KrazyKain: people talking about editing an ini file to get games working on xfire.. what ini file would this be? i cant see any in my xfire folder.
In Windows Vista (don't know about XP, so someone else would have to fill in) xfire_games.ini usually sits in C:\ProgramData\Xfire.
From analysing my xfire_games.ini I can't find much support for command line switches, but what seems to be supported (I need to do extra testing to confirm) is finding the path to the game, so for the basic GOG.com installation (where DOSbox is installed with the game, if you don't uncheck it) it might work.
try editing the
LauncherDirKey= line (or adding one) to where in the registry the game's install path is found, or edit
LauncherDirDefault= to the path where dosbox resides, then edit the
LauncherExe= line to
dosbox.exe, I don't believe
DetectExe= works, since it isn't run by windows directly, but rather in the emulation/translation layer that DOSbox provides, thus windows may know that the file is opened by dosbox.exe, but not that the application is being run (as if you had opened the game binary with a hex editor or whatever).
Similar actions are needed for games running under ScummVM. And most windows-native games "should" work directly if they exist in xfire's database (if they don't, like Fallout 2 for me, give Xfire the path manually through the options).
Double post, because I want to give an update to what I've found out.
BAH!, can't double post! Most DOSbox and ScummVM games are probably not in the Xfire database, and in addition to that they're not easily detected (since they don't run directly, but through a runtime) and as such they cannot be easily added (if you manage to create a new working entry in the ini file, but your buddies will still just see that you're playing game "47843257" or whatever number you gave it, not really meaningful for anything else than launching it from the Xfire menu (where you'll see the game's name, since you have it defined in your custom ini file).
Examples: Lure of the Temptress, Teenagent.
Some native Windows games doesn't exist either and suffer from the same problem as above, except they're not running through another runtime and are easily detected and added (but your buddies don't know which game you're playing, since they just see a number).
Examples: M.D.K. 2
Some games exist, but Xfire looks for the wrong name of the game executable, or it looks for the Steam version, which is a whole other business.
Examples: Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon (wrong exe name, in addition to the problem below), Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee (looks for the Steam version).
What I did was:
1: find entry [5051] (Broken Sword 3) and change the LauncherExe=BS3PC.EXE line to LauncherExe=BSTSD.EXE, then add the game manually (you only tell xfire to "look for the specified exe in this folder, you don't tell it which exe file to use)
2: look for entry [5545] (Abe's oddysee) and change LauncherDirKey=HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Valve\Steam\InstallPath to LauncherDirDefault=G:\Games\GOG.com\Abe's Oddysee (change to where your game is installed), changed LauncherExe=steam.exe to LauncherExe=AbeWin.exe, removed the line starting with DetectExe=, then remove -applaunch <number> from the line beginning with Launch=.
Some undetected, but existing, games are really easy, as Xfire just looks in the wrong place for the path, these need just be added manually through the Xfire options.
Examples: Fallout 2
Examples are taken from the games I have bought here, as I don't know how the other games works.