Took a while to nail down, but basically no version of RetroArch properly supports PAL 60 on PS3. (or more specifically switching the machine into PAL60 - it’s fine if you can force it) Without this the audio on PAL machines will be badly mistimed EDIT: unless you use HDMI (but then obvs some stuff like simulated transparency looks a bit shit).
Tried about a dozen official/standalone/unofficial releases and the only one that doesn’t crash is TwinAphex’s Nov 2019 1.81 release here: https://store.brewology.com/ahomebrew.php?brewid=152
If they don’t crash immediately (as all official builds do), generally nothing will happen on the menu or ingame. Even the working one above seemed to affect the game only.
Long story short:
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audio will be crap unless you get it into PAL 60
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unofficial build is the only one where that works
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unofficial build badly overscans and you can’t see the cursor
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so install the current official build here: https://xbins.org/libretro/stable/1.8.3/playstation/ps3/RetroArch.PS3.CEX.PS3.pkg
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then the brewology build on top (both parts) https://store.brewology.com/ahomebrew.php?brewid=152
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select a core from the unofficial build and the UI will switch to unofficial build
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set it to PAL 60
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load your game
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the UI is now back to the official build, so you can see the cursor again.
Bit of a faff, but it does work =)