Atari/Legends Flashback Expansion Builds

[rocketfan]

@OrangeKryptonite On a Flashback 9 you would just install custom firmware and install the files onto a FAT32 formatted SD card, not on a stick.  I forgot to mention to @magnusfalkirk that I did find and test on a Flashback 9 standard and things appeared to work fine.

 

As far as custom firmware for AFB9, if you look in the /tools folder on the distribution there is a firmware folder with two separate folders for AFB9 and AFB9 Gold.  There is an overclock available for the 9 standard, but not the Gold - and they are NOT the same or interchangeable, using the wrong one will likely break your device.  IMO for whatever reason the AFB9 was not quite as performant as the AFBX.   My reason is some people reported the videos would never play as well on those. 

Edited January 22 by rocketfan

[OrangeKryptonite]

1 hour ago, rocketfan said:

@OrangeKryptonite On a Flashback 9 you would just install custom firmware and install the files onto a FAT32 formatted SD card, not on a stick.  I forgot to mention to @magnusfalkirk that I did find and test on a Flashback 9 standard and things appeared to work fine.

 

As far as custom firmware for AFB9, if you look in the /tools folder on the distribution there is a firmware folder with two separate folders for AFB9 and AFB9 Gold.  There is an overclock available for the 9 standard, but not the Gold - and they are NOT the same or interchangeable, using the wrong one will likely break your device.  IMO for whatever reason the AFB9 was not quite as performant as the AFBX.   My reason is some people reported the videos would never play as well on those. 

Thanks so much for the detailed response. Too bad there isn't an overclock for the 9 Gold otherwise it would be perfect with the wireless controllers. 

 

So I assume then by your response that all you need to do is flash the firmware using the SD slot...you don't need to open the device up first like you need to do with the X to initially flash it to enable OTG USB support, correct? 

 

[magnusfalkirk]

13 hours ago, rocketfan said:

@OrangeKryptonite On a Flashback 9 you would just install custom firmware and install the files onto a FAT32 formatted SD card, not on a stick.  I forgot to mention to @magnusfalkirk that I did find and test on a Flashback 9 standard and things appeared to work fine.

https://forums.atariage.com/profile/66451-orangekryptonite/

As far as custom firmware for AFB9, if you look in the /tools folder on the distribution there is a firmware folder with two separate folders for AFB9 and AFB9 Gold.  There is an overclock available for the 9 standard, but not the Gold - and they are NOT the same or interchangeable, using the wrong one will likely break your device.  IMO for whatever reason the AFB9 was not quite as performant as the AFBX.   My reason is some people reported the videos would never play as well on those. 

Rocketfan, thank you very much for this long awaited updated to the Nexus build! I'm in the process of downloading the torrent. Will report if there are any problems. Thnks again for this.

Edited January 22 by magnusfalkirk

[OrangeKryptonite]

This is a really outstanding build. I'm curious, are there any other supported cores that haven't beed added in yet? I am wondering in particular about the potential for Laserdisc titles like Dragons's Lair and Philips/Magnavox CDi.

 

Edited January 22 by OrangeKryptonite

[rocketfan]

On 1/21/2024 at 8:58 PM, OrangeKryptonite said:

So I assume then by your response that all you need to do is flash the firmware using the SD slot...you don't need to open the device up first like you need to do with the X to initially flash it to enable OTG USB support, correct? 

Yes, under Tools there is a firmware folder with (very) brief instructions, but I believe the original AtariAge thread from @Brad_from_the_80s who made the custom firmware for these Atari flashbacks is still here which probably gives more details.  You have made me realize that area could use some updates to explain things in a little more detail and especially in light of the newer versions out in the last year or so.

[rocketfan]

14 hours ago, magnusfalkirk said:

Rocketfan, thank you very much for this long awaited updated to the Nexus build!

You are certainly welcome!  I have been enjoying it - and some of the challenges of getting new things going.  Also, it "forced me" to get back up to speed on the home brew scene which is really active and full of great games for Atari systems.  There is so much 8-bit home-brew that I think it could be split into a separate section like the one for VCS home-brew.    

[rocketfan]

6 hours ago, OrangeKryptonite said:

am wondering in particular about the potential for Laserdisc titles like Dragons's Lair and Philips/Magnavox CDi.

Sorry to be a downer, but that was tried with no success.  I believe we reached the top end of what these can do, although you never know.  Unfortunately all the devices running retroarch just keep getting more powerful, so I don't think there will be a new push to make super efficient libretro cores for the lower end like these little arm devices.  Someone out there asked about Wii emulation on these - no way!  An emulator has to be quite a bit more powerful than the device it's trying to emulate, especially when the emulation is shooting for "cycle exact" perfection.  Some of these emulators for Sony systems can run 4X resolution - I wish they would introduce 0.25X resolution mode for really low end hardware, plus it might look pretty retro.  🙂

 

Still, there may be some cores that could be brought in.  In the past, ironically the C64 core and VIC-20 cores would never work, but only due to some incompatibility with our front end, not because of processing power reasons.

 

All that said, maybe also check out the current Sega CD area if you have not. 

[OrangeKryptonite]

54 minutes ago, rocketfan said:

Sorry to be a downer, but that was tried with no success.  I believe we reached the top end of what these can do, although you never know.  Unfortunately all the devices running retroarch just keep getting more powerful, so I don't think there will be a new push to make super efficient libretro cores for the lower end like these little arm devices.  Someone out there asked about Wii emulation on these - no way!  An emulator has to be quite a bit more powerful than the device it's trying to emulate, especially when the emulation is shooting for "cycle exact" perfection.  Some of these emulators for Sony systems can run 4X resolution - I wish they would introduce 0.25X resolution mode for really low end hardware, plus it might look pretty retro.  🙂

 

Still, there may be some cores that could be brought in.  In the past, ironically the C64 core and VIC-20 cores would never work, but only due to some incompatibility with our front end, not because of processing power reasons.

 

All that said, maybe also check out the current Sega CD area if you have not. 

Oh man, C64 would be a GREAT addition if it was possible but there would likely have to be some sort of virtual keyboard overlay for full compatibility.

[Batchman]

Have downloaded the new build, now will just have to find the time to install it Amidst all my procrastinating.

 

Thank you, Rocket! Love seeing this continue!

[rocketfan]

On 1/24/2024 at 2:05 AM, Batchman said:

Love seeing this continue!

Thanks for the encouragement!

 

I have been off on a tangent for a few days, but it wound up being a productive tangent in this case.  This attached DosBox core improves performance and sound quite a bit.  It applies to both the recent Nexus 1.6 and December Arcade Legends Flashback builds.  If you plan to play with the DOS games or add any additional ones, replace the file in the /emulator folder on your drive with this one.

 

I have in mind to go back to add some very early Atarisoft DOS games to the next iteration.  I found the emulation can be really good of such old and undemanding games, but sound was particularly bad for the emulation of the PC speaker.  So this addressed that in particular, but along the way some compilation changes really helped performance overall.

 

 

 

dosbox_pure_libretro.so

Edited January 26 by rocketfan

[OrangeKryptonite]

Awesome! Applying now! Thanks so much!! 

[Batchman]

What I want to know is where and on what can I play old computer games I really enjoyed from the early Mac days.

 

Some day I'd love to get a chance to find a copy and manage to really play the full version of Gridz! 8-) or Spectrum Holobyte's Solitaire Royale (I think ... had 8 solitaire games, and a sort of tournament you could do where you would play through each game once in order.)

 

Memories!

[rocketfan]

15 hours ago, Batchman said:

Gridz! 8-) or Spectrum Holobyte's Solitaire Royale

I took a look around, Gridz seems like it was MAC only. No idea how to play that today.  Solitaire Royale was also released for DOS, so I tried it on a Legends Flashback and it came up with no fuss very well. I thought I was going to win my first game of Klondike, but no!  It's a really good implementation and even has instructions for all the games.  It might need button mapping for the AFBX, but should work fine.  It has a main "click the card" button, and a button (start) is needed to bring up the in-game menu interface.  That game has a save game interface in the "file" menu.  The Dosbox Pure core creates a "virtual" disk for each game, and that save and restore function actually works, which is pretty neat since the built in save states don't work with the core on these devices. 

 

A couple things I should mention about the DOS games:

 

1) You generally want to play in keyboard mode.If you are asked if you have a joystick usually say no (Atarisoft Marble Madness seems to be an exception). Some games might need a special key to start things up or maybe do some special function later.  Like if the games says press "k" to start in keyboard mode you would just bring up the on screen keyboard (Z on the legends flashback or Select on the Atari flashback) to press the K key.  If the game says you can press "Escape" to return to them menu you may not have a button for it, but it can be done through the onscreen keyboard, and so on.

2)The games always need mods to the /msdos/data/retroplayer.ini modified specifically for the the game to disable rewind, to map so you can open the keyboard, and for older arcade games to slow things down enough to be playable.  If the core plays 1982 games without a manual setting they go insanely fast.  Once I put out an update there will plenty of examples in there.

 

I have found a lot of enjoyable older DOS games to add coming up. For example Ms. Pacman and Battlezone from the early 80's are really good ports.

Edited January 27 by rocketfan

[Batchman]

I was just rambling ... didn't expect anyone to actually look into it ... thank you for the effort!

[rocketfan]

@Batchman You happen to catch me while I've been looking for some good DOS games to beef up the section.  Good timing - LOL.  My first thought when I saw your comment was they might be available for DOS.  Solitaire Royale turned out to be a good suggestion, and it's implementation works surprisingly well for joystick use with the cursor hopping the "mouse pointer" quickly between the cards, plus the save game thing is a very cool aspect of that.   It will be in an update for sure.  Makes me think I should explore Spectrum Holobyte games a little more.  One of my favorite platformers for Genesis is Tinhead, which is a pack-in game on some AtGames products.  I played it a lot when I first got my Arcade Legends Flashback.

 

 

 

 

 

[rocketfan]

Good news update - C64 is going to work.  I have to say IMO the core is slightly buggy, or at least it relies on the retroarch configuration scheme to initialize some values, which seems like a poor practice.  Our little "libretro front end" on the flashbacks doesn't have all those config menus, so anything that does not get initialized through the normal init callback can be a problem.  The audio rate setting was defaulting to zero and so as soon as a game started the emulator crashed.  The function to bring up the OSK had a similar issue.  Last thing which can be very confusing is that C64 crazily uses controller 2 by default, but apparently that is the way many/most of the original games worked.

Edited January 29 by rocketfan

[rocketfan]

VIC 20 is a go as well.  Dust off your VIC 20 1311 joystick and prepare to play some Jelly Monsters.

 

[rocketfan]

On the off chance someone wants to play with it, here are the patched up cores to put in /emulator:

 

vice_xvic_libretro.sovice_x64_libretro.so

 

Here are the runcommand lines to enable some game extensions:
 

  "T64")
      /usr/bin/startx /tmp/retroplayer.l ${dev}/emulator/vice_x64_libretro.so $gm >/dev/null 2>&1 ;# >${dev}/output_x64.txt 2>${dev}/error_x64.txt
     ;;
  "a0")
      /usr/bin/startx /tmp/retroplayer.l ${dev}/emulator/vice_xvic_libretro.so $gm >/dev/null 2>&1 ;# >${dev}/output_xvic.txt 2>${dev}/error_xvic.txt
     ;;
  "20")
      /usr/bin/startx /tmp/retroplayer.l ${dev}/emulator/vice_xvic_libretro.so $gm >/dev/null 2>&1 ;# >${dev}/output_xvic.txt 2>${dev}/error_xvic.txt
     ;;
  "D64")
      /usr/bin/startx /tmp/retroplayer.l ${dev}/emulator/vice_x64_libretro.so $gm >/dev/null 2>&1 ;# >${dev}/output_x64.txt 2>${dev}/error_x64.txt
     ;;
  "crt")
      /usr/bin/startx /tmp/retroplayer.l ${dev}/emulator/vice_x64_libretro.so $gm >/dev/null 2>&1 ;# >${dev}/output_x64.txt 2>${dev}/error_x64.txt
     ;;

 

 

Here are the core options I have been using (some of them are essential) and example button mappings to put in retroplayer.ini  - Put in /rom/data/retroplayer.ini if you just wanted to play some games out of /game - later they will be included a Commodore folder.

 

[Core]
vice_vic20_memory_expansions=16kB
vice_mapper_select=TOGGLE_VKBD
vice_joyport=1
vice_c64_model=C64 NTSC
vice_vic20_model=VIC20 NTSC
vice_sound_sample_rate=22050

[KeyMappingUser]
GIANA1.D64=0, 8, 11, 9, 1, 2

 

 

 

Edited January 30 by rocketfan

[rra]

On 1/29/2024 at 7:38 AM, rocketfan said:

thing which can be very confusing is that C64 crazily uses controller 2 by default, but apparently that is the way many/most of the original games worked.

Yes, most C64 games use port 2 for single player games.  A few games use port 1, and some allow you to choose.

 

C64 and Vic20 emulation will be great additions to Nexus!

[rocketfan]

40 minutes ago, rra said:

Yes, most C64 games use port 2 for single player games.

The vice_joyport=1 setting above appears to effectively swap them, or maybe it just tries to force joystick 1?  However, it can be overridden either per game with a game specific setting in retroplayer.ini, or even dynamically because there is a button in the on-screen keyboard to impact which "virtual" joystick is being controlled.  A nice feature of the emulator - a short press of select (mapped to z on LFB) brings up the keyboard, a long press brings up a status display which can be useful since it gives feedback on joystick activity.

 

I realized the button mapping I gave above was for the LFB - for the AFB it would be different, maybe this:

 

[KeyMappingUser]
GIANA1.D64=0, 8, 11, 2, 1, 9

Although I'm not sure it's needed at all on an AFB - or maybe needs swapping the 0 and 8.  I haven't tried it yet.

[TampaBay]

This Nexus build is *awesome*.  I created an account on this forum just to say thank you to all of you who put this together!  It's incredible!

 

I have a Flashback 9, and I just picked up a Flashback 12 Gold.  I was trying to figure out what to do with the FB9 when I came across this forum just reading reviews of various Atari products  While scanning comments about the Flashbacks, Gamestation Pro, etc., I kept seeing comments about "Nexus" so I started reading all the threads from way back in 2022.  I didn't realize you could apply custom firmware to these consoles with that much extra functionality.  Anyway, fast-forward and I grabbed Nexus 1.6, booted up my FB 9, and I couldn't believe what you all were able to accomplish on this box.  It's amazing!

 

The majority of what I've played works perfectly, and that's everything from the Atari console line, the arcade cabinets, the Sega consoles, and the Playstation.  Some favorites from the non-Atari consoles are Outrun and Space Harrier II on Genesis, Star Wars on Genesis 32x, and Gran Turismo and Galaga: Destination Earth on Playstation.  From the arcade cabinet section, I loved playing Jungle Hunt again!  All of the Atari line from the 2600 up were great.  The only game I can think of that I couldn't get the controls to work on was Pole Position in the "Atari Arcade' section, and considering I played dozens if not hundreds of games already, that's a pretty great record.

 

Install was no problem.  I had to move the files over to my SD card in batches because my laptop wouldn't let me transfer 4+ gigs at once, but that was no big deal.  

 

This is a super-impressive setup.  A huge thanks to all of those who contributed to putting this together.  I'm sure it was countless hours of effort, and it is appreciated!!

 

 

[rocketfan]

11 hours ago, TampaBay said:

This Nexus build is *awesome*.

Thanks for the kind words - a lot of work by a lot of people led to the current build.  The originator of the community builds and I were possibly a little obsessed for a period of time.  LOL  Also, welcome to AtariAge.  It's a great time to be an Atari fan with Atari releasing neat stuff and seemingly caring about their legacy/history as much as we do for a change.

 

I was surprised Pole Position is mapped wrong!  Unfortunately it's a little arcane to get into the mame mapping on these, but try dropping the attached config into the /rom_aarc/data/mame2000/cfg folder on your build and hopefully you will get:  Select or Start add a coin/start, push forward to shift, pull back to brake, fire button to accelerate.

 

 

 

poleposa.cfg

Edited February 1 by rocketfan

[Cthulhu8u]

A new Nexus build for LFB? That's what I get for not checking this thread for a few months!

Very exciting news, now I am looking forward to finding some time to download and try it out. I was quite happy with my current build and wasn't expecting any updates at this point, but the fact that it's still growing in emulation support is amazing.

I still have my LFB hooked up in my basement and will turn it on occasionally to play a few arcade games. Still going strong and an awesome device with Nexus considering I didn't pay much.

Thank you for the continued device support @rocketfan

[TampaBay]

8 hours ago, rocketfan said:

Thanks for the kind words - a lot of work by a lot of people led to the current build.  

 

...but try dropping the attached config into the /rom_aarc/data/mame2000/cfg folder on your build and hopefully you will get:  Select or Start add a coin/start, push forward to shift, pull back to brake, fire button to accelerate.

 

 

 

poleposa.cfg 1.53 kB · 1 download

 

Yeah of course!  I can totally see how much work you've put into it, so I just wanted to recognize that and say thanks.  I'm sure it's easy for some to come in and see it and think it magically "just appears", without realizing how many hours actually went into it.  I still can't believe how much functionality you're able to add to these little boxes and to see what they're capable of.  

 

I grew up with the 2600 and have a Flashback 2 as well (always thought I might mod it to take cartridges, but never found the motivation, ha).  I've been playing these games for years, and yes, lately Atari and 3rd party companies have really stepped up their game.

 

I didn't have any luck with the file for Pole Position, but I honestly wasn't fishing to ask for a fix!  Actually the opposite, my intention was to point out how flawless everything works and that I barely found any games that didn't operate properly!  That's quite a feat considering how many games there are in the build.  I also think it's really cool that you all focused on the one-button games and weeded out the stuff that wouldn't work because it requires multiple buttons.

 

Totally unrelated, any solutions you can think of if the Flashback Player 1 joystick with the menu button breaks?  I was playing Bruce Lee for Atari 8-bit and got so into the game I managed to snap my Flashback 9 joystick.  I tried to repair it, and well, let's just say that didn't go well and the whole thing ended up in the trash (the inside of it pretty much disintegrated when I opened it up).  I wound up buying a used FB 9 on ebay for like 20 bucks for the joystick and a backup FB 9, but was just wondering if there's some other solution that I'm missing if the joystick with the menu buttons breaks.  I tried putting My FB 12 joystick in the Player 2 port and playing games with a non-menu-button joystick in the Player 1 port, but in the Player 2 port, the menu buttons don't work properly.  Anyway, that's all getting a little off-topic.

 

Thanks again for all your work.  I can't wait to keep exploring all the games in all the consoles!

[rocketfan]

@TampaBay   One place you can get Flashbacks cheap in general is shopgoodwill.com, in fact they have a set of flashback joysticks right now.  With shipping I think they'll be around $20, so no savings over what you did.  The shipping and handling is high and often a spoiler on that site, but sometimes there's a 1 cent shipping one.  I think that's where I picked up my spare LFB and the AFB9. 

 

Actually it's possible to play a lot of things with a standard joystick.  The flashback joysticks are recognized to be a little worse than an original or say a hyperkin trooper.  You can use select on the console body plus joystick pushed a direction (I think it's down?) to get the menu in a game so you can exit.  However, you need a trick to get back to the game selection menu - from the manual file we have this below.  Not sure I agree with the up, I thought it was down.  🙂

 

 

**********************
* EXIT GAME SHORTCUT *
**********************

When exiting a game you no longer have to go back to the current game's details page. You can now instead go directly to the current top menu. This helps if you are playing with a joystick that does not have the extra P1 menu button. 

To implement the Exit Game Shortcut move the "restart_return" file from the /emulator/tools/Exit_Shortcut folder to the /emulator folder. 

NOTE: Use the Select button/switch on the console + Up on a controller for the Menu button. Just an FYI, the Rewind button is Select on the console + Down on the controller.

 

 

It's weird, the (corrected) controller mapping on Pole Position is working for me.  The only thing I can think - there's a duplicate/additional mame2000 folder right directly under /rom_aarc - which is NOT the one where you want that file placed.  You need it in the mame2000/cfg which is underneath the "data" folder.   Anyway, since it's working for me it will be fixed for sure in a future version.  I waited a long time between the previous updates, but it will be much sooner for the next ones.  I really appreciate it if people mention when something's not right.  As you say a lot of it is good, there's just so much there's always bound to be some broken parts.