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Retro-Bit Super Retrocade with Capcom, Data East games


Flojomojo

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  • 4 weeks later...

This thing's pretty neat. Loaded up a few test ROMs for MAME, Neo Geo, Genesis, NES, SNES, Gameboy, Gameboy Color, and Gameboy Advance and it played them all. Anyone know of any other systems this can play?

 

Sound emulation can be a bit dodgy and the controllers aren't the most responsive at times, but I can live with that with what this thing will do.

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  • 1 month later...

1.1 virgin flashable dump here:

 

https://www.rendezvo.us/super_retro-cade

 

 

From the readme:

 

Questions have been raised about the legality of distributing this data. To this, I respond with the following: Given the purposes of this data (allowing legal owners of the Super Retro-Cade to lawfully upgrade their hardware to the latest version of the operating platform, as promised in the press release here:

 

http://retro-bit.com/super-retrocade-press-release

 

 

and to enable other features such as PCE emulation via the already-included cores), the fact that provisions for updating the firmware _already exist_ in the firmware but images were never released, and the fact that nearly the entirety of the whole distribution (emulators and game code alike) were *illegally* distributed and are _unlicensed_, despite manufacturer claims) - the only piece of legal, undisputed (as of yet) intellectual property being a small, poorly-written Java front-end loader...I will be able to sleep just fine at night knowing this was made public. If you aren't comfortable, delete the content and move on with your life. Nobody is forcing you to keep or use it.

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Wrt the above .... the part to get Lakka, edit couple of files to be able to first backup the old and then "dd" the new is not exactly user-friendly, I understand why mind you.

 

I wonder how long it will be before a ready-made lakka update img file for 1.1 with those step already done?

If I get it right it's really a Lakka first boot, 2 files edit and a script that could check if the version is 1.0 and in case unmount everything, take a backup on the SD and then "dd" the 1.1 in ... but not my cup of tea.

 

 

Do we know how much better are the tweaks performed in 1.1? (nobody cares about the extra games)

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The download works now... I just need to figure out how to get that file installed on my Super Retro-Cade. Evidently I must have already installed Lakka on it, because that's what comes up when I boot it. Man, it's been so long since I used this crazy thing...

 

You definitely don't want to update a partition you booted from - get Lakka working on a SD card, copy the firmware to that card (using a LInux host) and then boot into SD Lakka and dd the image back to NAND from there.

 

If you need more precise details than that, let me know.

 

To be perfectly honest, my priority was making sure the content was preserved and available, assuming someone else would take up the mantle and make an all-in-one SD card image to upgrade from (either using the built-in features of the firmware to do it or using Lakka as a springboard).

Edited by Rodney Hester
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Lakka is working on an SD card. If I pull it out the system should boot with the original operating system. I could double check, though.

 

Also, I don't really know how to "dd" anything. I presume that once I'm running Lakka on the Super Retro-Cade I can run Linux commands on it with a USB keyboard. I'm just not sure how to access the command line. There's a lot I don't really know, so yeah, I think I'm going to need more information.

 

For instance, where would I put the IMG file on the SD card? Straight on the root? I can boot my PCs into Linux with a boot disc... I just burned a fresh copy of Ubuntu, so I should be set there.

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I'm running Ubuntu on my desktop right now. I'm moving the IMG file over to the SD card but I'm not able to put it in the root folder... it simply will not allow me. For now I'm sticking it in with the ROMs; hopefully it can be moved to the correct place later.

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... the fact that nearly the entirety of the whole distribution (emulators and game code alike) were *illegally* distributed and are _unlicensed_, despite manufacturer claims) ...

 

So, not even the games are legal? That's a rather disturbing point--and if you have some specific evidence to support the claim* I'd be interested to read it.

 

* I can believe it, of course, given they were shady enough to use non-commercial emulators in a commercial product. I'm just a bit surprised they attached their names to the product and risk being sued by actual companies (Capcom, specifically).

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So, not even the games are legal? That's a rather disturbing point--and if you have some specific evidence to support the claim* I'd be interested to read it.

 

* I can believe it, of course, given they were shady enough to use non-commercial emulators in a commercial product. I'm just a bit surprised they attached their names to the product and risk being sued by actual companies (Capcom, specifically).

 

It's actually worse than that. They removed Nintendo branding on NES games.

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It's actually worse than that. They removed Nintendo branding on NES games.

 

Um, AFAIK that's because the noticed "Licensed by Nintendo of America" doesn't apply on non-Nintendo consoles. You see a similar alteration in the Mega Man Legacy collection. Ie, I don't think that's proof of anything nefarious and instead if anything proof of trying to be legally compliant.

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Some people mistake that as implying Nintendo has some sort of ownership or control, when in fact these are Capcom properties and so forth that the owners are free to license out or rerelease themselves.

 

All it's basically saying is Nintendo has approved your release and is allowing you to publish it on their system in exchange for a slice of the pie. You're not giving up future rights to your property when that "Licensed by Nintendo" line shows up.

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All it's basically saying is Nintendo has approved your release and is allowing you to publish it on their system in exchange for a slice of the pie.

 

That's precisely why it needs to be removed. Retro-Bit Super Retrocade isn't a Nintendo system, and Nintendo hasn't approved release of Mega Man 2 (or others) for the system. Given what is the tarnished reputation that is this system, leaving that line in could reasonably be a basis to believe Nintendo's trademark is being tarnished as well. That'd mean Nintendo could potentially sue Retro-Bit or Capcom for misuse of trademark. At least, that's my non-lawyer understanding of how lawyers tend to push hard on protecting their trademark.

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Microsoft did the same thing with Rare Replay. All of the NES games have had their references to Nintendo scrubbed out.

100% true. We were the devs on the Rare Replay emulation and the only reason that line was originally there was because, basically, back in the day (and this is still essentially the model for consoles today) Nintendo licenced the game, and did the manufacturing of the carts, etc. Without that physical process of bringing the game to retail on the NES, Nintendo is out of the equation, and the copyright owner has no longer has any business using their trademark.

 

We even had to replace the letters you collect that spell "NINTENDO" in RC Pro Am with "CHAMPION" for the same reason: the game was Rare's but Nintendo owns the trademark to their name and gets to determine who uses it, when, and how.

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OK - I'll back off my position on the games, I honestly didn't know that (thanks for the confirmation, Jeff!). It's also a very common practice amongst companies like Sachen, and obviously their motivations are quite different. ;)

 

That being said, there's still this:

 

https://www.libretro.com/index.php/category/retro-bit/

 

and what's even more amusing, *it doesn't use RetroArch at all*. Arcade emulation is provided by MAME4droid, which is a particularly sore point because that's a property *I* worked pretty heavily on for a while.

 

Still no regrets. Hope the firmware helped someone.

Edited by Rodney Hester
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  • 3 weeks later...

I have been playing around with this Super Retrocade for a few months now, and thought I would throw in my 2 cents. I currently have a dedicated SD card for arcade games. Then I have a 2nd SD card that has SNES and Genesis. I dont know if this was previously mentioned, but if you want to separate how the games appear, you can:

1) do a quick format on your SD card.

2) on your PC, sort the games by type

3) now select all your Genesis games, & copy them to the SD card

4) now select all your SNES games, & copy them to the SD card

5) finally, select all the image (png) files, & copy them to the SD card

6) when the SD card is read by the Retrocade, it will show thumbnails of all the Genesis games first, followed by all the SNES games

 

This is just a quick trick to have the games appear, sorted by system.

 

Also, the new Genesis & Saturn controllers recently released by Retro-bit ( http://retro-bit.com/sega-collaboration), work awesome with the Super Retrocade!

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  • 5 months later...

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