How to run libretro MAME from commandline? And/or see debug info?

wrybread

What does 'commandline' mean for the Libretro core ?

Maybe I misunderstand what the libretro core is. I'm simply trying to launch a ROM using MAME using that version of mame via cli.

I don't think it was just a romset mismatch, I downloaded the correct ROM for that version of MAME, or at least I think I did.

As far as the space between 0_SYS_ and mame-libretro, good catch! I did have one in the actual commands I was running though, and it doesn't work with the space either.

I wound up installing Mame4All (and downloading a romset specifically for it), all seems to be working perfectly now. It's a simple matter of running:

/opt/retropie/emulators/mame4all/mame digdug

Not sure why mame-libretro isn't straightforward to run from cli, or maybe it was just a matter of extreme user error.

Does anyone know if there's a significant disadvantage to mame4all over mame-libretro? All the roms I've tested seem to be working perfectly, but my tastes do lean heavily to the super classics (80s and early 90s).

mitu

@wrybread said in How to run libretro MAME from commandline? And/or see debug info?:

Not sure why mame-libretro isn't straightforward to run from cli, or maybe it was just a matter of extreme user error.

It's not that extreme. Verbose logging should clear up the issue.

Does anyone know if there's a significant disadvantage to mame4all over mame-libretro? All the roms I've tested seem to be working perfectly, but my tastes do lean heavily to the super classics (80s and early 90s).

Yes, mame4all is a very old and un-maintained MAME version, which runs only on a RPI. It's not supported on newer RaspiOS since it depends on the older Broadcom GPU drivers - it's only included for the weakest Pi devices (Pi0/Pi1). The Libretro based MAME cores will run wherever RetroArch runs and receive a modicum of maintenance.

EDIT: you can use the latest mame also to run things or FBNeo Libretro core, both of which are actively maintained and kept up-to-date. Mame2003-Plus is also an option, it still gets support and - sporadically - also new games.

wrybread

@mitu said in How to run libretro MAME from commandline? And/or see debug info?:

EDIT: you can use the latest mame also to run things or FBNeo Libretro core, both of which are actively maintained and kept up-to-date. Mame2003-Plus is also an option, it still gets support and - sporadically - also new games.

I tried using the latest MAME, or at least the latest MAME available in the apt package manager, installed via apt-get ("apt-get install mame"). It can launch and play games but it freezes when I hit the TAB key to configure the button inputs.

I wonder if there's a version in retropie_setup.sh that I missed.

wrybread

@mitu said in How to run libretro MAME from commandline? And/or see debug info?:

It's not that extreme.

It is a bit oddly complicated. Every other version of MAME I've ever used can be run from commandline like:

mameExecutable romname

With some optional commandline args of course.

The Libretro version is running something like:

/opt/retropie/emulators/retroarch/bin/retroarch -L /opt/retropie/libretrocores/lr-mame2003/mame2003_libretro.so --config /opt/retropie/configs/mame-libretro/retroarch.cfg "/home/wrybread/RetroPie/roms/mame-libretro/digdug.zip" --appendconfig /dev/shm/retroarch.cfg

I'm sure it's possible to wade through that and make it work, by enabling verbose output (which doesn't seem to be simply adding a "verbose" commandline arg, but I might be wrong about that). But that's a lot more complicated than every other version of MAME I've ever used.

Not saying there aren't good reasons for it though.

mitu

I tried using the latest MAME, or at least the latest MAME available in the apt package manager, installed via apt-get ("apt-get install mame"). It can launch and play games but it freezes when I hit the TAB key to configure the button inputs.

I wonder if there's a version in retropie_setup.sh that I missed.

There is and that's the version I was referring to. Not sure what what version of RetroPie you're using and how it was installed, since you haven't added any info about your setup, but recent RetroPie versions include a MAME binary installation which installs the latest stable MAME version.

wrybread

@mitu said in How to run libretro MAME from commandline? And/or see debug info?:

since you haven't added any info about your setup

I mentioned that it's a Pi 3, and it's running retropie-buster-4.8-rpi2_3_zero2w.img.

wrybread

@mitu said in How to run libretro MAME from commandline? And/or see debug info?:

There is and that's the version I was referring to.

Is that the version in retropie_setup.sh called "mame" under Experimental Packages?

There's a few others, pasting them in in case it's one of those:

Under "main packages":
avmame-0.94
advmame-1.4
advmame
mame4all
lr-mame2000
lr-mame2003-plus
lr-mame2010

Under "experimental packages":
mame
lr-mame2015
lr-mame2016
lr-mame

wrybread

The package under Experimental named simply "mame", which is MAME 0.254, has the same issue as the one installed via apt-get, it plays games just fine but when you press TAB everything slows to a crawl and I have to kill the process.

wrybread

Trying to get the Libretro version of MAME working, running with verbose flag I get a lot of errors, lots of them related to trying to create directories in /home/pi subfolders (even though I'm running as user wrybread, so paths should start with /home/wrybread).

I pasted the output into this pastebin, I don't imagine anyone has any idea how to fix?

https://pastebin.com/raw/Z1JBJUpG

mitu

@wrybread said in How to run libretro MAME from commandline? And/or see debug info?:

Trying to get the Libretro version of MAME working, running with verbose flag I get a lot of errors, lots of them related to trying to create directories in /home/pi subfolders (even though I'm running as user wrybread, so paths should start with /home/wrybread).

Looks like a broken configuration for the core. Did you copy the configurations from another system ? How did you install RetroPie specifically ?

wrybread

@mitu said in How to run libretro MAME from commandline? And/or see debug info?:

Looks like a broken configuration for the core.

Interesting.

Did you copy the configurations from another system ? How did you install RetroPie specifically ?

No, didn't copy anything, just installed retropie-buster-4.8-rpi2_3_zero2w.img.gz using [Raspberry Pi Imager] (https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/raspberry-pi-imager-imaging-utility/)

Is there a way to reset the config for the core?

mitu

@wrybread said in How to run libretro MAME from commandline? And/or see debug info?:

No, didn't copy anything, just installed retropie-buster-4.8-rpi2_3_zero2w.img.gz using Raspberry Pi Imager

The image is using the pi username for the installation, but you seem to be using a different username (wrybread) for the installation. That's not supported.

Is there a way to reset the config for the core?

You either use the pre-configured username (which is kind of the point of using the pre-installed image) or do a manual installation from the desired user account so that configurations are generated correctly.

wrybread

@mitu said in How to run libretro MAME from commandline? And/or see debug info?:

The image is using the pi username for the installation, but you seem to be using a different username (wrybread) for the installation. That's not supported.

Whoa. And oof. I wonder if creating the user "pi" will fix it.

mitu

@wrybread said in How to run libretro MAME from commandline? And/or see debug info?:

Whoa. And oof. I wonder if creating the user "pi" will fix it.

The user is already present, but the configs are probably broken now since you've run the setup as a different user. Just reinstall the image and start again.