Atari/Legends Flashback Expansion Builds

[rocketfan]

@RichardB Just to verify a couple of things:

 

1) You put the file AFB9_Custom_Firmware.img (or AFB9G_Custom_Firmware.img if you have a GOLD unit) onto the root of an SD, renamed as atari_update.img, and went through the boot - reply yes, and reboot process?

 

2) When you placed the contents of the .zip on the SD card, have you included both /mount_sd.ini as well as /startup.sh - which must appear at the root of the SD?  (All the games folders need to be directly in the root as well, not placed in a subfolder).

 

 

(Hint:  The correct custom Firmware can be found in the /tools folder under /tools/Firmware_Backup.)

 

 

No - I don't think you need the original FW.  You should just be able to install the custom one. 

 

One other thing - if you are using a Mac, beware that it can do strange things like modify case or leave hidden extensions on files.  Linux is case sensitive, so if anything like the case of filenames is changed it won't work.

Edited June 2, 2022 by rocketfan

[chadcabrera]

Hi @rocketfan,

 

I've applied the most recent updates from the older thread that was supposed to get both Sega CD games and TG-16 CD games to work. Sega CD works when capitalizing the extension like you said, but TG-16 CD games seem to have stopped working? Maybe I did something wrong and there's a file I should replace?

[RichardB]

18 hours ago, rocketfan said:

@RichardB Just to verify a couple of things:

 

1) You put the file AFB9_Custom_Firmware.img (or AFB9G_Custom_Firmware.img if you have a GOLD unit) onto the root of an SD, renamed as atari_update.img, and went through the boot - reply yes, and reboot process?

 

All sorted now.  I made the mistake of assuming I'd already done step one when I installed the custom firmware from Flojomojo.  I've now used the one from your zip and am very happy to report I've got Nexus up and running.

 

Many thanks for keeping this going, and for your help!  Now I just need to get the paddles working...

[rocketfan]

On 6/2/2022 at 3:32 PM, RichardB said:

All sorted now. 

Hey, that's great!  I'm glad you got it going.

 

On 6/2/2022 at 7:10 AM, chadcabrera said:

TG-16 CD games seem to have stopped working?

Hmmm, For the Legends Flashback it's hard for me to say about the older stuff at this point.  You could try using the /emulator/runcommand.lfb file from the newer build (linked above in post #12) which I will attach here.  That's the file that sets up the mappings for extensions.  I suggest rename the older file before you drop this one in emulator.  Verify that the /tg16/???.chd files truly have lower-case extensions - .chd, NOT .CHD.

 

 

 

runcommand.lfb

Edited June 4, 2022 by rocketfan

[Gamer2020]

I've been looking for this for a while so far I only have a couple questions I noticed on archive you can't Download just one folder from the pack (ex neogeo) so far I have everything else and it all is working great the other question is Playstation working on this and what file and extension do the images need to be?

Edited June 6, 2022 by Gamer2020
Messed up

[rocketfan]

On 6/6/2022 at 11:03 AM, Gamer2020 said:

I noticed on archive you can't Download just one folder from the pack (ex neogeo) so far I have everything else and it all is working great the other question is Playstation working

On the LUFB download,  yeah - there is not a simple way to get one folder AFAIK.  Archive at least lets you use a torrent client using their own "automatic" seeds, which isn't too bad.  You could "import" just ng into your setup, if you want everything else intact.  Probably the simplest way is to copy over the ng folder, then rename your emulator and rom folderss to like emulator.old and rom.old and copy those over also to get the links and support needed.

 

Strictly speaking PS1 can work, I have played a couple of games.  It doesn't work very well - the device is not quite powerful enough.  That said I always thought that with the right tweaks it might play some games acceptably - but I did try things like frame skip already.  It looks like PBP (all caps) extension is set up (hint: you can find games in "autobleem" archives for the PS Classic) but I'm not sure it's going to work out of the box.  I'll experiment a bit more when I have a chance.  Ultimately, these do a good job up to "4th Generation" consoles, and not really after that.

[Gamer2020]

On 6/8/2022 at 7:38 AM, rocketfan said:

On the LUFB download,  yeah - there is not a simple way to get one folder AFAIK.  Archive at least lets you use a torrent client using their own "automatic" seeds, which isn't too bad.  You could "import" just ng into your setup, if you want everything else intact.  Probably the simplest way is to copy over the ng folder, then rename your emulator and rom folderss to like emulator.old and rom.old and copy those over also to get the links and support needed.

 

Strictly speaking PS1 can work, I have played a couple of games.  It doesn't work very well - the device is not quite powerful enough.  That said I always thought that with the right tweaks it might play some games acceptably - but I did try things like frame skip already.  It looks like PBP (all caps) extension is set up (hint: you can find games in "autobleem" archives for the PS Classic) but I'm not sure it's going to work out of the box.  I'll experiment a bit more when I have a chance.  Ultimately, these do a good job up to "4th Generation" consoles, and not really after that.

Thanks for the response I also have another question is there a way to disable rewind for certain games I have both tmnt arcade games in .zi3 format and they run really well for me until I accidentally rewind them I also like that with the .zi3 format you don't need to press menu to insert coins

[rocketfan]

Someone on Archive asked how to enable bezels for your Legends Flashback Atari 2600 games.  At the moment the most straightforward way would be to download the Nexus slim build linked earlier in the thread (post #9) which has 2600 bezel art in it.  Unload the .zip to your hard drive, then follow these steps.

 

1) From the Nexus slim build copy the bezels from rom_a2600 to your LUFB SD card /a26 folder.  These are the *.b.png files.

2) Also copy the /rom_a2600/data/retroplayer.ini  to  the LUFB SD card  /a26/data folder (over-writing the retroplayer.ini there) - that file has the settings to turn on the per-game bezel.

 

I believe that should do it!

[rocketfan]

On 6/10/2022 at 10:08 PM, Gamer2020 said:

is there a way to disable rewind for certain games

Yes, it can be done in the retroplayer.ini file.  There is one retroplayer.ini for each "section".  In there you can either globally disable rewind for the section, or disable it on a per-game basis.

 

To disable globally you could add a line "Rewind=0" to the [Global] section for the ???/data/retroplayer.ini file for whatever game section (???) you are interested in.

 

To disable per game you add or extend a [Rewind] section and per game set =2 or =0.  I can't remember the diff between 0 and 2 - or maybe I never knew.  Possibly one produces the "rewind disabled" popup and the other doesn't?  Just a WAG on my part.

 

Example per-game section: 

 

[Rewind]
VideoChess.a26=2
Amidar.a26=0
RiverRaid.a26=0

 

Edited June 12, 2022 by rocketfan

[Gamer2020]

On 6/12/2022 at 10:31 AM, rocketfan said:

Yes, it can be done in the retroplayer.ini file.  There is one retroplayer.ini for each "section".  In there you can either globally disable rewind for the section, or disable it on a per-game basis.

 

To disable globally you could add a line "Rewind=0" to the [Global] section for the ???/data/retroplayer.ini file for whatever game section (???) you are interested in.

 

To disable per game you add or extend a [Rewind] section and per game set =2 or =0.  I can't remember the diff between 0 and 2 - or maybe I never knew.  Possibly one produces the "rewind disabled" popup and the other doesn't?  Just a WAG on my part.

 

Example per-game section: 

 

[Rewind]
VideoChess.a26=2
Amidar.a26=0
RiverRaid.a26=0

 

Now is this the same for the legends?sd/arcade/data/retroplayer.ini [Rewind]tmnt2po.zi3=0tmnt22p.zi3=0 I had no luck so then I changed the 0 to 2 still had no luck so I deleted that than I tried [Global]Rewind=2 then [Global]Rewind=0 and still no luck I don't know if I'm doing something wrong?

[rocketfan]

 

On 6/14/2022 at 7:43 PM, Gamer2020 said:

Now is this the same for the legends?

Hi yes, it is the same.  Sorry for the delayed reply, but I was out of town on vacation then just busy with work and life as usual.  I just tested it to be sure it works.

 

So, I tried with Colecovision Defender.  If you have a [Rewind] section (rewind is on one line alone - game names are on subsequent lines) like this in /cv/data/retroplayer.ini:

 

[Rewind]
defender-1983.cv=2
 

Then, when starting the game you will see an "Info" dialog which says "Rewind function is incompatible with this game."

 

If you change the 2 to a 0 you will instead see the message "Save, Load, and Rewind functions are incompatible with this game."

 

So, now we know the difference from 0 to 2.

 

There is a tricky part I forgot to mention!  For .zi3 you will need to use .zip on your filename - not .zi3.  It's because when the file is passed to the retroplayer, a link has been made with the .zip extension the emulator needs.  Even more complicated, this is not true for .zim because the emulator handles that directly!  You can see this by examining the cases in /emulator/runcommand.lfb  - many cores do need .zip so it has been changed to allow us to key off the extension but then we "rename" (really link) on the fly to give the core what it needs. 

 

TL;DR - Even though your roms have .zi3 extension - by the time the retroplayer program sees them it gets .zip - so I think you need this:

 

[Rewind]

tmnt2po.zip=2

tmnt22p.zip=2

 

 

 

Edited June 26, 2022 by rocketfan

[thesnable]

Hi!

 

Is there any other build than nexus slim out there? i would be happy for a pm.

[beatles2001]

First would like to thank Rocketfan for all the work, the nexus slim is excellent and cant believe all the cores you have got running on the flashback x, I'm running into a problem though I flashed the firmware with the cfw overclock version the Mrfister released. My system freezes now no matter what im playing and if I'm playing from the system itself or the usb stick. I tried reflashing the firmware to the 0.1.21 but still getting the freezing problem. It happens usually within 10 to 15min of playtime. Any help with this would be appreciated and thank you in advance..

[rocketfan]

@beatles2001  It does sound like your particular device is not up to the overclock.  One thing you could try is looking for a 2 amp 5V supply.  The included one is 1 amp but long ago some people reported better results with a higher current one.

 

Unfortunately, applying the 0.1.21 does not undo the overclock - I just checked the contents of it to be sure.

 

I think the good news is that (when running Nexus) the "modern" version of the overclock is done dynamically, and you can just change a script to prevent the overclock from kicking in.  So, try this:

 

On your drive, rename your /emulator/runcommand file to /emulator/runcommand.sav

copy the attached runcommand.low file to emulator and rename it to runcommand (no extension).

 

Restart your system and see if it helps!  If it does it more or less proves your unit is running too hot with the overclock.  Then, you could also try the "medium" clock rate to see if the half-way point works for your case.

runcommand.low runcommand.mdm

Edited August 6, 2022 by rocketfan

[rocketfan]

I hope anyone out there is doing well this summer!  I have been focused on some other hobbies and not visiting much, though still playing retro/Atari games here and there!

 

The only thing I have worked on a bit in the last month or so was trying a compile of a "new" 5200 core someone pointed out to me in a PM.  It's touted as an improved core based on the original Atari800 emulator.  I was able to build it - but lo and behold it didn't work too well.  There are several things I can do differently though, so I'm not giving up hope yet!  ?

 

[rra]

Are you referring to the updated Atari800 v.5.0.0 emulator?

 

[beatles2001]

On 8/5/2022 at 8:09 PM, rocketfan said:

@beatles2001  It does sound like your particular device is not up to the overclock.  One thing you could try is looking for a 2 amp 5V supply.  The included one is 1 amp but long ago some people reported better results with a higher current one.

 

Unfortunately, applying the 0.1.21 does not undo the overclock - I just checked the contents of it to be sure.

 

I think the good news is that (when running Nexus) the "modern" version of the overclock is done dynamically, and you can just change a script to prevent the overclock from kicking in.  So, try this:

 

On your drive, rename your /emulator/runcommand file to /emulator/runcommand.sav

copy the attached runcommand.low file to emulator and rename it to runcommand (no extension).

 

Restart your system and see if it helps!  If it does it more or less proves your unit is running too hot with the overclock.  Then, you could also try the "medium" clock rate to see if the half-way point works for your case.

runcommand.low 16.7 kB · 4 downloads runcommand.mdm 16.69 kB · 118 downloads

@rocketfanThank you so much the run command file did the trick, is there a way to get the overclocking out of the firmware so if I don't want to use the OTA cable I can just run the system on its own? Thank you again for your help, the system is now playable. You deserve all the praise you get on Atari Age and then some.

[magnusfalkirk]

I bought an Atari Flashback 9 on ebay that came with a 16GB card with the Nexus Community project on it. I also found the Nexus Slim 1.5.1 on Archive.org and downloaded it. I've copied some game folders from the Slim to the 16GB card, along with the appropriate all-game.ini, and am able to play the newer folder on the FB9. I ran across this thread and read through it. Then I followed Rocketfan's link to Archive.org and downloaded the LUFB zip file. I noticed there are differences in the way the rom folders are labeled, as well as the roms themselves. So I have a question, is it possible to take game roms and .pngs from the LUFB folder and transfer them into the Nexus build on the 16GB card or am I just out of luck?

[magnusfalkirk]

I just bought a 50 game LFB from eBay. I have downloaded the LUFB from archive org. My question now is this: How can I run the LUFB games, I copied the entire file to a 32GB SD card or did I waste my time and money buying the 50 game version?

[beatles2001]

3 hours ago, magnusfalkirk said:

I just bought a 50 game LFB from eBay. I have downloaded the LUFB from archive org. My question now is this: How can I run the LUFB games, I copied the entire file to a 32GB SD card or did I waste my time and money buying the 50 game version?

I believe I read somewhere that you can't use a card bigger then 16gb, give that a go, maybe it helps

[pimpmaul69]

On 5/15/2022 at 7:08 AM, rocketfan said:

I believe the previous "community projects" for Nexus and the "Legends Ultimate Flashback" were helpful to quite a few people, just based on the numbers of downloads.   In particular, I have been happy with the ability to emulate 8-bit games on these systems, and the presentation of those games is (IMHO) better than just about any other device - with nice box art and a description for every game.  Still, I respect that AtariAge gets to decide what's posted here, and those threads were probably consuming a very large amount of cloud storage given the many archive files stored in them.

 

A couple inquiries have come my way about getting the more recent builds available again.  So, I've been thinking about something that might be more tolerable to AtariAge.   Maybe just make the builds available to be downloaded from some other source?  However, the truth is that the builds had almost reached their ultimate goals considering the limited power of those devices.  Traffic on those threads had been getting slow, so maybe there is not much additional interest?

 

If anyone has opinions/ideas or just wants to discuss the possibilities, let me know.

 

 

I have a question since draxxon isnt around. Going through 53 pages in 2 threads I found his nexus up to 4.1 but 5.2 didnt seem to be in post it shouldve been in. Question i have though. He has atari 7800 games on it and they are kind of unplayable with one button. Was there ever a workaround for different controls? I am assuming not?

[pimpmaul69]

On 8/5/2022 at 6:24 PM, rocketfan said:

 

I have a question. I have an atari flashback x. Without a usb the internal emulator can use the difficulty and select switches and button. I tried every stella release i could find in the old posts and they dont work on any of them. But select works in other emulators just fine. Is there any way to fix this?

[pimpmaul69]

On 8/22/2022 at 5:46 PM, beatles2001 said:

I believe I read somewhere that you can't use a card bigger then 16gb, give that a go, maybe it helps

I doubt that it has a 16gb limit. Im using a 32gb on an atari flashback x. 

[pimpmaul69]

On 8/22/2022 at 2:31 PM, magnusfalkirk said:

I just bought a 50 game LFB from eBay. I have downloaded the LUFB from archive org. My question now is this: How can I run the LUFB games, I copied the entire file to a 32GB SD card or did I waste my time and money buying the 50 game version?

Im going to say its an older unit that didnt have the capabilities. Just like the older genesis and atari flashbacks dont work. 

[magnusfalkirk]

1 hour ago, pimpmaul69 said:

Im going to say its an older unit that didnt have the capabilities. Just like the older genesis and atari flashbacks dont work. 

Well I'm going to give it a try with somw stuff I downloaded that Rocketfan posted a link to in another thread. If it doesn't work I guess I'll just have to find another LFB.

 

magnus