Vic 20 with vice

[MaineBear]

I'm trying to set up Vic 20 roms with Vice through Launchbox.  The rom set I have the roms are .60, .20. a0.  Vice doesn't launch them.  Do I need a different set?

Thanks for you help!

[dragon57]

Those should work. Are you using Retroarch and the vice_xvic_libretro core for Vic-20 or the native Vice with the xvic.exe?

[MaineBear]

I am using Vice with the xvic.exe.  I get ?UNDEF'D STATEMENT ERROR when I try to run them.

Edited March 1 by MaineBear

[MaineBear]

Do I need a bios?

[dragon57]

4 hours ago, MaineBear said:

Do I need a bios?

Yes, you need a number of files for each different emulation that vice supports. Those files should be included with the vice archive you download. Make sure you are grabbing the correct vice archive and binary type for the hardware you are using.

[MaineBear]

I downloaded a game from itch.co and it was a .d64 file, it's a Vic 20 game.  It plays fine with the Vice emulator, so it seems to have all the correct files.

[MacGuyver]

Hi there, maybe I'm alone here, but I found RetroArch a little tricky to set up to successfully run Vic-20 games, due to the fact that many games require specific memory settings in order to boot correctly.   I didn't really understand how you could save individual game setups using the Retroarch menu system and I found it a little confusing to navigate.    But I did succeed in working it out, so hopefully this post will be of some use.  It's a little bit of work to set up each game, but once you understand the steps, it's very easy to do for all your Vic games, and once you save the settings in RetroArch, each game will automatically have the settings work properly.   And it would be a shame not to include the Vic software library in Launchbox!

For this example, I'm using the game called "Cheese and Onion" which needs 35Kb RAM to run properly.    Because it needs extra ram, this game won't run with the default RetroArch settings, which is where myself and others are likely having issues.

Download the game here if you'd like to use it for a test case.

https://misfit.itch.io/cheese-and-onion

The ROM file in this case is named "vic20_cheese_and_onion_32k.d64".   Save it where you'd like it to live on your computer.

 

1. On the Tools menu of Launchbox, select "Import ROM files", then single platform.
2. Choose the game file you downloaded, and select the Commodore Vic-20 Platform when prompted.
3. Choose "RetroArch" as the emulator you'd like to use to run this ROM
4. Copy/Move or Leave the ROM file where it is, per your preference
5. Click the checkmark to download Metadata for your game
6. Decide which media you'd like downloaded from Emumovies (there may not be any)
7. Skip "Download Bezels" because there won't be any for a Vic-20 game
8. Select custom options, if desired 

 

Now the game has been installed in Launchbox.   Next we need to adjust the per-game memory settings in the RetroArch menus.   This is the most important step that many people miss, mainly because the RetroArch menu system is not entirely intuitive.

Go ahead and double click on the game in Launchbox so that it starts running.   You will see the standard Vic-20 Loading screen displayed (load *, 8), and then the following screen:   (You can see that it's an unexpanded Vic currently, due to the 3583 bytes free.   We need to change that.

 

 

Very quickly the game will show you the below loading screen.   The loading takes quite a while, which is the perfect opportunity to change the RAM settings in RetroArch. 

 

 

What is important to do next is to change the memory settings for this particular game IN RETROARCH (not Launchbox).   You only have to do this once, and it will remember the setting!

While you see the screen above, press F1 to enable the Retroarch menu (or press the X-Box guide button, if you are using an X-Box 360 controller)

You will see the Retroarch menu appear over the game screen.   The game is paused.

Navigate to Core options->System->Memory Expansion

Set the memory expansion to 32K (the default is off (no extra memory), which won't allow the game to load correctly)

Back up one menu (using backspace key or controller) and go to Manage Core Options-> Save Game Options.   Congratulations, It has now saved a memory expansion profile for this game only.   The setup is complete, you can now run the game over and over again from Launchbox and it will work correctly each time.

For a graphical walkthrough of the Retroarch screens and settings, see :https://ibb.co/3yKyY9qd 

If you have done it correctly, the game will load and you will see the game menu running perfectly:

 

 

If however you did not adjust the Retroarch game memory setting correctly, then the game will fail to load and you will see the following instead.   

 

 

If this happens, run the game again, and bring up the Retroarch menu while loading the game, and make sure you follow the above steps exactly to set the memory setting correctly for that game.

A quick tip for speeding up loading time, since this game takes quite a while to load:   You can press the spacebar in Retroarch to speed up the load time tremendously.   Just make sure to press space again to turn off the speed loading once the game loads, or it will continue to play at high speed.

I hope this helps folks on how to manage the memory settings per game on the Vic-20.   It allowed me to easily build the ultimate easy setup and play every single Vic game I ever wanted to play, easily, alongside all the other systems I have setup on Launchbox. 

For other Vic20 games, the same steps will apply, although some games will need different memory settings.   Often times the correct RAM needs are part of the file name.

A special thank you to the readme file on the Cheese and Onion Game page, which showed me finally how to properly navigate the Vic20 memory settings page PER GAME in Retroarch, and to save the setting permanently!

Let me know if anyone needs help with any specific ROM, and I'll do my best to help!

 

 

Edited yesterday at 04:11 AM by MacGuyver
Expanded the answer

[MacGuyver]

I expanded a walkthrough above to help anyone who is trying to set up Vic-20 games in Launchbox (using RetroArch)