Homebrew Retroarch just got a lot better!

[gcafox]

How is the GBA performance on the n3DS using retroarch? I know there are other options when it comes to GBA but I'm looking for something with easy cheat support. Last time I tired it GBA performance was pretty rough.

 

[MarioKartFan]

GPSP is excellent. Full speed. Very high compatibility. Great fast forward support.

 

[quixote]

Most GBA games run quite well on the gpsp core with dynarec enabled. There are a few games (at least as of 1.9.7 last time I tested my collection) which still either spontaneously reboot, or cause Arm11 crashes. It's a small portion of the overall GBA romset though. I definitely consider playing GBA in an environment which supports sleep mode to be worth a little trial and error.

I've gone from having ~60 GBA titles installed to having 9 installed and the rest running via GPSP.

These are the only games I've had to continue running via ambassador or open_agb_firm:
Car Battler Joe - Runs without crashing in GPSP, but the shadows under your character's feet are distractingly inaccurate
Mario & Luigi Superstar Saga - Game freezes
Golden Sun 2: The Lost Age - Game spontaneously reboots during intro
Mario Golf: Advance Tour - Game spontaneously reboots at character creation
River City Ransom DX - Arm11 crash during opening sequence after starting new game
Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2 - I can't remember whether it's a reboot or a crash, but either way it wasn't playable

ROM Hacks:
Final Fantasy Vi with color restoration and sound restoration patches - There is an Arm11 crash which is not present when the game is played without patches, but I only play this game patched
Final Fantasy V with sound restoration patch - spontaneous reboots

 

[gcafox]

Awesome, I'll install it and give it a shot. What section in the retroarch menu is dynarec under? I haven't heard it mentioned until your post.

 

[MarioKartFan]

It’s enabled by default so I wouldn’t sweat it. But it’s probably under Quick Menu -> Options

 

[quixote]

There is one setting you may benefit from changing.
under Settings -> Video -> Synchronization

Change "Frame Delay" to 1. It gets rid of the flicker at the top of the screen for most GBA games.

 

[AC1DFOX]

Man I love RetroArch. Always appreciate when improvements come along.

 

[placebo_yue]

i guess im gonna need to get my self a N3DS...

why? only thing you'd gain is PSX and N64, and even then, it's not perfect. I'd rather use a PSP or some other device to emulate PSX.
Everything else you CAN emulate on O3DS. I dunno about accuracy and such but SNES runs perfectly on bubble's emulator.

Anyways, anyone tried the O3DS-approved cores with the new feature yet? Is there any drop in performance because of it?

 

[MetoMeto]

why? only thing you'd gain is PSX and N64, and even then, it's not perfect. I'd rather use a PSP or some other device to emulate PSX.
Everything else you CAN emulate on O3DS. I dunno about accuracy and such but SNES runs perfectly on bubble's emulator.

Anyways, anyone tried the O3DS-approved cores with the new feature yet? Is there any drop in performance because of it?

some games run better on n3ds

 

[FanNintendo]

how fast is the retroarch launch?? and how fast does it load the core and games ?? thanks

 

[Clydefrosch]

i can already see myself tapping wrong and adding more and more saves every couple minutes, but it does look nice

 

[MarioKartFan]

That is a good edit

how fast is the retroarch launch?? and how fast does it load the core and games ?? thanks

very. And very. Few seconds for each.

 

[UltraSyko]

how fast is the retroarch launch?? and how fast does it load the core and games ?? thanks

Delete any cores you don't use to speed up boot time. That's what I do. Less cluttered in general when selecting cores ingame

 

[gcafox]

Thanks all. I've got SNES, GBA, and PSX (SOTN) up and going and playing pretty great. Is there a guide or wiki somewhere about ideal settings for retroarch on the 3ds? I know it's a lower powered device so I'd like to tweak it to be as performant as possible.

 

[MarioKartFan]

I put up a guide for pcsx rearmed on the 3dshacks Reddit.

 

[MrHuu]

I have an o2DS, what do you want to be tested? Tbh I don't use RetroArch much on it because of most cores speed, but I can test whatever you need.

The old2ds is the only device not capable of turning off the LCD screens backlight. Since it only has one screen.
I've read reports of retroarch crashing on these devices, and i want to know the current status of this.

Does the bottom screen just stays black, or does it crash? It shouldn't tho.

 

[kenseiden]

Does the bottom screen just stays black, or does it crash? It shouldn't tho.

Coincidentally enough, I was giving the latest nightlies (2021-09-08) a test run on the o2DS, and I didn’t encounter any bottom screen-related crashes when it went black. Was mostly testing Slow Mole on QuickNES and some random Master System games on Genesis Plus GX, for the record.

 

[MrHuu]

Coincidentally enough, I was giving the latest nightlies (2021-09-08) a test run on the o2DS, and I didn’t encounter any bottom screen-related crashes when it went black. Was mostly testing Slow Mole on QuickNES and some random Master System games on Genesis Plus GX, for the record.

Awesome, thanks! Don't have to worry about that anymore. If you do run into any issues, let us know.

 

[Kurt91]

I'm trying to use this, but I've got

"bottom_menu.png not found in the assets/ctr folder"

I checked and that file is already there.

I tried to update my old installation, and I admit that I skipped the files in the assets folder that were named after different consoles. (Sort of, I stopped at the Sony ones in the "automatic" folder, but I'm trying to use GBA and I know I already got the Nintendo ones done) This was only because I'm stuck trying to use my iPhone and ftp program to transfer the files and don't have access to a physical MicroSD card reader right now.

Any idea why that error message is coming up? The console .png images are the only missing files, and even then they're only missing for consoles I don't plan on emulating on a N3DS, such as the PS3 or XBox.

EDIT: Figured it out. For anybody updating from a previous installation, make sure you go into Settings and change the directory from "media" to "assets"

Now I get "Tap the Touch Screen to go to the Retroarch menu". I was under the impression that the new setup was more elaborate than that, with touch-screen controls for save/load state. Am I still missing something?

EDIT II: Okay, I'm an idiot. I assumed that message meant to tap the screen to pull up the old menu like normal. I touched the screen and got the menu I wanted. This is working pretty well now. Still plan on finishing the file installation when I have the physical reader later on, just in case.

Loading RetroArch is kind of hit-and-miss, though. I don't know if it's just abnormally slow to load from the 3DS menu sometimes or what, but I've about a 50/50 success rate, and have to restart the system on the times it fails. This is from using the primary base core, mind you. Not starting the GPSP core directly.

 

[Kcacc]

Is there any way to re-enable the debug log on the bottom screen? I like the new features, but to be honest I'd rather have diagnostic and technical information like resolution changes, framerate on the bottom screen, and error messages for when I test unrefined cores (some of which work rather well actually!).