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Second monitor usage

Second Screen value opportunities​

Many gamers have a second screen which is usually unused while they play and focus on their main monitor. The second screen is a great opportunity to provide more value in more ways for your users - and building a second window experience is just as simple as creating a normal window which communicates with GEP and has a transparent background window.

  • Second screen windows should launch automatically.

  • Second screen windows should have easy ways to close them - at least a hotkey and an X button at the top.

  • The second screen launcher should default in the original sized screen but have the ability to scale/restore down.

  • If you don’t know the exact resolution of the second screen, use 1920X1080 which is the most common one.

When building the second screen window, follow these rules:​

  1. Set the keep_window_location flag to true.

  2. Set the desktop_only flag to true.

  3. We recommend you set native_window flag to true.

  4. If your native window run as a second-screen with the game, make sure to set the disable_hardware_acceleration manifest flag. It improves the performance of the game by reducing usage of the GPU while you are playing.

  5. Identify which screen is the secondary one and display the secondary window on that screen.
    Use the getMonitorsList() function for that.
    If you know the resolution of each screen, you can do the calculation for exactly where you should display your window.

  6. Note that the GameInfo object contains a monitorHandle and a windowHandle. Take advantage of that if needed.
    Usage example: identify that the user moved the game window to the secondary screen.

  7. Use the transparent background window to share data and have your app windows communicate.

Second Screen Example

For a second screen implementation example, see the Second Screen Example from our GitHub repo.