Category: News

RetroPie 4.7 images are now available, and include a variety of changes and improvements. We marked RetroPie 4.6 as having beta support for the Raspberry Pi 4. We now believe it to work well enough to remove the beta label.

RetroPie 4.7 supports the new Raspberry Pi 400.

Please see below for more information on what’s changed since RetroPie 4.6.

You can download a 4.7 image from https://retropie.org.uk/download/. For first installs please follow the Installation Instructions.

You can also install RetroPie on top of an existing Raspberry Pi OS (Formerly Raspbian) set up, or on top of Ubuntu on a PC/Odroid-C1/C2/XU3/XU4. Links to the relevant instructions can be found on the Download Page.

Please note that our pre-built binary packages for Raspbian Stretch are no longer updated, and support is being dropped for this version. If you are still running a Raspbian Stretch based image you will get a warning when launching RetroPie-Setup. We recommend people update to the latest image which is currently based on Raspberry Pi OS (Buster).

If you want to support the project, donations are always appreciated and can be made on our Donation Page. The lead developer Jools Wills also has a Patreon page up at https://www.patreon.com/retropie.

Thanks to everyone who has contributed to this release.

Changes since 4.6

• Updated to the latest Raspberry Pi OS Buster image, with support for USB boot on the Pi4. The RetroPie 4.7 image can be flashed directly to an USB drive and booted directly, the Pi4 boot EEPROM should be updated first using Raspberry Pi Imager as detailed in https://github.com/raspberrypi/documentation/blob/master/hardware/raspberrypi/booteeprom.md.
• Added xpadneo – linux driver for xbox one wireless gamepad.
• retroArch – updated to v1.8.8.
• Added mame – standalone MAME emulator building from latest code.
• srb2 (Sonic Robo Blast 2) – updated to v2.2.2.
• cgenius – updated to 2.4.4.1.
• hatari (Atari ST emulator) – updated to v2.2.1.
• amiberry (Amiga emulator) – updated to v3.3.
• scummvm –  updated to 2.2.0
• xroar (Dragon 32 / CoCo emulator) – updated to v0.36
• ti99sim –  update to version 0.16.0 and switch to SDL2.
• Added ti99sim-sdl1 for older distros as new code requires GCC 8
• sdltrs –  switch to the SDL2 version, enable for KMS
• attractmode – now supports RPI4/KMS.
• lr-vecx – now includes GPU rendering support for smooth vector output.
• sdl1 / runcommand – fix aspect ratio using the dispmanx backend with sdl1 on fkms (this affects various sdl1 emulators such as dosbox, daphne, openbor and others).
• lr-gpsp – fixed crash on RaspberryPi OS Buster.
• opentyrian – updated to latest code which now uses SDL2 backend.
• darkplaces-quake – added optional gles version for RPI4 with better performance.
• gemrb – updated to v0.8.6 and switched to SDL2 backend.
• lr-bnses – updated to the current BSNES version of the libretro fork.
• vice – updated to latest version, and re-enable fastsid which got disabled by default upstream.
• Improved Aarch64 support (64bit Arm) – can be manually installed on the beta 64bit Raspberry Pi OS, but is not officially supported.
• lzdoom –  update to 3.86a (This was announced as the final lzdoom release to support GL2 rendering.)
• mupen64plus – reworking of module logic – now enabled on mali targets.
• Added recognition for Jetson Nano and Tegra X1
• Added gpg signing for pre-built binaries.
• Improvements to runcommand and RPI4 videomode detection.
• Updates to Skyscraper (Metadata scraper).
• usbromservice – fixed bug with mounting ext3/ext4 partitions.
• audiosettings –  updates for Pi4 and support for discrete internal ALSA devices.
• New esthemes added.
• Various other bug fixes and improvements.
• Added new experimental modules:
  • lr-mesen – Mesen NES/Famicom emulator.
  • lr-theodore – Thomson MO/TO system emulator.
  • lr-smsplus-gx –  Sega Master System/Game Gear emulator.
  • lr-gearsystem –  Sega Master System/Game Gear/SG-1000 emulator.

We are very pleased to announce RetroPie 4.6 with beta support for the Raspberry Pi 4.

It’s been some time since we last updated our pre-built images. However development has been ongoing in the background, and a lot of changes have been made since the last release. Note that we update RetroPie constantly, and you can update your system at any time. We wanted to wait until we were happy with the Raspberry Pi 4 support before putting out some new images though, but RetroPie has been working on the Raspberry Pi 4 for some time for those wanting to manually install or try a weekly development image.

You can see what emulators are available for our supported platforms thanks to a new stats module included in RetroPie – https://retropie.org.uk/stats/pkgflags/. 

For RetroPie 4.6 we have moved to Raspbian Buster as a base for our pre-built Raspberry Pi images. Raspbian Stretch is no longer supported by Raspberry Pi Trading Ltd. We will continue to support Stretch for a while longer, but will likely stop updating binaries for it later this year.

We are marking the Raspberry Pi 4 image as beta for now – primarily as there are still some things to improve on, but most packages run well. Please do try it, and report any issues to our forum https://retropie.org.uk/forum/. If you are running a weekly Buster development build from https://files.retropie.org.uk/images/weekly/ you can just update within RetroPie-Setup – no need to start from a new image.

Please see the changelog below for more information on the changes since RetroPie 4.5.

You can download a 4.6 image from https://retropie.org.uk/download/. For first installs please follow the Installation Instructions.

You can also install RetroPie on top of an existing Raspbian Buster set up, or on top of Ubuntu on a PC/Odroid-C1/C2/XU3/XU4. Links to the relevant instructions can be found on the Download area.

If you want to support the project, donations are always appreciated and can be made on our Donation Page. The main developer Jools Wills also has a Patreon page up at https://www.patreon.com/retropie.

We hope you enjoy this update, and wish everyone the best at these difficult times. Happy gaming x.

Changes since 4.5

• Raspberry Pi 4 support! Support is labelled as beta currently as there are still things to improve, but most emulators now run well.
• The RetroPie images are now based on Raspbian Buster – Stretch is no longer supported by Raspberry Pi (Trading) ltd. RetroPie will stop updating pre-built binaries for Stretch later in the year.
• Improvements to RetroPie packaging system and core RetroPie-Setup code so package state is remembered and binary updates will only be done if an updated binary is available. Source installs won’t be overwritten by a pre-built binary when updating also. We started providing pre-built binaries for the packages in the experimental section for the supported platforms.
• RetroArch updated to v1.8.5.
  • New notification system with cheevos badges support.
  • RGUI can be themed.
  • Support for real CD ROM, with the ability to dump the disc image.
  • Improved disk control system, with support for labeling disks in .m3u files.
  • RetroAchievements support for PS1/Sega CD/PCEngine CD.
• EmulationStation updated to v2.9.1.
  • Scraper fixes for the TheGameDBNet.
  • Grid view improvements and bugfixes.
  • Theming improvements.
  • New options for “disable system name on custom collections” and “save gamelist metadata after each modification”.
• Added videomode switching support to runcommand for KMS and X11 targets. SDL2 applications only.
• Added ioquake3 module for platforms other than Raspberry Pi 1-3.
• Replaced zdoom with lzdoom as zdoom is no longer maintained.
• amiberry – updated to 3.1.3 including ipf support.
• stella – updated to 6.0.1.
• SDL updated to 2.0.10 with rpi4/kms fixes.
• solarus – lots of updates to modernise the port.
• eduke32 – major overhaul including adding package for IonFury.
• zesarux – updated to v8.0.
• cgenius – updated to v2.3.6.
• drastic – update to 2.5.0.4 with RPI4 compatibility.
• scummvm – updated to v2.1.1.
• atari800 – updated to v4.2.0 (lr-atari800 config has been moved to lr-atari800.cfg to avoid conflicting)
• lr-mupen64plus / lr-mupen64plus-next – enable GLES3 support on rpi4.
• lr-opera – renamed from lr-4do.
• Sonic Robo Blast – updated to 2.2.
• Lots of other fixes and improvements.
  • Added new experimental modules.
  • vvvvvv – Port of the popular platform / puzzle game VVVVVV.
  • lr-neocd – Neo Geo CD emulator.
  • redream – Dreamcast emulator for the Raspberry Pi 4.

Raspberry Pi 4 image from – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raspberry_Pi#/media/File:Raspberry_Pi_4_Model_B_-_Side.jpg – released under CC BY-SA 4.0