Arcade Part 3 - Final Burn Alpha (Dozens of Systems) - LaunchBox Tutorial

Another Arcade tutorial in the, what will be, long list of Arcade tutorials, focusing today on Final Burn Alpha! This emulator does emulate quite a few arcade boards and even a few consoles, but we're focused on the Arcade portion only. Again, a very similar tutorial with a few key differences.
FBA Website: www.fbalpha.com/
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Full Emulated Arcade List:
Capcom CPS-1
Capcom CPS-2
Capcom CPS-3
Cave
Data East DEC-0, DEC-8 and DECO IC16 based games
Galaxian based hardware
Irem M62, M63, M72, M90, M92 and M107 hardware
Kaneko 16
Konami
Neo-Geo
NMK16
Pacman based hardware
PGM
Psikyo 68EC020 and SH-2 based hardware
Sega System 1, System 16 (and similar), System 18, X-Board and Y-Board
Super Kaneko Nova System
Toaplan 1
Toaplan 2
Taito F2, X, Z and others

[@GlassICE]

I can't see it There's NO FinalBurn Alpha in that list in my LaunchBox is that possible if the version is different ? mine is 11.7

[@TheSirkao]

i dont have final burn as default emulator on drop down list with the latest launch box..

[@warchildxx]

Awesome tutorial! I've been following the whole series and now have Saturn, Dreamcast, Mame, FBA, and NeoGeo all set up! I used FBA emulator for all the neogeo/cps1/cps2 games and mame for the rest of the arcade. One thing I noticed: EmuMovies only downloads stuff for NeoGeo if you use the platform name "SNK NeoGeo". The defaults in Launchbox are "SNK Neo Geo MVS" and "SNK Neo Geo AES" and they cannot be found on emumoveis. Thanks so much for all the awesome tutorials!! My home arcade is awesome now :)

[@JOHNBOYVR]

Great video as usual pal keep up the great work 👏️👏️👍️👍️

[@chrislikeslotsothing]

Great tutorial. Something new to add to my setup this weekend!

[@SentaiBrad]

Glad I can help users experiment.

[@chrislikeslotsothing]

Thanks! I was getting the same error message as you, and FBA was refusing to go full screen. I did some googling and it seemed the error was due to the internal resolution in FBA not matching my actual display resolution (1280x720) for me. I switched that in FBA for horizontal and vertical to the correct value, changed the bit depth to 24bit and checked 'force 60hz refresh rate' and now everything is loading right into full screen with no issues. Really love how the emu lets you easily set controls for each game individually, with the correct labels, great for SF2 and the rest.

[@TheRafcave]

@@chrislikeslotsothing Thank You Chris!

[@NBWDOUGHBOY]

OMG!!! WHY DIDNT I KNW ABT THIS FRICKING EMULATOR. IT EMULATES ALL THAT? THIS THING IS AWESOME!!!

[@SentaiBrad]

There's lots of emu's that will emulate a lot of systems. Actually, MAME emulates most of these boards pretty well as is, this is just an alternate and for those games that have trouble in MAME.

[@NBWDOUGHBOY]

Sentai Brad nice

[@GiveBlood555]

NICE , ive managed to trim down my emus with this tut cheers

[@SentaiBrad]

You're welcome!

[@KevinHorsten]

I'm fairly new to this. But I have MAME set 0191 does it make any sense to have a Final Burn Alpha set as well? These are the same arcade games right? I don't understand what the difference is

[@crazykong1967]

It works using the FBA emulator through LB. Hitting F5 sets up controls. A bit wonky, but it works, sorta.

[@yakuzaronin7090]

Great video. Convinced me to add FBA to my Launchbox with little research. Question is it true that controls are setup game by game? Does retropie/retroarch handle it better or are all those prebuilt images from someone going game by game...

[@darkbrengameroom3929]

I'm using the 64bit version of FBA on windows 7 64bit, I am able to play the games on FBA with no problem if I opened it directly from the emulator however if I add the rooms into launchbox following this tutorial whenever I want to open a game I get an error message saying that the game is not supported by FBA (the game works perfectly if you open it directly from FBA)

[@MrJabberwock101]

I was having the same issue on my Windows 10 computer, until I saw this video. Go to the 10:30 mark on this video and you will get the reason. If you do not check the "don't use quotes" and the "use file name only without file extension or folder path" boxes, then FBA will not play your ROMs.

[@JorgePueyoPons]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/kJKVkqp3orx-pdE

[@crazykong1967]

@@MrJabberwock101 Thanks, I was really confused about FBA not working in LaunchBox. Cheers!

[@hyd-megido]

do this not work anymore? I just downloaded the latest version and there's no FPA or final burn alpha on the dropdown list. it is a premium feature?

[@787sever]

Hey I got fba to work in retroarch but i cant get it running in launchbox thru retroarch only outside of it im using retroarch inside of lb with other console systems without an issue im confusion. I have the fba core i need works alone but cant find a way to associate it when editing emulator in launchbox nothing in the list

[@mgarozzo11]

Kind of off topic... But I've been getting a lot of crashes in 6.12 not sure when exactly it started Maybe after the xml split. But when I'm scrolling through games in launchbox the app closes with no error message, my library is very large not sure if that may be why. I've tried increasing the ram setting in options as high as it will go which I believe is 4 gig to no avail. Have you had other reports of this

[@SentaiBrad]

No we haven't actually, but the best way to try and figure this out is to make a post on the forums about it. Make the post and tag Jason and myself in it on the forums so we'll get notified directly.

[@jdestroyer9721]

If I'm using the retroarch version of FBA and want to switch to the standalone version of FBA do I have to reimport all my roms or is there an easier way?

[@inglewoodpyro1233]

Is it possible to use the bezel project with FBA in Launchbox? I am using the retroarch version FB neo core

[@rafaelfreitasrafaelfreitas9628]

Great! This was the easiest way that I've found to import Arcade roms on Launchbox that really worked. But Final Burn Alpha standalone ask me to set my two joypads for almost each game! It so annoying! I couldn't find a way to have a generic controller map to play all FBA games. Does anyone knows how to do that?

[@supersonicstep]

YES IVE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS!

[@SentaiBrad]

You're welcome, and thank you for watching.

[@supersonicstep]

np, but i am having issues, Does this work with Any fba? because i tried an Older one called FBA-RR and i got an Error. its the exact same, but an older ver of fba, and i cant find a good rom pack or website for the newer one, what are my options?

[@SentaiBrad]

The rom packs don't need to match exactly, you should be able to use an older one on a newer version fine. The command line could have changed, especially if it's a fork of FBA and not the main FBA. If it's a different version of FBA, then that developer could have changed the requirements and command line parameters, I only know what to do with this one which is the command line and those two boxes checked.

[@supersonicstep]

ahhh, So try the new one to avoid these probs?

[@SentaiBrad]

That would be my guess.

[@jordanmadick7378]

wat does Create new memory card do im using final burn neo

[@TommyFlex1406]

i did everything in the video and still cant get it to work plz help

[@SentaiBrad]

Sorry for the late reply, but that doesn't really tell me much. If you give me some more info I'd be happy to help, or you can head on over to the forums and make a few searches. We've covered a lot of this information there too. The forum link is in the description.

[@attck29]

Abdur Rahmaan did you ever figured it out? I did the same thing and nothing worked

[@theindiediary5950]

Trying to use Final Burn Alpha. All my roms working fine. My problem is....I don't know how to configure my controller? I've looked everywhere and can't see nothing! Looked all over the bloody net as well. I seem to be the only person with this problem? I'm using a wired x360 controller for windows. Any help would be awesome. :(

[@rwprime1]

With your controller plugged in (and on - mine is wireless 360) In the fba64, click Input and then in the 3 drop down boxes, Player 1, Joystick 0, Normal and dblclk P1 Coin and press Select on you xpad, dblclk P1 Start and press Start and for P1 Up, I chose the analog stick Up, etc. For P1 Shot, that should read P1 Shoot and I chose the A button and for the Bomb, I chose the B button and click Save and OK. My problem is I cannot make "Make default" work. If I go to another game, I have to set the controller up all over again. My LB is up to date and the fba64.exe ends in .39. I didn't use the .42 'alpha'.

[@gears955]

half of my games work on FBA and the other half works with mameui64.can I use both in launchbox at the same time. Doing two different arcade paths to solve the issue?

[@SentaiBrad]

You'd have to edit your games individually or in the bulk edit wizard. Ctrl + Clicking games, then right clicking editing multiples will bring up the bulk edit wizard. The best solution would be separate platforms.

[@pwrmac1]

How did you get the region in the titles? Launchboxtool does not work since the split xml files....

[@SentaiBrad]

I did nothing special, everything I did, step by step, I showed off in the video.

[@SilentSoundGuy]

When it asks me what platform I would like to use, FBA isn't an option. When I go to manage emulators, FBA isn't an option.

[@SentaiBrad]

You can type in anything you'd like. Worst case scenario, type in what ever you want and scrape it as Arcade. The rest of the tutorial still applies.

[@redabouzid9637]

i like your desktop wallpaper plz could you give me the web to download it too

[@SeinDeineika]

No me aparece la opcion de fba, como hago?

[@martinhernandez656]

How can you find only the sega genesis and turbografx 16 on the final burns alpha

[@jonathanthompson4296]

How on earth do you set some sort of default controls. Iv created presets then set them as default but they never seem to carry over to other games. Only thing that works is configuring every game individually. What gives?

[@SentaiBrad]

I think that is what they have people doing right now. To be honest, I created this as an alternate for people who kept asking, but a lot of this stuff can be emulated well in MAME on it's own, so that may be something to look in to for the platform you want.

[@larryladeroute971]

I have had that error message when I launch GBA. I recall getting rid of it but then it came back. Want to say it is related to the resolution or window size...

[@maddogd1]

Is there a way to separate the games by cps1,cps2 etc . i have the roms in one folder but i'd prefer them by platform.if that makes sense

[@UnbrokenSoftwareLLC]

There is a way to do that, yes, though it requires an external program currently. You can use Antropus's Lightspeed importer: forums.launchbox-app.com/topic/30530-lightspeed-ultra-fast-mame-importer-tool

[@NBWDOUGHBOY]

Final Burn Alpha is not reading some of my roms. The same roms I can use on Kiwaks, Fightcade and Mame are not being loaded to FBA. This is crazy. IDK man, What am I doing wrong

[@SentaiBrad]

I am unsure. I do remember reading that Final Burn Alpha roms may have needed alteration at one point, (I don't remember if that is true anymore or if it's another arcade emulator I am remembering) but I just found an FBA specific rom set and they worked. In Arcade Part 4 I found a Neo Geo MVS only rom set as well and they work in FBA as well. The only thing I can think of is did you change the paths? Did you put your roms in the FBA roms folder or did you add the path to those games? That is the only thing I can think that might be off is that FBA doesn't know where to look for BIOS if you don't have your games in the roms folder. If they are in the roms folder, than I am actually more lost and would suggest going over to our forums and making a thread there to get the full help of our community.

[@jb-jbjb]

NBW DOUGHBOY you need the final burn alpha rom pack. For some reason it doesn't like the mame packs

[@derekwashuck7691]

How about Namco based hardware ?

[@MrJDuro]

I keep having problems with final burn alpha. Had everything set up and working go to play the next day after the 7.11 update and all the meta data for the game is gone and now it's not working. Gonna try to set it up using fb alpha 2012 in retroarch, hopefully that should work.

[@treylasalle]

Does this work for fightcade?

[@divebomb1000]

i followed your video and got final burn alpha to work it was really simple but how do i get it to go into fullscreen and stay there im using my desktop connected to my hd tv and also using launch box big box

[@SentaiBrad]

Should be as easy as setting that in the options menu, or even in the ini if you're comfortable with editing that.

[@Willi-ammm]

I am having problems here, the emulator does not find the roms there appears a mistake that is missing several files of the rom help me please have already put all the correct paths and the version of the rom is a pack of the final burn

[@UnbrokenSoftwareLLC]

Hey there! hit us up on the forums if you get a chance and we'll be able to help you there! :)

[@SentaiBrad]

If you downloaded specific rom packs randomly online, they can often contain broken files or missing BIOS. All the games are in a MAME rom pack (split or non-merged), and should be good to go. Honestly, FBA is just an alternate emulator to MAME, but MAME can run things just fine. So if you now import MAME games in to LaunchBox (follow the MAME tutorial), and you let it create playlists (a new feature that was not made during that tutorial), you'll have breakouts of all those games you'd want.

[@Willi-ammm]

Fba does not find any roms ... I'm going to try the Mame ... I was trying to use Fba to play the CPS 3 system, because until now I could not emulate cps 3 in the mame.

[@SentaiBrad]

Well, you'll import your games and set FBA as the emulator. You'll also need to tell it where your roms are located if they're not in the roms folder. You need to keep all MAME games together because of parent and child rom dependencies. So in FBA (and MAME too for that matter), if you don't put the roms in the roms folder for that emulator, you need to tell it where they're located in the UI.

[@Willi-ammm]

I've done these procedures but it's still the same ... Do you know of another cps 3 emulator that works in the Launchbox?

[@NBWDOUGHBOY]

What is the other Emulator that does NES, SNES, all those. I need to download that one too

[@rodrigonascimento4868]

Higan

[@NBWDOUGHBOY]

Rodrigo Nascimento Thanks. I was thinking abt RetroArch but, I'll look into this one too

[@Deltax5]

I get a error? my stuff is in a totally different folder away from launch box is that a problem. Launch box found all the roms fine. THe other emulators work fine. D:\xx\Emulaters\NeoGeo is not supported by FB Alpha. I even put the -L "cores\fb_alpha_neo_libretro.dll" in/

[@Deltax5]

the emulator itself can play the games fine.

[@jb-jbjb]

Your resolution command is in the wrong format. It should be 1024, 768 not 1024x768

[@rwprime1]

Just a heads up. I had all my fba roms in D:\LaunchBox\Games\FBA and fba64.exe wants them in D:\LaunchBox\Emulators\fba64 oms In other words, in its own roms folder. So I had to move them there and in LB, go Tools / Manage Platforms and under 'Games' Browse to the new folder. Of course I left everything else where it was (artwork). You can also change the name here. I started out with FBA instead of Final Burn Alpha as the platform name (so that I could 'scrape as'). This is the place where you can change that (and I did).

[@edwnx0]

I had this issue and the problem is that FBA wants you to type a backslash at the end of the directory. So instead of _D:\LaunchBox\Games\FBA_ you should type _D:\LaunchBox\Games\FBA\_

[@NBWDOUGHBOY]

retroarch?

[@SentaiBrad]

RetroArch does it all through their cores. Watch the tutorials for those systems on the channel.

[@NBWDOUGHBOY]

Sentai Brad definitely. thanks man

[@mixahman]

does anybody know how to make it "not" go fullscreen? Seem like it's not reading it properly in the ini file, unchecking Auto switch to full screen after game load doesn't work when launching thru Launchbox. Works fine thru FB Alpha game load menu, but LB is not liking it. Loading Neo-Geo, fba_029739, LB 6.12

[@SentaiBrad]

Yours is going fullscreen automatically? Mine never went fullscreen on it's on. It wont solve your problem at launch but Alt + Enter should revert it back, at least while you play. Are you sure you're pointing to the right exe in LaunchBox? I honestly don't know what could cause it to do that. You can also try posting your question on our forums.

[@rwprime1]

I never got fullscreen.

[@JoeArahi]

i tried to use the fb alpha all the @%&# day, and the solution was the two squaeres of the 10:35 but, btw, ty, i love ur software and ill buy the big box mode

[@nachovill26]

Please, Tutorial for daphne emulator.

[@SentaiBrad]

I'll be getting there in due time, there's a lot to cover.

[@NBWDOUGHBOY]

10 GIGS!! FUCK!!! thats a lot of games... lol

[@stoodent1975]

tutorial win kawaks

[@georgieferraro3938]

10000x Thanx!

[@SentaiBrad]

Of course, no problem!

[@me_grimm]

I like eta prime's tutorials better. Just saying.

[@Liberal_tears_in_my_cup]

there is no final burn alpha option in launchbox in 2018b or something? what do i have to do to get final burn alpha as an option to select in launchbox? looks like im going to just go back to hyperspin

[@mikemeza90]

Just type it in