New and jumping in with both feet!

chubsta

A very vague question I'm afraid - I have read the stickies and FAQ so understand the rules, but my question is pretty vague as i don't actually have a Pi yet but have ordered one which I intend to use for emulation.

I am far from 'new' when it comes to emulation - I got my first ever Windows PC back in 98 having seen a friend running mame (0.28 i think!), and have dipped my toes in and out ever since. At one point i had a couple of Sega Astro City cabs running mame in hori and vert (as well as a couple of dozen dedicated arcade cabs such as defender), i currently only use Mac's, on which i run sdlmame through qmc2 and various other emulators through OpenEmu. I have also written a number of successful iOS apps using ObjectiveC.

I am not posting the above for any other reason other than to show i am not a complete idiot when it comes to computers and technology, because the point of this post is that I have absolutely no idea how to do anything at all with the Pi! I am aware of but have never used Linux, if that is indeed what the Pi runs on.

So, my question is this - for someone who has a rough idea about Operating systems and coding, what areas should i concentrate on to ensure i am able to setup the Pi and emulators properly? Is there a good knowledge of a particular language or OS needed in which case i would appreciate someone pointing me in the right direction to any helpful tutorials (not the step by step guides i have seen here for example on how to install a particular emulator) that would help me 'understand' what i am doing instead of just copying someone else work. It seems like there are many different emulators for each system and i have spent a fair bit of time reading about their various virtues on this forum, everything 'seems' simple enough to get up and running but then i come across so many posts where people have issues.

My previous experience with building dedicated emulation systems for mame has shown that i have a tendency to jump straight in which isn't always the best way so this time i want to do it 'right' and develop a good workflow for getting it up and running.

Anyone who can offer any advice or a list of the common mistakes that people make would be much appreciated - in the meantime i will try to read more although understanding what is going on without an actual Pi is kind of like learning a foreign language without having any translations.

If nothing else, thanks for reading and "hello!"

paradadf

I believe it depends on what you want to do. EmulationStation is written in C++, there are many python scripts being used and the retropie script itself is written in shell. Some libretro emulators and retroarch use C.

speeb

I've tinkered with Linux over the years, sometimes using it as my primary OS, but not considering myself an expert. I'm just putting finishing touches on my RetroPie box.

The best piece of advice I can give: Know how to read and understand directions.

I know that seems obvious, but online support and docs for RetroPie is great. As long as you can follow directions, you should be able to do it.

Challenges I have run into (and been able to overcome):

MegaDrive to Genesis; PC Engine to TG-16. There are directions in the RetroPie wiki, but after following them, both systems disappeared completely. Turned out I had a typo in the cfg file.
Related to that, I think I put all my Genesis screenshots into the Genesis directory when they should have been in the MegaDrive directory. Just moving them didn't work, so right now I'm rebuilding those.
I ran into the white screen a bunch with themes, but usually a restart of ES solved that.
Don't use the built in scraper for your entire collection. I used it for one offs on my PSX games since I only have a few of those. Otherwise, I used

where I found it. OH, BUT..... Make sure you let it finish up and don't cancel if it's taking a long time on your last ROM. I made that mistake with my NES set - it broke the game list and had to run the whole thing again. Probably an easier way to do it, but that worked for me.
When I first started moving ROMs over, I made it way more difficult than it needed to be. I started out copying everything to a USB drive, but when I realized that would require a lot of time, I just grabbed WinSCP and FTP'd the ROMs over. You can also just go to \retropie\ in Windows Explorer and copy things that way.

Again, just be comfortable with following directions and you should be able to get most of it done. Be careful with sudo commands. Don't panic.

Good luck and have fun!

dankcushions

welcome! start here: https://github.com/retropie/retropie-setup/wiki/First-Installation :)

in terms of learning how it works, i think the best first bit to learn is linux itself. specifically the command prompt (if you've ever used the command prompt in osx it's basically the same for most commands). once you start tinkering with retropie beyond the basic setup, you'll find you have to use it more and more, and you'll learn fast.

after that, if you know objective c you'll probably find you can help out on some fixes on the emulators themselves! i didn't know any C before i starting tinkering. just doing some I/O or UI fixes will be hugely helpful, if you can spare the time. just pick an emulator for a system you like using and have a look at the issues list :) it's not too tricky to edit the code, and compile stuff on your pi (in fact, i should write a wiki page for this...)

fabio78

I personally have never had any contact with Linux before and had Retropie up and running in less than an hour, games and all. As far as installation, basic configuration and use go, everything is concealed and running under the bonnet (that's the idea of the project in the first place). The guys did a great job at keeping it friendly. Just download the image and that's it, basically plug and play.
Obviously, if you want deep customization and play with "power user" features and experimental packages, you will have to learn a bit. But as pointed out by others, the Wikis are very helpful. Also, YouTube is a great source of tutorials. Look for a guy called ETA Prime. His channel is amazing, and his videos cover pretty much everything there is, in a VERY friendly manner (almost everything I know I've learned with his videos). Needless to say, I have learned a great deal of Linux since then, and have never stopped tinkering with my setup, mainly because it's half of the fun. Trust me, you will love it! Jump in without fear :)

chubsta

Thanks for the very helpful and detailed replies guys, I am really looking forward to getting stuck in - my previous Mame installations have involved spending far more time messing with settings etc to get as authentic as possible than it ever did actually playing games (except for Circus Charlie - that gets played every time i load the emu up!).

Given that i know a fair bit of coding stuff (my first experience was Basic on the ZX Spectrum and assembler on the Atari ST but am currently most proficient on ObjC) I guess i need to get used to Linux as a starting point, hopefully everything else i do will make far more sense once i understand the basics, I havent used Terminal much on the Mac but i guess it is just a case of learning the various commands as i have used it enough to understand how it actually works.

As you may have guessed i am actually pretty excited about this and am looking forward to learning more, i think 'learning' is always my thing, it is great to find new stuff out and you cant beat that feeling when something suddenly clicks!

chubsta

Quick update - the Pi arrived, plugged it all in and haven't had much time to mess with settings etc as i am too busy playing the games! Playing Atari VCS Demon Attack on a 65" screen looks fantastic, the whole experience so far has been positive, with a complete lack of issues to try to sort out, hopefully something will rear it's head and I can get stuck in but for the time being it is probably the best emulation set-up I have ever had, and believe me, I have had a lot...

Can't believe how professional a job everyone has done to make it as simple and plug-and-play, really, really impressed.

ohmycommodore

I was also quite new and found the instructions easy to follow. I also wanted to get the Megadrive to Genesis tweak working, and made sure I had the best and latest info before doing that. As well, coming from a Mac, I had to come up with a solution for removing the extra "dot" files. Again, took the time to read and came up with the best workflow for me – one that isn't a permanent fix, but a bit of easy upkeep once in a while. Not a coder at all, but appreciate and try to follow others, especially if they've taken the time to be super-detailed in their instructions, etc.

Lyle_JP

@chubsta
It goes in cycles. When I first got into my pi, I played the holy hell out of each new MAME game I added to it. Then I started adding consoles, and I started playing those games like mad (until I didn't know what time it was).

But then, when there was no novelty to adding new games, I started being all about customizing the pi interface itself. Then I went down the Emulation Station rabbit hole and didn't play any game on my pi for months, because every time I turned it on I saw something else I wanted to change or tweak. Then I discovered shaders... well, that was another week or so of experimenting.

It wasn't until I had satisfied myself that I couldn't get the interface any cleaner that I finally started really enjoying games again. Funny thing is, I thought I would be playing new games I've never heard of or tried for years with this thing... yet I find myself always coming back to the same dozen games that I love.

chubsta

@Lyle_JP said in New and jumping in with both feet!:
"Then I discovered shaders... well, that was another week or so of experimenting."

Yeah, shaders - they are something i need to spend some time looking at, as i said i am playing on a 65" LED at the moment and it is hard to get the old CRT look, the graphics are bright enough and the scaliness help but you cant beat the original look of an old CRT monitor. Bearing in mind how long it took me to get my old mame installs sorted i guess this will take a while too!

Todays job has been 'themes', trying to understand all the settings for those is the first thing i will look at i think, nice and straightforward, not too much code to deal with and plenty of info, should be a good place to start...

PetroRie

Configuring the Pie isn't really hard at all, everything is perfectly documented on the Wiki page. This forum is also great, you can find many good old topics.

I see that you mentioned MAME gaming. If you want to play MAME games on the Pi I can suggest you to use the lr-fbalpha emulator. read the forum rules. You don't have to rebuild them with clrmamepro this will save you a lot of time.

If you want that oldskool look, its kinda hard on a modern TV because the pixels looks just weird. In the main retroarch.cfg file look for

video_smooth

Enable it and set it to true. In my opinion the games look perfectly, combining it with a shader will look just mind blowing.

chubsta

@PetroRie
I have been playing around so much with this the last few days you wouldn't believe!

I have found everything extremely easy to set-up, the wiki has been very very useful and easy to understand, and i have all the emulators i need up and running great. I have a few small issues such as a green-screen on Firefox on Daphne (Dragons lair works though) and my 'scraped' roms need work on some of the art work but apart from that and finding a nice theme i am pretty much there at the moment. I do need to find a way to hide folders (such as Mame2003 in Arcade) but i suppose i should be able to change a config file somewhere to point to a new location and remove the old folder - would be nice to have a 'hide' option in the UI though!

I did run into a problem with the Pi Zero W not installing rp but i guess that is due to the fact i was trying it on the day of release and the cores hadn't been updated so am concentrating on my Pi3 at the moment.

I do need to do more work on the shader side of things to get things perfect but it has been a totally positive experience so far, and the results are at least on a par, if not better due to ease of menu, with my previous mame installations.

In short, great piece of software, and great community!

speeb

@chubsta I found a post somewhere that talked about binding SELECT plus the shoulder buttons to cycle through the shaders. Works great! The only thing I haven't quite figured out is how to include a "no shader" option, but I haven't looked much either.

chubsta

@speeb
thanks for the heads up, that sounds a great idea so will look into it...