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!
The Dolphin libretro bounty has led to this rebasing of the Dolphin libretro core. It is now up-to-date with the latest sourcecode, and it now supports OpenGL, Direct3D11 and Vulkan! It is even available for RetroArch on Android right now, provided you use the AArch64 version (since Dolphin itself requires a 64bit CPU on Android anyway).
In addition to this, I have also taken a look at porting Ishiiruka (a Dolphin fork) to Libretro. This one is not as far along yet as the mainline Dolphin core, but we are already making steady progress with the OpenGL renderer!
RetroArch 1.7.4 – WIMP updates
There will continue to be improvements to the WIMP UI in RetroArch 1.7.4. One of the big new features will be a fancy grid view. Previously, the WIMP UI only had a list view.
Beetle PSX HW
Some important bugs have been fixed. Finally, mask bit emulation has been (hackishly) implemented by flyinghead for the OpenGL renderer, so Silent Hill’s fog finally displays properly. iCatButler has made PGXP much more robust over the past few weeks, which has led to many rendering bugs being fixed when PGXP is enabled.
Reicast
You can read about all of our improvements to the Reicast core in this separate blog post here.
RetroArch is already at the tip of the spear when it comes to latency mitigation strategies with features like runahead, configurable max swapchains, frame delay, custom video context drivers, etc. Beam racing is a new lagless VSYNC technique has been developed that is already implemented in some emulators like WinUAE. The aim of this bounty is to finally implement it in RetroArch as well, and the users/devs that want it have put their money where their mouth is for this particular feature!
(Dreamcast/Compatibility) Fixed rendering issues with Tokyo Xtreme Racer games (link)
(Dreamcast/Compatibility) Conflict Zone – Modern War Strategy now works
(NAOMI/Compatibility) Metal Slug 6 now works without graphics bugs
BeetleDC OIT – Increased compatibility with AMD/Intel GPU drivers
AMD GPU owners on Windows/Linux and Intel HD users on Linux/Mesa should probably be able to use the Reicast OIT core now, as several GLSL compliance bugs have been fixed by now.
Note that BeetleDC OIT can still be very buggy for Intel HD users on Windows, and slow to boot. The renderer really lends itself better to discrete GPUs from AMD/NVidia.
Render to texture upscaling!
Previously, games which rendered to texture (such as Dead or Alive 2 or Crazy Taxi) would always output at 1 x native resolution. Now, you can set the upscaling factor. Games which render the screen to a texture should look much better as a result, provided your GPU is up to the task.
An example – here is a comparison of the Crazy Taxi pause screen – left is 1x native resolution, right is 4x upscaled –
xBRZ Texture upscaling
This new setting allows you to upscale all the textures in a game up to 6 x their original resolution using the xBRZ texture filtering algorithm! See it in action with Shenmue in this video below –
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