Vertical Screen Rotation on RP4 400 HELP

[gargoyle73]

Mods, I have searched all docs here and done extensive search but have not found what I needed

I have built a great cab with vertical monitor especially for shmups and virtual pinball, BUT so far cannot get the GAMES out of horizontal mode and need image rotated 170 degrees, I HAVE been succesful modifying autostart.sh in emulationstation using the --screenrotate commands, but alas that only rotates menus, not games

So how do I rotate games? Does it have to be done in each emulator?

I'm using Mame2003, and have extensive MAME experience, so I'd normally just go in the config file and adjust rotation, any way I can access the config file? How? YES sadly I am new to Pi and retropie so thank you for your patience as I learn

Thank you SO much for any help, my search showed many struggling with pi4 on rotation, sure hope this can be solved

Lee in NC USA
pi 4 400
retropie 4.8
power supply unkown
built on retropi imager, manual install
USB connected: custom controls pcb. ultimarc spinner, keyboard some

[mitu]

@gargoyle73 said in Vertical Screen Rotation on RP4 400 HELP:

So how do I rotate games? Does it have to be done in each emulator?

Pretty much yes. See for instance this topic.

There's no rotation via config.txt anymore and the PI4 never had this kind of rotation available (it supported a 180 deg. rotation at release time, but the was removed entirely afterwards). Apart from running in a desktop environment (unsuported by RetroPie), I don't think there's other general solutions that will start with the screen rotated, so each program must support rotation and start rotated (I assume you meant 270 deg and not 170 deg).

[gargoyle73]

@mitu thank you!n And yes 270 degrees, slip of the keys:)

SO how do I access the config file for Mame2003? Hoping I can use my usual rotate command there

[mitu]

@gargoyle73 said in Vertical Screen Rotation on RP4 400 HELP:

SO how do I access the config file for Mame2003? Hoping I can use my usual rotate command there

Not sure what you mean - the config file for Mame2003 is not plain text and cannot be edited. But since it's a Libretro core, the advice in the topic I linked above applies to it - you can edit the retrorach.cfg for the arcade system or for libretro-mame (the file in /opt/retropie/configs/arcade or /opt/retropie/configs/libretro-mame) and add the rotation options there.

[gargoyle73]

@mitu you are exactly right apologies, failed to check the link while at work, finding what I need, many thanks! Will update as I go

note to devs though, more ease at rotation at all levels most welcome, grateful user here, amazing software

[mitu]

@gargoyle73 said in Vertical Screen Rotation on RP4 400 HELP:

... more ease at rotation at all levels most welcome,

That would be welcome, but it's not something that's developed by RetroPie. Moons ago, it was part of the Raspberry Pi's firmware, but these days and with the adoption of the newer Pi models (Pi4/5), it's been removed from the firmware in favor of controlling the rotation from applications/user space.

Note that even if you rotate the video output in RetroArch, the menu will still be shown without the rotation.

[gargoyle73]

@mitu update trying to:

Configure RetroArch for rotation by editing /opt/retropie/configs/all/retroarch.cfg and adding

video_allow_rotate=yes
video_rotation = "1"

how do I access and edit this cfg? Is this in file manager?

MANY thanks, apologies, as I'm new to pi

[mitu]

...
how do I access and edit this cfg? Is this in file manager?

Yes, you can access it from the Pi, using mc (the File Manager) and edit it (press F4 to get an editor for the file that's highlighted) or you can access it from your PC, over file shares, by opening the \\retropie\configs\all\retroarch folder.

[Thorr69]

@gargoyle73 said in Vertical Screen Rotation on RP4 400 HELP:

@mitu thank you!n And yes 270 degrees, slip of the keys:)

SO how do I access the config file for Mame2003? Hoping I can use my usual rotate command there

If you use mame2003 for everything, this probably would be a whole lot easier if you just made game-specific configs to rotate.

Arcade games don't have a consistent native rotation. Some will have to rotate 90 degrees and some will need 270. For my setup, I made myself a list of all the vertical games in mame2003 and made a config for each one. One the primary mame2003 config file, I have it set to Autorotate = off and I have Tate Mode = on (better screen filling for my vertical 4:3 montior).
I believe every file contains:
video_allow_rotate=yes
video_rotation = "1"
but the "1" has to be changed for every game so that it comes out right.

I have found this works great for me.

[gargoyle73]

@Thorr69 thank you! New to pi, where do I place config files? What folder? I assume theres just a config folder like regular mame on a pc?

OH and I'm realizing, I can navigate all folders on my PC if I just insert my micro sd in a reader, correct? That is preferred method for compiling?

[Thorr69]

@gargoyle73 said in Vertical Screen Rotation on RP4 400 HELP:

@Thorr69 thank you! New to pi, where do I place config files? What folder? I assume theres just a config folder like regular mame on a pc?
Place them in the same folder as the rom. So, wherever you have pacman.zip, put pacman.cfg.

OH and I'm realizing, I can navigate all folders on my PC if I just insert my micro sd in a reader, correct? That is preferred method for compiling?

You can't do that normally. It's much better to connect to your Pi via Samba shares. You can access them as a network folder that way. See documentation for that. (you can corrupt your SD card quite easily by putting it in a Windows PC and doing the wrong thing such saying Yes when windows asks you to fix it or format it.)

As far as 'compiling', I am not sure where you are going with that. config files are just plain text files and need no compiling. If you are talking about actually program and package compiling, then you can't compile something on a windows machine and expect it to work on a Linux base (such as the OS used by RetroPi). Compilation operations would be done in a terminal on the pi itself.

[gargoyle73]

guys I'm still stuck:) I'm so sorry but REALLY want to get this working, I'm so close!

SO what interface do I use to read and alter MAME configs? Can you walk me through steps? Like, I've done this a million times in Windows 10, graphically all I do is go the folder and change the cfg files. What am I missing? Is there a graphical interface I am missing?

BTW Samba not an option for me as the cab is in a workshop with no wifi

thank you!

Lee

[mitu]

@gargoyle73 said in Vertical Screen Rotation on RP4 400 HELP:

SO what interface do I use to read and alter MAME configs? Can you walk me through steps?

Start the 'File Manager' (mc - Midnight Commander) from the RetroPie system. It has an interface similar to the old Norton Commander, which allows you to browse the filesystem and operate on files/folders. Go to the folder where the retroarch.cfg is located (/opt/retropie/configs/all/) and modify the file by selecting it and pressing F4. This will start an editor, from which you can modify the file and save it afterwords.

There are lots of links with documentation/videos on how to use Midnight Commander - see for instance https://www.tecmint.com/midnight-commander-a-console-based-file-manager-for-linux/ or https://www.linode.com/docs/guides/how-to-install-midnight-commander/.