c64 C64 Dreams (massive curated C64 collection)

[Zombeaver]

Oh, actually you would need the base core options file as well, hold on.

[Zombeaver]

Go into C64 Dreams\C64 Dreams\Retroarch and copy/replace with this file.

retroarch-core-options.cfg

[Zombeaver]

Turtles was changed like that intentionally, by the way, as the game itself is slightly off center vertically (down). The entire game is offset by 4 pixels vertically (but the trainer screen isn't). You could decrease the top crop so that the trainer was easier to read if you wanted to. Go into Quick Menu > Options and change the top crop value from 39 to 35.

[Zombeaver]

I updated the upload to include the base core option file as well.

[Zombeaver]

7 minutes ago, Pixelpiper said:

I LOVE the drunk perspective on the sidewalks in that Donald Duck game!  

Donald Duck's Playground is a childhood favorite of mine. But yeah, that is pretty weird lol

[Z3R0B4NG]

OK, looks better now.  

how, do i get into the RA quik menu again? F1 doesn't work. i know it has been answered before...

[Zombeaver]

Press Numpad Minus + F1 or Back + Xbox on a controller. Enter accepts and LAlt goes back.

[CalmGamer]

Hi @Zombeaver

I'm loving the C64 Dreams but have 2 questions.

Should the Big Box Pause screen work ? it works for all my other cores but not 64 dreams. I just get the retroarch paused game message in lower left.

Also, how did you get the keyboard to fully work without using the game focus on ? 

I'm just trying to get a c64 emulator going for the fun of it but cant seem to get full keyboard control until I turn on game focus.  When I do this I lose the ability to exit the game until I turn the focus off again.

 

Thanks

[Zombeaver]

44 minutes ago, CalmGamer said:

Should the Big Box Pause screen work ? it works for all my other cores but not 64 dreams. I just get the retroarch paused game message in lower left.

I have no idea. I've never messed with pause screens at all. It might, but it's not something I have any experience with.

45 minutes ago, CalmGamer said:

Also, how did you get the keyboard to fully work without using the game focus on ? 

I'm just trying to get a c64 emulator going for the fun of it but cant seem to get full keyboard control until I turn on game focus.  When I do this I lose the ability to exit the game until I turn the focus off again.

I'm not sure what that is or why you would need it. A better way to phrase that is you shouldn't need it. Does this still happen with the updated vbs script or launching with bats directly?

I swear you have something running in the background on your computer, or something weird going on with your peripherals or... I'm not sure what. But there is something wrong going on on your end, and I really don't know what it is. You shouldn't have to do any of the stuff you're doing in order to get focus, so something - I'm not sure what - is stealing that focus. Usually that's some form of external software, maybe some type of mapping software, maybe some type of wrapper like Nvidia Share or equivalent, or hell, maybe even AV software, but something is stealing/keeping focus in the background. All I can tell you is that no one else has reported what you're reporting, and I can't replicate it. My suggestion would be to take a look at what all software you have running in the background and see what you can eliminate and potentially narrow down a culprit. There isn't much more I can tell you.

[CalmGamer]

15 minutes ago, Zombeaver said:

I have no idea. I've never messed with pause screens at all. It might, but it's not something I have any experience with.

I'm not sure what that is or why you would need it. A better way to phrase that is you shouldn't need it. Does this still happen with the updated vbs script or launching with bats directly?

I swear you have something running in the background on your computer, or something weird going on with your peripherals or... I'm not sure what. But there is something wrong going on on your end, and I really don't know what it is. You shouldn't have to do any of the stuff you're doing in order to get focus, so something - I'm not sure what - is stealing that focus. Usually that's some form of external software, maybe some type of mapping software, maybe some type of wrapper like Nvidia Share or equivalent, or hell, maybe even AV software, but something is stealing/keeping focus in the background. All I can tell you is that no one else has reported what you're reporting, and I can't replicate it. My suggestion would be to take a look at what all software you have running in the background and see what you can eliminate and potentially narrow down a culprit. There isn't much more I can tell you.

This has nothing to do with my focus issue.  that's much better and i've updated your script to all the vbs files as you suggested.

Im just curious how you got the keyboard to work as I was tinkering with a separate vice emulator and was curious how you did it

The only issue im having now is the big box pause screen not working.  just curious if it should or not.

 

Thanks again.

 

 

[Zombeaver]

8 hours ago, CalmGamer said:

This has nothing to do with my focus issue.  that's much better and i've updated your script to all the vbs files as you suggested.

I'm glad that's fixed at least. I'll adjust them all for the next update.

8 hours ago, CalmGamer said:

Im just curious how you got the keyboard to work as I was tinkering with a separate vice emulator and was curious how you did it

I didn't do anything special. My guess is that, while you might think that the two issues aren't related, they probably are. Whatever it is that's requiring the extra code in the .vbs scripts is probably the same thing that's causing that issue. They both amount to something weird going on with focus.

Now that I understand what the game focus key does, I can tell you it isn't used because it isn't necessary when an "enable hotkeys" key is set - which isn't set by default in Retroarch. Once it's defined, unless that key is held, none of Retroarch's hotkeys (F1 for UI, F2 to save state, etc.) are used. This is necessary for most computer-based platforms because the keys share space with what Retroarch uses - like  the F-keys for example.

8 hours ago, CalmGamer said:

The only issue im having now is the big box pause screen not working.  just curious if it should or not.

I did a little looking and I think this might be possible but is going to require some work - they're not setup as roms with an emulator in LB, so that makes it more difficult. That said, it should be possible, I'll just have to mess around with making a script to do it.

[Zombeaver]

I have seen it reported on the libretro forums as something that can (or at least used to) happen when using the vulkan renderer, but that wouldn't be relevant here (and I believe was fixed a long time ago in any case).

Whenever I've seen people run into this in the past (not within the context of this project but just in general) it was from someone running something that didn't want to give up focus in the background. It might be something else, but I couldn't tell you what, if so.

All "physical keyboard passthrough" does is disables internal mapping for the cursor and fire keys so they're read as the original keyboard keys. Hotkeys like F1 etc. still invoke the RA UI when that option is enabled, for example. I don't think that has anything to do with what he's talking about.

Now, you do need an "enable hotkeys" key, which is in C64 Dreams, and isn't something set by default in Retroarch. The reason being is that Retroarch's hotkeys are all common-use keys within the context of using a C64 that interfere - like the F-keys which are used regularly. The same is true for DOS and other computer-based platforms. The game focus toggle hotkey can function as an alternative to this, that's a toggle rather than needing to be held. It turns off the hotkeys when enabled, and turns them back on when it's off. It isn't necessary here because an enable hotkeys key is set, so the Retroarch keys aren't read unless it's pressed (held) first.

So I guess to answer that question: Because an enable hotkeys key is assigned (numpad minus or back on a controller).

[Z3R0B4NG]

hmm... after playing a lot C64 recently... i start noticing stutter when anything is scrolling, happens in every game really.  
and it is a weird ...kind of "breathing" stutter,
it plays perfectly smooth for a second then stutters shortly for like 3 frames that look way out of sync, smooth for a second, stutters shortly, smooth for a second, stutters shortly...  

it gets really obvious when you have scrolling text like in the intro from "Drip" and try to read.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoWWSVovPqE  

the video doesn't show it quite right, there is some slight wobble at all times in it (that isn't there for me while playing), but if you ignore the wobble, slow the video to half speed in the youtube options you can see the brutal stutters pretty clearly.  

it is not C64 dreams fault, i have it with my regular retro arch and vice cores as well... maybe you guys got an idea?  

[Zombeaver]

Video says it's private.

My guess, however, is it's simply the result of trying to make the C64's refresh rate of 50.125hz display properly on a 60hz screen. It's no worse in Retroarch than it is in anything else in my experience. The intro to Drip looks the same in standalone Vice as it does in Retroarch to me.

[Zombeaver]

While I don't have a G-Sync/Freesync monitor at my disposal, I've always been curious how well they would adapt to this scenario. There's a "Sync to Exact Content Framerate" option under Settings > Frame Throttle that you should try if you have one.

[Z3R0B4NG]

1080p 144Hz G-Sync screen, yeah i feared it would be the 50Hz thing... then the same thing would have to happen with other Cores, like SNES PAL games etc. ...i'm gonna double check just to be sure but i don't think they do that.  

> There's a "Sync to Exact Content Framerate" option under Settings > Frame Throttle that you should try if you have one.

will do... 

and i guess i could try standalone Vice as sanity check

[horse]

hi zomb and fellow c64 enthusiasts, just a quick tip im using retroarch for my c64 emulation and using snaps created in vice standalone so my games boot directly in game no wait times no loading nothing.

 

 

towards the end of the video i boot international karate directly ingame. hope that it helps others who want to go directly in game with there fav c64 titles

[Zombeaver]

That's already done here where it's really necessary.

Any instances that have "Autoload State: Yes" are noted on the sheet. When you start those games, it immediately loads a state automatically. You could technically do it for any/all of them (with the exception of Easyflash games that have in-game saving, but Easyflash loads instantly anyway) but that would be completely overkill. I'm generally using it in cases where TrueDrive is required. When it's not, it's usually not really warranted. 1887 out of the 2000 games in the collection (94.35%) don't require TrueDrive, so you're talking about only a few seconds to load anyway.

[Z3R0B4NG]

14 hours ago, Zombeaver said:

Video says it's private

should be visible now

 

[Zombeaver]

Yeah I'm pretty sure that's just the result of the 50.125hz refresh rate. That's what it looks like on every C64 emulator for me, but I only have a 60hz display. The only thing I would know to do is to try messing around with that sync to exact content framerate setting (you may need to disable v-sync in the video settings as well). It's not something I can test because I don't have a Freesync/G-Sync monitor.