[Tutorial] How to launch Philips CDi Games with Retroarch in LaunchBox

[SiriusVI]

UPDATE: In order for CDi emulation to continue working, you need to get the updated cdimono1 bios file from mame. It was updated some time ago and CDi emulation on newer mame versions without the updated bios file is broken.

[neil9000]

5 minutes ago, SiriusVI said:

UPDATE: In order for CDi emulation to continue working, you need to get the updated cdimono1 bios file from mame. It was updated some time ago and CDi emulation on newer mame versions without the updated bios file is broken.

Well that is true of MAME in general, you shouldnt be updating the emulator if you are not also updating your romsets and bios files to match.

[SiriusVI]

3 minutes ago, neil9000 said:

Well that is true of MAME in general, you shouldnt be updating the emulator if you are not also updating your romsets and bios files to match.

Very true, but I feel many people don't know, haha.

[thewhite]

Hi,

I have a problem running cd-i game in chd format. I follow this tutorial but i also got the blurry screen "initializing" with required file is missing. I have mame - current (0.237), i have this folder RetroArch\system\mame\hash with cdi.xml. My games are in cd-i\cdimono1\ with cdimono1.zip. I start game with the dummy file.

I thought that was the bios or game, but i tried with mess (standalone version) with the same file and it work. There is a specific option to change in the core in retroarch? What i missing?

Edited November 11, 2021 by thewhite

[thewhite]

I found the problem, i doesn't see it in the tutorial;

Here's the folder structure we need;
-- CD-i (rom folder)
----- cidmono1.zip (bios file)
----- hotmario.zip (dummy zip file)
----- hotmario (folder same name as dummy file)
---------- hotel mario (1994)(philips)(eu)[!].chd (same filename found in the xml file)

So you need to create a folder with your chd in and your chd need to have the same name in cdi.xml.

[degetalwolf]

Has anyone had any experience with the cursor randomly drifting down and right with the mame core? As soon as I start the game the Philips cursor starts slowly drifting and I can only move it with my arrow keys on my keyboard, not my Xbox controller. Doesn't have an effect on some games (Tetris), but I can't play Wand of Gamelon at all because I'm constantly moving to the right and crouching as I do. I figure there's a setting somewhere, I just have no idea what it is.

[CTRL-ALT-DEFEAT]

I don't if @SiriusVI still frequents the site or not, but I finally got CD-i games running thanks to your guide, so wanted to let you it is much appreciated. I had basically given up on ever getting it to work, but now it does. Thank you!

[SiriusVI]

4 hours ago, CTRL-ALT-DEFEAT said:

I don't if @SiriusVI still frequents the site or not, but I finally got CD-i games running thanks to your guide, so wanted to let you it is much appreciated. I had basically given up on ever getting it to work, but now it does. Thank you!

I'm still here. Thanks =). However, this tutorial is kind of pointless now that retroarch has a dedicated cdi core, I think... 

[CTRL-ALT-DEFEAT]

11 hours ago, SiriusVI said:

I'm still here. Thanks =). However, this tutorial is kind of pointless now that retroarch has a dedicated cdi core, I think... 

still helped figure out where to put some things, but yeah the core was different (the SAME core and can load directly from the CHDs). still had my BIOS files sorted incorrectly though and games were not booting at all with SAME so still helped me out

[SeikaSkye]

On 8/6/2019 at 5:11 PM, SiriusVI said:

UPDATE: In order for CDi emulation to continue working, you need to get the updated cdimono1 bios file from mame. It was updated some time ago and CDi emulation on newer mame versions without the updated bios file is broken.

 

This has been quite the ordeal, but I finally got it working, so I thought I'd share what I found out. There is some conflicting information online, so it took me a while to figure it all out. I found this discussion / tutorial written by people far more capable than me. My tutorial is based on that. I just wanted to write a more comprehensive tutorial and give some additional info (also this tutorial is technically for andriod devices, so I think it should be stated that it works for PC as well.)

https://www.reddit.com/r/EmulationOnAndroid/comments/980mar/tutorial_phillips_cdi_on_android/

1. What you need:

1.1 Retroarch's Mame core (without year tags)

1.2 This Archive: https://mega.nz/#!0OQ2zASD!UKoefHzpnsHBj79MdYRMWzdZYSv6kpPvxud0DmSSX3A (I hope I'm allowed to post this here)

1.3 CDi roms (I only tested the .chd format, but I'm pretty sure that cue/bin will also work)
--> Keep in mind that there are many CDi roms that flat out don't work (more on that later)

1.4 Philips CDi bios files (mainly "cdimono1.zip", but I also have "cdimono2.zip" and "cdibios.zip". I don't know if they are needed for any games though)
--> I cannot provide links to these bios files. You'll have to get them on your own.

1.5 LaunchBox, of course.

 

2. How to get your CDi games running:

2.1 Navigate to your main roms folder and create a folder called "Philips CD-i" (You can name the folder whatever you like, I just used the name that LaunchBox uses).

2.2 This is important: Inside the "Philips CD-i" folder, create another folder called "cdimono1". It's very important that you use this exact name. It doesn't work otherwise.

2.3 Copy all of your Philips CDi roms into the "cdimono1" folder.

2.4 Also copy your Philips CDi bios files into the "cdimono1" folder.

2.5 Download the archive from 1.2. Inside this archive you will find two more archives. Open the one called "CDI_blank.zip". Inside this archive you will find many different empty, "dummy" .zip files. These files have shortened title names for the CDi games (much like Mame roms). You'll need them so the Mame core is able to load your roms (more on that later). Copy all of these empty .zip files into the "cdimono1" folder.

--> To sum up, in your "cdimono1" folder there should now be:

• your Philips CDi roms
• your Philips CDi bios files
• your empty .zip files

2.6 Open the archive from 1.2 again, but this time open the second archive within it called "RetroArch.zip". You don't need everything in here, just one specific subfolder: Go to "Retroatch --> system". In here, you will find a folder called "mame". Take that folder and put it in your own Retroarch directory in "YOUR_PATH\RetroArch\system\".

2.7 Download Retroarch's Mame core (without year tags) and leave all the settings at default (you can change the resolution if you want to)
--> This is where misinformation held me back. There are many tutorials which tell you to change various settings, but believe me, you must keep the default settings.

2.8 Open LaunchBox and import the empty .zip files from 2.5. Important: You cannot import your CDi roms directly, it doesn't work. Unfortunately, this means that you will later have to rename all your imported roms with their actual names manually (There maybe a way to automate this, but I don't know, I just trail-and-errored my way through this). Also important: when importing, make sure that you choose retroarch as your emulator for the Philips CDi platform.
--> you might want to start with just one file at first, just to make sure everything works. You can uset Hotel Mario ("hotmario.zip") for this, since I can confirm that this game actually works. If you have done everything correctly, you should have a game called "hotmario" in your LaunchBox. You can rename it to "Hotel Mario" and get all the metadata for it. 

2.9 In LaunchBox, go to "Tools --> Manage emulators". Select retroarch. Go to "Associated Platforms", scroll down and add a new Associated Platform called "Philips CD-i". Choose "mame_libreto" as your core. Important: Don't add any "EXTRA Command-Line Parameters", despite what you might have read elsewhere online.

--> You can now run Hotel Mario in LaunchBox and if you have done everything correctly, you should see a light blue screen. Wait a few seconds. You will then see a grey Philips CDi bios screen. Use your mouse and click "play". The game should now start. If it starts, you can import your other games. Keep in mind however, that not all of them will work. To find out which games are not supported, navigate to "YOUR_PATH\RetroArch\system\mame\hash" open the "cdi.xml" (here you can also find out which actual games the empty .zip files correspond to.) If it says something like "<software name="7thguest" supported="no">" that means that this specific game will not work, so you don't need to import it.

3. Further configuration (optional, but very much necessary in my opinion):

3.1 Since you most likely want to use a controller and not your mouse + keyboard, you'll have to map the controlls within the Mame GUI to your controller (I use an Xbox One controller). Once your game is up and running, hit TAB on your keyboard to bring up Mame's GUI. Navigate to "Input (this Machine)" and map the inputs to your controller like this:

• Mouse Button 1: Joy 1 B or A (your choice)
• Mouse Button 2: Joy 1 Y or X (your choice)
• Mouse X Analog: Joy 1 LX (press your left analog stick to the right)
• Mouse X Analog Dec: LEFT (press left on your D-PAD)
• Mouse X Analog Inc: RIGHT (press right on your D-PAD)
• Mouse Y Analog: Joy 1 LY (press your left analog stick up)
• Mouse Y Analog Dec: UP (press up on your D-PAD)
• Mouse Y Analog Inc: DOWN (press down on your D-PAD)

Now go back and navigate to "Analog Controls". Reduce the two sensitivity settings drastically. "10" is a good point to start, but I found that even lower values ( 5 or even 1) are better for some games. 

• Mouse X Sensitivity: 10 (your choice)
• Mouse Y Sensitivity: 10 (your choice)

3.2 Now your controlls should be mapped to your controller. However, when I did this, characters in games would start moving by themselves. This is because for some reason, the deadzone seems to be too small. If you experience this, do the follwoing: Once your game is running, press F1 to bring up retroarch's GUI. Navigate to "Settings" --> "Input" and scroll down to "Analog Deadzone". change the value from 0.0 to 0.5 (this worked for me). Important: you don't want to change this setting for all of your games or even for all platforms using the same mame core. You want this change to be in effect just when you play CDi games. So head back to "Quick Menu" --> "Overrides" and hit "Save Content Directory Overrides". This will save the changes you made just for CDi games. If the issue isn't solved for you, try increasing the deadzone value.

Congratulations, you are now done! You are now able to experience a bad Mario game and three bad Zelda games (Why did I spend so much time on this?) Jokes aside, I hope this helps someone.

 

No matter what i've tried, I can't get the option to choose a core when choosing retroarch as an emulator after importing ROMs.. help?

[SiriusVI]

On 9/20/2025 at 9:10 AM, SeikaSkye said:

No matter what i've tried, I can't get the option to choose a core when choosing retroarch as an emulator after importing ROMs.. help?

I'm not sure I understand what you mean ... you need to associate the CD-i platform with the right core inside the retroarch emulator config in retroarch. Can you send an image showing your problem?

[JoeViking245]

3 minutes ago, SiriusVI said:

I'm not sure I understand what you mean ... you need to associate the CD-i platform with the right core inside the retroarch emulator config in retroarch. Can you send an image showing your problem?

How to select the core was answered/resolved in Discord.

Quote

Select RetroArch and click Edit. Then go into the Associated Platforms section.