Homebrew WIP SNES Classic Launcher For Nintendo Switch

[eskinner3742]

Maybe taking a look at the code for retronx can help with linking this frontend to a snes retroarch core.

 

[Fadi5555]

Any update on this please? Especially after getting OpenGL support.

 

[bonoboy]

This is one of the reasons why I love scene!

 

[peroquelepongo]

Excelent, very nice and if it's posible to change music it would be nicer

 

[HOv]

The Nintendo switch online app that let's you play NES games has been hacked. I've read an article stating that it's a direct port of the NES classic. So we all know the NES and the SNES classic are pretty much running the same software emulation, and with the Nintendo online app being hacked, is it now possible to make this project of yours a reality? Please let us know. It would be awesome to have this SNES classic launcher on our switch.

Hey everyone! :-) I've been messing around with lovepotion lately, and have made a bit of progress into having the SNES Classic interface be on Nintendo Switch.



Lots to go still, and the real bottleneck here is no hardware acceleration. But, once all that is solved, we should be good to go as far as having an application that can launch games you put on your SD card.

Will update the thread as progress continues.

 

[Deleted-351540]

Considering this user hasn't been back to the Temp since June, I think it's a safe bet that this project is dead.

 

[HOv]

Yeah you're probably right. Too bad. Myself and I'm sure everyone else would have loved this on their switch.

 

[samthebreadman]

Hi. Waiting for SDL2 support for OpenGL before I can continue. Thanks!

 

[DocKlokMan]

Hi. Waiting for SDL2 support for OpenGL before I can continue. Thanks!

We have OpenGL support now. Or is it not available to the SDL2 library yet?

 

[samthebreadman]

We have OpenGL support now. Or is it not available to the SDL2 library yet?

AFAIK no one has done SDL2 with libnx openGL. Not yet at least. I could try working with openGL directly I guess.

 

[Speshe]

AFAIK no one has done SDL2 with libnx openGL. Not yet at least. I could try working with openGL directly I guess.

SNES classic emulator on switch would be epic !!!
a nice front end makes me want to play !!

 

[focusonme]

AFAIK no one has done SDL2 with libnx openGL. Not yet at least. I could try working with openGL directly I guess.

HE IS ALIIIIIIIIIIIIIIVE ! <3

 

[Deleted-351540]

I guess I need to open my mouth and insert my foot.

 

[HOv]

Yes! OP lives!!! Haha

In all seriousness, thank you for working on this. I hope everything works out and we can one day have this on our switch. I already have my retros setup with retronx on my switch, but I much prefer this one you're working on. Good luck and thanks again for all your hard work.

 

[samthebreadman]

So, the way I'm going to have to do this is make a framework on top of OpenGL that eases the use of doing simple tasks. This includes tasks such as drawing a texture to the screen, drawing bitmap text, and so forth.

Once that is done, I need to find out if the framework is powerful enough to render what needs to be rendered in the launcher by doing stress tests.

It's pointless to put in the work of making a pretty user interface if the foundation is weak.

Just letting you know where I am headed here.

 

[Fadi5555]

So, the way I'm going to have to do this is make a framework on top of OpenGL that eases the use of doing simple tasks. This includes tasks such as drawing a texture to the screen, drawing bitmap text, and so forth.

Once that is done, I need to find out if the framework is powerful enough to render what needs to be rendered in the launcher by doing stress tests.

It's pointless to put in the work of making a pretty user interface if the foundation is weak.

Just letting you know where I am headed here.

AFAIK It’ll be easy to get OpenGL support on SDL2 according to natinusala

 

[HOv]

Let's say this ends up working great. Would we be able to add games too for different cores, like nes and sega? Like how hakchi works?

 

[notimp]

"Like Hakchi" - no, never. This is not a port of the SNES classic, this is a skin/launcher. Any comparisons to SNES classic functionality drawn on the program level are more misleading than anything else.

Function wise (could you get the same result?) - it might be possible.

Next question: Does it make sense though?

Probably not.

The Switches Retroarch build - probably for good reason, might never allow commandline launch parameters that would be handed over from this "launcher". Which in return means, that either samthebreadman would have to modify retroarch code for each emulator individually - or revert to other "for switch" emulators, which we in general might consider less optimal to use.

So in the best case scenario, you'd -

- Introduce a new layer that probably hides more functionality than it introduces
- Have the need for a new retroarch fork, or forked emulator(s) to be maintained, by certainly not that many people
- Introduce new points of failure, and the usual "thanks for porting the SNES classic" misconceptions in a whole lot of peoples perceptions.

If you know what you are getting yourself into - its actually a neat project (mostly because of style - but hey, why not), but for most of its potential users, this will create more issues, make sure they dont get mainline RA updates as fast as they could - or make sure that they tend to use a worse emulator - just to get a nicer launcher.

Coincidently its still the people that think, that this is great because its "like a SNES classic" (no its not, its just a launcher/skin) that are most excited about the prospects.

Then again, its neat. But. There is a but.

 

[HOv]

Oh so this is just a skin? All this time, I thought the idea was to make it look and function just like the snes classic with the snes games and everything right on the switch. I guess I misunderstood sorry lol. Still looks pretty cool though

 

[notimp]

Its a launcher. But smartphone users dont know that concept either, even though they use one every day. So launcher with a SNES classic "skin" is the next best thing to call this, to make them understand, that even though this looks like "the thing they are familiar with", it isnt.

Also this thing had a SNES emulator integrated in the past as well, which is where most of the "you da bomb" comments come from (because it did something, look...).

Coincidently its a comparatively bad one.

Also I write those longer texts, so I can transport complex ideas. "So this is just skin?" isn't what I tried to explain.

This is "skinned launcher" which makes everyone go "wow, great assets you took from Nintendo", that has a SNES emulator baked in thats "not ideal", and "never gets updated". (At least not as frequently as the better projects out there.)

Its the equivalent of "make your Samsung look like an iPhone" for the "looks are what counts most" generation.

Wow, is that an iPhone that you are using?

Also theres the aspect that only ever devs who dont't mind being known for using "borrowed" assets will associate with this project (harshly spoken).