Wrong Size

Typically, emulators will output a screen shot that is 1:1, i.e. the actual size of the emulated machine's screen in pixels. As an example, MAME provides the image opposite for Out Run that is 320 x 224 pixels.

On ExoticA, and especially in the LiT section, we prefer small screen shots to be scaled to 2:2, i.e. doubled in both width and height, as it's easier to see details.

It’s not an exact science, but hopefully you get the idea!

Bad Scale Filter

The above example image of 320 x 224 should be scaled to 640 x 448 (2:2) - but take care that your image editor settings aren't set to smooth or filter the image, otherwise it may look like the blurry image opposite.

Badly Scaled Image

It will be obvious to most, but you should also take care when scaling images that you scale on both the X and Y axis or your image may look distorted like the following examples: -

Perfect Scaled Image

If a small image is scaled properly to 2:2 with no smoothing or video filters used, then the image should look like that one opposite with clear, sharp pixels.