@Zombeaver: Thanks for the in-depth reply. I have everything installed on a RAID drive on a PC, but I never play on the PC, I have 20,000+ games installed (almost 6tb). and I use Moonlight on my Android TV boxes to stream everything to 3 different TV's/big screens.
When streaming, RetroArch is a life saver as far as exiting games, configuring options & game pad settings, etc.. Of course a few systems, I prefer to use a different emulator instead of Reteoarch, but I can still use a hotkey script to exit a game with a game pad and return to LB.
I was hoping to use Retroarch for a couple reasons, some as being mentioned above, but another is when you launch DOS games in Retorarch, the gamepad will work as a mouse without anything extra, So even if I launch a game that does not have joystick support, it can be playable with a game pad. And with a mini keyboard, I can jump into the RA settings and map or change a couple buttons to my likings, save that game profile in RA and not have to worry about it and it is good to go on all the streaming devices.
I have tried the last thing you listed"
"If you were to only use RA, you'd need to uncheck the "Use DOSBox" box in the DOSBox tab, then select the .conf (or .exe, though this won't always work) in the Launcher tab, and select Retroarch in the Emulation tab."
Here is an example using King's Quest I: Quest for the Crown - This game does not require any installation.
Okay if using the built-in DosBox, LaunchBox is executing the file "Sierra.com" with nothing else added, no config files, etc. - it works as expected (keyboard only).
If I go to Retroarch and load the same file "Sierra.com" with nothing else added, no config files, etc., - it works as expected with keyboard and game pad acting as mouse.
If I go into LaunchBox, uncheck the "Use DOSBox and choose Retroarch as the emulator it fails to start.
Since the same loading file (Sierra.com) works both ways, I suppose that is what is confusing me. Why when LB is simply calling Retroarch, it fails? Neither of them are using any special Command Lines or config files
I know DOS & MAME games are a pain as far as configuration, and individual game settings. (I have been working on my MAME collection for weeks using Retorarch, but is working great when each game is configured in RA)
I thought about using the built in DosBox in Launchbox and maybe something like joytokey to map the controller, but if I remember correctly, this will not work when your streaming, I can't remember??