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RetroArch 1.8.2 (and onwards)

DGrayson

Mod Team and Bat Team
Staff Member
Just wanted to post to say I'm very into RA and if anyone is having trouble finding a good filter for GBA then I modified a preset a bit and thought it looked great on a 65" 4K screen, was so hard to get a balance of having the pixel grid but its not being too defined. I don't think its very accurate to what the AGS-101 screen would actually look like but it makes the pixel art look as sharp as possible while also making the sprites [Is that even the right word?] look great.

The oversaturated colours of Metroid Fusion and The Minish Cap I corrected with the core built-in colour correction but I think it desaturates those games too much so I combined a pass of GBA-color with my modified CRT-Caligari [Which includes bilinear filtering I think so you can turn that off in the general options if you have it on].

All the GBA ones I tried were authentic-looking but didn't actually make the art look great at 4K, I'm got the scaling set up pretty well I think but maybe I shouldn't be running GBA games at 2160p to begin with, I do it to get a slightly lowesr input lag on the telly.


Got any pics?
 

Kuranghi

Member
Got any pics?

Sure, will grab some tomorrow, I'm down at my family home until then.

edit - Here you go:



+ bonus Super Metroid presents screen because I have no idea.

I thought it was too desaturated at first but if I bump it up a notch some of the map greens and a few other parts look overdone. I think it could be better with a bit more granular control over the gba-color filter.

I never had a GBA of any kind so I'm guessing this isn't remotely what it looks like native, this is just pleasing to my eye with screenshots of the games as reference (Although I didnt go in depth i mean like 2 screenshots).

I love the way the pixel borders give the impression of texture and the way it makes the main menu look so 3D.

Thoughts? Should I "blur" it more? Maybe the gamma adjustments of one of the filters has also messed with the color saturation?
 
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Kuranghi

Member
edit - should be all fixed now

Can anyone else see the pictures above?

I can see them on my PC but not my Macbook which is on the same network :pie_thinking: the only difference is mac and PC, its firefox latest on both afaik.

I'm guessing its some sort of protection from google photos maybe, christ, hang on I'll get them online a different way.
 
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Soodanim

Member
Can anyone else see the pictures above?

I can see them on my PC but not my Macbook which is on the same network :pie_thinking: the only difference is mac and PC, its firefox latest on both afaik.

I'm guessing its some sort of protection from google photos maybe, christ, hang on I'll get them online a different way.
I can't see them. Imgur should be fine as a host
 
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Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!


My remaps and stuff for all cores are fucked after updating, idk if I did something wrong. Flycast won't launch content, inputs don't work as they're meant to near universally except keyboard.

Had to do a clean set up again, only kept my playlist files and saves and I'm not entirely sure but I think my Beetle Saturn saves don't work, had to redo my VF2 control and option settings and stuff.
 
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Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!


Also they've been working towards the Steam release, lots of cores have been approved as DLC etc. I might make a new thread for RA when the Steam launch occurs since this was a bit messy and eh.
 

Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!


I still have some general weirdness like having to text edit the config manually to set shaders to true or the global config just won't apply and they're turned off every app/game launch.

Additionally, now my Fighting Commander is not recognized as just an Xbox 360 pad but specifically as a Fighting Commander that gets a "not configured, using fallback" message every launch. That "fallback' seems to be just the same as before so it's alright at the moment.

It all works for most of my stuff just as before, but I can't get it to configure right in Flycast where I have the Commander set as gamepad 2 and even though I change the inputs properly button R2 keeps acting as R (I want it empty) and L2 can't work as R no matter what I change. I use the Commander's top switch set to the right in order to have all different inputs for Saturn (and not only) stuff you see, so I need to set L1 and L2 to the physical L3 and R3 and also set R1 and R2 to the physical L1 and L2, the switch changes them up in this manner. That's the only way to not get duplicate inputs with this gamepad (R1 and R2 are both on the face buttons and on their normal shoulder positioning by default). It just seems a bit screwed up in Flycast now even though I set it up properly in Beetle PSX in exactly this way (I tried copying the remap from that core, it didn't work).

Still, it's alright if it doesn't mess up elsewhere, I don't really play multiplayer on this PC and only mapped it as a just in case scenario. I guess we just won't play Dreamcast stuff if it occurs, it wouldn't be ideal without an analog stick on the Commander anyway.
 
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RCU005

Member
One question: Have the cores for N64 been taken down? I installed 1.9.0 on a Mac and there are no N64 cores. Will they come back? Is it something wrong?
 
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Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
I see two (mupen and parallel) N64 cores available for download when I go to the core downloader on my install (PC).
 

MrFunSocks

Banned
The problem I have with retroarch is that there doesn't seem to be any UI to be able to change the settings for the cores like you can with the actual emulators own GUIs. Take DuckStation for example - on the standalone emulator you can pump up the internal rendering resolution and change a million different settings to get PS1 games looking amazing, but on retroarch you get.........nothing. Just their original resolution.
 

Wonko_C

Member
The problem I have with retroarch is that there doesn't seem to be any UI to be able to change the settings for the cores like you can with the actual emulators own GUIs. Take DuckStation for example - on the standalone emulator you can pump up the internal rendering resolution and change a million different settings to get PS1 games looking amazing, but on retroarch you get.........nothing. Just their original resolution.
Options for each particular core are in the Quick Menu >>> Options. With the BeetlePSX HW core, you can actually change internal resolution, add texture filtering, and even fix the texture warping "feature" of the PSX hardware.
 

jshackles

Gentlemen, we can rebuild it. We have the capability to make the world's first enhanced store. Steam will be that store. Better than it was before.
PCSX2 core is awesome, the previous PS2 core that was available was light years behind the stand alone PCSX2.
 

MrFunSocks

Banned
Options for each particular core are in the Quick Menu >>> Options. With the BeetlePSX HW core, you can actually change internal resolution, add texture filtering, and even fix the texture warping "feature" of the PSX hardware.
Thank you! Do you know what the default shortcut to bring up the Quick Menu is?
 

Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Thank you! Do you know what the default shortcut to bring up the Quick Menu is?
What he said, or F1. But ya these are basic things and you trashed it before asking :p

I'll say not all cores have all the options the stand alone emus do though, it was weird to configure Dolphin core on RA for me personally so I keep the stand alone version.
 

ThisIsPrfct

Neo Member
Do we have any informqtion if this will and how it will run on XSX? It would be funny if XSX gets ps2 emulation before the actual Playstation.
 

Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Do we have any informqtion if this will and how it will run on XSX? It would be funny if XSX gets ps2 emulation before the actual Playstation.
No. It's possible. We'll see. It's also possible for Sony consoles so, you might not get the pleasure either way though. Who knows. We'll see.
 
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MrFunSocks

Banned
What he said, or F1. But ya these are basic things and you trashed it before asking :p

I'll say not all cores have all the options the stand alone emus do though, it was weird to configure Dolphin core on RA for me personally so I keep the stand alone version.
I have really only used Retroarch for PS1 and earlier emulation, then the standalone emulators for everything newer, and none of the cores I had supported any of that. Still, my mistake for not reading up on that more.

Duckstation and Beetle just won't play anything in retroarch for me :(. Just get a black screen. Duckstation standalone is fine and works amazingly well.
 

Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Are you pc savvy to check the basics like hardware compatibility, drivers, os update, selecting different video apis like ogl, d3d, vulkan, whatever else, there's zero reason for it to not show anything at all if the stand alone emu works, just possibly different defaults, and the thing runs on anything from beastly pcs to the Pi...

Previously it presumably worked for you since your first problem mention was a lack of options to output in higher resolution, this time it doesn't work at all so, something is apparently fucked up. Hope you can figure it out, RA or no RA it'll likely improve your experience overall to sort this out and find what's going so wrong.
 
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ThisIsPrfct

Neo Member
No. It's possible. We'll see. It's also possible for Sony consoles so, you might not get the pleasure either way though. Who knows. We'll see.
Thats interesting, can ps4 use retroarch without a jailbreak? I have a pro and would test it right now if possible, gonna look some info about it.
 

Wonko_C

Member
I have really only used Retroarch for PS1 and earlier emulation, then the standalone emulators for everything newer, and none of the cores I had supported any of that. Still, my mistake for not reading up on that more.

Duckstation and Beetle just won't play anything in retroarch for me :(. Just get a black screen. Duckstation standalone is fine and works amazingly well.
Retroarch is not very user-friendly to setup compared to standalone emulators, it could be that you're just missing BIOS but it won't actually tell you you're missing them. Once it's all setup though, you will not want to go back. :D
 

quickwhips

Member
I got this working on my xbox one x in dev mode but when I leave dev mode I have to re do everything. Any guides on making it stay after reboot?
 

MrFunSocks

Banned
Retroarch is not very user-friendly to setup compared to standalone emulators, it could be that you're just missing BIOS but it won't actually tell you you're missing them. Once it's all setup though, you will not want to go back. :D
Nah I’ve got the bios’ and I can hear the boot sound play, it’s weird.

The menus definitely need an overhaul. Retro arch is like XBMC imo - it has an air of “we want it to be complicated to set up because it’s a complicated product”, which is bad because when someone does it right - like Plex - they crush you.

dolphin for example is so much better than retro arch on a pc. Same with cemu, pcsx2, etc. anything where you need/want to customise just doesn’t have enough flexibility in retroarch.
 

Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
You can save per game or per playlist configs. There are a few different menus, I use ozone that's the current default, the last default was xmb the PSP style. You just need to get the hang of it, I thought like you for decades and only got into RA when I made this thread, but now for any system that has a good core my go to is RA.

I even used the stand alone mednafen for a while since it had great Saturn emulation (and also PS emulation which I had last used with ePSXe aeons ago) but I like the Beetle cores just as well. I only keep Dolphin stand alone for now and PCSX2 I just don't use but if the core is good and doesn't lack options and such then I will...

It's certainly easier to configure RA than the average mame installation from my experience. And yes I know there's mame as RA core as well, but I just ended up using Final Burn Neo for arcade games, it's not as compatible for sure but it plays many of the greats I wanted up to CPSIII so it's fine for now, I cba with mame romsets.

Plus after configuring it for one system, Windows or whatever, then you basically know the gist of it for all other platforms as well, Linux, Pi, Android, whatever is out there. Granted some cores aren't available for all systems I believe but I'm sure they work on that and you can just use an alternative with the same bios and games.
 
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Teslerum

Member
PCSX2 core is awesome, the previous PS2 core that was available was light years behind the stand alone PCSX2.

PCSX2 (standalone) has recently picked up massive speed again after they are nearly done with years of cleanup. X64 support is finally in and the Plugin system is also nearly removed (Of the big ones only GSDX and Lilypad left). Meanwhile the cooperation between PCSX2 and Dobiestation has lead to some major accuracy improvements.

Lookin' good.
 

Teslerum

Member
Any Improvements to input lag yet for pcsx2?
There were a few attempts, but as I don't have the problem myself can't really make a statement on effectiveness.
An area where the retroarch core can certainly help as playing in retroarch usually has much lower input lag than standalones.
 
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Teslerum

Member


From a user perspective I don't get the appeal for retroarch on steam. You can't even use the internal updater in this version, but instead the cores are treated as DLC by Steam. More complicated than the standalone version with zero real benefits. Kind of meh.

TBH, that thought applies in general for applications on Steam. I guess it improves visibility, but when your product is already free, what's the point?
 

Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
People use Steam, they know how to use Steam, everything will be kept up to date automatically presumably after choosing the "DLC" you want like any Steam game/app. Lots of people want it on Steam. I won't use it on Steam, but clearly there's demand for it to be on Steam, and so it is now.
 
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Simbabbad

Member
Just wanted to let people know I've updated my handmade collection of RetroArch overlays:

Vectrex%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
Atari%2B2600%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
MSX%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
ZX%2BSpectrum%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
Amstrad%2BCPC%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
Commodore%2B64%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
Amiga%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
Game%2BBoy%2B%2528shader%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
GBC%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
Virtual%2BBoy%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
GBA%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
Nintendo%2BDSi%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
Nintendo%2BDSi%2B%2528overlay%2Bun%2B%25C3%25A9cran%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
NES%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
SNES%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
Master%2BSystem%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
Mega%2BDrive%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
TurboGrafx-16%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
Sega%2BSaturn%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
PlayStation%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
PSP%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
Nintendo%2B64%2B%2528overlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg
Nintendo%2B64%2B%2528mini%2Boverlay%2529%2BRetroArch.jpg


As you can see, most home consoles and computers are covered. The overlays are in general designed to frame an image set to integer vertical resolution, then the horizontal resolution may vary: for example, the NES overlay displayed here is designed for pixel perfect 8:7, but another alternative overlay in the pack frames a 4:3 image (for Punch-Out!! for example). Various sizes may exist. The overlays are designed not to be visually invasive compared to the game image, and (therefore) to be rather dark.

I also previously designed 106 specific arcade artworks and 12 generic ones for MAME, they may be adjusted to work for RetroArch.

Space%2BInvaders%2B%2528artwork%2529%2BMAME.jpg
Puck%2BMan%2B%2528artwork%2529%2BMAME.jpg
Rampage%2B%2528artwork%2529%2BMAME.jpg


You can see all my work and download the content through the dedicated page on my (French) blog:


The links are at the bottom of the page.
 
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With the recent release of RetroArch on Steam, I thought it might be a good time to revive this thread so that people can share their preferred shaders, cores, and whatever else while giving people something to go back through.

What have you got for me, GAF?

I found a vulcan (you have to change the video driver to vulcan!) shader, that "simulates" the glow of the crt on the edges of the bezel. Combined with the integrated curvature and scanlining, the effect is pretty nostalgia-inducing. There are some nice presets and a lot of options

luULBdU.jpg

Ue4sHmx.jpg

wHaZPP1.jpg
 
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