Box86 and Wine on RPi4

[George]

@chado21 The box86 script does check to make sure that RetroPie is on version 4.7.7 or later. This is because 4.7.7 introduced some new function calls for dependency checks, which is used by the Box86 script.

[chado21]

@george

still seems to be the same. i wish i knew what to fix....

[George]

@chado21 Ok, you're on the right kernel version, which is a good sign. But what about the output of the other commands I mentioned? Can you send that as well?

- George

[TedMaul]

Hello, I've been persevering with trying to run through Wine explorer (still can't see how to make shortcuts for ES to run directly...). I've got Sonic SMS 1 Remake working (great fun btw!) and audio is fine but gameplay is very laggy. Are there any options for speeding up, if that isn't a silly question? Cheers.

[mth75]

@tedmaul

Overclocking is your best bet.

[George]

@tedmaul If there are any options in the game to change the screen resolution, that would be something to try as well, though if I remember correctly, you might have an issue doing that through Wine Desktop.

Are you using Wine through the ES Ports menu, or did you update to the branch where I added Wine as an emulator?

[TedMaul]

I don't have any active cooling so not sure if I'll go for overclocking just yet... it already feels too hot half the time in my standard Pi case...

@george I'm using it through the Ports menu at the moment - if I want to update should I get rid of what I've already got, or will the setup take care of it?

Thanks both for replying btw!

[George]

@tedmaul The only major change is that Wine is listed as an emulator instead of as a port. That said, you'd probably need to update your themes for it to be usable also. I've made an entry for the Pixel theme (which is my favorite) on my own fork. You should be able to get it with the following:

git clone --branch rp-box86wine https://github.com/GeorgeMcMullen/es-theme-pixel /home/pi/.emulationstation/themes/es-theme-pixel 

The benefit to using Wine as an Emulator in EmulationStation is that you don't need a script that would essentially install another script that would run your game.

I also did update the Box86 script so that it pulls from Box86's master branch. There are several performance improvements that are quite amazing.

Hope that helps!

[VictimRLSH]

The biggest problem I have trying to get things to run on Box86 (or even compile if that is needed) is I can't install i386 architecture libraries because apt-get and all the package managers won't allow them because the current architecture doesn't support them (but box86 will if you point them out to it)

Is there an install script to install x86 architecture libraries so box86 can use them?

[George]

@victimrlsh You shouldn't need i386 architecture to compile box86. You might want to try the Box86 Discord though if you're seeing a particular issue compiling Box86. https://discord.gg/Fh8sjmu

[VictimRLSH]

@george The issue isn't Box86 itself, but the libraries that apps running under Box86 need. The reference to compiling is that some apps running under Box86 need to be compiled and need even more libraries than at runtime.

[George]

@victimrlsh Hmm. Yes, trying to compile something under box86 probably isn't going to work very well. It would probably be easier to compile it on a true x86 machine and then copy the binaries over Of course, if the source is available, I would also look to see if someone has already done the work to make it compile on ARM based devices. It would run much better that way.

[TedMaul]

@george sounds interesting / promising, thanks! I'll give it a go and report back.

[TedMaul]

@george I'm having trouble getting the new version to work; tried this:

pi@retropie:~ $ git clone https://github.com/GeorgeMcMullen/rp-box86wine/tree/emulator /home/pi/RetroPie-Setup/ext/rp-box86wineemu/
Cloning into '/home/pi/RetroPie-Setup/ext/rp-box86wineemu'...
fatal: repository 'https://github.com/GeorgeMcMullen/rp-box86wine/tree/emulator/' not found

Apologies, but have you got any pointers?

Separately, I tried creating a shell script from the file that is in that branch (rp-box86wine/scriptmodules/emulators/wine.sh) and put it into a roms/wine folder, and a new system in es_systems.cfg, pointing to it, but then I was missing a file in runcommand (which, with hindsight, makes sense...)

[George]

@tedmaul Try this instead. Just need to call git in a different way.

git clone --branch emulator https://github.com/GeorgeMcMullen/rp-box86wine /home/pi/RetroPie-Setup/ext/rp-box86wineemu/

You'll want to remove the any other clone you might have already done, or RetroPie Setup will complain about duplicate scripts and won't load one of them.

Hope that helps.

- George

[TedMaul]

@george Brilliant, thanks - I've got my emulator entry now! Wine desktop etc is running directly from that just fine - my first attempt at a shell though...

#!/bin/bash
wine /home/pi/RetroPie/roms/wine/Files/claw/CLAW.EXE

... resulted in a black screen with no way of exiting. I may have missed something...

[George]

@tedmaul cool. Ok, I have yet to document this, but there's now two ways to add "roms" to the Wine emulator section in Emulation Station. The first way is supposed to be a little easier as it is just a conf file.

Create a file /home/pi/RetroPie/roms/wine/CommanderClaw.conf containing the following:

DIRECTORY=/home/pi/RetroPie/roms/wine/Files/claw/
PROGRAM=/home/pi/RetroPie/roms/wine/Files/claw/CLAW.EXE
OPTIONS=

The other way would be to use the shell script method. Create a file called: /home/pi/RetroPie/roms/wine/CommanderClawShell.sh containing the following:

#!/bin/bash
xset -dpms s off s noblank
cd "/home/pi/RetroPie/roms/wine/Files/claw/"
matchbox-window-manager &
WINEDEBUG=-all LD_LIBRARY_PATH="/opt/retropie/supplementary/mesa/lib/" setarch linux32 -L /opt/retropie/emulators/wine/bin/wine '/home/pi/RetroPie/roms/wine/Files/claw/CLAW.EXE'

After you've created either of these files, you'll have to restart Emulation Station in order for them to be picked up.

Hopefully one of those should work. I have a long list of games that I'm supposed to test out and haven't gotten to it yet, but Commander Claw is on the list.

- George

[shavecat]

@george
hey ,
i did try claw but also get a black screen.
did u get it working with what u write ?
will check it too if so :)

[TedMaul]

@george Thanks, the conf file opened Wine Desktop but then kicked me out; the shell script was more promising (opened before freezing on the first level), but every subsequent attempt just opens Wine Desktop before kicking me out again (without loading the game). But it feels like progress!

[George]

@tedmaul interesting. When you say "Wine Desktop", do you see the Wine start menu/task bar at the bottom of the screen?

It does feel like progress though, especially if you were able to at least see some of the game.

- George