I use 8bitdo SN30 Pro & M30 controllers. I need different hotkeys

RetroArch General
#1

So the way I’ve had RetroArch set up (using LaunchBox) is to have my default button layout for my SN30 Pro, and then I made a separate retroarch.cfg file with an alternate button layout for my Sega Platforms so that it works with my M30 (I use LaunchBox to have alternate ways to open up RetroArch config files using command lines)…

After something happened where I lost some of my settings, I decided to edit the autoconfig file for my M30 so that it would just match up the buttons properly with the need for a separate retroarch.cfg file. It worked great, but the problem is that the M30 doesn’t have the type of button I use on my SN30 Pro for the hotkey enable button. My current default is to use the left analogue stick button for the hotkey enable button, which the M30 doesn’t have. The M30 does have a Home button on it (which is assigned to “2”), and my old, separate RetroArch config had that button assigned for the hotkey enable button, but I want to move away from using separate config files for different controllers.

The problem is that RetroArch only allows for 1 button to be assigned for the hotkey enable button, as far as I can tell. I tried manually editing the retroarch.cfg file to include multiple buttons, but it defaults to whatever number is first (from what I can tell, you can have 1 controller button, 1 keyboard key, and 1 mouse button).

I can’t, for the life of me, figure out a way to make it so that I have the hotkey enable button work with multiple controllers (it wouldn’t work to switch the hotkey enable button to a button both controllers have since the M30 is lacking on extra buttons, and while the “Home” button on the SN30 Pro works, it opens up Steam when I use it on the SN30 Pro, and I’m not sure how adaptable it would be to random controllers like a Xbox controller).

Any ideas? Is there a way to have multiple hotkey enable buttons without having to use different config files?

#2

I think you can add hotkeys to the autoconfigs manually, so if both controllers are powered by autoconfigs, you should be able to have different hotkey assignments that will change with the pad (I think)

#3

This was my impression too, but when I tried it, it didn’t work. I’ll have to look into this again. Maybe I entered the lines in wrong.

#4

Well, I tried adding this line to the autoconfig:

input_enable_hotkey_btn = “2”

And the default hotkey enable button seems to override it. I read that you need to set the hotkey enable settings to “null” in the retroarch.cfg file, but when I tried that, it basically makes it so there are no hotkeys (for instance, opening up the RetroArch menu is normally hotkey button + start, and now just pressing start opens up the RetroArch menu).

I also tried some of the ideas in this thread without any luck. I’m kind of at the assumption that it’s just not possible to do this, unless someone knows better. I think the solution I’m going to go with is to keep the SN30 Pro hotkey button as the default, and keep the M30 retroarch.cfg file as an optional backup. That way, the M30 can still be set up properly to play games by default, but if I’m going to use it, I have the option to load it with the hotkeys.