Retroarch Wonderswan and wonderswan color core dilema

[Shredder_guitar]

I've reached a point where i don't know whether to zig or zag and I thought of stopping and asking for suggestions before I do anything. I just got done setting up my Wonderswan setup in Retroarch including bezels, backgrounds, shaders overlays saving shaders on horizontal and vertical games as needed and for the most part it's accurate. Now I move on to Wonderswan color and happen to notice that it uses the same core.... Which technically means that that base configurations are just not an option because wonderswan is using them. So my options (as far as I am aware) are...

• Find an alternate core for wonderswan color
• Script out unique configurations on a PER GAME basis for ALL GAMES in Wonderswan color (I am fully capable of this, but this option seems like a very cumbersome solution)
• Find a core splitter to split the mednafen_wswan_libretro.dll core so that I can have configurations for wonderswan and wonderswan color without conflict....
• Or lastly, some other alternative solution I a haven't thought of yet.

 

Any help or suggestion here is welcome.  
Here's some screenshots of my wonderswan setup if it's inspirational, I am basically using just the mega bezel shader for wonderswan with custom backgrounds, typically i use a combination of megabezel and overlays....

 

Edited Tuesday at 07:27 PM by Shredder_guitar

[dragon57]

Just fyi, the new release of The Bezel Project Windows application now supports Retroarch cores that can be used with different systems like Wonderswan and Wonderswan Color. The app creates custom config directories and a new retroarch cfg file that points to the new config directory structure (this mimics the structure found on RetroPie installations). You just need to use the retroarch -c command line option. This is fully documented in the app startup screens and the Help section.

[Shredder_guitar]

29 minutes ago, dragon57 said:

Just fyi, the new release of The Bezel Project Windows application now supports Retroarch cores that can be used with different systems like Wonderswan and Wonderswan Color. The app creates custom config directories and a new retroarch cfg file that points to the new config directory structure (this mimics the structure found on RetroPie installations). You just need to use the retroarch -c command line option. This is fully documented in the app startup screens and the Help section.

Thanks for the reply, I haven't FULLY dug into the bezel project to find out what all it can/can't do, but there is a convenience factor that I like about it. I'm particular about my setup and like to know how/what things are doing. I ended up 'biting the bullet' and scripting out configs for each wonderswan color game because it seems that beetle wonderswan is THE ONLY core that emulates both... I don't like having to do it that way becaus ei feel like it may risk things being unmanagable down the road, but fortunately the config is pretty simple to recreate if everything completely shits the bed. 
happy to share it out.

This is done in powershell. The slangblock also turns off that dumbass intro sequence... I don't mind it for consoles, but it doesn't make sense to have a fuzzy TV intro for handhelds. 

$romdirectory = '{your full rom path here}\*'
$zipextension = ".7z"
$Fullpath = $romdirectory + $zipextension 
$Retroarchfolderpath = "{your retroarchfolder path here}"

$Slangblock = @'
#reference ":/shaders/Mega Bezel_Packs/Duimon-Mega-Bezel/Presets/Advanced/Bandai_WonderSwan_Color/WonderSwan_Color-[ADV]-[LCD-GRID].slangp"
HSM_INTRO_WHEN_TO_SHOW = "0.000000"
'@  # Split into individual lines

$filenames = (Get-ChildItem -Path $Fullpath ).BaseName

foreach ($filename in $filenames) {

    $Slangblock|set-content -Path "$Retroarchfolderpath\config\Beetle WonderSwan\$filename.slangp"
}

The end result is pretty sweet, I have been testing out random games, but have not found any that are vertical orientation yet, they will need to be corrected to vertical orientation if found. 

Edited Wednesday at 02:36 AM by Shredder_guitar

[dragon57]

Yep, if you understand retroarch and its structure, it is easy to manually set this up, or use an application like ours. Good job.

[Shredder_guitar]

14 hours ago, dragon57 said:

Yep, if you understand retroarch and its structure, it is easy to manually set this up, or use an application like ours. Good job.

I didn't really want to do it that way, but until there's a separate core for ws color, then i don't really see any other way unless someone has a better idea. Retroarch desperately needs a settings per core entity option; i.e. if a core contains the ability to play genesis, SMS, SG-1000 and game gear games, then I should have the ability to make shaders and settings for each of those things within a single core, ...it's a glaringly obvious issue in the RA community that it really is work worth doing. 

Edited Wednesday at 05:34 PM by Shredder_guitar

[dragon57]

I doubt you will get that wish fulfilled. Many have lobbied the Libretro devs to address just that and almost without fail, the response has been all the tools you need and the command line switches are all you need. You just need to read the documentation to get the result you want.

Most don't realize Retroarch defaults and implementation on Windows is different than what most prepacked Retroarch configurations on Linux offers. Like I said above, the latest version of the Windows utility now follows the Retropie standard which never had the issue of using cores that support multiple systems like a default Windows installation has.

It all depends on where you come from, mostly. At least Retroarch offers numerous ways of achieving the result you want, so there is that.

[Shredder_guitar]

32 minutes ago, dragon57 said:

I doubt you will get that wish fulfilled. Many have lobbied the Libretro devs to address just that and almost without fail, the response has been all the tools you need and the command line switches are all you need. You just need to read the documentation to get the result you want.

Most don't realize Retroarch defaults and implementation on Windows is different than what most prepacked Retroarch configurations on Linux offers. Like I said above, the latest version of the Windows utility now follows the Retropie standard which never had the issue of using cores that support multiple systems like a default Windows installation has.

It all depends on where you come from, mostly. At least Retroarch offers numerous ways of achieving the result you want, so there is that.

I'm a devops engineer...that's a canned response for ' i don't know how, and I don't want to dig into it'. Retroarch although highly appreciated for it's consolidation efforts, is a polished reverse engineering effort....just calling it what it is. I love retroarch in it's seemingly endless capabilities...but it seems that in almost every juggernaut gaming platform, there always seems to be 1-5 things that are a reoccurring thing that no one has the ingenuity to fix. If i had the skills and knowhow, I would certainly try. Linux users have always poopoo'd windows users since the dawn of systems and it largely speaks to why windows sucks so much now and has an odd amount of overreach...because microsoft is no longer controlled by windows users...it's controlled by linux users and a good marketing team that are tolerating windows and filling in a position..........but that's another discussion altogether. 

Edited yesterday at 12:58 AM by Shredder_guitar