RetroArch config changes being overridden

Hi,

I recently installed the latest RetroBat on my gaming drive (Windows 10 system) and copied in my roms.  Roms are read and load fine, however I'm having issues changing RetroArch options.  Options changed within EmulationStation (integer scaling, aspect ratio etc.), however other additional settingsa don't appear to stick.  I've tried:

• Editing ./RetroBat/emulators/retroarch/retroarch.cfg
  
• Editing ./RetroBat/system/templates/retroarch/retroarch.cfg
  
• Opening up a game, bringing up the RetroArch menu, making changes (eg. disabling fullscreen), saving configuration, and exiting RetroArch (verified ./RetroBat/emulators/retroarch/retroarch.cfg is modified as expected).
  
• Opening up RetroArch from the RetroBat menu entry, making changes (eg. disabling fullscreen), saving configuration, and exiting RetroArch (verified ./RetroBat/emulators/retroarch/retroarch.cfg is modified as expected).
  

It seems like on next game launch, the settings are overwritten.  As a specific example, "arcade" game "1941: Counter Attack" I tried changing both "video_fullscreen and "video_windowed_fullscreen" to false. It gets reset to true on game starts after.

For reference, my retrobat.ini is:

Code:

[RetroBat]
ConfigMode=3
InputComboMode=1

[EmulationStation]
InterfaceMode=0
Fullscreen=0
WindowXSize=1920
WindowYSize=1080
NoExitMenu=0
PlayVideoIntro=0
VideoLength=0
VideoFile="RetroBat-intro.mp4"

[RetroArch]
DefaultVideoDriver="d3d11"

Any clues what might be causing this or workarounds that might work for this issue? Any help is appreciated.

Hello,

You should try with ConfigMode on 0, it disable automatic configuration.

Files in templates folders are not supposed to be modified since they're default config files.

Thanks for the quick response. Tried with ConfigMode=0 and no change.

Tried a fresh install of RetroBat, with only `./roms/arcade/1942.zip` and with the only changes to `./emulators/retroarch/retroarch.cfg` as:

Code:


video_fullscreen=false
video_windowed_fullscreen=false


However the same situation occurs and everytime I launch the game from RetroBat, it appears to reset the values within retroarch.cfg.

Interestingly, however, if I make the changes to retroarch.cfg and launch the included retroarch.exe or retroarch_angle.exe, both programs open in windowed mode successfully and the retroarch.cfg changes are retained.  This leads me to thing either EmulationStation or EmulatorLauncher might be related to what's changing the config when games are launched in RetroBat, and I'm very confused.


EDIT:  To add more details

I saw in ./emulationstation/emulatorLauncher.log:

Code:


2020-11-12 09:07:38.115 [INFO]    "F:\RetroBat\emulationstation\emulatorLauncher.exe" -p1index 0 -p1guid 030000006d0400001fc2000000007801 -p1name "XInput Controller #1" -p1nbbuttons 11 -p1nbhats 1 -p1nbaxes 6  -system arcade -emulator angle -core fbneo -rom "F:\RetroBat\roms\arcade\1942.zip"
2020-11-12 09:07:38.223 [INFO]    ->  F:\RetroBat\emulators\retroarch\retroarch_angle.exe -L "F:\RetroBat\emulators\retroarch\cores\fbneo_libretro.dll" "F:\RetroBat\roms\arcade\1942.zip"


I then decided to verify the issue isn't RetroArch itself by running that launch command itself from command prompt:

Code:

F:\RetroBat\emulators\retroarch\retroarch_angle.exe -L "F:\RetroBat\emulators\retroarch\cores\fbneo_libretro.dll" "F:\RetroBat\roms\arcade\1942.zip"

And like running RetroArch alone directly, it opens in windowed mode successfully with no issues and the retroarch.cfg unchanged.   So it appears to only reset/modify the retroarch.cfg when the game is launched through RetroBat/EmulationStation/EmulatorLauncher.

EDIT2:
I tried running emulatorLauncher.exe on its own based off the command from the logs:

Code:

F:\RetroBat\emulationstation\emulatorLauncher.exe" -p1index 0 -p1guid 030000006d0400001fc2000000007801 -p1name "XInput Controller #1" -p1nbbuttons 11 -p1nbhats 1 -p1nbaxes 6  -system arcade -emulator angle -core fbneo -rom "F:\RetroBat\roms\arcade\1942.zip

This did change the retroarch.cfg values.

So I think this may be a bug/issue (or undocumented limitation) in emulatorLauncher.exe.  Is the source available anywhere, I'd be willing to help debug if possible

Ok, so your problem is only for fullscreen option. It's because emulatorlauncher forces this settings before launching the games.

The two programs overriding settings are retrobat.exe and emulatorlauncher.exe, the first one do it globally before running EmulationStation (if ConfigMode > 0) and the second before running games (with settings selected in ES menu).

Thanks for the information; helps me know I'm not going crazy, ha.

Is there any way to disable that fullscreen override or is my only option to modify es_systems.cfg to remove usage of emulatorLauncher.exe entirely? I have RetroBat setup with Fullscreen=0 to disable EmulationStation in fullscreen, so naturally I'd like the games to be opened in windowed mode as well. Tried the messy workaround of setting ReadOnly attribute, but it fails to launch games entirely in that case.

If you remove emulatorlauncher you will not be able to select emulators settings in ES anymore.

Nevertheless, you can edit es_systems.cfg by keeping ConfigMode=0

Keep in mind that es_systems.cfg can be and will be overrided with future updates and with ConfigMode > 0.

Maybe we can do something to not force this setting...

Sources of emulatorlauncher (batocera-ports):

Code:

https://github.com/fabricecaruso/batocera-ports

Kayl wrote:If you remove emulatorlauncher you will not be able to select emulators settings in ES anymore.

Nevertheless, you can edit es_systems.cfg by keeping ConfigMode=0

Keep in mind that es_systems.cfg can be and will be overrided with future updates and with ConfigMode > 0.

Understood.

Kayl wrote:
Maybe we can do something to not force this setting...

It would be extremely useful if there was an option to allow windowed mode for games In the same way that Fullscreen=0 is super useful. Games, moreso even, given how non-fullscreen emulation is especially friendly in multitasking (eg youtube window playing while emulator window is also up). I'd be willing to help out coding/testing/whatnot wherever possible.

Yes, but some emulators require fullscreen when they launch games with command lines. We certainly have to sort them.

same problem, any solution now

Hello.

Which problem ? There are many in this topic.

Is there any way to disable that fullscreen override or is my only option to modify es_systems.cfg to remove usage of emulatorLauncher.exe entirely? I have RetroBat setup with Fullscreen=0 to disable EmulationStation in fullscreen, so naturally I'd like the games to be opened in windowed mode as well. Tried the messy workaround of setting ReadOnly attribute, but it fails to launch games entirely in that case.

No, no workaround in-between have been found.

I am having an issue because of this feature as well, but not the same issue. Forcefully changing Retroarch settings at launch is detrimental to systems like Atari 800. Atari 800, 5200, XE, XEGS all use the same one core, and the method to determine is to open the menu at launch and select the machine, however since changes revert at launch people are unable to hotkey said menu, any solution for this?


; Enable the RetroArch menu in game as L2 R2.
input_menu_toggle_gamepad_combo = "10"
in the retrobat.ini didn't work.

setting retroarch.cfg to read only stops games from booting at all.

If I remove it for just one system, say Atari XE, would launching any other game not change the .cfg back anyway, causing me to have to set it up before using atari xe every time? is there a way I can add a section to atari 800 ES menu that asks for machine selection?

currently it looks like the only fix is to manually edit my es_systems.cfg to direct launch every core/emulator without using it? but there is well over 100 systems in there, thats a pretty big task.

Hello,

What you are saying is wrong.
If you launch an Atari 800 game, Retrobat selects automatically the "800XL (64k)" mode and if you launch an Atari 5200 game, it selects the "5200" mode.

I have the fullset of the 2 systems, and they are working fine.

I think I'm going to close this topic, and for the last time, there is no way to get through the way Retrobat is working, it's designed like this and it will not change.

If you want to take another way, you should use another frontend.

If something is missing, ask to have it added or if it's a bug, ask to have it fixed.

Lorenzolamas wrote:Hello,

What you are saying is wrong.
If you launch an Atari 800 game, Retrobat selects automatically the "800XL (64k)" mode and if you launch an Atari 5200 game, it selects the "5200" mode.

I have the fullset of the 2 systems, and they are working fine.

I think I'm going to close this topic, and for the last time, there is no way to get through the way Retrobat is working, it's designed like this and it will not change.

If you want to take another way, you should use another frontend.

If something is missing, ask to have it added or if it's a bug, ask to have it fixed.

the issue is that its defaulting to 5200 when i try to use XE games, giving me the atari 800 blue screen menu instead.

as for the use another front end option, i guess i will just remove the launcher and hard code path, if I get it working I will pass it along.

Hello @slaminger

Really don't understand why you got this problem.
Using atari800 and atari5200 folders make things clear

Atari in Retrobat

getupor wrote:Hello @slaminger

Really don't understand why you got this problem.
Using atari800 and atari5200 folders make things clear

Atari in Retrobat

It's because I gave Atari xe it's own listing in emulationstation, and that's not how the launcher is set up. Have to add changes to source and recompile bits to test things or add them.

I have a similar problem, in retrobat I configure retroarch hotkey access, I show in the user interface to be able to manually save the retroarch.cfg file when exiting, and when any emulator game is executed, the default retroarch file is modified and there is no way, even modifying the file retroach, cfg in reading mode when executing in ES emulator tries to modify the file and does not load the game it is clear that when starting any game this file is modified.

I think there is some program error because you should not modify the retroarch.cgf- file.

Hello
No, it's not an error, it's the attended behaviour.
All settings have to be set up from Retrobat menu directly, that "inject" the value to the cfg file.

For hotkey, you have to define one when set up the controller.

Hello, thank you very much getupor.


When I configure the controller I select the last key is hotkey when I press the key it does nothing.

I mean when I enter retroarch . settings, controls and hotkey, this menu is where you can select fast save, fast forward etc... many keys to do a function, what I do is remove all the functions of the keys. But then when running the emulator it restores default

You say that this is done from within retrobat? Pressing the hotkey configured in command does not open any menu.

How to do it, can you help me? thank you very much please How do I have to do it?

Try to use "Select" key as hotkey
Then, as you can see on the wiki, you can make different action by using hotkey combined with another key
https://wiki.retrobat.org/navigation/navigation-keys
You can then use the combined keys to enter Retroarch menu (you will find in Retrobat menu an option to see the full and complete Retroarch menu if needed) BUT take care that the Retroarch option that you want to use isn't allready on the Retrobat menu. If it's the case, any Retroarch change will be reverted if you haven't change it on Retrobat directly.

In retropie I do it with the keyboard and remote control and by pressing the shortcut key the retroarch appears and if it works, I know what you tell me.

But I'm doing it in retrobat with the keyboard pressed hot key and keys a b c d and nothing at all bufff :-(

RetroBat is not Retropie.

The wiki explains how to navigate.

In order to make the retroarch menu appear when using RetroBat:
- On Keyboard : press F1
- With controller : press HOTKEY + A (south button) (depending on what button you defined hotkey for your controller, usually SELECT)

The EmulationStation version included in Retropie is also miles away in the past compared to the fork included in Retrobat. You should try this new way without fear

Well I'll try it with some command to see if the combination appears because with the keyboard nothing at all, I have to run this when I'm in any emulator with a running rom.
But in the developer options the option that comes up is this: SWTICH CONFIRM & CANCEL BUTTONS IN EMULATIONSTATION, it is this truth. because SWTICH A & B BUTTONS IN EMULATIONSTATION does not appear.

Thank you so much.

I have installed a USB controller and configured the keys with the quick access key and if indeed with the controller the options work and I open retroarch with the hoykey + a, now in retroarch access to the configuration -- input and quick access, and remove hotkeys I don't want. and save the current configuration. And when you enter again, it still does not save the configuration, I mean, the configuration is not saved by accessing as you tell me, mate.

You don't want to understand that Retrobat doesn't work like you want to... You have to adapt to they way it have been programmed.
Or maybe Retrobat isn't the right solution for your need.

Thank you very much then!, and sorry for insisting.