EmulationStation Interface for MiSTer and a NES Style Case

[SD2SNES]

theming_system.png (405.07 KiB) Viewed 4006 times

Hello. I really like the EmulationStation interface, I consider it a lush interface ever created for a retro -game.

I have long wanted to buy an RPi3-4 with RetroPie that has an EmulationStation shell, but the poor performance in SNES games repelled me and the lack of RGB output. I was very interested in MiSTer because it is hardware based. I would like to have nice console titles and screenshots with descriptions or even videos, since I don't want to launch every game and look for good games in the list for a long time.

Is it possible to make such an EmulationStation in this version 1 or at least in the next version 2 if it is ever designed to support Nintendo 64 and Dreamcast and early PC for Diablo 2 and Heroes M&M III ?

I would also like Retroflag to write out cases for MiSTer in the form of classic NES SNES SEGA consoles because there is not a single normal case in the form of a console on the market.

[Insert Disk Two]

Nope.

There won't be a version 2 supporting Dreamcast.

[thorr]

I was able with a huge amount of effort to install my MiSTer and Digital IO board into the NESPi 4 case. It can fit if you are willing to gut the internals and run a ribbon cable for the HDMI port and use a small USB hub with the outer plastic shell removed. I have nice HDMI and USB jacks in the back for everything, and the front two USB ports I was able to rig up one as SNAC and the other as USB, and the power and reset work too. I also have an ADC port for connecting paddles with the Atari 2600. An analog IO board would most likely not fit.

[MostroW]

I think you've got the wrong idea on what MiSTer is as a system in it's current state.

The DE10 has limitations on what it can perform as an fpga, it has been discussed many times before.
I'd recommend strolling over the forums to read a few discussions concerning your "request(s)".

If you want an experience that's very near to hardware level then MiSTer can fulfill that, if you're looking for systems beyond Playstation and Saturn currently that's not possible because of multiple limitations, again read over the board and do some homework.

Many people always post on forum "asking" on what they'd like to see, people should (in my honest opinion) readjust those expectations / beliefs because asking looks like demands most of the time.
Most of the developers here do their work for free and have a patreon set up for some much needed funds for additional things they need to get a core up and going, it consumes a lot of time and money.

If there's ever going to be a follow up system nobody knows for sure, but my best guess is that the industry will keep developing newer, faster and cheaper stuff time given, i don't believe that fpga based hardware will be an exception, though that's my belief.

[Malor]

AFAIK, an interface like that could be implemented, but would have to be written. Also AFAIK, none of the current devs are even vaguely interested. So it would be up to you: create it yourself, or pay someone to do it for you. And it would need to be good enough to convince the existing devs to accept into mainline.

The Dreamcast and N64 can't be done on the present hardware, and both would be extremely hard projects even if an FPGA board came out that was large and fast enough. Don't expect hardware emulation on either for years. And they are probably a hard wall on what FPGA can accomplish; they would be enormous projects to duplicate in hardware, and going any further is unlikely to ever happen. The real companies making the real chips spent millions or even tens of millions designing the circuitry, so expecting hobbyists to duplicate hardware of that complexity for free is, IMO, wishful thinking. Even if FPGAs got fast enough, any hobbyist capable of completing those projects could be working instead, and making a ton of money.

The Mister project is extremely unlikely to ever do what you want, and your focus on the Pi is misplaced. A fast mini-ITX PC, on the other hand, can emulate almost anything. You've got the usual latency problems of software emulation, but they'd be even worse on the Pi. You should be able to fit a mini-PC like that into a case that looks like a console, and get pretty good results. Just make sure to buy a CPU that runs cool, and make sure you've got some airflow.... this is not console-like, but that's the price you'll pay to be able to run the software you want.

[DevilHunterWolf]

There is a different expectation that comes with MiSTer. Unlike a lot of other projects that are interested in flash and fancy, MiSTer focuses on a hardware like experience. That means fast, closer to instant load from a cold boot and quick loading of cores. The DE10-Nano board was not selected because it could handle a full GUI with video playback. It was selected because it had HDMI standard, an ARM processor to run a basic Linux installation and system tasks, and had some additional FPGA capabilities compared to the chip in the MiST board. It's this lean and (comparatively) basic experience that lends itself to the simple, low latency experience that is common when using a MiSTer for retro gaming. Using a MiSTer is like using a flash cart attached to an ever changing console, not a computer.

If the main consideration you have for a retro gaming device is a fancy interface and videos, MiSTer is not what you're looking for. You'd be better suited sticking to a Raspberry Pi, a PC, or some other single board computer. All of those extras come at a performance requirement that the DE10-Nano was not selected to handle and configuring headaches that come with the additional features. But if you decide you want to return to the old days of turn on and boot a game quickly, then feel free to look at the MiSTer project once again!

[SD2SNES]

As far as I understand, MiSTer has the same blue menu with settings on Linux as RetroPie, they also said above that the DE10-nano has an ARM processor and this means that you can install the EmulationStation shell on it. I think sooner or later someone will do it.

[PistolsAtDawn]

No, your understanding is far off. Sorry to be blunt, but you clearly aren't listening to anyone.

[Hetzen]

I guess if you have a remote operated video switcher, you could potentially send launch commands from a Pi to a DE10 to launch menu'd games. You'd have to switch the video signal between the two systems if you wanted to share the same screen.

RMC had a barcode scanner that launched MiSTer games from original boxes. So remote control is possible.

[Malor]

I think sooner or later someone will do it.

The only way to be certain is if that someone is you.

[grizzly]

As far as I understand, MiSTer has the same blue menu with settings on Linux as RetroPie

Yes it's pretty much the standard way for the linux terminal to setup/install things.

they also said above that the DE10-nano has an ARM processor and this means that you can install the EmulationStation shell on it.

Have an ARM cpu yes!
Emu station could probably be installed fine, running it could maybe happening but it would run EXTREMELY SLOW and that is IF it would run at all.
And by EXTREMELY SLOW i mean it would take forever to to ANYTHING!!!

WHY? you ask.
Because the ARM cpu on the mister does not have ANY GPU AT ALL which means that anything that will use anything graphically will be EXTREMELY SLOW if it can run at all.
On top of that the cpu have a very low clock too.

Compared to a raspberry pi.
The pi 1 have a single core 700mhz cpu AND a gpu so for running stuff like emustation the pi will be MUCH,MUCH,MUCH faster then the misters 800mhz cpu with no gpu.
The first pi 2 had a 900mhz cpu (the second pi 2 had 1,2ghz cpu) and they where 4 cores and will be faster then the 2core 800mhz mister cpu.

[SD2SNES]

Will it run slowly even at 800x600p on a 4:3 CRT TV?

[Bas]

Yes. Look at what the current menu core does and hoe it works.

[Nickie]

I would also like Retroflag to write out cases for MiSTer in the form of classic NES SNES SEGA consoles because there is not a single normal case in the form of a console on the market.

Multisystem? jammix? ironclad?

regarding MiSTer, being hardware-based you actually have to fight your instinct of thinking in terms of "CPU power" or such "bits x MHZ" type of capacities because the chip is blank unless programmed otherwise,

as stated before, the ARM cores that coexist along the FPGA are just good enough to manage file access and USB devices and that's it, it's original purpose was to be remotely accessed via text terminal and handle pretty simple tasks

so the GUI you get on MiSTer is a whole core on it's own, whereas the interface of emulation station runs on a linux kernel and standard graphical libraries that already existed for it
on MiSTer you would have to program the whole thing from scratch, along with the supporting "hardware" in the FPGA itself if you want a video output

it CAN be done absolutely, i mean if you can run a whole Saturn on that chip, you can run an animated GUI, but it will really require someone VERY dedicated to that exact task

[aberu]

The only way to find out if it can be done is to try it yourself.

[flynnsbit]

I had zombo.com help me create a version for MiSTer as it said it was possible and that you can do anything.

Mister RetroPie.png (2.32 KiB) Viewed 3190 times

[Malor]

I suspect the menus and graphics might be possible via the existing framebuffer; it's capable of displaying quite nice color images. And you might even be able to animate the UI a little bit if you wrote the code very efficiently in a fast language, although major pans and scrolls may not work.

But, AFAIK, videos are highly unlikely to happen. Someone would have to write a video accelerator for the FPGA, and the only existing one I know of is the PS1's movie decoder, which is super crappy compared to anything modern. It may well not be possible to decode modern video with the Cyclone V, no matter how talented a dev tackles the problem, because there just may not be enough bandwidth on the chip to shovel that much data in and out. And the ARM chip definitely can't do that, it has nowhere near enough horsepower.

Video, in other words, is just not very damn likely, and even a graphic UI is likely to be sluggish, unless someone wrote a bunch of video accelerator functions for the FPGA. That part might be doable, and you might be able to get a reasonably snappy graphic UI. But someone has to want to do it. It would be a major time investment for something that doesn't matter at all to most devs. The existing text menu is fine.

The idea of using an outboard barcode scanner is an interesting one, though. You could have a display wall and just point your wand at something. RMC on Youtube has already got this working, so it's obviously possible. You could probably use the favorites script as a base to work from.

[pbsk8]

As far as I understand, MiSTer has the same blue menu with settings on Linux as RetroPie, they also said above that the DE10-nano has an ARM processor and this means that you can install the EmulationStation shell on it. I think sooner or later someone will do it.

where can be accessed this menu so I select only the systems I play?

[Malor]

I've never seen that screen, so maybe it's a contributor-only feature in update_all?

[Flandango]

That looks like one of the config scripts for EmulationStation and not MiSTer