Reacting to events

Introduction

Playnite's API allows extensions to react to various events, like when a game is started or installed.

Available Events

Name	Event	Passed Arguments
OnGameStarting	Before game is started.	OnGameStartingEventArgs
OnGameStarted	Game started running.	OnGameStartedEventArgs
OnGameStopped	Game stopped running.	OnGameStoppedEventArgs
OnGameStartupCancelled	Game startup was cancelled.	OnGameStartupCancelledEventArgs
OnGameInstalled	Game is installed.	OnGameInstalledEventArgs
OnGameUninstalled	Game is uninstalled.	OnGameUninstalledEventArgs
OnGameSelected	Game selection changed.	OnGameSelectedEventArgs
OnApplicationStarted	Playnite was started.	OnApplicationStartedEventArgs
OnApplicationStopped	Playnite is shutting down.	OnApplicationStoppedEventArgs
OnLibraryUpdated	Library was updated.	OnLibraryUpdatedEventArgs
OnControllerButtonStateChanged	Controller/gamepad button was pressed/released.	OnControllerButtonStateChangedArgs

OnControllerButtonStateChanged is only functional in Fullscreen mode and is not available for PowerShell script extensions.

Cancelling game startup

If you want to cancel game startup from OnGameStarting event, set CancelStartup property of OnGameStartingEventArgs to true.

Example - Handling start/stop events

Game Starting

Starting event is executed before a game is actually started. Game startup procedure can be cancelled by setting CancelStartup property of OnGameStartingEventArgs object (passed to an event method) to true.

Game Started

Following example writes name of currently playing game into a text file.

• C#
• PowerShell

// To have a code executed on a specific event, override selected event method in your plugin.
public override void OnGameStarted(OnGameStartedEventArgs args)
{
    logger.Info($"Game started: {args.Game.Name}");
}

Game Stopped

This example writes name of game that stopped running and the time game was running for into a text file.

• C#
• PowerShell

public override void OnGameStopped(OnGameStoppedEventArgs args)
{
    logger.Info($"{args.Game.Name} was running for {args.ElapsedSeconds} seconds");
}