Flyinghead has succeeded in merging both renderers into one. As a result, we no longer require a separate core for BeetleDC OIT, and there will be only one BeetleDC core from now on, simply called BeetleDC Libretro.
Recommendations
Moving forward, we recommend that you remove the BeetleDC OIT Libretro core from your cores directory, and leave only the regular BeetleDC Libretro core instead. This file should be called reicast_oit_libretro.{so/dll/dylib}. You can also remove the core info file that exists for it inside your Core Info directory. We have already proceeded to remove these files from our buildbot, but these files will be left lingering in existing installations unfortunately, necessitating this manual cleanup by the user.
So how do you switch between OIT and non-OIT now?
By default, BeetleDC Libretro will boot in non-OIT mode. You can tell if this is the case by going to Quick Menu -> Options and checking the ‘Alpha sorting’ option. If it’s set to ‘Per-triangle’ or ‘Per-strip’, the non-OIT GL2/GL3 renderer is used. You can use OIT mode by setting it to ‘per-pixel’ and then restarting the core.
Make sure that just like before, OIT mode (per-pixel accuracy) requires a video card that has OpenGL 4.3 support. Be aware that OIT mode is also much more GPU intensive than either per-strip or per-triangle alpha sorting. You might really need a good discrete GPU in order to be able to play this at decent speeds.
For which platforms is OIT mode (per-pixel alpha sorting) available?
It should be available for both Windows and Linux builds. macOS only supports OpenGL up to version 4.1, so per-pixel alpha sorting has to be excluded from this version unfortunately (since it requires GL 4.3).
Please be aware of the following disclaimer that should pop up before you use this:
WHEN USING THIS, YOU NEED TO BE PREPARED THAT A REAL RISK EXISTS THAT YOU MIGHT BE BANNED [FROM NINTENDO’S ONLINE SERVICES]. USE OF THIS FILE IS THEREFORE DONE AT YOUR SOLE RISK AND IS WITHOUT WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND BY US, EXPRESSED, IMPLIED OR OTHERWISE INCLUDING WARRANTIES OF TITLE, FITNESS FOR PURPOSE, MERCHANTABILITY OR NON-INFRINGEMENT. Under no circumstances are we liable for any damages arising from the usage of this file on your Nintendo Switch.
New Switch cores! 49 Cores now!
Just a few days after launch, we already have a few new cores for the Nintendo Switch available for Nintendo Switch! You can grab these new cores by going to ‘Online Updater’ -> ‘Update Cores’ from within RetroArch, and downloading them one by one.
Let’s quickly run through some of them:
Mupen64plus
This is an early port of Mupen64 Plus for the libnx Switch port! Please be aware of the following:
You will need to install RetroArch NSP and boot it straight from the main menu in order to be able to use this core. Mupen64plus requires more memory to be allocated than Hbmenu allows for.
The framerate right now is not great. This is as a result of there being no dynamic recompiler right now, it just uses a cached interpreter core instead.
NOTE: Everybody is completely aware of the lacking performance of the current Mupen64plus. This is simply a proof of concept for now. Remember, once this bounty (which has amassed so far an amazing $1K+ in little over a week) is finally completed, most games will be running at fullspeed effortlessly on Switch with this emulator!
What this core illustrates is that libretro GL works fine on RetroArch Switch. You can expect to see more libretro GL cores being ported over to Switch in the near future. We are excited for what the future holds over this!
Mr. Boom
This is a great homebrew Bomberman clone made by franck. Up to 8 players can play locally, and you can even setup AI bots that will play against you in either singleplayer mode or multiplayer mode. This should be a perfect fit for the Switch with one Joy Con doubling as two controllers.
GW – Game & Watch
This is a Game & Watch simulator. It runs simulators converted from source code for the games available at MADrigal. Each simulator is converted with pas2lua, which was written specifically for this purpose, and uses bstree, which was also specifically written to obfuscate the generated Lua source code as per MADrigal’s request.
However, 81-libretro only emulates the Sinclair ZX81 with 16Kb RAM for now. Other machines will be added as time permits. Push requests are welcome.
The port correctly loads and runs some many games I have around in the p format. tzx format is also supported.
EightyOne also emulates some ZX Spectrum machines, but those were left out of this core on purpose. For a ZX Spectrum core for libretro, see the Fuse core.
This core is courtesy of leiradel, who personally ported this over to Libretro.
Wiimpathy has now added Virtual Memory support for the Nintendo Wii! Finally, those bigger Neo Geo ROMs that were previously impossible to load on RetroArch Wii can finally be played with FBAlpha 2012 Neo Geo core!
Note that a few games(SNK Vs Capcom PCB for example) are still too large with this method.
Dosbox SVN – Dynarec on 32bit Windows/Linux and 32bit Android
radius has done extensive work on a new Dosbox libretro core. The dynarec has now been made to work on the following platforms:
32bit Windows/Linux versions
32bit Android versions
You can now play fairly modernish games like Duke Nukem 3D (from an MS-DOS perspective) on Dosbox at fullspeed!
But there is more! There is even MIDI playback implemented, and netplay works via IPX.
Reicast
Last time we reported on Reicast, we had full keyboard support implemented which was already hot on the heels of full multiplayer online support with zero network configuration. Since then, flyinghead has not been exactly sitting still. An overview of the progress that has been made since:
Lightgun emulation support (House of the Dead 2 (US and EU), Confidential Mission (EU), and Death Crimson 2 (JP) all confirmed working)
Various crucial graphics bugs have been fixed on both Android and ARM Linux. FMVs should no longer show a black screen and Soul Calibur’s characters should no longer be black (due to high quality textures not being rendered).
Threaded rendering mode’s stability has been further increased.
A bug existed that caused white lines on the top and right side of the screen. Various games exhibitedthis. This has now been fixed.
Further improved CHD image support.
The next thing flyinghead is planning to do is merging both Reicast and Reicast OIT into one, so that we no longer need to have two separate renderers/cores!
RetroArch 1.7.5 has just been released! Grab it here.
This latest version has also been uploaded to the Google Play Store. This is the 32bit version. We also have a brand new 64bit version for users with 64bit capable devices. You can grab that one here. More on that version later!
If you’d like to show your support, consider donating to us. Check here in order to learn more.
NOTE: Currently the following versions have not yet been released – Xbox OG. I am working on building those versions as we speak.
Highlights
Launch of Nintendo Switch version
Easily the main event of this release. Read our dedicated blog article here –
We were fully cognizant of the fact that it was very inconvenient for many mobile users (such as Android users) to have to repeatedly click on a setting in order to adjust its value. So we have finally implemented dropdown lists now for the majority of the settings!
A dropdown list will appear when you either click on a certain setting or press the ‘OK’ button on your gamepad. Settings that have a dropdown lists are typically decimal/hexadecimal settings, or even string lists.
We have even made the core options feature dropdown lists, and they work uniformly across all currently existing menu drivers right now. So that means the dropdown lists work with RGUI, MaterialUI as well as XMB!
We hope this will smooth over some of the rough edges that have existed in the raster-based UI for quite some time!
Adaptive V-Sync implemented for OpenGL (Windows/Linux)
We have implemented the “swap_control_tear” extension for OpenGL when using WGL on Windows or GLX on Linux. In order to take advantage of this, your GPU needs to support either the “WGL_swap_control_tear” extension (for Windows) or “GLX_swap_control_tear” (for Linux).
Adaptive V-Sync is basically a conditional V-Sync mode. V-Sync is enabled until performance falls below the target refresh rate. If it falls below the target framerate, it will conditionally disable V-Sync. Basically the logic behind this is that tear lines is preferable vs. a sudden halving of the framerate (under a normal double buffered V-Sync configuration) from 60 fps to 30fps, and from 30 fps to 15fps, and so on. This can minimize stuttering when performance falls below real-time, and can be more energy efficient. It can also help with very intensive shaders that makes the framerate fall below fullspeed.
Adaptive V-Sync is commonly seen on current-generation game consoles such as Xbox One and PlayStation4.
Improved Vulkan performance (especially for Nvidia cards) – mailbox emulation
Thanks to Themaister’s latest patches implementing mailbox emulation for Vulkan, there should no longer be frame pacing / stuttering issues with Vulkan on Windows when using Nvidia graphics cards.
Easy recording/streaming options (for versions with ffmpeg support)
RetroArch video streaming feature was revamped with GUI support, automatic file naming and quality presets.
Live Streaming to YouTube and Twitch is now possible with a single click (after setting up your stream key of course). You can go to Settings -> User -> Accounts and configure your Youtube/Twitch stream key there.
UDP Streaming to another RetroArch instance
In addition to streaming to YouTube and Twitch (and to file) you can now stream to another RetroArch instance.
This is meant to be the backbone for Discord spectate mode. And streaming netplay (think parsec, gfe co-op)
An interesting fact about this is that you could stream at 1x without shaders and playback in another instance with shaders and at any scale you want.
Of course all these things still need more work, GPU assisted recording, custom FFMPEG, etc. But I’ll get there eventually.
To playback on another instance just do:
retroarch udp://127.0.0.1:56400
General changelog
– CAMERA: Fix Video4Linux2 driver that broke years ago.
– CONFIG: Add ‘Reset To Defaults’ setting in Configurations. This will reset your config file to defaults.
– CHEATS: Add support for Rumble when increase or decrease by the rumble value.
– CHEATS: Add cheat variables to allow for updating large portions of memory.
– CHEEVOS: Prevent loading states before achievements are fully loaded.
– CRT: New porches and interlaced bug fix.
– CRT: New functionality, ability to switch between 15KHz and 31KHz, etc.
– COMMON: Support for “OEM-102” key (usually ‘\’ on Euro keyboards).
– DISCORD: Add ‘Ask To Join’ Feature.
– EMSCRIPTEN: Add stb_font support.
– INPUT: Add new menu toggle combos ‘L3 + R’ and ‘L + R’ (useful for Switch).
– IOS: Use safe area to account for notch for iPhone X and adjust main view.
– LOCALIZATION: Update Portuguese / Brazilian translation.
– LOCALIZATION: Update Japanese translation.
– LOCALIZATION: Update Polish translation.
– LOCALIZATION: Update Spanish translation.
– MENU: Add dropdown lists for many settings.
– MENU: Fix crash that could happen when changing core’s options on Android.
– MENU/QT/WIMP: Add option to rename playlists.
– MENU/QT/WIMP: Add option to filter extensions inside archives when adding to a playlist.
– MENU/QT/WIMP: Rename playlist entries with 2 single clicks.
– MENU/QT/WIMP: Fix shader parameter checkboxes not working
– METAL: Add screenshot support.
– NETPLAY: Save lobby details received back from server after first announcement.
– OPENGL/GLX: Implement Adaptive VSync – GLX_EXT_swap_control_tear.
– OPENGL/WGL: Implement Adaptive VSync – WGL_EXT_swap_control_tear.
– RUNAHEAD: Fix performance degradation that could happen over time (after approx. 30 mins). Fixed input IDs outside of range 0-35 causing slow performance in runahead.
– SWITCH: Add stb_font support.
– SWITCH: Add Retro Achievements support.
– SWITCH: Add networking support.
– SWITCH: Add touchscreen support.
– SWITCH: Add OpenGL support.
– SWITCH: Merging of RetroNX Nintendo Switch port, based on libnx SDK.
– VULKAN: Fix race condition in threaded mailbox emulation.
– VULKAN: Maintenance fixes.
– WIIU: Fix menu lag when built with DevKitPro r32.
Keyboard support has now been implemented by flyinghead! In this video you see us testing the game Typing Of The Dead, which relies on a keyboard as its primary input device..
In order to play this game, make sure the keyboard is set to Port A of the Dreamcast. You can see us doing this in the video by going to the Quick Menu, selecting ‘Controls’, and setting the first port to ‘Keyboard’. Now restart the core and the game. You should now be able to play the game.
Game focus toggle
Quick tip: RetroArch by default binds a lot of keyboard keys to hotkeys. In order to be able to use the keyboard in full, try to bind ‘Game focus toggle’ to a key. You can do this by going to Settings – Input Hotkeys, and binding ‘Game focus toggle’ to any key you want.
How this will work is as follows: if you press the game focus toggle, you will be in ‘game focus’ mode. In this mode, none of the hotkeys will work, and you can use every key of the keyboard. When you want to go back to the RetroArch hotkey mode, you press the ‘game focus toggle’ key again in order to deactivate game focus mode.
Written by Sean Green, the author of the Bliss-Box In a continued effort to bring the best gaming experience to the scene, Bliss-Box and RetroArch have some exciting new developments.
Firstly, the cables are finally here! Jump over to the new secure webpage at bliss-box.net and grab them
These cables come in the way of dongles and adapter boards. The boards were created to support low demand cable types and thus in the form of a mini adapter.
Also if you have not yet taken advantage of the exclusive offer from RetroArch, there is still time to get the deal. That’s 2 free cables with the purchase of a new 4-play kit. Plus, part of the profit goes to help RetroArch.
Single-player Blissbox adapter
There is also a bit more exciting news coming down the pike. Here is a sneak peek at one of the new products Bliss-Box and RetroArch are bring to the scene. This will be the first ever single player Bliss-Box adapter. It comes in the form of a D.I.Y kit and planned to be packaged with a D.I.Y product from Retro Arch. Yes you heard it right, RetroArch product, more to come on this soon.
And a final word in case you missed it, Bliss-Box and RetroArch were just featured on Linus Tech Tips, check it out here.
Future Libretro integration and Bliss-box plans
Written by Daniel De Matteis, RetroArch/Libretro Lead Developer
The above paragraphs were written by ulao, Bliss-Box author. Allow me to expand on our collaboration with Bliss-Box for a moment here and why we feel the need to feature this product on a regular basis. Bliss-Box has bigger aspirations beyond just being a controller adapter system. While people using original controllers of old videogame systems is obviously a big step forward in terms of bringing that authentic feeling of playing the real game, there still remains missing elements that serve to break the cognitive dissonance that you are playing on the real hardware. Things that come to mind would be for instance the Rumble Pak on the N64 not working, or the Controller Pak not being able to be read, or the VMU unit inside a Dreamcast controller not showing anything onscreen. Obviously, to make all this happen, not only do modifications need to be made to the firmware of the Bliss-Box adapter, but RetroArch will have to drive audio/input/video data back to the Bliss-Box so that the Bliss-Box can then interpret this data and do something with it. According to the Author, the Bliss-Box can even tunnel the native controller data via USB. This makes it possible to talk directly to and from the game itself. To this end, we are highly interested in implementing the necessary extensions to the libretro API in the near future so that Bliss-Box will be able to do such things, such as being able to read a real physical memory card instead of a virtual one directly from the joypad device, or being able to display graphics on the VMU and be able to read/write to the VMU as well. We see this as a perfect marriage of two projects that both strive to bring the experience of playing on a real console as close to the original as possible.
Of course, this will require further development, where both Libretro authors and Bliss-Box authors will need to collaborate in order to get this fully implemented, and we cannot give you an exact ETA when such functionality will be available. Nevertheless, I wanted to take the opportunity to explain just what the nature of our collaboration with Bliss-Box is, and why we are backing the project so firmly.
Thank you for your time, and hopefully you will be able to understand better exactly what the future holds with regards to this new-found Bliss-Box/RetroArch marriage.
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