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nickybmon edited this page Mar 31, 2026 · 1 revision

Box Art

OpenEmu-Silicon fetches cover art automatically from ScreenScraper, a community-maintained database of game artwork and metadata.

Setup

1. Create a free ScreenScraper account

Go to screenscraper.fr and register for a free account. Registration takes less than a minute.

An account isn't strictly required — anonymous access works — but anonymous requests are heavily rate-limited, which means large libraries will stop getting art partway through. A free account gives you a much higher daily limit.

2. Enter your credentials in OpenEmu

  1. Open OpenEmu → Preferences → Cover Art
  2. Enter your screenscraper.fr username and password
  3. Click Save

The status line will update to show "Signed in as [username]" when credentials are stored successfully. Your password is saved securely in the macOS Keychain — not in plain text.

How It Works

Cover art is fetched automatically whenever you import a game. OpenEmu identifies the game by its MD5 checksum first (the most reliable match), then falls back to the ROM filename if the checksum isn't in the database.

For each matched game, OpenEmu fetches:

  • Box art (cover image)
  • Game title (used to correct display names for games with odd filenames)
  • Game description

Region preference is set automatically based on your Mac's language/region settings. A US-region Mac will prefer North American box art; a European-region Mac will prefer European art, and so on. If no regional art is found, it falls back to the next best available region.

If Art Isn't Loading

"No credentials saved — using anonymous access (rate-limited)" You haven't entered credentials yet, or they were cleared. Go to Preferences → Cover Art and sign in.

Art loaded for some games but not others You've likely hit the daily rate limit for your account tier. ScreenScraper limits the number of API requests per day — free accounts have a generous limit but it can be exhausted with a very large import batch. The remaining games will be fetched on subsequent days as you use the app, or you can trigger a re-scrape manually (right-click a game → Get Cover Art).

A specific game has no art The game may not be in the ScreenScraper database, or the ROM's checksum doesn't match any known dump. You can:

  • Set art manually by right-clicking the game in your library and choosing Paste Custom Artwork (if you have art on your clipboard) or dragging an image directly onto the game tile
  • Check if the game exists on screenscraper.fr and contribute the missing data to the community database

Art loads with wrong title or wrong box art The ROM filename is ambiguous or the MD5 isn't recognized. Rename the file to match the standard title (e.g. Super Mario World (USA).sfc) and re-import, or set artwork manually.

Clearing Credentials

To remove your saved credentials, go to Preferences → Cover Art and click Clear. This removes both the username and the Keychain entry for the password.

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