How to enable bgfx shaders in MAME (standalone)

[SiriusVI]

Hey everyone,

I wanted to try the realistic arcade bezels by Mr. Retrolust and got it working no problem. However, I also wanted to enable a bgfx shader, but I just cannot get it to work. The only shader I ca get working is the HLSL shader.

In the mame.ini I have the following settings related to shaders:

#
# OSD VIDEO OPTIONS
#
video                     bgfx
numscreens                1
window                    0
maximize                  1
waitvsync                 0
syncrefresh               0
monitorprovider           auto


# BGFX POST-PROCESSING OPTIONS
#
bgfx_path                 bgfx
bgfx_backend              vulkan
bgfx_debug                0
bgfx_screen_chains        crt-geom-deluxe
bgfx_shadow_mask          slot-mask.png
bgfx_lut                  lut-default.png
bgfx_avi_name             auto

 

Can anyone tell my why this doesn't work?

[Metalslug]

Might not be working because of your path settings in mame.ini.
bgfx_path is a path value.
It'll work when you replace the bgfx value with <path>\bgfx.
<path> must be the path to your Mame folder where the bgfx folder is located.

[Armindesk]

A couple of things to check here:

First, make sure your MAME build actually includes BGFX support (some builds or older versions don’t fully expose all chains properly). Also double-check that the bgfx_path is pointing to the correct folder structure and that the shader files exist there.

Another common issue is the backend—try switching bgfx_backend from Vulkan to Direct3D or OpenGL just to test if Vulkan is the problem on your setup.

Lastly, verify the crt-geom-deluxe chain is actually available in your bgfx/chains directory. If MAME can’t find it, it silently falls back, which can look like “nothing is working”.

If everything looks correct, testing with a default chain like default can help isolate whether it’s a config issue or missing shader files.