RetroArch never works right. Even once you get past the cores and all the other stupid bs, once you get to setting up the controls it never works right, most buttons just do not work in game, if they even work in the menus.
So many years, so much effort, all wasted.
It’s still so much easier to keep BlastEm, Snes9x, Duckstation and whatever else installed, so much faster to set up controls and most of the time you don’t even need to as everything works out of the box.
And yet plebbit will say nuhhh use muh libretro cores!!!1 so heckin’ wholesome Keanu chungus 100!!! I love my wife’s boyfriend!!!111 Thanks Reddit!!!
Skill issues. And being toxic like that won’t help anyone; it lets you look like a clown. Why don’t you use standalone emulators instead, if that is what works for you? Nobody is forcing you to use RetroArch.
I personally think that RetroArch is one of the greatest and best software ever made. It is exactly what I always wanted and even tried to do some similar setup before RetroArch was invented. I’m sick of standalone emulators that work differently and each and every of them is a special snowflake and does not do everything I want. If you have only a few simple systems such as Snes9x and Duckstation, then you might not even need RetroArch. But if you have installed over 70 emulators in RetroArch for more than 70 systems, then its a godsend. It was already after 4 or 5 cores added.
The reason why RetroArch is not as easy as a single emulator is simple. RetroArch does:
- bring many different kind of emulators and systems, such as MAME (which itself is a multi system emulator), DOSBox (PCs basically), many consoles and handhelds and tries to fit it into single environment
- can be installed on and works on all kind of hardware and software, such as Windows PC (even on Windows 2000), Linux, on Nintendo 3DS, Android smartphones, Raspberry Pi, on Steam, Xbox, on Web Frontends in your browser, and more
- every system needs to work with the same UI and all configurations are setup the same way
- configurations need to work across all systems and environments, such as controllers
- while being extremely flexible and configurable
The price you pay for all of this is the added complexity to the system to manage everything. And sometimes not everything can be up to date, until they port or update the cores in RetroArch. There is no denying in. But I’m not the one who is crying here.
it lets you look like a clown
I guess you were trying to say “it makes you look like a clown”.
I’m afraid that’s a C-, see me after class.
I’m afraid
It is a shit design.
It’s trying to do everything and ultimately does nothing very well at all. It’s such a bad frontend, the only way through which it is really useful is if you use another frontend for it, but if you want to change any settings you’re also SoL and might as well just use the standalones, since the way the RetroArch configs translate to individual cores is just a fuzzy mess where the actual dysfunction and if any - user error - will inevitably be obfuscated from the user.
I do not agree. I use RetroArch since years and don’t want use standalone emulators every again. But I have to use them still, because they are no RetroArch cores for. There are million reasons why I prefer RetroArch over standalone, such as unified configuration and usability, or Shaders for all cores.
You seem not to value the values and features that RetroArch brings to you. And please speak for yourself if you say “which it is really useful is if you use another frontend for it”, because clearly that is not true for lot of people including me. Either use a frontend or standalone emulators if you don’t like RetroArch. If you want, try to be productive and don’t shit talk and toxic, maybe talk what could be done better.
I have over 70 cores setup in RetroArch. They are all setup the same way, with some exceptions that need special attention. One UI, lot of playlists for all different games and emulators. Everything is updated in one system, all screenshots and files are in the retroarch directory.
And then I have standalone emulators PS3, yuzu and ryujinx, Cemu and Xemu. Some are installed through direct download (AppImage), some through specific package manager (Flatpak) and they have different file structures, configuration, different UI. Only 4 or 5 standalone emulators and they are all different and a mess. Compared to the RetroArch setup. Some can update itself from its menu (and I have to do this for every single emulator) and some need manual download and some are updated through the special package manager. Playing one game on an emulator will not put it in a global history file like in RetroArch. There are no user created custom playlists. I hate it.
Your gripes with standalone emulators are not invalid of course and I’m happy it works for you.
What’s got my jimmies all rustled is that this is often recommended as the go-to by people online, making me constantly have to counter this.
There are many occasions where I’ve seen less tech-savvy friends, some far more intelligent folks than myself with a low patience for bullshit give up on emulation altogether, because they were having some issue or another, and it’s always with RetroArch’s peculiarities and troubleshooting issues in it to me feels unclear and fuzzy, requiring either dumb brute force or referencing at least several sets of docs, compared to a standalone emulator.
They don’t have enormous setups, they just want to play that one game they remember as a kid once every 4 years.
If you’re the type to know what [!] and GoodSNES mean with 70+ cores, then yeah, you could probably do worse than a nice set and forget configure-everything-once RetroArch install. I had just that on my Pi, for MAME exclusively, with ES thrown on top for good measure.
As for configs and updates I feel your pain. I never update software for this reason. If config is not in /etc/ or in ~/.config I uninstall immediately, if I see .conf.d - I uninstall immediately. Software exists to solve problems or be fun, not bloat out the system with complexity.
Retroarch is like the power users emulation front end. Regarding button mapping. Once you realize that there is Retroarch UI button mapping and separate mapping for the core you’re using it gets much easier to figure out. But, yeah, it’s not an easy to use front end for the newbie.
Lol fuck off. I’ve been in the emulation scene since long before this absolute garbage became recommended by you drooling 12 year olds. It’s not a matter of “newbie”, it’s a matter of shit design that looks and functions worse than PCSX2 did circa 2013.
This is a shitty, fuzzy program that tries to do everything but does nothing. It’s useless for arrogant morons and otherwise non-technical people like yourself without emulationstation or some hundred hour youtube tutorial, and it’s useless for actual devs and technical folks like myself who want a clear simple model of program flow and interaction between all the settings so we can quickly troubleshoot whatever issues arise and get on with our lives.
Are things alright with you, man?
Depends on the controller used I guess. Which controller are you using? Most of my 8bitdo controller works out of the box.
I find it works in most cases, but I have also seen it “just not work.” I feel like your good “this does everything you need for this one thing and just works” apps like Retroarch and VLC have become FAR less reliable in recent years.
VLC is one of the scariest apps on my phone. Normally when I kill an app (I have “kill” bound to long-press home), it stays dead.
VLC doesn’t die. If you connect a Bluetooth headset to your phone, VLC spawns in the background and begins recursively scanning your media, even if you didn’t give it permission to.
Its otherwise a highly performant media player for me, but my god it terrifies me.