Problem with loading some WHD games on Amiberry

aidy80's

Pi Model or other hardware: B+
Power Supply used: Original Pi PSU
RetroPie Version Used: 4.5.1
Built From: retropie-4.5.1 -rpi2_rpi3.img.gz
USB Devices connected: PS3 controller & usb keyboard
Controller used: PS3 controller
Error messages received: Black screen on a game after the intro and an Amiga Dos prompt on the others
Guide used: (Mention if you followed a guide) Referred to Amiberry Setup on GitHub

Hi, I'm not sure if I'm missing something or perhaps I have a couple of bad ROMS? I'm using Amiberry and using ROMs that are WHDload .lha format.

It seems a little hit and miss getting them to work. I'll use three as an example.

It Came From The Desert 2 Antheads - The game shows the meteor intro although it seems to be running a little quicker than I remember and the screen that usually asks if you want to load a saved game flashes up and disappears so quick that you can't do anything. Then the screen goes black and nothing further happens. I can hotkey into the menu and I've tried lots of different variations in the configuration and then doing a reset but nothings seems to make a difference.
Race Drivin' - The game looks like it will load and then an Amiga Dos prompt appears but that's it... I typed Dir and could see some files e.g. RaceDrivinNoIntro.slave
Police Quest 2 - Loads up an Amiga Dos prompt saying xpkmaster.library version 4 not found. File Disk 4 is compressed using XPK but not cached, detected in function 'resload_diskload' WHDLoad failed returncode 144 ?

I feel like there's probably something simple I'm missing but I can't quite figure it out! Any help greatly appreciated.

aidy80's

I tried some different Kickstart ROMs too, but that didn't help, in fact it messed everything up. Glad I backed up the original files!

aidy80's

Any ideas anyone? Or should I simply source different ROMs?

All help appreciated.

aidy80's

I had some success today, so I thought I'd post to update this post in case anyone else has a similar issue.

It Came From The Desert 2 Antheads: I just have to press fire during the intro and it loads fine. If I leave the intro to play through to the end I get a black screen... How strange!

Police Quest 2: Sourced a different working ROM. Odd as it appears to be 3 disks and not 4, so not sure why I was getting an error about disk 4!

Still can't get Race Drivin' working.

aidy80's

Success! I scrapped the Race Drivin' .lha file and sourced a ROM of just Disk 2 which you can boot directly from to get to the game. Phew, got there in the end.

BadFurDay

Both It Came from the Desert games will stop flickering if you enable JIT in the CPU and FPU settings. Unfortunately, the Amiga is a complex beast and different games need different settings to run properly.

Stuffu

@aidy80-s not sure what version of Amiberry you are running but there has been a lot of development lately. I think latest release is 3.1.1 (not sure what binary you get from RetroPie though), also from Amiberry GUI, update your whdload.xml. Hope it helps!

aidy80's

@BadFurDay Thanks! The only flicker I experienced was on an older ROM of Antheads that I tried. On the latest one that I've got I don't get any flicker.

aidy80's

@Stuffu Thanks! I updated the whdload.xml very recently, in the past couple of weeks or so, I couldn't tell if it made a difference or not. I have trouble running Skidmarks too. Can't get past the first screen on the AGA version or get the CD32 version to boot.

IyonUK

@aidy80-s Skidmarks doesn’t work because Amiberry doesn’t emulate the serial port

https://github.com/midwan/amiberry/issues/631

aidy80's

@IyonUK Thanks for that info! What about Super Skidmarks on the CD32, I just get a black screen for that regardless of what settings I use?

IyonUK

@aidy80-s dunno, not tried that one. Will give it a go later if I remember. 👍🏻

IyonUK

@aidy80-s I can’t get it to work. I might have an older version of the LHA though but I just get a “Can’t allocate Expmem” error

aidy80's

@IyonUK Thanks for trying, I get the same error message.

nemo93

hello, for anything CD32 I highly recommend you go with the "iso" version using bin/cue files. Those will work straight away from within Retropie. The .cue extension will be detected automatically by Amiberry and the CD32 config used from the get-go. Remember to have the proper "Kickstart ROMs" in the Retropie Bios folder (there's one for CD32).
=> Super Skidmarks CD32 is working flawless here.

As @IyonUK mentioned the first Skidmarks on Amiga is currently not working due to the lack of serial port emulation. Hopefully a new package version will be released or Amiberry will emulate such port in a future version.

Last I do confirm and I insist that you must always rely on the latest WHD packages. Also update both Amiberry (from source) and the whdload.xml file (from the Amiberry GUI).

BadFurDay

@aidy80-s Still WHDLoad? Which version? I have the latest one from Retroplay and still get flickering without JIT.

aidy80's

@BadFurDay it's v2.0 .lha of Antheads.

aidy80's

@nemo93 Thanks! Will look out for .bin / cue versions.

aidy80's

@nemo93 Some games I have to click on it in the Retropie menu to load, then adjust the configuration in the menu such as change the Kickstart Rom or Chipset, then click Reset to get it to load. I've tried the Save Configuration option and it adds and entry to the list that appears under Configuration but this doesn't seem to save things like the Chipset or Mhz etc. Is there something I manually need to edit for this? E.g. I got Super Skidmarks CD32 bin/cue files working but for some reason I have to change the Kickstart Rom to CD32 every time to load it up. Is there a quick way to save this kind of setting?