Support Basilisk port to Libretro! Help Mac Emulation!

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sshrugg
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Support Basilisk port to Libretro! Help Mac Emulation!

Post by sshrugg »

I don't know if you all have heard of Libretro, but let me tell you - it's awesome.

It's an open source library that works with a whole bunch of emulators. This might sound like MESS or MAME, but the critical difference is that rather than emulate at the machine level like MESS, the goal of LibRetro is to get the best possible playing experience - sometimes with machine emulation, and other times with virtualization. This means Basilisk II is already getting ported over:

As you can see, however, it gets very few commits, and still is not working.

But think about how awesome it will be when it gets finished: this library makes RetroArch work. Retroarch is a multiple machine emulator that runs (and runs great, might I add) on Windows, Linux, Mac OS, Android, PS3, Rapberry Pi, and Xbox - to name only a few.

This means we could make 68K macs that are as small as a wallet for 20 dollars! We can FINALLY get Basilisk to load CDs again without using an unsupported version of Windows! We can get (relatively) hassle free Netplay for Marathon and Avara sessions! We'll be back to the glory days of really playing these games on whatever systems we please, instead of forcing our parents to keep our old Performa's stashed in a closet somewhere back home.

Finally, here's why I think we should get excited: We can decide what they work on next!

RetroArch devs are letting the users decide which emulator cores get added to the emulator next.

Basilisk running on everything, people. NOW GO OUT AND VOTE FOR 68k MAC EMULATION!!!
sshrugg
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Re: Support Basilisk port to Libretro! Help Mac Emulation!

Post by sshrugg »

Apple 68k has gone from 0% at the time of this post to 4% thanks to me pestering all of my friends. It needs 23 more votes right now to barely take the lead against Commodore 64, which is getting 47% of the votes right now. We can do this, everybody!
sshrugg
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Re: Support Basilisk port to Libretro! Help Mac Emulation!

Post by sshrugg »

We're up to 8% everybody, but still have ground to cover! Thanks for your votes! Keep 'em coming!
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adespoton
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Re: Support Basilisk port to Libretro! Help Mac Emulation!

Post by adespoton »

Wouldn't PCEmu be a better fit for libretro? Downside is that it doesn't emulate 68040.
sshrugg
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Re: Support Basilisk port to Libretro! Help Mac Emulation!

Post by sshrugg »

adespoton wrote:Wouldn't PCEmu be a better fit for libretro? Downside is that it doesn't emulate 68040.
DOSbox is already integrated, and works great. 68040 should be next!!
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adespoton
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Re: Support Basilisk port to Libretro! Help Mac Emulation!

Post by adespoton »

Also, I asked Paul Pratt a year or so ago about integration of Mini vMac into LibRetro; he has no plans to make it an official target, but has no problem with someone creating a separately maintained fork that uses the framework. So that could handle 68000 and 68020 hardware in libretro, and is again a better fit, as it emulates all the necessary interfaces, whereas BII cheats a bit.
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adespoton
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Re: Support Basilisk port to Libretro! Help Mac Emulation!

Post by adespoton »

Well... I now have RetroArch 1.9.0 running on my iOS device, with the Basilisk2 core. I haven't sorted out adding the various files (it needs BskII_prefs, keycodes and Quadra605.rom in the same folder in the RetroArch/system directory and a boot image), but the core does start and show a blank screen.

I built this core straight from the main libretro trunk, so it looks like the port is successful and official. However, I noticed that the source they're using is... rather old, and the documentation is ancient and incorrect for the source they ported.
sshrugg
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Re: Support Basilisk port to Libretro! Help Mac Emulation!

Post by sshrugg »

OMG! You've gotten further than I did!

This core hasn't seen very many updates on GitHub. The issues your pointing out are likely because it's a quick and dirty port with little to no testing.

I was hoping this post would drive people to the survey and push basilisk higher up on their "To Do" list. It looks like that was not successful, but I'm glad I got the attention of a talented tweaker such as yourself.

If you'd like to report what you've discovered, you may want to inquire on the LibRetro forums.
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