BeetleDC Libretro NAOMI and MAME ROM support!

Libretro Team

Flyinghead is adding MAME ROM support to the arcade side of BeetleDC Libretro.

Here is what has currently been implemented:

  • NAOMI M1 cartridge support
  • NAOMI M2 cartridge support
  • NAOMI M4 cartridge support

Things you need to know

  • Right now, only non-merged romsets work. A merged rom is a ROM without parent, it contains all the files needed.
  • NAOMI M4 cartridges require a special BIOS file to be put inside your System directory. The M4 bios should be in a “naomi.zip” file in the BIOS folder (/dc ). The file in specific which hsould be inside that zip file is called ‘epr-21576h.ic27’.

Other important additions/changes

  • in the past, NAOMI games would only work with BeetleDC Libretro if you loaded .lst files. .lst files are no longer necessary now. You should be able to run an arcade game with BeetleDC Libretro using the plain .bin/.dat file instead now. So theoretically it should now be capable of just loading Demul-compatible ROMs instead.
  • Ring Out 4×4 now allows for up to 4 player support due to adding dual I/O board support for this game.

What are the list of MAME ROMs that are compatible?

You can check the entries inside this file here –

https://github.com/libretro/beetle-dc/blob/master/core/hw/naomi/naomi_roms.h

Out of these games, nearly all should work except for Samba De Amigo right now.

What’s planned/next?

  • Sammy Atomiswave MAME ROM support
  • Sega NAOMI GD-ROM MAME ROM support

BeetleDC Libretro now supports the keyboard as an input peripheral!

Libretro Team

Keyboard support has now been implemented by flyinghead! In this video you see us testing the game Typing Of The Dead, which relies on a keyboard as its primary input device..

In order to play this game, make sure the keyboard is set to Port A of the Dreamcast. You can see us doing this in the video by going to the Quick Menu, selecting ‘Controls’, and setting the first port to ‘Keyboard’. Now restart the core and the game. You should now be able to play the game.

Game focus toggle

Quick tip: RetroArch by default binds a lot of keyboard keys to hotkeys. In order to be able to use the keyboard in full, try to bind ‘Game focus toggle’ to a key. You can do this by going to Settings – Input Hotkeys, and binding ‘Game focus toggle’ to any key you want.

How this will work is as follows: if you press the game focus toggle, you will be in ‘game focus’ mode. In this mode, none of the hotkeys will work, and you can use every key of the keyboard. When you want to go back to the RetroArch hotkey mode, you press the ‘game focus toggle’ key again in order to deactivate game focus mode.