Help 3DS emulation

[chaosmos]

There are a handful of 3DS games I want to play. I was able to get MH4U and SMT: Strange Journey Redux working through Retroarch using a Citra 2018 core. When I tried both SMT:IV games, I got a black screen briefly and then Retroarch closes. I am curious in how to troubleshoot this. If it helps, when I select the previous two games, it allows me to choose one of the 3DS cores. When I select either of the latter two, I don't get that option, just black screen and everything closing. Thanks in advance for any helpful input.

 

[Clippy]

Try standalone Citra or one of its forks. 2018 was seven years ago.

 

[iceball]

Try switching the video driver from openGL to vulkan on both cores, maybe it will help.

 

[HextarVigar]

Never use OpenGL if you have another option. It works pretty much perfectly using Vulcan.

 

[Glaciation]

Out of all the emulators I use, citra is the most problematic. It runs pretty well on the steamdeck but with a bit of a lag when loading new areas. It catches up almost immediately, though. Could totally see a remastered SMT4/A and Strange Journey getting a steam release at some point.

On topic: check your bios and firmware to make sure they are compatible. If it's not booting at all, I'd bet it has to do with that.

 

[Graw]

Retroarch cores for anything after 16-bit systems kind of suck and it's usually better to use standalone emulators for them.

 

[RageBurner]

I would suggest trying Citra standalone, preferably a recent fork as others have said.

 

[Zerohour2k12]

I still have Citra, both the last release and the nightly. After it got taken down though. I have yet to try to newer forks.

 

[Sumea]

Retroarch cores for anything after 16-bit systems kind of suck and it's usually better to use standalone emulators for them.

That is not true, BeetlePSX was a core with mostly same features duckstation had years before duckstation gave a standalone package for most of the same features like the polygon stabilization etc. The saturn core and N64 cores in retroarch likely still beat most standalone choices, and THEN, yes, Dolphin, any of the PCSX2 forks, etc. are bit more trouble than worth. And of course, unless there is citra, non 2018 version, just citra 2018 core it should likely be avoided in favor of last available standalone versions/forks.

It is understandable though given citra got nuked from internet so finding it's standalone versions is harder now, and there is two forks, that also got nuked at some point just now, only site that hosts the files receives mixed feelings for how legit it is since these things can always be malicious, much like all the fake PS4 emulator sites in past.

 

[Graw]

The saturn core and N64 cores in retroarch likely still beat most standalone choices,

N64 emulation in retroarch is terrible. Every standalone n64 emulator works much better

 

[Sumea]

N64 emulation in retroarch is terrible. Every standalone n64 emulator works much better

Dunno how, there is three point rendering and other better quality N64 emulation options in mupenplus and it is also multiplat, so switch had better N64 emulation before official N64 emulator came out worse and stayed worse. Though, certain games need a lot of overclocking on switch, and may still be a bad experience speed wise. And I dunno what "every standalone N64 emulator" is there is like Project64 that has patreon gatekeeping and same features newest build of Mupen next does, minus the paywall.

 

[Graw]

Dunno how, there is three point rendering and other better quality N64 emulation options in mupenplus and it is also multiplat, so switch had better N64 emulation before official N64 emulator came out worse and stayed worse. Though, certain games need a lot of overclocking on switch, and may still be a bad experience speed wise. And I dunno what "every standalone N64 emulator" is there is like Project64 that has patreon gatekeeping and same features newest build of Mupen next does, minus the paywall.

Project64 and Mupen are both open source. There's no paywall for either of them.

 

[Sumea]

Project64 and Mupen are both open source. There's no paywall for either of them.

Right

https://www.patreon.com/Project64

"* Get access to the latest builds from the source, available via the Project64 website"
Right.
Also does Mupen suck or does mupen rock because now the signals are real mixed there.

 

[HextarVigar]

Right

https://www.patreon.com/Project64

"* Get access to the latest builds from the source, available via the Project64 website"
Right.
Also does Mupen suck or does mupen rock because now the signals are real mixed there.

Considering the last stable release was three years ago, I think you're just complaining for the sake of it.

Also, if you insist on being anal retentive, the nighty releases are right here.

 

[Sumea]

Considering the last stable release was three years ago, I think you're just complaining for the sake of it.

News to me I just googled the thing since it is last impression I had on Project64, friend asked me help pirating the patreon build. Did not even check downloads or release years. If true, then only truly actively developed N64 emulator is Mupen64plus-next as far as I can tell. That is the same emulator as RetroArch core and standalone, which means Graw is still winning in weird complaining department.

I was just assuming my decade or half old memory was still somewhat relevant that project64 held something over other emulators given how much Graw seemed to praise it indirectly. If there is nothing Project64 has not been king of for years, there truly is only weird reasons to complain about the one and same emulator running under different UI, since Mupen Next is the same emulator under both.
I personally elect to not continue this offtopic more though.

 

[Graw]

Right

https://www.patreon.com/Project64

"* Get access to the latest builds from the source, available via the Project64 website"
Right.

I don't understand your point. So you can donate and have someone else do the work of building the latest code for you? How does that lock it behind a paywall? Ardour uses a similar system. Absolutely nothing is stopping you from building the latest version yourself or waiting.

Also does Mupen suck or does mupen rock because now the signals are real mixed there.

I use mupen. Works fine for me.

 

[Sumea]

I use mupen. Works fine for me.

Yet you complain about N64 emulation on RetroArch, "N64 emulation in retroarch is terrible."-sic - it is Mupen64Plus-Next. Is it terrible or works fine for you?
Done here. I assumed you were praising and using Project64 because the alternative turned this argument you yourself elected to raise into one, really, really dumb one. Totally worth derailing this thread over.

 

[HextarVigar]

Yet you complain about N64 emulation on RetroArch, "N64 emulation in retroarch is terrible."-sic - it is Mupen64Plus-Next. Is it terrible or works fine for you?
Done here. I assumed you were praising and using Project64 because the alternative turned this argument you yourself elected to raise into one, really, really dumb one. Totally worth derailing this thread over.

Oh, I dunno - you've managed to prove to me that you don't know your asshole from your armpit, so...

 

[Graw]

Yet you complain about N64 emulation on RetroArch, "N64 emulation in retroarch is terrible."-sic - it is Mupen64Plus-Next. Is it terrible or works fine for you?
Done here. I assumed you were praising and using Project64 because the alternative turned this argument you yourself elected to raise into one, really, really dumb one. Totally worth derailing this thread over.

By works fine I mean, games run at full speed and there are no graphical errors. I'm not really sure what else you expect out of an emulator. By comparison retroarch n64 cores do not run at full speed and have graphical errors. Both project64 and mupen standalones work pretty much as good as eachother. They both emulate games at full speed without graphical errors. I really don't care about ui or under the hood differences. I just want the games to work. That's really all I care about.

I have a ten year old laptop and a 3 year old phone. Retroarch cannot emulate n64 on my laptop at any playable speed. Standalones run games perfectly. On my phone, retroarch n64 cores are slow and will drop fps. Standalones do not. My phone can emulate ps2 and even Wii games full speed. It's pretty inexcusable to have slowdowns with n64 games.

 

[Sumea]

By works fine I mean, games run at full speed and there are no graphical errors. I'm not really sure what else you expect out of an emulator. By comparison retroarch n64 cores do not run at full speed and have graphical errors. Both project64 and mupen standalones work pretty much as good as eachother. They both emulate games at full speed without graphical errors. I really don't care about ui or under the hood differences. I just want the games to work. That's really all I care about.

I have a ten year old laptop and a 3 year old phone. Retroarch cannot emulate n64 on my laptop at any playable speed. Standalones run games perfectly. On my phone, retroarch n64 cores are slow and will drop fps. Standalones do not. My phone can emulate ps2 and even Wii games full speed. It's pretty inexcusable to have slowdowns with n64 games.

 

[Graw]

View attachment 40013

Yes I realize many retroarch cores are based on standalone emulators. That's always made it more confusing to me as to why they run so poorly in retroarch.

 

[Sumea]

Yes I realize many retroarch cores are based on standalone emulators. That's always made it more confusing to me as to why they run so poorly in retroarch.

Most likely reason is your aged hardware that you blame the software for, bad configuration of RetroArch for the hardware (renderer etc.), or bad configuration of the emulator/core for your hardware, such as not using less accurate but speedier emulation options. Retroarch is also not without overhead, on some hardware it can cause a performance difference, but major difference only in very low powered hardware. Configured correctly Mupen64plus-next runs OK on RetroArch for Switch, which is 7 year old ARM hardware that was already some years old on launch. You might have missed or ignored something. You might be just suffering from the opposite of "Works for me :)" -situation.

On topic: Forked versions of Citra, for now PabloMK7's and when released Azahar are winners for 3DS emulation. Azahar is not out but seems to be merging of Pablo's and Lime3DS forks into one, glorious future emulator. RetroArch's might not have good and updated 3DS emulator core for a while in this mess of a situation.

 

[Graw]

Most likely reason is your aged hardware that you blame the software for, bad configuration of RetroArch for the hardware (renderer etc.), or bad configuration of the emulator/core for your hardware, such as not using less accurate but speedier emulation options. Retroarch is also not without overhead, on some hardware it can cause a performance difference, but major difference only in very low powered hardware. Configured correctly Mupen64plus-next runs OK on RetroArch for Switch, which is 7 year old ARM hardware that was already some years old on launch. You might have missed or ignored something. You might be just suffering from the opposite of "Works for me :)" -situation.

That was why I mentioned I also use more up to date hardware and experience problems also. Why would I want to spend time messing around with configurations the way I used to do back in the early 2000's when I could just not use retroarch for those systems and not do any of that?

I don't own a switch so I really have no idea or opinion on the state of emulators on the switch. I can only speak about my experiences with devices I've actually owned. If retroarch works well on the switch that's great and you should use it. I don't have any moral objections to retroarch. I've just personally found overall it's not the best choice in a lot of situations and a lot of problems people run into could be avoided if they just didn't use retroarch in those cases and used a standalone emulator instead.

 

[Yousef]

Alright guys talking about vidya gaems is fun n all but keep it civil.

 

[_oBSOLEte_]

Out of all the emulators I use, citra is the most problematic. It runs pretty well on the steamdeck but with a bit of a lag when loading new areas. It catches up almost immediately, though. Could totally see a remastered SMT4/A and Strange Journey getting a steam release at some point.

On topic: check your bios and firmware to make sure they are compatible. If it's not booting at all, I'd bet it has to do with that.

That or Retroarch set to GL instead of Vulkan. It's a bit of a double post from last week's 3DS thread, but I'm in the same boat as you are regarding the few stutters... IME The culprit is shader and texture caching. To alleviate the issue :

• I run Citra's folders on a SSD.
• With the Vulkan renderer (allowing SPIR-V shader gen)
• I tweak options like Shader JIT and Async Shader Compilation depending on the game.
• You could also find already compiled caches online for a few games and unzip those files in the game folder. There's instructions on how to do it here.

I have used Citra both in Retroarch and with the standalone version with the same performance for the games I have. Nowadays I mostly play with the standalone version of Lime3DS in windowed mode and VR headset, the stereoscopic mode and SteamVR and Desktop+. There's also a port of Citra for mobile oculus headsets called CitraVR but my headset dont support it. 3DS games are a blast, upscaled in 3DVR it's incredible to play those games. My computer is quite old now and lower mid range but somehow I still got enough headroom to both play and record in native 4K60FPS... Not bad.