basic 2 player support not working correctly

mitu

@puppetj said in basic 2 player support not working correctly:

i guess i can access the log file format the network right? and copy it over to my pc with this page to post to

The /dev/shm/runcommand.log is not accessible via network, you'll need to enable [SSH](https://retropie.org.uk/docs/SSH/] and use a program like WinSCP to transfer it. Since the log is quite large, you can post it on pastebin.com, it's easier to read and find things there.

lostless

@puppetj Did you plug the controllers into the same usb ports you set them up in? The USB ports do determine what controller is player 1 and 2. the order is top left is player on, bottom left is player 2, top right is player 3 and bottom right is player 4. If you skip a port, lets say the player one port and you plug a controller into the player 2 port, that now becomes player one. Its a priority system.

puppetj

@mitu said in basic 2 player support not working correctly:

@puppetj said in basic 2 player support not working correctly:

i dont know what emulator its using by default. (how can i find out?)

The name of the emulator is shown at game start, next to the game name (for instance, this is a NES game launched with lr-fceumm):

snes emultaor - lr-snes9x2010

nes emulator - lr-fceumm

sms/genesis emulator - genesis-plus-gx

puppetj

@lostless said in basic 2 player support not working correctly:

@puppetj Did you plug the controllers into the same usb ports you set them up in? The USB ports do determine what controller is player 1 and 2. the order is top left is player on, bottom left is player 2, top right is player 3 and bottom right is player 4. If you skip a port, lets say the player one port and you plug a controller into the player 2 port, that now becomes player one. Its a priority system.

even if you map the controllers? i tried many different combos but can you show me a diagram?

lostless

@puppetj yes even if you map the controllers. You are only mapping the buttons, not what's player 1 and 2 ect ect.

puppetj

@lostless said in basic 2 player support not working correctly:

@puppetj yes even if you map the controllers. You are only mapping the buttons, not what's player 1 and 2 ect ect.

ok, well that doesn't seems to be a issue

puppetj

@Clyde said in basic 2 player support not working correctly:

Hello and welcome to the forum.

Finally, you should run the games with verbose logging and show us the contents of the file /dev/shm/runcommand.log.

setup a seems pretty difficult i dont think i can do that.

Clyde

@puppetj Don't give up just yet. We can try to walk you through it, one step at a time.

Which of our suggestions did you already try? What worked and what didn't (in what way)?

puppetj

@Clyde said in basic 2 player support not working correctly:

@puppetj Don't give up just yet. We can try to walk you through it, one step at a time.

Which of our suggestions did you already try? What worked and what didn't (in what way)?

well the only suggestion i got, related to getting controllers to work for two player, is the usb port order, which never was a issue.

puppetj

@Clyde Im correct that pressing start and select at the same time quit game and goes back to the emulation station menu right? if so why doesnt it work?

Clyde

@puppetj said in basic 2 player support not working correctly:

well the only suggestion i got, related to getting controllers to work for two player, is the usb port order, which never was a issue.

I also meant the suggestions for further diagnosis like running the games with verbose logging.

@puppetj said in basic 2 player support not working correctly:

@Clyde Im correct that pressing start and select at the same time quit game and goes back to the emulation station menu right? if so why doesnt it work?

It also depends on the controller mapping. So, if that is broken, start+select may also not work. It also depends on the emulator used, as to my knowledge only the RetroArch / Libretro cores beginning with lr- are auto-mapped by Emulation Station. Other emulators have to be configured manually, see the Docs for that.

mitu

@puppetj said in basic 2 player support not working correctly:

I'm correct that pressing start and select at the same time quit game and goes back to the emulation station menu right? if so why doesnt it work?

Only P1 can use the hotkeys - if you're trying with the P2 controller, that won't work.
Are the controllers working fine standalone (i.e. just one controller connected) ?

Clyde

@mitu said in basic 2 player support not working correctly:

Only P1 can use the hotkeys

Ah yes, and that. 😊

puppetj

@Clyde sometimes the hotkey "select" will work with two controllers plugged in, some times they dont work, it can be random

Clyde

@puppetj And with just one? (see @mitu's question above)

If so, with any one of them or just one in particular?

With two, mind @mitu's remark that only the P1 controller can use Hotkeys.

The verbose log may be really helpful to see if the emulator says anything about the controllers.

edit: In the case that it's caused by changing player<->controller assignments, you could try @meleu's script joystick-selection. It's easy to setup following the instructions in the link and will be available in Emulation Stations Setup section afterwards. It can assign controllers to P1-4 via their name or index number of the system.

puppetj

@Clyde

The verbose log may be really helpful to see if the emulator says anything about the controllers.

i dont undetstand what this means...

When launching Libretro cores (those prefixed by lr-) the Runcommand launch menu presents the option to Launch with verbose logging, let alone half of the other stuff on that page for logging

Clyde

@puppetj It's what I suggested in my previous post:

@Clyde said in basic 2 player support not working correctly:

Finally, you should run the games with verbose logging and show us the contents of the file /dev/shm/runcommand.log.

puppetj

@Clyde said in basic 2 player support not working correctly:

@puppetj It's what I suggested in my previous post:

@Clyde said in basic 2 player support not working correctly:

Finally, you should run the games with verbose logging and show us the contents of the file /dev/shm/runcommand.log.

i dont undetstand what this means...

When launching Libretro cores (those prefixed by lr-) the Runcommand launch menu presents the option to Launch with verbose logging, let alone half of the other stuff on that page for logging

Clyde

@puppetj Ah, that was a quote from the linked artikle. I thought those were all your own words and wondered why you don't just select verbose logging from the menu you already seemed to be in. You should put a > before quotes to mark them as such (like I did below).

If you don't know the Runcommand menu, the first paragraph of the article in my link tells you what to do:

Each time you load a ROM there is an option to open what is called the Runcommand Launch Menu. This is accessed by pressing any button on a controller (the bottom face button is recommended as to not accidentally change anything) or pressing any key on a keyboard, while the prompt in the image below is displayed or right after a launching image disappears, if you have those set up.

If you do that, you'll get a menu with the option Launch with verbose logging.

That said, we should first ensure that you can get to the logfile /dev/shm/runcommand.log afterwards to show it to us. You can get it via SSH and a program like WinSCP like @mitu told you above, or, if you can connect a keyboard to your Pi, I can tell you a handful of console commands to copy the file to a directory that you can already access, like your roms directory.

The former takes a few more steps to setup, but could be handy for more maintenance in the future. The latter should be easier, but you'll learn not much more than to type some commands which someone else tells you. So what should it be?

puppetj

@Clyde yeah i can hook up a keyboard, let me know about the commands.