Gamestarter: Retrogaming add-ons (RPi/Generic)

    Hi bite_your_idols,

    Love what you've done, every emulator seems to run very smoothly without much hassle.

    Just wondering if you have plans on compiling the reicast core into this one?
    There are a few dream cast titles that do run pretty well on the rpi.

    Cheers

    Hello,
    first of all - thank you for your great work. I really enjoy being able to switch fast from my Kodi to RetroArch forth and back.

    I have a question - i am planning to buy another Pi for my TV in my Bedroom. My Wife is currently playing a lot of old games on the first Pi in the living room - is it possible to synchronize the save files ?
    I`ve got an third Media Server at home which is running on debian and running 24/7 hosting a couple of other stuff for me including the mysql database for synchronized Kodi.
    It would be cool to store the savegames or even better all the emulators / bioses and roms on this server and just stream it from all the Pis to the specific tvs.

    Not sure if this is possible though, hope you/someone can help me :)
    Greetings,
    apfello.

    Yes! you can use my Google drive addon in both pis and select one folder to sync your saves/bios/roms (it depends in storage size):
    GitHub - bite-your-idols/script.pigdrive: Google Drive as a kodi addon for Raspberry Pi.

    But if you say you have a 24/7 server in your home you cann try to select a folder in it as your emulators folder (including bios/roms/saves). Just go to retroarch settings>folders and change default ones (/storage/emulators/...) to your server ones (http://192.168.1.XX/path/to/emulators/...) it should work. Maybe you need to add that folder to libreelec media folders but I am not sure... just try it! ...and give us feedback ;)

    Quote from bite_your_idols

    Yes! you can use my Google drive addon in both pis and select one folder to sync your saves/bios/roms (it depends in storage size):
    GitHub - bite-your-idols/script.pigdrive: Google Drive as a kodi addon for Raspberry Pi.

    But if you say you have a 24/7 server in your home you cann try to select a folder in it as your emulators folder (including bios/roms/saves). Just go to retroarch settings>folders and change default ones (/storage/emulators/...) to your server ones (http://192.168.1.XX/path/to/emulators/...) it should work. Maybe you need to add that folder to libreelec media folders but I am not sure... just try it! ...and give us feedback ;)

    Hello again,

    sorry for the long pause, it took quite some while for my new Raspberry Pi to get delivered but today it finally arrived.
    Sooo to make things short - it works like a charme.
    I had to mount my server as a networkshare into the different Pis because RetroArch could not access Network Files. But as soon as i had them mounted i could set everything up and i have just tested it and it works just the way i wanted it :)

    Thank you for your great work - now i can continue all of my games in the bedroom aswell. Sleep is for the weak anyway :)

    Greetings apfello.

    Quote from apfello

    I had to mount my server as a networkshare into the different Pis because RetroArch could not access Network Files. But as soon as i had them mounted i could set everything up and i have just tested it and it works just the way i wanted it :)

    could you mount your server using Kodi's LibreELEC settings addon or you need to do it using CLI?
    do you need to mount it every time you boot your pis or it auto-mounts in each boot?

    Hello,

    I am not sure how to mount it through Kodi`s LibreELEC settings. I did it through the CLI.
    And i just needed to write a script to mount it automatically everytime i restart my system. I found a really good explanation here :

    Mounting network shares - OpenELEC

    Did it as stated in this tutorial and it worked really smooth :)

    Does anyone have a good set of settings, or a debug guide for getting good sound on a RPi3 using Gamestarter to launch Retorarch Mame games?

    I've got sound working on most games, but for some there's strong static or hiss along with the sound effects (eg. Donkey Kong, Defender).

    I'm using mame2003 via Retroarch and using mame 0.78 ROMs.

    I'm connected via HDMI and have also tried a couple of ROMs.

    Is there a particular setting (audio driver?) that provides best sound on a RPi 3 via HDMI ?

    I'm just lost where to start. Most of my searching finds hits for sound not working at all. I just have some games with annoying background noise that shouldn't be there.

    Cheers.

    I just tried a build of RetroPie and it plays the ROMs with no sound problems.

    I thought both RetroPie and Gamestarter/Retroarch all use the lr-mame2003 emulator, so I'm not sure why they produce different results with the sound.

    Quote from kidhazy

    I just tried a build of RetroPie and it plays the ROMs with no sound problems.

    I thought both RetroPie and Gamestarter/Retroarch all use the lr-mame2003 emulator, so I'm not sure why they produce different results with the sound.


    did you try into a fresh LibreELEC installation? maybe it is something related with your installation/configuration... sound in that emulator should work fine...

    Quote from bite_your_idols

    did you try into a fresh LibreELEC installation? maybe it is something related with your installation/configuration... sound in that emulator should work fine...

    Yes, had tried a clean LibreELEC - but had also done RetroArch update after the install. I'll try another fresh LibreELEC install with just Gamestarter and see what happens.

    Quote from kidhazy

    Yes, had tried a clean LibreELEC - but had also done RetroArch update after the install. I'll try another fresh LibreELEC install with just Gamestarter and see what happens.

    Just tried a fresh rebuild of LibreELEC from here LibreELEC-RPi2.arm-8.0.1.img.gz on to my Raspberry Pi Model 3

    Installed Gamestarter V2.8 add-on and copied MAME 0.78 ROMs (reference set) over.

    Still have a background 'hiss' on some games such a dkong.zip and defender.zip.

    I can't figure out the difference between this build and the RetroPie build for running these ROMs under Retroarch.

    Edited once, last by kidhazy (May 17, 2017 at 11:17 AM).

    Has anyone had any luck or know how to pair the xbox one s controller by bluetooth? I try to pair it in the bluetooth settings, and it says bluetooth input/output error. i would really love to pair my controller up it would make everything so much easier than having to be right up on my raspberry pi 3

    Finally figured out my buzzing noise problem on Retroarch under GameStarter.

    I had to set "Vertical Refresh Rate" to 50 Hz in Retroarch Video settings.

    Retropie had an additional retroarch.cfg file in /dev/shm that appended video_refresh_rate = 50

    Sound all working now.

    Been playing around with GameStarter on a RPi and trying to get the Arcade Overlay Bezels for Mame2003 to work.

    Most of the tutorials are for a RetroPie default installation.

    What I found was I needed to modify the game.zip.cfg files to point to where I installed that Overlays and Shaders.

    But, more importantly, I had to update gamestarter.start to call in the additional game.zip.cfg file.

    I modified line 96:
    from: $DIR/resources/bin/retroarch -c $CONFIG_FILE -L $LIBRETRO_DIR/$1_libretro.so "$2" &> $LOG_FILE_RA
    to: $DIR/resources/bin/retroarch -c $CONFIG_FILE --appendconfig "$2.cfg" -L $LIBRETRO_DIR/$1_libretro.so "$2" &> $LOG_FILE_RA

    I also updated RetroArch config so that the config file is not saved on RetroArch exit.

    This works for me, and loads the additional config file to add in the shader and overlay info.

    I'd like to know if this modification is really necessary - or have I missed something?

    Cheers.