I’ve been playing around with the PCE libretro port, but it’s having a few problems; the graphics are all messed up:
Also, I can’t seem to load any CD-based games, instead getting this error message:
Are these just known problems with the current state of the core, or am I just having unique issues here?
Also, is there a reason the libretro port is using the PCE-Fast core instead of the normal PCE?
No such problem here. Are you sure about the origin/quality of your roms ? Reminds me of some NES roms with bad headers and mirroring problems.
To play CD games, for the moment you need to have syscard3.pce in the same folder as the game you want to play. Square has mentioned that in future revisions this will be fixed and the file will go to the "system directory " .
As for why the pce_fast module is used, I assume it is to allow the console versions to play at full speed. According to Mednafen documentation, the improvements of the pce module trades speed away for "(usually) unneeded accuracy " so it does not sound like we 're losing much.
Yeah, I know the ROMs are verified good dumps, and they work just fine using Mednafen itself. Would you mind sharing your PCE core? Maybe my compile is just bad. Or if anyone else has the most recent compile from source, if they could share, too. 
Also, I was using the syscard3.pce file in the system folder, as you referred to. Moving it the ROMs’ folder solved the CD loading issue, so thanks.
There is another reason I finally opted for PCE Fast (that it runs fullspeed even on Raspberry Pi is of course an ideal fit for the kind of portability we intend to pursue, but was not the real reason).
There was no way to make the PC Engine module fill the screen normally - it was using really odd (and just downright erroneous) framebuffer width/height values that made absolutely no sense.
And yes, the four games that are in need of the ‘PCE Accuracy’ module are so obscure I doubt anybody living outside Japan is ever going to want to play them.
Those screenshots BTW definitely don’t look right and I’ve never had it look as badly as that - and I’ve tested the PCE core on all consoles/platforms so far.
Try to use No-intro’s PC Engine romset and see if that gets rid of the issue - or try to use another binary.
Understood, and quite logical.
I’ll try to hunt down some alternate copies of the ROMs, but in the meantime do you have a latest compile of the cores I could try, instead? Mine are a couple of weeks out of date, and it’s quite possible something is wrong with them.
Edit: Just verified that it’s not the ROMs, using a few games from the No-Intro set.
You, sir, are a gentleman and a scholar. That did the trick.
One more issue found with this core: it will not load CD images if “” is used instead of “/” in the command line.
For example:
retroarch.exe “Roms\Game.cue” will not load retroarch.exe “Roms/Game.cue” will load
I have not seen this issue with any other core, but it seems to be limited to just the CD portion of the PCE core, which means I’m guessing it runs into issues when trying to find any file the CUE file points to, if that makes sense. Obviously, this makes its usage with launchers (such as XBMC) problematic.
Yes, I can confirm this behavior. Happens with the Mednafen PSX core as well. Sega CD and Yabause are fine.
Also discovered one more problem: no matter how the controls are set, Player 1 always controls both Player 1 and Player 2, making two-player effectively impossible.
hunterk thanks for the download. I been looking for that. =)
Tried the latest build of this port, and still no dice. Is a fix in the works for proper 2-player controls in this?
I’ll look at it this week.
OK, finally fixed it - turned out you needed multitap enabled since the PC Engine only had one joypad port.
You can built from source to get the latest version.
I tested the new build with Bomberman '93 with 3 players and 1941 with 2. It’s all working beautifully. Thank you very much.
My last suggestion would be to bind the PCE buttons I and II to A and B respectively to match the original layout just like with the FCEU core. For more detailed information, see this post.
Just compiled the latest Wii version of this core. I am playing on a CRT monitor (Sony PVM-14M) in the 512x239 mode.
Ninja Spirits, Daimakaimura and R-Type (Hu-Card) graphics are distorted beyond recognition. No-Intro set, all verified.
Same roms work great in Win and Linux version. I tried changing resolution and play with filtering but it does not fix the problem. All the other games I have tried work fine.
Also, the vertical scrolling “hicups”, like some very slow and consistent tearing, slice by slice. Very noticeable in 1941. Enabling bilinear filtering fixes the issue.
Anyway, I’ll be investigating that issue and fixing it if possible.
EDIT: Could be endian issues if it’s only the Wii version that is affected by this (out of all platforms you can test I suppose). I know R-Type outputs correctly on a Linux PC with the same core.
Glad to see you already have an idea!
I should be able to test on Raspi soon. Android (Tegra 2 tablet) too but I might need some detailed instructions on how to build. I have seen that android-ndk is in ArchLinux aur repository so setting up the environment should not be too hard.
Oh I have a PSP too if that ever comes into play …
