THE WIDE ICON PROJECT

I'm working on putting together a set of wide icons for my Box. I've come across a lot of them along the way. With this goal in mind, this is a preservation and organization project. It is intended to give the artists of the Wide Icons credit as well as keep the work alive long after the threads have faded into obscurity.

For historical purposes, here is the original beta of the Wide Icon Pack (OLD): DOWNLOAD




Here's the Spreadsheet so nobody is making duplicate wide icons: SPREADSHEET

If you'd like to make new wide icons to be included in future packs, post them here to be added. Please be sure to check the spreadsheet so you're not putting a lot of hard work into making an icon for a game somebody else covered. We do keep track of multiple icons per game though, so if you feel you can do better, go for it!

I will also use this space as a place to request wide icons I feel need to be made to make the set complete. By now, I pretty much have a wide icon with a PM3 border on it for every emu/category/company/xbox game i have backed up, but some could use a little more character.

Thanks to everyone who has and will contribute!


REQUESTED WIDE ICONS:

Emulators:
Apple McIntosh Plus
FMSXBox (if there is any difference between this and games BlueMSXBox plays)
SarienX (Sierra Games Player)
Thomson to7-70

Homebrew:
XBomberbox 1
XBomberbox 2 (This and XPong below are the two things I actually don't have a wide icon at all for)
XPong

Company:
Commodore

Categories:
Arcades
Other Emulators

PC:
Abuse
Gladiator
Out of This World


Also, I was hoping we could see some Regional stuff like this (I've got plans for them in the future):

US Licensed
Europe Licensed
Japan Licensed
Unlicensed
Prototypes
Hacks
Translations
------------------------------

Be Creative!



HERE'S THE BORDER I'M USING FOR MY PERSONAL COLLECTION:



Thanks to NineT9mustang for making this and giving me a way to make my set look uniform. If I put a border around an icon or somebody else did, I put both versions in the pack.



If anybody sees their stuff in the pack and it didn't have your name on it, let me know. If anybody objects to their stuff being put in this pack, let me know that as well. Thanks in advance if you're cool with it!


Thanks!
~Rx

by border do you mean the pmIII xpr texture thats in the back ground? if so I'll just make it out of that

Nice work Sotu. That's a few of them that I didn't have yet.

Any chance talking you into putting the PM3 Border on them?





Hey mtsaint,

This is what I mean by PM3 border:





I don't have it, but I'm going to get the border so I can post it at the top of the thread for everyone to use.

Later,
~Rx

Here

hey soto could you make a whole set one for each game system i love that dreamcast vmu one

I guess I don't understand how that dark gradient border is supposed to portray PM3's style.

From a designers point of view the border cuts off a third of the icon's image so you have less area to work with, effectively making an already narrow icon even more so. I prefer using the entire area of the icon to it's fullest. Waste not want not.

PM3 has a glossy finish which is what my icons have. No knock on whoever came up with the gradient border, I just don't care for it.

Effects (especially borders) can make an icon all but unusable in various skins. It's easy to add these effects if you wish to have them, but those who would prefer to do without (eg me!) would have a far, far harder time removing them if they were pre-applied.

"Base images" without any effects applied to them are, in my opinion, a heck of a lot more valuable. Say you grab a pack of icons with the corners rounded off. They might look very nice, but they won't fit in with all your other icons... Unless you round off all those corners too. But why should you be forced to conform to that effect if you don't want it?

So;


1. Open your image in Paint.NET. There are many other programs you could use for this, but I'm suggesting this one as it's free and simple to use. Goto the Image menu, select Resize, uncheck the "Maintain aspect ratio" check box and enter the width/height of the border image you'll be using under the "Pixels" section. Click Ok.



2. Goto the Layers menu and select Add New Layer. Make sure this new layer is highlighted in the layer window (which, if you've closed it, can be accessed via the Window menu).



3. Open your border image in another Paint.NET window. Use Ctrl + A to select the entire image area, then Ctrl + C to copy it to your system clipboard. Switch back to the first window and use Ctrl + V to paste the border on top of your icon. The result should look something like this (depending on your border):



4. Save your finished image, making sure you select JPG or PNG as the file type. You'll be asked whether you want to discard the layering information, say Yes to this, and you're done.

5. Watch sotu cringe at his disfigured work.

I wouldn't use the borders if somebody would make a complete set. But getting somebody to do that is like pulling teeth. I should know..... I've been lobbying for it for over a year now.

This is the only way I could come up with to make all the icons look uniform. Until now, I've had icons of different styles and sizes and it looked like crap, even with all the great work behind the individual borders. My brother seems to think it looks a lot better like this anyways. When they ALL have these boarders it really looks great in the PM3 skin. That's the catch though.... you have to have them ALL like that or it defeats the purpose. There are only a few that I don't have like this buried deep in obscure categories for the most part. Even the ones I mentioned above except for a few I have icons with boarders for. Some of them are too plain or boring though and could use an update. Like sotu's great Dreamcast one is definately getting a boarder and replacing the one that I've got.

I guess the boarders are my sentence for not letting anything go and having to have every system and homebrew.... even the ones that nobody wants to make great looking icons for. Every homebrew had a comparitevly boring icon made with these boarders that I had grabbed over half a year ago. I've replaced some of them with better images wrapped in these boarders, but about 2/3rds of them still have the basic ones. Even though they're two completely different styles though, they still look like they belong together.

That is actually PM1 border.
Hey we really need to standardize the size of the wide icon. 758 x 140 is what Team XBMC suggest.

http://xbmc.org/wiki/?title=Wide_Banner_Icons

Does someone know where I can find the .psd template for those icons:



I know I had the psd sometime, but I can't find it anymore. I would be thankfull for any help

I think Sotu might have those Horscht..... ?

I think it's actually Cospefogo...

Can anyone tell me what format the pics need to be named if you're going to use them for .CUT files? I assume that this is the only reason we have wide icons made for games within emulators, correct?

Since my image host account got deleted, I'm going to re up the images then I'm going to try and do the icons you requested for these:

REQUESTED WIDE ICONS:

Emu Specific:

CoinOPS Ignite
Sega Dreamcast VMU
Apple IIe
Chip8
Thomson to7-70
Apple McIntosh Plus
SarienX (Sierra Games Player.... probably use a Kings Quest I box for a great pic)
Company:
NeoGeo (I know it's not the "Company", but I need a good icon that's just "NeoGeo")

Homebrew:
XBomberbox 2
XPong

Categories:

XBox Games
Other Emulators
Multi-Player Hombrew Games

The problem I bump into when it comes to the less popular emulators is that there are no HQ or even medium quality source images or logo's to use. Since I'm always battling time restraints trying to fit things in around changing diapers, cooking, cleaning and making the wife happy. It just really helps having something decent to use as source material so I don't have to make it all myself. Which just takes a lot of time. The DC VMU icon took me over an hour. But I'm not as fast as I used to be but I do try to do my best on each one I create.

I understand Sotu. No need to justify it. You've done great work, and it's very appreciated around here.

I wasn't implying that anybody wasn't doing something right, just that something about the situation wasn't right and that this suits my tastes as a way to fix it. I understand it might not be for everyone.

I have a ton of icons in my pack that I know belong to you. If you can't find yours let me know.

~Rx

Can anybody tell me what you have to name the images to get them to work on .CUT files? I'm not trying it now, but since I'm putting this pack together I'd like to have the pics named the way they should be named.

This is what a .cut file looks like



the name of the thumbnail does not matter, as you can define it in the .cut file.

Anyways, sotu:

do you happen to have that PSD?

Sorry, can't edit:

I found it. It's available on Cospofego's site: http://fancyxbox.info/index.php

Hello again. I've made a few more banners (see previous post). I should mention that many off the assets from these were borrowed from themes created with Hyperspin, a frontend for Windows based emulators so I can't take credit for much beyond composition.

I don't plan on putting the border on since I prefer them like this.

Regards,
BBX























Some more...

So the image can be png, jpg or tbn?

This pack I'm putting together is great. Do me a favor Ultimate509. Let me know the list of icons that you created on your own with the border. I don't want to piss anybody off by having your name on other peoples banners that you put a border on. I'm sure you understand.

I'm going to have to try to hunt down more stuff now that I put this much together. I'm not doing any movies or TV shows, just XBox releated stuff here. It will be named right so you can just dump the file into your folder and FTP it over.




No worries on the borders on your stuff BillyBob. I don't want to use them on images for the cut files for games anyways. Are those mostly arcades you're doing?

yes, probably anything that XBMC can display as well (bmp etc.)

Note that files saved in PNG format are in "perfect quality", while JPG images are not. A TBN file is simply a renamed PNG or JPG file.

Yes, png should probably be the filetype of our choice.

Yeah... I am aware of the differences between the filetypes, in at least a basic understanding.

I also notice that XBMC reads a PNG file even if it's named JPG.

Right now, for the "Emulators" wide icons I have every icon nested like this:

Emulators/Nintendo - NES/Sotu/default.png
Emulators/Nintendo - NES/Sotu/default.tbn

Emulators/Nintendo - SNES/Guybird/default.png
Emulators/Nintendo - SNES/Guybird/default.tbn


This way, when you're viewing these in Explorer it shows up in "Filmstrip" mode so you can see what the icons look like with the PNG files. If you just have TBN files in there Explorer won't show you what they look like, even when you put "show thumbnails".




For Folder icons, such as the company names like "SEGA" and "Nintendo" I just put a lone jpg file in there named "folder.jpg" since that's the format the Box likes and Windows will allow you to preview.

Ex:

Companies/Nintendo/Sotu/folder.jpg
Companies/Nintendo/Ultimate509/folder.jpg



I just need to work with BombBloke to find out the ideal set up for the individual game icons you'd use .CUT files to load. Might just have to have them all in one folder with the game name.

My setup is this:

I have a folder called "EmulationCuts" that I put in my XBMC UserData folder (though it could go anywhere, really).

In this are a number of sub-folders. The first, called Emulators, is filled with shortcuts pointing to each of my emulators. The thumbnail files for these are called "default.tbn" and stored in each emulator's folder.

All the other sub-folders are named after a given system (Eg GameBoy), and are filled with ROM shortcuts. The thumbnails for these match the shortcut filename but with a TBN extension, and are stored in the same folder as the shortcuts they belong to. They could go anywhere really, but I see no reason to put them anywhere else.

The reason I use TBN is because that way, if I have a mixed set of JPG/PNG/whatever images, I don't need to worry about what format they're supposed to be in. I just set them all to TBN and be done with it. Using the same extension for everything makes it a heck of a lot easier to work with my shortcut generator (which is now linked in my signature).

But if ALL your thumbnails are PNGs, then you might as well forget about the TBN extension and stick with that.

Anyway, I then set the EmulationCuts folder as a source in XBMC's Programs menu (I call it "Emulation" or whatever it is MC360 expects you to call it, it's either that or "Emulators" - Keep in mind that the folder name is only the source name by default), and that's that.

Note that XBMC's File Manager can view/preview TBN files.

Sounds like a good setup BB.

So putting the pics for the games in the folders for the consoles they belong to, with the same name as the .CUT file and the rom is the best way to do this? I just want to make sure that the way I set these up will work with your .CUT file program. I haven't tried that out yet, so I'm kind of flying blind here when I put these together.


(Note to self, if this is the case we'll have to determine which systems the wide icons belong to).



So.... anybody else interested in making wide icons for individual NES, SNES and Genesis games? Plenty of artwork available for them I'm sure.

I could get this pack set up so that you just drop the folder for the emu you want wide icon/cut files for and run BombBloke's program to get them set up on your box. Just need to get the icons now.


Later,
~Rx


EDIT: No worries on the borders for emulated games. Since none of them have them now, none need to have them in the future. I've decided that on my box no emulated games or XBox games will have borders, just the rest of the stuff since there isn't one good set to work with otherwise.

844x125 pix.

That's the size of the icon, when viewing "Big wide" in 720p. (PM3)
Just for inform.

The "rule" is that all the thumbs for use with a given type of ROMs need to be in the same folder. Where this folder is doesn't matter. I just use the same folder as the associated CUTs because I consider anything else to be messy, but it really doesn't matter where they go technically speaking.

Er, you might just find it easier to run the CUT generator and see for yourself.

Hey BB... any chance you could create another DOS script for me?

I wanted to be able to put all of my boxart for any given system in the same folder to use with your cut program. Unfortunately, my boxart is all named "0001.png" and in individual folders that have the exact rom name.

I was hoping you could make something that would copy these "0001.png" files into one folder for each system, but change the image name to the name of the folder they were originally in so the image name would match my rom names perfectly. This would be an easy way for me to create full boxart packs for use with your .CUT maker by easily converting all the work I've already done into another format, instead of having to spend countless hours converting these things by hand.

Thanks,
~Rx

Heh... thought I might try my own hand at it but that code is definitely a foreign language to me.



EDIT: Icons that still need to be created or upgraded:

Companies:
NeoGeo

Consoles:
SarienX (Sierra Games Player)
Apple Macintosh Plus
Thomson To7-70

Homebrew:
XBomberbox 2
XPong

Categories:
XBox Games
Other Emulators
Multi-Player Hombrew Games

Thanks a ton for working on these more obscure ones Sotu. Love what you did with Chip 8 for instance.

Question: Is there a difference between the roms that FMSXBox and BlueMSXBox plays?

I'm going to try to get a beta pack out tonight or tomorrow. I still have a lot of "attributing to artist" work to do, and for some reason a lot of the images I had of Sotu's were much lower quality than those he re-uploaded recently, so I have to fix all of that as well. Plus, I fubared the way we should be doing individual games a while back, so I have to fix that area of the pack as well for use with BB's CUT maker.

I'll keep you updated...




EDIT:

Hey Sotu,

Any chance you could tell me how you make that cool effect on your wide icons... the one where it's kinda split down the middle horizontally?

Okay... this is starting to look (and work) great now.

I've separated the categories like this:


Categories (Various "folder" icons to distinguish Emulators, Homebrew, Apps, etc)
Companies (Various Company Name icons for folders. For example a Nintendo one for a folder with all emus by Nintendo in it)
DOS Ports
Emulators
Homebrew

Each of these are broken down in easy to follow directories, and have the artist credited for the work in the folder which contains the artwork. Inside these folders, there is 3 files.

1) default.png
2) default.tbn
3) folder.jpg

This way, you should be able to easily move one of these images by FTP or copying in Windows, no matter what the format has to be for that particular type of Wide Icon.

Example:

Emulators\Nintendo - NES\Sotu (1)\default.png
Emulators\Nintendo - NES\Sotu (1)\default.tbn
Emulators\Nintendo - NES\Sotu (1)\folder.jpg





I still have about 100-150 images at least to go through and format for this part of it. BombBloke is going to make me a batch program to convert my Xtras Boxart to the correct format for easy use with the CUT file maker. When that is made I will add these images to the pack (This pack may end up being too large for one download )

The emulated games will be set up as follows:

Emulated Games\Nintendo\Gameboy\Tetris.png
Emulated Games\Nintendo\NES\Final Fantasy.png
Emulated Games\SEGA\SEGA Genesis\Toejam and Earl.png

They will match the rom names in the Xtras perfectly, so when you correctly set up BombBlokes CUT maker, it will create perfect cuts for you with the Boxarts for the games. (Still haven't decided what to do about games that don't have boxart now).

I should have a "beta" pack ready for release sometime tomorrow.

~Rx


EDIT: I just thought of something else cool about the emulated game portion of this. If you decided you only wanted 100 or so of the roms, instead of the full pack, this would make the cuts for all of the games you had and work with the artwork perfectly. If you don't mind having the space taken up by having the whole artwork pack for a system, you don't even have to bother purging artwork you weren't going to use because it will work just fine having them in there.

Here's the BETA

Let me know what you think. If you are the artist, or know the artist that did any particular work in here that I didn't know, please let me know. Also let me know if I've mis-attributed any work to anybody.

======================================================================

For anybody who's keeping score, these are the only icons we really need still as far as I can tell:

Emulators:
Apple McIntosh Plus
FMSXBox (if there is any difference between this and games BlueMSXBox plays)
SarienX Sierra Games Player
Thomson to7-70

Homebrew:
XBomberbox 1
XBomberbox 2
XPong

Company:
Commodore

Categories:
Arcades (Need a real eye catching one here. The one I have is pretty boring)
Other Emulators

PC:
Abuse
Gladiator
Out of This World

Anybody take a look at the Wide Icon pack?

Just wondering if anyone found it useful.

i downloaded i will be using some of them i wish the Zelda's had pics from that game like zelda a link to the past has twilight princess screen shot in it

but yep its handy some of these i haven't seen before saves me looking around

@ResX
Yes, and thank you for uploading this. I have been using the NineT9Mustang pack b/c it was one of the most complete sets out there...at least that is what I had thought...until now.

Anyway, I had left a reply back at Bomb Bloke for his "Xbmc Shortcut Creator" and mentioned that it could be worth considering using "Icon Pack Installer" with the icon packs made Cospefogo, sotu, guybird, NineT9Mustang, frankmorris, etc. for your project. If it could be implemented packs could be added at anytime, just a thought.

Again, thank you for all the work you have been putting into this project and I would like to contribute something if I can. I'll be working at my end to see if the "Icon Pack Installer" is a solution. There has to be a solution!

Thanks,
RAMblur

Here's one more you're missing Res



If you guys can find source images I'll do the rest of them, just not into making custom logos for them atm. Post some links to images you'd like used for them and I'll see what I can do.

Hey rambler and nate. Glad you're getting use out of them. It took me a few weekends to do, and isn't near complete I'm sure, but it's a great little collection, I think.

I'd also like to see some kind of "installer" rambler, but I just can't really think of a good way to automate the process since everyone has different folder names for everything from Box to Box. That's why I at least put the 3 different versions in the folders with the conventions you'd likely need so you can just drag and drop instead of having to download the image, convert the image, rename the image and then copy to where you wanted it.



Oh... and thanks for the icon Sotu. Great work man. Looking forward to someday getting the rest of those missing ones.

Later,
~Rx

New request for wide icons because of the .CUT abilities...

I was hoping we could see some regional stuff like this:

US Licensed
Europe Licensed
Japan Licensed
Unlicensed
Prototypes
Hacks
Translations

Probably more I'm forgetting about, but this would be a great start. Anybody interested?



EDIT: Oh... and maybe a "Console Game Auto Loader" Icon as well. I don't know.... what should we call the process of starting games straight from XBMC? My brother isn't going to know what the hell a .CUT file is. It should have a name that would easily identify exactly what we're doing here and also looks good on a wide icon.

Hey everyone,

Check out the first post again. Nate1579 has caught up completely on the Wide Icons for our Roms at this point and uploaded a pack for us to download. Right now, all Rom Wide Icons should be included in the pack and remarked in the spreadsheet with the artist credited.

If there are any missing Wide Icons that you or somebody else made, let us know. Also if for any reason the wrong artist is credited for a work let us know.

Thank you to everyone for the great work. I know it's summer and people don't have as much time to do this stuff when they're enjoying the nice weather, but I'm hoping that this is the reason that it's slowed down a bit in here and would love to see more great artwork like what's on display in here so far.

I hope the fact that this project has gone as far as it has is proof that there really are people that appreciate this work and I look forward to seeing what else you come up with.

Be sure to check the spreadsheets before you decide to make a wide icon for a particular game because one may already be made.

Also.... if anybody could do some of the requests I have in the first post I'd be mighty appreciative.

Thanks and Enjoy,
~Rx

I wish someone continue to work soem emulator icons like these i have tried several ways to get ahold of billybobx but never can

if someone could make more icons like these for
Gameboy (with all three gameboys on it if possible)
Playstation
Nintendo 64
Game Gear
Master System
Atari 2600
atari 5200
atari 7800
Colecovision
atari lynx
msx
msx2
wonderswan
virtualboy

I know this is a tall list but it would begreat those icon look great on my tv in any skin I really like them so if anyone wants to try to take a crack please do

thanks in advance

nate1579

Here's where the original cartoon-style pictures are from:
http://www.iconarchive.com/category/game/c...y-sykonist.html
http://deleket.deviantart.com/art/Gaming-Icons-Pack-42723812

Hey everyone!

I've updated the top of the thread with Nate's work. Here it is for anyone reading so you don't have to go back to the top of the thread.




Here's the Spreadsheet so nobody is making duplicate wide icons: SPREADSHEET

If yours aren't in there, or if yours are but the author is credited as "unknown" please let us know.

I'd love to see more from you all. Some great work here and we're doing our best to preserve the work and give the authors full credit for it.

Take it easy,
~Rx

does anyone even use this just wondering dont here and feedback or anything


Hey Rx
What do you think about (putting these into a photo bucket account each catgoire get a album then the album link is on the spread sheet i could have ti done in no time then i wouldnt have to up date here just leave it in the xtras thread? or do you have a better idea?

just a thought


nate1579

However you want to do that man is cool with me... as long as you think that stuff will be up there for a long time and not "break" on us.

I'm really dumb about all that stuff.

I would like to see more feedback, but it is the middle of July. Even the guys I work on the Xtras with don't post nearly as much as they did in the crappy weather.

Don't get disheartened. In a few months I'm sure people will be holed up in their heated abodes with nothing better to do.

Later,
~Rx

Well I tried lol. Now someone with some skill redo them. We need N64,PSX,and Arcade in this style.

What happened to Sotu? I thought he was making all the emulators in PM3 style? I would rather have his pm3 set than the cartoony style but I would take either one.

also I downloaded the wide emulator set and it only has low res sotu icons for some reason (331x72).

thats better You can see I took my time this time.

took your time my ass you stole my images and changed a little called them your own



http://forums.xbox-scene.com/index.php?sho...0375&st=285

lmao yea I guess I didnt just spend 4 hours working on these.

Yes I obviously used the same system and controller icons you used but I got them from the source and resized them. The system logos I spent hours searching on google finding them from various sources Yes I was inspired by your work but I didnt steal your work lol. If it makes you feel any better I give you co-credit even though I'm the one that just wasted my entire day putting a ton of effort into them.

proof:

http://i29.tinypic.com/3151khx.jpg

were di you get the consoles because there are only in one place

you didnt get the consoles from the source

I dont see why you are so worked up over this. This is what happened...

I took your idea and improved it.

I dont care anymore

Do what you wish

I think it just made me mad because i been requesting so long then i go do it my self then its like lets copy nate1579 idea but oh well making a entire different set soon that will blend in with any skin


well cheers

I do have a short fuse so i am sorry hope you understand
nate1579