How on earth can I configure Reicast??

[icefox]

I love Recalbox for my new XU4. It will emulate N64 and PSP perfectly. N64 default ratio is stretched at 16:9 but using Glide64 fixes it. I was also able to edit the PPSSPP config file to achieve a 2x output (and still at 100% speed). But Dreamcast games run at maybe 80% speed. I tried to see if Reicast will skip some frames to hit 100% speed, or if the 80% speed is a result of 50 vs 60hz. But despite digging for hours on the Internet, I just can't figure out how to config Reicast under Recalbox. The closest I got is to edit an emu.cfg file. However whenever I start Reicast the file gets regenerated and all changes are wiped out. Is there any way to config Reicast under Recalbox at all? I know Reicast can run at 100% speed because I tested another Batocera build (branch of Recalbox), and Reicast there runs a bit choppy but at 100% speed (plus some text glitches), so I assume frame skip was enabled.

So, anyone know how to config Reicast under Recalbox??? Please help! Also I strongly recommend XU4. Perfect N64 and PSP emulation plus 80-90% DC emulation is already awesome!

[gkralicek2]

@icefox Dreamcast will NEVER run at full speed on XU4 with reicast (abandonned project for several years already). Framerate will get close to 55fps in the best case but that's all (you get between 45 and 55 fps on Sonic Adventure 2 for example). Trying all the magic tricks in the world (and that includes frameskipping) won't change anything
And if you're not convinced, try a real dreamcast side by side... The difference is obvious regarding speed (and that's not taking into consideration the countless graphical and audio glitches that reicast emulation brings)

[icefox]

Appreciate your comment very much. But still... can you tell me how to configure Reicast on Recalbox? I just want to play with it a bit, and editing emu.cfg doesn't work. I know Reicast can perform better than in the current Recalbox build because, like I said, I've seen it perform better (but with a graphical glitch) on a Batocera build.

Also, Reicast doesn't seem to be abandoned for years. On the official website the latest update was from two seeks ago. In any case I'd really appreciate any tips on just how to config it, if not for anything more than my curiosity:) Thank you.

[voljega]

@icefox you have to modify configgen scripts which generate configuration in /usr/lib/python2.7/site-packages/configgen/generators/reicast

[Substring]

@icefox they woke up eginning of april after 2 years of catatonic sleep. But i'm not sure anything more will happen.

Obviously, configgen is annoying you. Add some dreamcast.configfile=dummy to recalbox.conf and you're good to not have recalbox write it at each launch

[icefox]

Thank you so much Substring and woijega! This is exactly what I need.

I've used Retropie before and I see how Recalbox differs in philosophy. Retropie is like PC: it is designed to be "messed around" by amateurs, with not so nicely looking UI to do a lot of things directly in ES. Recalbox on the other hand is like Mac. It has a near perfect setup (no need to even setup controller buttons, comes with Kodi, consistent UI, etc.) but with little customization possibilities. It's meant for dummies, in a way. But advanced users can still do everything through terminal command lines. I just wish documentation and user community were a bit better developed. I swear I tried everything I could with Google and couldn't find out how to disable dreamcast auto config. I'll be coming here a lot. Thanks in advance for much help down the way.

[voljega]

@icefox yeah for that kind of thing you must go on the forum, but the wiki has already a lot of info

[Substring]

@icefox yeah, we are oftzn compared as recalbox being apple and retorpie being android

Anyway, try my suggestion and report back

[icefox]

@substring I was actually thinking the iPhone vs Android analogy first, expect that Apple doesn't allow anyone to fiddle with iPhone, not even with a terminal (unless jailbroken). Thus it's more like a Mac. I like Apple's approach though, thus I like Recalbox: normally you don't see even an ascii character.

Coming back to Reicast. By having that "dummy" code in Recalbox.conf, emu.cfg isn't overwritten anymore indeed. But after experimenting with it I'm convinced Reicast completely ignores the cfg file. No change of settings affected anything, including the obvious ones like frame rate limit and widescreen hack. So the question is, where are the REAL settings for Reicast? Let me check out the python script but it starts to get out of my comfort zone quickly...

[icefox]

Also... the date setting interface when startup is in Spanish. I didn't bother until I went into Shenmue... and found everything to be in Spanish and no where to change it. There is a region setting (=4) in emu.cfg but even if I disable configgen with the "dummy" command, this item is still being overwritten alongside cable type etc. This configgen thing is so confusing. Why not just let user change the cfg file freely...

I did go into the configgen python code but could't figure out where the real settings are stored. There seems to be an initial cfg file. Can you point me to it? If I change that cfg file and delete the current one, maybe I'll be able to change the settings?

[paradadf]

@icefox right after launching a game, you can press A+B+X+Y+START at the same time to configure some bios stuff.

[icefox]

@paradadf said in How on earth can I configure Reicast??:

@icefox right after launching a game, you can press A+B+X+Y+START at the same time to configure some bios stuff.

Tried, not working for me. Thanks & sorry. Edit: I meant Reicast

[Substring]

@icefox I think you should try a different bios. My emu.cfg is read and overwritten by reicast (tip : Dreamcast.RTC does change). It's also read as it's reading the pads configuration. So i really believe something is wrong on your side. As a reminder, the file is in /recalbox/share/system/configs/reicast or \\RECALBOX\share\system\configs\reicast for the Wiondows share

[icefox]

@substring said in How on earth can I configure Reicast??:

@icefox I think you should try a different bios. My emu.cfg is read and overwritten by reicast (tip : Dreamcast.RTC does change). It's also read as it's reading the pads configuration. So i really believe something is wrong on your side. As a reminder, the file is in /recalbox/share/system/configs/reicast or \\RECALBOX\share\system\configs\reicast for the Wiondows share

Ok I solved the language problem. I somehow had a nvmem file in the bios folder. Deleting it and language is back at English (and it's not being regenerated). I'm still unable to config Reicast. Even with the "dummy" command so emu.cfg is not being overwritten every time I start Reicast, change anything in there doesn't have any effect.

Can you test if you can for example enable widescreen hack or remove frame limit by editing emu.cfg? Also I'm not sure what command enables frameskip. I tried changing ta.skip = 0 to 5 to no avail.

I also have a theory... I was testing Reicast slowdown mainly in SoulCalibur. I noticed how 10s in game is precisely 12s in real life, regardless of rendering complexity. Could it mean the game is actually limiting a 60 fps game to 50 fps because of confused mode (NTSC vs PAL)? But again when the game ignores the config file I can't do any test to confirm it.

[voljega]

@icefox no need for crazy theories

@gkralicek2 said in How on earth can I configure Reicast??:

Dreamcast will NEVER run at full speed on XU4 with reicas

[icefox]

@voljega You know, when Reicast simply ignores emu.cfg, it drives people crazy and desperate.

Can you tell me the location of the INIT Reicast config file? Maybe editing that would work. Thanks in advance.

[Substring]

@icefox they miust have a reasonnable frameskip to respect the length of a second, depends if they made the video synced with audio or vice-versa

[icefox]

@substring Good point. I should point out even when the game is slowed, sound is perfectly smooth, thus my suspicion that it is simply matching 60fps games to 50hz refresh rates.

At least now I don't have Spanish Shenmue so the most pressing issue is resolved.

[Substring]

@icefox which means they want audio foremost, whatever video does. The other problem could be regarding audio resampling which is not as good as expected and could "slow down" the game too. But i'm really not aan emulator dev, so i can be totally wrong

[gkralicek2]

@substring If 60 fps original content was matched to 50 hz output frequency, keeping the sound in sync would bring a slowdown in pace and the music + sound would feel "off" compared to the original which is not the case with reicast, no ?
When there is some lag in a game, the sound remains in sync to a certain point until it finally disrupts. To me it feels more like frameskipping is added when the hardware cannot cope with the framerate rather than downsampling to match a lower output rate immediately when difficulties occur.