custom firmware for sega flashback 2018

[Steve_Rose]

Just flashed the Megadrive img with /rom remount, works a treat, you can even add mega cd / sega cd roms, BUT you have to load the bin rather than the cue file.
your solution is more elegant as it only remounts when the intended file is added to the SD and otherwise has no impact.

love it!!

Steve

 

[rrifonas]

Great work guys. I started work on a rudimentary app to manage the all-games.ini (including automatic box art resizing) for the 2017 flashback so I may pick this back up and finish it for this model.

@rrifonas will you be making a picodrive version of those latest updates? I think I prefer how picodrive runs on this hardware now.

I thought nobody liked the Picodrive update! I updated the post with Picodrive. Enjoy!

 

[dcuk7]

I wasn't for it at first as Genesis Plus GX is the better emulator IMO but for whatever reason, it exhibits sound glitches on this unit that aren't evident on anything else I use for emulation (Wii U, Raspberry Pi, GPD XD Plus, PC, Fire Stick, so many devices). As a mad Sonic fan, the sound of collecting rings with the stock emulator gets on my nerves!

Thank you for the Picodrive update.

 

[rrifonas]

Just flashed the Megadrive img with /rom remount, works a treat, you can even add mega cd / sega cd roms, BUT you have to load the bin rather than the cue file.
your solution is more elegant as it only remounts when the intended file is added to the SD and otherwise has no impact.

love it!!

Steve

.cue and .chd worked fine for me. Check if the bin file name inside the .cue is correct.
I've seen that larger box art files make the menu slower. The original size for the png files are 183x255 for the 'full' box and 122x170 for the smaller one.

 

[subcon959]

Hmm, the Picodrive update didn't work for me. I get a bunch of zero-byte files in a bkini folder and the console acts totally stock, ignoring SD card. The regular Genesis Plus GX update works great and mounts my custom game list fine.

 

[rrifonas]

Hmm, the Picodrive update didn't work for me. I get a bunch of zero-byte files in a bkini folder and the console acts totally stock, ignoring SD card. The regular Genesis Plus GX update works great and mounts my custom game list fine.

Fixed! I think I've typed something wrong with routine to backup retroplayer.ini. I just removed it, it should be good now.

 

[D-an-W]

Thanks for the continued updates @rrifonas, did you just update the download links for the Picodrive releases?

 

[rrifonas]

Thanks for the continued updates @rrifonas, did you just update the download links for the Picodrive releases?

Yes, I updated Post #97

 

[subcon959]

Fixed! I think I've typed something wrong with routine to backup retroplayer.ini. I just removed it, it should be good now.

Awesome, thanks. I'll give it a try in a bit.

Btw, am I right in assuming that this is a persistent change? As in, once I reboot without SD card and get the stock games back it will still continue to use Picodrive, and therefore the GG games won't work? If so, is there anyway to make it revert to Genesis Plus GX once there is no SD card?

 

[rrifonas]

Picodrive as Genesis Plus GX are permanent for now.
Your idea is interesting but the original partitions are read-only. I won't promise anything but I will take a look if it's possible to be done.

 

[WD_GASTER2]

well there was an idea floated around of dual booting an rk3066 chipset years ago. it might be possible:

https://en.opensuse.org/HCL:MK808

 

[dcuk7]

So, with the progress made on using the built-in menu to display the games, I have picked up working on my app to manage the game list. I started this for the 2017 Flashback HD but stopped almost immediately when better hacks for replacing the built-in stuff became available.

This will let you select your SD card and it will check for a valid /rom/all-games.ini. As you can see, it shows all the games in the list and lets you expand each one to make any changes to each field. You can also delete games from the list (and the option will be there to delete just the entry from the .ini or remove associated files like artwork and the rom itself).

You can also add games to the list. Some fields are pre-filled to make it quicker. It has support for box art too (supported images are JPG, BMP, GIF and PNG). Once you've filled the info in, the app will add the entry to the .ini, create both box art files with correct sizes and copy the artwork and rom to your SD card.

I need a few more days to make it stable and make sure it does everything it's supposed to but as soon as it's ready I'll make it available here.

 

[subcon959]

That looks great. It's pretty laborious creating entries manually for all-games.ini so a bit of automation will go down a treat.

 

[Casey-Strange]

This looks awesome! I hope this comes up for download soon.
I love where all of this is going.


How do I get Sega CD games to run on this?
Can I just convert an ISO or CUE to BIN and rename it to run properly?
What do I do if I have a copy of the game where the redbook audio is split and the game is buried in track 1 or 2?

I hope when all of this is figured out a convenient patch can be packed an alongside a text file containing instructions.
Not a lot of people buying this stuff will understand how to use it.

*edit*
My comment was on both the software in progress above as well as the recent update patch by another user.
Still new to this place. heh heh..


I'd also like to add that the permanent change with the Picodrive patch is the only thing keeping me from wanting to try it. I don't think I'd like to buy another model just to run two different emulators. I mean I would if I had that kind of money to throw around.

 

[ghorricks]

So, with the progress made on using the built-in menu to display the games, I have picked up working on my app to manage the game list. I started this for the 2017 Flashback HD but stopped almost immediately when better hacks for replacing the built-in stuff became available.

This will let you select your SD card and it will check for a valid /rom/all-games.ini. As you can see, it shows all the games in the list and lets you expand each one to make any changes to each field. You can also delete games from the list (and the option will be there to delete just the entry from the .ini or remove associated files like artwork and the rom itself).

You can also add games to the list. Some fields are pre-filled to make it quicker. It has support for box art too (supported images are JPG, BMP, GIF and PNG). Once you've filled the info in, the app will add the entry to the .ini, create both box art files with correct sizes and copy the artwork and rom to your SD card.

I need a few more days to make it stable and make sure it does everything it's supposed to but as soon as it's ready I'll make it available here.

View attachment 155656

I am sure like most folks, would be happy to help test a UI to add games/images to the /media/rom folder on the SD card.
I don't have access to the internal ROM partition, so took some guesses and have managed to get "OutRun" with images and instructions from the roms folder on the SD card appearing fine. Seems very straight forward with the new custom firmware. I guess it would be a case of:

Scan the roms folder for md/bin files.
Check if png files for std and small size exist.
Download via google search, convert to png if needed, naming correctly and saving.
Perform a google search of the game (must be some databases out there already), and add info to the all-games.ini.
Almost worth writing something myself - but very happy to test.

 

[BillyHGamer]

Just flashed the Megadrive img with /rom remount, works a treat, you can even add mega cd / sega cd roms, BUT you have to load the bin rather than the cue file.
your solution is more elegant as it only remounts when the intended file is added to the SD and otherwise has no impact.

love it!!

Steve

,




How do you do it I can't get sega cd roms too work

 

[WD_GASTER2]

This looks awesome! I hope this comes up for download soon.
I love where all of this is going.


How do I get Sega CD games to run on this?
Can I just convert an ISO or CUE to BIN and rename it to run properly?
What do I do if I have a copy of the game where the redbook audio is split and the game is buried in track 1 or 2?

I hope when all of this is figured out a convenient patch can be packed an alongside a text file containing instructions.
Not a lot of people buying this stuff will understand how to use it.

*edit*
My comment was on both the software in progress above as well as the recent update patch by another user.
Still new to this place. heh heh..


I'd also like to add that the permanent change with the Picodrive patch is the only thing keeping me from wanting to try it. I don't think I'd like to buy another model just to run two different emulators. I mean I would if I had that kind of money to throw around.

if you have the 2018 model you can revert back and forth as however you wish.

 

[rrifonas]

By the way, I've found the issue with Picodrive loading Sega CD games and it is fixed. I will make the updates for the US and EU version available this weekend.

 

[D-an-W]

Nice one, been wanting to try some Sega CD

 

[Beetch18]

Does the atgames firmware update change the emulation or just add sd card support? Someone on reddit said it improves emulation but I thought it just added sd support. I downloaded wd_gangster2's firmware update to add sd card support and have been very happy with it. Would consider downloading at games update if emulation improvements are included though.