ROM Collection
ROM Collections is as the name already implies a collection of ROMs or games within AKL. You can compose the collection by using one or multiple import rules connected to sources or you can manually import or reference existing ROMs/games from other collections and sources. The ability to associate multiple import rules to your collection makes it possible to have diverse collections. You can associate different sources with your collections, but treat the contents as one set. Or you can make an import rule that only looks for specfic type of games over all sources available. Collections with import rules might be considered similar to using Playlists in Kodi for other media. Just like the category the collection also has a range of metadata and assets to give the collection more detail. Associate one or multiple launchers to your collection to make the ROMs or games in the collection executable with those launchers, or dont add any to use the ones associated on a source/ROM level.
You can create ROM collections based on a certain console or you might want collections based on a popular franchise. The choice is yours.
- ROOT
|
| - Franchises
| | - Sonic
| | - Mario
| | - Call of duty
|
| - Nintendo
| | - NES
| | - SNESOpen AKL and navigate to the location where you like to add the new ROM Collection (in the root or under any Category).
- Open up the context menu, choose "Add" and choose "ROM collection".
- Choose either to create the collection at the location you are at or under the library item you are currently on.
- Choose the platform of the collection.
- Enter the name of the collection.
- AKL will process your input and render the new views. Once completed it will update your screen and you can find your newly create collection.
Open up the context menu of a ROM collection and you can either edit the collection or directly import ROMs using the configured import rules.
If no rules configured then no import actions are executed. To configure them, go to Edit and then Manage ROMs.
Under manage ROMs you can add new import rulesets. A ruleset is either associated with a specific source or all sources. The ruleset optionally consists of rules. When no rule is added the ruleset will simply get all ROMs from the associated source. If one or more rules are added, you can choose to either execute them with an AND condition or an OR condition. So either a ROM should satisfy all the rules or just one of them.
When adding a rule, you will be able to select a certain metadata field you want to validate. After which you choose how to validate the value of that field and then the actual value to validate against.
Using rulesets you can setup your collection the way you want.
Each of the entities or library items in AKL has certain metadata and assets associated. These can be changed after creation the give all the needed details about each entity. Depending on the kodi skin it will be displayed in a certain way on your screen. In the case of ROM collections you can also apply launchers to further complete your collection.
Go to the collection and open up the context menu to be able to change all the details.
You can change metadata details like the name, year and genre for each collection. Follow these steps.
- Go to the collection you like to edit and open up the context menu.
- Choose "Edit ROM collection".
- Choose "Edit Metadata ...".
- Choose which metadata to edit.
You can import a NFO file that contains all the needed metadata for this entity.
You can change the assets of the collection, like the icon, banner and the fanart. Depending on the support by the skin, you can view all of these assets when you select or hover on this particular collection. Follow these steps to change the assets.
- Go to the collection you like to edit and open up the context menu.
- Choose "Edit ROM collection".
- Choose "Edit Assets/Artwork ...".
- Choose which asset to edit.
After selecting the asset to edit you will have similar steps as already described under Selecting an asset under Category -> Edit Assets.
This option gives you to opportunity to switch asset types with eachother when being rendered for the view. In the case a skin only supports showing the Icon asset of the library item, but you want to show the clearlogo asset instead, then you can use this option to link the original clearlogo asset to the icon asset. AKL will swap the actual value or path when rendering the view.
This shows and changes the status flag for this particular collection. When the view is rendered all library items will have a finished/unfinished status flag which points to this particular value. Depending on skin support you can filter on them or it will show a particular image on top of the icons indicating the status.
This will export the collection details to a XML file. You can use that for backing up or copying configurations between different Kodi instances.
Deletes this particular ROM collection. Will not delete any of scanned files/ROMS.
With this menu option you can associate a new launcher with this collection. The launcher is the actual application or script that will be executed once you select a ROM in this collection. For more details read the page about Launching.
Wintermute0110 has a some good documentation about setting up certain emulator configurations. Check: