Back in 2019, it was revealed that RetroArch would be headed to Steam, bringing the emulator frontend to the platform for the first time ever. Things have been fairly quiet since then, but now we've got some new details regarding the launch of the program. There's still no projected release date, but we now have a clearer idea of how RetroArch will work on Steam. The initial program will be free, and each core that loads different emulators will be available separately, as additional free DLC. 47 cores will be available on launch, each legally secured and with permission granted from the original developer, with more to follow at a later date. Those cores are as follows:

• bsnes
  
• bsnes HD beta
  
• Final Burn Neo
  
• Flycast
  
• Mesen
  
• Mesen S
  
• Nestopia
  
• Play!
  
• SameBoy
  
• TIC-80
  
• EasyRPG
  
• Mupen64 Plus Next
  
• Kronos
  
• Theodore
  
• Blastem
  
• Stella
  
• Snes9x
  
• mGBA
  
• 4DO
  
• Genesis Plus GX
  
• 2048
  
• RACE
  
• VBA-M
  
• NeoCD
  
• FreeIntv
  
• FreeChaf
  
• QuickNES
  
• Picodrive
  
• Game Music Emu
  
• GW (Game & Watch)
  
• PX68K
  
• REminiscence
  
• XRick
  
• Desmume
  
• gpSP
  
• PocketCDG
  
• Tyrquake
  
• Vitaquake 2
  
• boom3
  
• EightyOne/81
  
• Gearsystem
  
• CrocoDS
  
• Gearboy
  
• Caprice32
  
• Parallel N64
  
• PPSSPP
  
• NP2Kai

In addition, none of the cores, nor RetroArch itself will have any DRM, including Steamworks. You'll even be able to boot it via the shortcut, without requiring Steam to be running in the background.

What To Expect

This is what one can expect for the impending launch:

• RetroArch as an application itself, when installed through Steam, will be able to be launched even without Steam being active. Therefore, no kind of DRM is being imposed.
  
• RetroArch as well as the cores will be provided completely for free.
  
• The cores do not have any kind of DRM applied to them.
  
• No Steamworks integration. If it will ever happen, it will be done through a separate process as has been done by plenty of other Steam GPL-licensed programs/games.
  
• We will never provide any copyrighted content that we do not have permission to under any circumstance. Out of the gates, you will be able to run disk-based content from a CD-ROM drive with many CD-based emulators. There is also a preservation-focused project in the work that will make it easier to preserve your legally bought cartridges, but more on that as we get closer to release.

Source

 

[ShadowOne333]

This will never happen although it would be awesome.

I do hope something like that happens.
Like it opens the floodgates so that gaming companies see the potential in releasing classic games as ROMs legally through the Steam page. So you can pay a minimum amount of money for getting a retro game legally, and then use that very ROM in a core or emulator of our choice.

That's what the users need to stop the bullshit Nintendo is doing with their bringing down ROM sites and crap like that.
Don't like it? Offer a fucking legal solution then, and not a rental service with 5% of the actual console's library.

 

[Nobody_Important4u]

But retroarch is already on pc!
We don't need shitty version for the worst thing to exist (steam).

 

[the_randomizer]

steam literally has porn on it, so i really think the rules have gotten lax as of late

also it's had commercial emulators for ages now

Right, but the Steam TOS compares emulators are piracy and most mods don't like people using that term.

Source: https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=4045-USHJ-3810

Content Rules

Do not post any content on Steam containing the following:

• Porn, inappropriate or offensive content, warez or leaked content or anything else not safe for work
• Discussion of piracy including, but not limited to:
  • Cracks
  • Key generators
  • Console emulators

It's double standard bullshit

But retroarch is already on pc!
We don't need shitty version for the worst thing to exist (steam).

Then stop bitching and use standalone emulators.

 

[lordelan]

I do hope something like that happens.
Like it opens the floodgates so that gaming companies see the potential in releasing classic games as ROMs legally through the Steam page. So you can pay a minimum amount of money for getting a retro game legally, and then use that very ROM in a core or emulator of our choice.

That's what the users need to stop the bullshit Nintendo is doing with their bringing down ROM sites and crap like that.
Don't like it? Offer a fucking legal solution then, and not a rental service with 5% of the actual console's library.

I don't think a company would release a rom without their own emulator so if a user has any issue while playing it with core "whatever", a few will blame the rom instead of the core (which in fact is the one that is inaccurate).
They don't want to deal with such things. That's why I doubt they'll release their bare roms as DLCs in RetroArch.
If they ever do then without being connected in any way to any emulator. Just as a sub category in Steam so everyone knows "I can try to use this rom with any emulator I find but if it's not running, I will contact the emulator dev", do you know what I mean?
Roms have to be sold independently from any emulator (if not a bundled emu like Nintendo's VC, Mini Consoles or those classic collections bei Konami, Sega and so on that you just mentioned).

 

[ShadowOne333]

I don't think a company would release a rom without their own emulator so if a user has any issue while playing it with core "whatever", a few will blame the rom instead of the core (which in fact is the one that is inaccurate).
They don't want to deal with such things. That's why I doubt they'll release their bare roms as DLCs in RetroArch.
If they ever do then without being connected in any way to any emulator. Just as a sub category in Steam so everyone knows "I can try to use this rom with any emulator I find but if it's not running, I will contact the emulator dev", do you know what I mean?
Roms have to be sold independently from any emulator (if not a bundled emu like Nintendo's VC, Mini Consoles or those classic collections bei Konami, Sega and so on that you just mentioned).

Oh I'm aware of that.
Selling the ROM on its own is just from the company, how the user plays them is up to them, and they should be aware that there could be emulation issues, which are obviously caused by the emulator itself and not the ROM. That is, if the emulator is from a verified source of course.

That's why I said "use that very ROM in a core or emulator of our choice".
The user gets the choice.

The important thing here is making the actual gaming companies to consider selling their old games as a one-and-done purchase, like current Steam games are.
Unlike Nintendo, which likes to shove up the same bullshit with each gen, and reselling them with no discount at all.
You paid for that shit when you got the actual cartridge/disk on release, you don't need to be paying for it an infinite amount of times just to be able to play it on whatever new device the gaming company develops.
It's a practice that Nintendo really needs to stop doing, as it reeks of greed all throughout.

 

[lordelan]

The important thing here is making the actual gaming companies to consider selling their old games as a one-and-done purchase, like current Steam games are.
Unlike Nintendo, which likes to shove up the same bullshit with each gen, and reselling them with no discount at all.
You paid for that shit when you got the actual cartridge/disk on release, you don't need to be paying for it an infinite amount of times just to be able to play it on whatever new device the gaming company develops.
It's a practice that Nintendo really needs to stop doing, as it reeks of greed all throughout.

Absolutely. I own some Mario and Zelda games so many times officially, it's just ridiculous.
In the end I'm playing the not so legal rom versions in RetroArch on the Switch just because RetroArch is awesome while the VC is not.

 

[ShadowOne333]

Absolutely. I own some Mario and Zelda games so many times officially, it's just ridiculous.
In the end I'm playing the not so legal rom versions in RetroArch on the Switch just because RetroArch is awesome while the VC is not.

The only reason I play roms is because of romhacking to be honest.
I'm a romhacker myself, and I enjoy doing improvement and QoL hacks for old beloved games, I only play my hacks and other people's on my library. Rarely I find myself going to the originals, this is something Sega should be taken as yet another example of, allowing for the fanbase to also play a part of the franchise alongside the company, not just feeding them whatever and suing if not doing what they want.

 

[chartube12]

I'm kinda hoping we see developers/publishers get onboard and publish games through the retroarch steam page as paid DLC packs, think things like the namco collection, sonic collection etc, if it picks up enough support it could allow a lot more retro games to be available legitimately from developers who otherwise wouldn't have the financial inclination to have to make/licence their own emulators and in turn make things a little more organised, maybe have a small fee from each sale be split between the emulator core devs for the required console and the retroarch team to help with development

let's face it, people will get these games regardless, so you might as well get whatever sales you can rather than stomp your feet and get nothing

i believe this is retroarch and steam’s goal.

 

[gamesquest1]

I don't think a company would release a rom without their own emulator so if a user has any issue while playing it with core "whatever", a few will blame the rom instead of the core (which in fact is the one that is inaccurate).
They don't want to deal with such things. That's why I doubt they'll release their bare roms as DLCs in RetroArch.
If they ever do then without being connected in any way to any emulator. Just as a sub category in Steam so everyone knows "I can try to use this rom with any emulator I find but if it's not running, I will contact the emulator dev", do you know what I mean?
Roms have to be sold independently from any emulator (if not a bundled emu like Nintendo's VC, Mini Consoles or those classic collections bei Konami, Sega and so on that you just mentioned).

i believe this is retroarch and steam’s goal.

yeah I wouldn't be surprised to see some kickbacks or introductory offers to get the ball rolling or maybe start by bagging deals with smaller time devs who have classic series such as the dizzy series from the bitmap brothers the Oliver twins, they seem like the kinda guys who appreciate the retro emulation community they even released a unreleased dizzy nes rom, its a win-win, and retroarch and steam could easily foster a new market for centralised retro game playback, all it needs is a few success stories of long forgotten games succeeding for the big guys to want to come dip their toes in and see how it goes.

I know bigger companies would probably prefer to keep their titles under lock and key to be released in standalone rom bundles each generation, but I personally would like retro games to officially converge into one unified go to "platform", I could also see Sega jumping onboard, they have become more relaxed around rom and rom hacks and have taken a step in the right direction, I just see that as the future, it just needs to happen and this seems like a nice first step in marrying the fan emulators scene with developers and publishers instead of them being stuck at loggerheads

 

[m4xw]

u guys smoke too much shit lol

 

[Issac]

As much as I like RetroArch, I just don't see the point of a steam version... Not saying I'm against it or anything, I just don't understand it

It's super easy to install as it is, works great... maybe updating RetroArch itself will be "easier" this way (as in automatic)? Oh well.

 

[Rahkeesh]

supprised not all nintendo cores are omitted i see vba-m bsnes etc i know emulators themselves are legal but being a big company attached so such a grey area program seems not too good of an idea especally if laws change etc

Companies like Squeenix, Konami, and Capcom are selling their roms bundled with 3rd party emulators of old Nintendo systems on many platforms, including the Switch. Nintendo are so past going after emulators themselves, as opposed to people using their old games which they own far more rights for.

What does concern me here a little is the emulators being included that require an external bios, which is typically supposed to be a copyrighted one. Like gPSP isn't going to do anything out of the box, and if you were willing to download files from random places you wouldn't need Retroarch on Steam anyway. Sega, Atari or whoever owns NEC might be interested in selling bioses as needed, but not active console makers like Nintendo or Sony. So I wonder how much use these kind of cores are going to see on Steam.

 

[Kraken_X]

As much as I like RetroArch, I just don't see the point of a steam version... Not saying I'm against it or anything, I just don't understand it

It's super easy to install as it is, works great... maybe updating RetroArch itself will be "easier" this way (as in automatic)? Oh well.

Steam added local multiplayer that is online, which will make it super easy to play old multiplayer games online with friends. No need to both have the same rom, walk them through setup, etc.

Steam link works really well. You can use non-steam programs with it, but this will be much simpler.

Maybe it will cloud save too?

 

[KidIce]

yeah I wouldn't be surprised to see some kickbacks or introductory offers to get the ball rolling or maybe start by bagging deals with smaller time devs who have classic series such as the dizzy series from the bitmap brothers, they seem like the kinda guys who appreciate the retro emulation community they even released a unreleased dizzy nes rom, its a win-win, and retroarch and steam could easily foster a new market for centralised retro game playback, all it needs is a few success stories of long forgotten games succeeding for the big guys to want to come dip their toes in and see how it goes.

Dizzy was published by Code Masters and developed by The Oliver Twins... The Bitmap Brothers never had anything to do w/ the series AFAIK.

Beyond that, I'm hoping that this is promising news on the retro front... There are so many games being lost to bit rot and various other things. There is also no legal way to buy [game x]. Hopefully, having a commercial source for RetroArch will help fix those two problems.

 

[gamesquest1]

Dizzy was published by Code Masters and developed by The Oliver Twins... The Bitmap Brothers never had anything to do w/ the series AFAIK.

Beyond that, I'm hoping that this is promising news on the retro front... There are so many games being lost to bit rot and various other things. There is also no legal way to buy [game x]. Hopefully, having a commercial source for RetroArch will help fix those two problems.

darn it, I knew they were brothers and "the bitmap brothers" just popped into my mind, my bad XD
but yeah I think it would be cool to have nice simple unified legitimate place to buy retro titles would be a really good step forwards , and having retroarch act as a nice store front with very low barrier of entry to resell your old retro games would no doubt make the practicality of officially reselling retro titles so much easier for developers/publishers

the popularity of the mini retro consoles in recent years should show that its something people would be willing to pay for if they have the option, it would be cool to be able to officially have a route to own some of the old classic games that aren't just the top 30 games from a console

but not only would it be nice for the original devs/publishers to get a few bucks from their fans and also be a nice way to reward the talented people behind the emulators too even if its just a small cut from the sales with the rest going to the original publishers

 

[eyeliner]

u guys smoke too much shit lol

Isn't Sega Genesis Collection basically an emulator with some ROMs on it?
I have it, and I *think* there's a folder with a few bin files that are the games.

Heck I even got it in the now defunct DotEmu as separate games, where each game installer would just point to the same install directory and placed a single file there.

RetroArch having a store is damn stupid, but a company having some kind of synergy with Retroarch is surely possible.

 

[gamesquest1]

Isn't Sega Genesis Collection basically an emulator with some ROMs on it?
I have it, and I *think* there's a folder with a few bin files that are the games.

Heck I even got it in the now defunct DotEmu as separate games, where each game installer would just point to the same install directory and placed a single file there.

RetroArch having a store is damn stupid, but a company having some kind of synergy with Retroarch is surely possible.

yeah idk I guess there would be too many egos and moving parts at play for everyone to get along (no doubt you would see the usual dramas kicking off if such a thing ever happened "well THATS IT!!!! I'm going to pull all my contributions to retroarch because they got $20 from SNK for letting them sell their games for use on retroarch and I'm against all forms of profit for people working on stuff!!!!", tis but a dream of games developers and emulator developers not being at each others necks to bring things to a slightly less adversarial position, I guess thats one of the problems with open sourced projects, once it gets to a certain point and a certain number of contributors it would be impossible for them to ever have a consensus on stuff such as fees for commercial use etc because people wouldn't be able to agree on who would receive what in terms of profit shares

I honestly wouldn't mind if publishers/developers just sold the rom files on steam and said use your favourite emulator solutions to play them, it would at least save all the never ending drama of trying to work together to do things a little more harmoniously

 

[the_randomizer]

Isn't Sega Genesis Collection basically an emulator with some ROMs on it?
I have it, and I *think* there's a folder with a few bin files that are the games.

Heck I even got it in the now defunct DotEmu as separate games, where each game installer would just point to the same install directory and placed a single file there.

RetroArch having a store is damn stupid, but a company having some kind of synergy with Retroarch is surely possible.

Yeah, and the emulator it uses is pure garbage

 

[m4xw]

yeah idk I guess there would be too many egos and moving parts at play for everyone to get along (no doubt you would see the usual dramas kicking off if such a thing ever happened "well THATS IT!!!! I'm going to pull all my contributions to retroarch because they got $20 from SNK for letting them sell their games for use on retroarch and I'm against all forms of profit for people working on stuff!!!!", tis but a dream of games developers and emulator developers not being at each others necks to bring things to a slightly less adversarial position, I guess thats one of the problems with open sourced projects, once it gets to a certain point and a certain number of contributors it would be impossible for them to ever have a consensus on stuff such as fees for commercial use etc because people wouldn't be able to agree on who would receive what in terms of profit shares

I honestly wouldn't mind if publishers/developers just sold the rom files on steam and said use your favourite emulator solutions to play them, it would at least save all the never ending drama of trying to work together to do things a little more harmoniously

its a giant drag, especially when theres a 4chan circle jerk making death threats like some monkeys.

 

[shano]

Not a fan of this being on Steam.