Best Bang For My N64 Buck?
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I'm aware that some emulators need a little more tweaking and setup to get them working just right. N64 has been notorious for this, with multiple cores and plugins required to get just the right combination. I'm also aware that some games will need to have their own custom setups to get working, and there is no one-size-fits-most options like with older systems. But can anyone give advice on a good middle of the road setup that will get me ballpark compatibility for most of the N64 library? I just wanna be able to play without any laggyness or huge graphical glitches (I can live with some). Or is the default emulator/plug in setup that comes with the latest RetroPie image a good jumping off point, or should I consider tweaking it right from the start?
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@alphabetapie perhaps lr-mupen64plus-next is the best default, but I would recommend NTSC ROMs above PAL. Some performance benefits.
So I would start there. If you are curious about recommended emulators for any N64 ROMs, you can refer to my N64 Recommended Emulator List. At that point, you might decide to install additional N64 emulators and map accordingly.
Nice to have choices...
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It could be worth always trying lr-mupen64plus-next first, regardless of what previous experience has been recorded in the spreadsheet. The Bust-A-Move '99 game (simple 2D puzzler with multiplayer) is listed as best in lr-mupen64plus@640x480, but the audio during the initial logo and character sequences is quite broken. lr-mupen64plus-next is better during the startup (not quite perfect), and has a nicer smoothing effect during the game.
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mupen64plus-gliden64 standalone. it should always be the most performant out of it and lr-mupen64plus-next.
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@busywait said in Best Bang For My N64 Buck?:
but the audio during the initial logo and character sequences is quite broken
I'm not seeing this issue with lr-mupen64plus. I only have audio issues/sluggishness with -next. Feel free to post settings/options if you've found a way to gain performance with next.
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@roslof said in Best Bang For My N64 Buck?:
Feel free to post settings/options if you've found a way to gain performance with next.
It seems more like I've found a configuration that gets worse performance from lr-mupen64plus doesn't it?
It's default RetroPie 4.7.8, plus...
Pi4B 4GB in a heatsink case
Full (not fake) KMS , inc the ARM audio driver (dtoverlay=vc4-kms-v3d)
Overclocked 1800MHz CPU, 700MHz V3D
Core option for 640x480 resolutionI've noticed that sometimes with lr-mupen64plus-next there are no sound glitches, but the next time I start the game with no configuration change there will be. (Which makes trying to test different settings frustrating.)
Edit: Some options don't seem to take effect unless I quit the game and restart it -
@roslof This is a setting in my ROM config that causes audio glitches when playing Bust-A-Move '99 with lr-mupen64plus-next:
input_overlay_enable = "true"changing it to
input_overlay_enable = "false"Seems to always avoid the audio clicks during startup. The bezel is just a simple overlay from the BezelProject.
Is this surprising?
As I said before, -next had fewer audio clicks than lr-mupen64plus when both have the overlay displayed.
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@busywait said in Best Bang For My N64 Buck?:
Core option for 640x480 resolution
Just a heads up that running n64 at 640x480 resolution is extremely taxing for the pi. I know it looks better, but most games are going to have trouble running at full speed.
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@quicksilver Thx - noted. In this case it is hard to read the text on some screens without bumping up to 640x480 - the 4-player screen has very small play areas.
It's a 2D puzzle game with mainly 320x240 assets inside, as far as I can tell. The 4-player game seems to use the extra resolution. I guess there could be activity being sent through 3D code and video processing.
But it runs fine with shaders on or off, threaded video on or off, stretched aspect ratios or integer scaled... but the audio glitches if I add an overlay! Very odd.
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@busywait said in Best Bang For My N64 Buck?:
@quicksilver Thx - noted. In this case it is hard to read the text on some screens without bumping up to 640x480 - the 4-player screen has very small play areas.
note that adjusting the resolution is suboptimal - better to leave at default and adjust the native resolution scale factor. the reason for this is that not all n64 games are 320x240, so by setting to a resolution, rather than a factor of the native resolution, you incur scaling artefacts and possibly a performance penalty.
But it runs fine with shaders on or off, threaded video on or off, stretched aspect ratios or integer scaled... but the audio glitches if I add an overlay! Very odd.
yes, overlays drain performance quite a bit, for whatever reason.
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@dankcushions could you give an example for the alternative ways (high and low overhead) to set resolution?
Are you describing libretro core options or Mupen64Plus .ini settings? Currently I've used only libretro options and retroarch settings.
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could you give an example for the alternative ways (high and low overhead) to set resolution?
didn't I just do that? :) low overhead - setting via native resolution factor. high overhead - setting resolution directly.
Are you describing libretro core options or Mupen64Plus .ini settings? Currently I've used only libretro options and retroarch settings.
you were talking about lr-mupen64plus-next (standalone uses the mupen64plus.cfg but doesn't have core options), so am i.
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@dankcushions - sorry, I just don't know the name of the options that you're comparing against each other.
Currently, I've set these core options for lr-mupen64plus-next:
mupen64plus-169screensize = "640x360" mupen64plus-43screensize = "640x480"Are those what you were talking about?
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@busywait yes, those are the ones you shouldn't change from whatever they were at by default.
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@dankcushions Thx again :)
That's not my experience with Bust-A-Move (maybe because it has no 3D rendering to do?)
I tried 4:3 Screen Size from 320x240 up to 1080x1440, with 4x Native Resolution Scaling, and they all performed about as good as it gets (except that the 4 player part of the game looks terrible with less than 480 lines).
And, the audio glitched in all cases with a bezel overlay 🙄
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OP here, just following up. From what I'm reading above, is seems much of the issues with N64 emulation on a pie has to do with the limitations of the smaller hardware. But let me pose this scenario. Since this is all built on a Linux system, could you install the Linux OS on a more powerful desktop, then image Retropie onto that (just like you would an SD card) and run everything the same as you would from a raspberry pie? But being able to utilize more power that come with desktop components? If so, that seems like it would open up advantage for lots of other resource heavy emulators as well (like Saturn for example).
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@alphabetapie said in Best Bang For My N64 Buck?:
Since this is all built on a Linux system, could you install the Linux OS on a more powerful desktop ...
Yes.
RetroPie allows you to turn your Raspberry Pi or PC into a retro-gaming machine. It builds upon Raspbian, EmulationStation, RetroArch and many other projects to enable you to play your favourite Arcade, home-console, and classic PC games with the minimum set-up. For power users it also provides a large variety of configuration tools to customise the system as you want.
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@roslof said in Best Bang For My N64 Buck?:
@busywait said in Best Bang For My N64 Buck?:
but the audio during the initial logo and character sequences is quite broken
I'm not seeing this issue with lr-mupen64plus. I only have audio issues/sluggishness with -next. Feel free to post settings/options if you've found a way to gain performance with next.
-next used to be the best performing option for me for Bust-A-Move - until yesterday, when I updated RetroPie to 4.7.11. (I think I was on 4.7.8 before).
Edit: Fixed after reverting my n64 core options to defaults.Now Bust-A-Move runs very slowly / jerky, and with very low CPU overhead. Bizare. Maybe the lack of change is a good reason to stick with the oldest core that mostly works :(
Edit: Not actually a problem -
@mitu said yes.
So what would you recommend? For example, I know I can build a decent budget media PC for my entertainment center. Then, I could install Linux on a blank hard drive partition. But then how would I image Retropie onto that? I suppose I could convert it to an external USB temporarily and image that way, then put it back in the desktop? I think there is a way to expand Retropie to take up the entire 1TB hard drive after the fact right?
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@alphabetapie the retropie images are for pi systems only. there’s no image for pc. the installation process is here: https://retropie.org.uk/docs/Debian/
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