Emulate Apple II with Retroarch's Mame Core

[SiriusVI]

5 minutes ago, Headrush69 said:

Do you have your roms in the default rom folder in the MAME folder?

You can set your rom directory wherever you want on that same screen under Configure Options but the default is roms folder in MAME folder. (Make sure you save configuration if you change it)

No, I had changed it, but I reconfigured it so the path is now correct. SUCCESS: I can now launch apple 2 games with Mame standalone. Now I just have to find out how to get the retroarch mame core to do the same. clearly there must be some rom file(s) missing in ma apple2 folder...

[SiriusVI]

OK, so I've done some additional trial and error testing. I'm pretty confident now that the problem is that retroarch does not know which bios to grab when launching apple2 games.

Can you think of anything I could add to  the "Extra command-line parameters" in Launchbox that would tell retroach which bios file to use?

[Headrush69]

5 hours ago, SiriusVI said:

OK, so I've done some additional trial and error testing. I'm pretty confident now that the problem is that retroarch does not know which bios to grab when launching apple2 games.

Can you think of anything I could add to  the "Extra command-line parameters" in Launchbox that would tell retroach which bios file to use?

I don't use Retroarch for MAME, but I tried running the latest MAME core (0.214) following this guide: https://docs.libretro.com/guides/softwarelist-getting-started/ (Using Method 1, Method 2 should like a lot of work)

and it seem to load OK once the hash file was put in RetroArch/system/mame but it promptly locks up my PC completely. Not really work the hassle VNCing in to check what's going on. Is there a specific reason to use Retroarch for MAME? SHaders?

Edited November 14, 2019 by Headrush69

[SiriusVI]

6 hours ago, Headrush69 said:

I don't use Retroarch for MAME, but I tried running the latest MAME core (0.214) following this guide: https://docs.libretro.com/guides/softwarelist-getting-started/ (Using Method 1, Method 2 should like a lot of work)

and it seem to load OK once the hash file was put in RetroArch/system/mame but it promptly locks up my PC completely. Not really work the hassle VNCing in to check what's going on. Is there a specific reason to use Retroarch for MAME? SHaders?

I mainly use retroarch for everything, including mame, because it just works. The Mame core needs minimal setup, I can use shaders and overlays, and I was able to emulate many smaller systems with it.

I've just tried to get Retroach's Mame core to launch Atari 5200 games and it just worked (using hash files and softlist roms). I really don't understad why Apple II is the exception here.

I gess I could use Mame standalone for Apple 2, but at this point it's just bugging me =D. I WANT to figure out how it works.

[Headrush69]

9 hours ago, SiriusVI said:

I've just tried to get Retroach's Mame core to launch Atari 5200 games and it just worked (using hash files and softlist roms). I really don't understad why Apple II is the exception here.

It's the same here.

My guess is there is some extra complexity because for Apple2 there are multiple software lists, unlike consoles like A5200.

I've been testing various configurations, but nothing in the console output from Retroarch is indicating a specific problem yet. 

[SiriusVI]

29 minutes ago, Headrush69 said:

It's the same here.

My guess is there is some extra complexity because for Apple2 there are multiple software lists, unlike consoles like A5200.

I've been testing various configurations, but nothing in the console output from Retroarch is indicating a specific problem yet. 

Yes I've also noticed tha and I've already tried some things. here are all the apple2 hash files that I have:

apple2_flop_orig.xml

apple2_flop_misc.xml

apple2_flop_clcracked.xml

apple2.xml

apple2_cass.xml

 

Now I checked which hash files correspond to my rom set. I found that "apple2_flop_misc.xml" and "apple2.xml" contain basically the same files and they both corresond to my softlist romset.

When I open "apple2_flop_misc.xml" it says: <softwarelist name="apple2_flop_misc" description="Apple II 5.25 miscellaneous disks">

So I tried naming my rom folder "apple2_flop_misc" instead of "apple2", because I thought maybe these softists need to be separated. Still no luck however.

I really feel that some command line in launchbox is needed in order to tell the mame core to load a specific apple bios. I tried the "apple2ee -flop1" as well as many other commands, but I haven't found one that works.

[Headrush69]

14 minutes ago, SiriusVI said:

I really feel that some command line in launchbox is needed in order to tell the mame core to load a specific apple bios. I tried the "apple2ee -flop1" as well as many other commands, but I haven't found one that works.

I’ve been testing directly with Retroarch from the command line to bypass Launchbox first. To eliminate Apple II machine specifics like that, I only kept the Apple2.xml hash file and associated software list. 

The newest Retroarch also has a config option to start in CLI. You likely have to enable that now, but I still haven’t had success.

[DOS76]

sometime ago a user figured out how to use RA MAME without software list games and he posted what you need to do to get it to work but I can't for the life of me remember who the community member was anyway here is an example of the command line he is using to get it to work. No clue if this will help at all.

 

[SiriusVI]

6 minutes ago, DOS76 said:

sometime ago a user figured out how to use RA MAME without software list games and he posted what you need to do to get it to work but I can't for the life of me remember who the community member was anyway here is an example of the command line he is using to get it to work. No clue if this will help at all.

 

Thank you for that. It doesn't seem to work for me, but maybe I entered the commandline wrong. I tried: 

"apple2ep -flop1 \"%romfile%\"

"

"apple2ee -flop1 \"%romfile%\"

"

"apple2 -flop1 \"%romfile%\"

"

 

[DOS76]

I'm searching for the post with it but no luck. I believe there was also a separate step but I can't remember what it is.

[SiriusVI]

2 minutes ago, DOS76 said:

I'm searching for the post with it but no luck. I believe there was also a separate step but I can't remember what it is.

Thanks for your effort. This community is awesome!

EDIT: I think tis is it: 

 

Edited November 15, 2019 by SiriusVI

[SiriusVI]

Uhhhh progress: I now get this using : "apple2ep -flop1 \"%romfile%\""


 

 

[SiriusVI]

I cannot complete the guide since there are no .ini files in my "RetroArch\system\mame\ini" other than "ui.ini"

[JoeViking245]

Did you try copying the one (mame.ini) from your regular MAME folder?

[SiriusVI]

17 minutes ago, JoeViking245 said:

Did you try copying the one (mame.ini) from your regular MAME folder?

There's an explanation how to do it in the other thread. i need to investigate this further. I have to go now, but I'll try again tomorrow. It seems like I'm close =D

[SiriusVI]

Looks like I finally got it working.

I added a new emulator to retroarch called "retroarch no quotes". I ticked the don't use quotes box, as the other tutorial in the other thread mentioned.

I added the folowing command line to mame: 

"apple2ep -rp \"L:\LaunchBox\Games\Apple II\apple2\" -flop1 \"%romfile%\""

There is a critical option in the mame core that needs to be enabled "Boot to CLI". Without this it doesn't work. That's also the reason why I use the mame2016 core instead of the mame core without year tags, because Philips CDi needs Boot to CLI disabled.

(I cannot figure out how to tell mame core without year tags to enable CLI only for apple2 games. I though I could do this by selecting "coontent directory override", but apparently the core options aren't saved like that. Does anyone know how to do this?)

Now, it SEEMS like I don't need the .ini file. I had a "apple2ep.ini" in may mame\ini folder, however I didn't have it in my mame2016\ini folder. So make of that what you will. I don't think it's required. I also don't know if you need tha hash file using this method.

Anyway, thank you sooooo much for all your help. This is a solution I'm happy with ?

Edited November 16, 2019 by SiriusVI

[SiriusVI]

Also, I found a game that uses 2 floppies and requires me to switch the floppy disk to "side 1" right at the start of the game. Does anyone know how to do that? I've tried unzipping the game and specifically launching side a (from the filename) but the game still wants me to switch to "side 1" at the start. Don't know hat to make of that. The game is called "The Abyssal Zone".

[JoeViking245]

Not sure if you can assimilate this to RA MAME, but in regular MAME via the keyboard.  

To switch to side "B"
    {Scrl Lock}     (to switch between emulated keyboard)
    {Tab}              (to show MAME's menu)
    (select) File Manager
    (select) flop1 {Enter}
    (select) side B {Enter}
    {Esc} {Esc} {Enter}
 

[Headrush69]

10 hours ago, SiriusVI said:

(I cannot figure out how to tell mame core without year tags to enable CLI only for apple2 games. I though I could do this by selecting "coontent directory override", but apparently the core options aren't saved like that. Does anyone know how to do this?)

The only 2 options are to save a per game option file for every Apple II game,  or to add loading a custom Retroarch.cfg to your command line options and in that Retroarch.cfg file point to a different Retroarch-core-options.cfg. (With boot to CLI enabled)

It works but it’s a bit ugly. Unfortunately there isn’t a per directory options override.

[SiriusVI]

9 hours ago, JoeViking245 said:

Not sure if you can assimilate this to RA MAME, but in regular MAME via the keyboard.  

To switch to side "B"
    {Scrl Lock}     (to switch between emulated keyboard)
    {Tab}              (to show MAME's menu)
    (select) File Manager
    (select) flop1 {Enter}
    (select) side B {Enter}
    {Esc} {Esc} {Enter}
 

Works like a charm, thank you so much!!!

Now, is there a way to map the "{Scrl Lock}" button to a button on my controller, so I can just press say the left trigger to enable the emulated keyboard?