Disclaimer: I haven't used this at all (no Steam Deck yet) so I have no idea how good it actually is, but WOW am I excited to use my device for emulation once I get it. I really like that it gives...
Disclaimer: I haven't used this at all (no Steam Deck yet) so I have no idea how good it actually is, but WOW am I excited to use my device for emulation once I get it. I really like that it gives the option between integrating the games in your Steam library and keeping them separate. Very convenient.
This is old as hell, but I just got my deck and had some thoughts I hope are relevant: I just set up RetroArch on my desktop and my Deck, which I received yesterday and have been loading up, and...
This is old as hell, but I just got my deck and had some thoughts I hope are relevant:
I just set up RetroArch on my desktop and my Deck, which I received yesterday and have been loading up, and put it on my Deck just now, and it synced my saves over, which meant all I had to do is manage my ROMs. I was just jamming some Tony Hawk's Pro Skater (this entire series is problematic for emulators) with desktop-level performance, and was able to load my save. If you just use the defaults, your saves will go to the Steam cloud.
I guess my question is, months after this post, what did @kfwyre, or maybe anybody else, settle on for emulation? I find RetroArch to be easy to use, and it's what I'm most familiar with, as well as providing an amazing experience that actually negates the need for something like Emudeck, at least for my purposes. I can probably get any PC game I wanted running through Steam thanks to Proton as well.
Congrats on getting your Deck! When I got my Deck I looked into the emulation options, and ended up opting against using EmuDeck. Some people had great success with it, but I also saw some that...
Congrats on getting your Deck!
When I got my Deck I looked into the emulation options, and ended up opting against using EmuDeck. Some people had great success with it, but I also saw some that had issues. Given that it's just a setup script, if something goes wrong it's not really easy to undo, and I'm not savvy enough to resolve or work around something like that.
There's also RetroDeck which looks promising but, as of the last time I checked, needs some more time to cook.
I went with installing emulators individually through Discover in Desktop mode. You have to add Flathub as a source (super easy) and then you have access to any emulator that has a Flatpak, which covers probably 90% of the systems out there. I installed a bunch but, honestly, have only emulated PlayStation games (via DuckStation) so far. It's a bit more to manually set up the emulators individually but 1) that can kind of be fun in and of itself and 2) I have a far better knowledge of what's going on with them. I don't particularly love RetroArch myself, and in my emulation digging it turns out there's some bad blood in the emulation community regarding it (the DuckStation developer specifically pulled his emulator from RetroArch). As such, I opted to just set up an individual system and load the ROMs from there.
An additional upside to this is that I generally have more up-to-date emulators. From what I've read, the RetroArch cores often lag behind the individual releases.
The tradeoff for this is that I have to manually configure everything, and I also don't have individual games with box art in Game Mode. Instead, I just open the emulator itself in Game Mode and then open whatever specific game I want to play from within the emulator. I don't mind this at all, but I can definitely see why some people would want something like EmuDeck to integrate individual game shortcuts into Game Mode.
If RetroArch works for you, that's definitely the easiest way to go about things though. It's a powerful one-stop-shop. I also think (but am not sure) that it's the only way to get cloud saves, since it's the only one that's integrated with Steam.
That's not a huge concern for me, as I've never really felt like I missed anything with RetroArch. If I want to do Gamecube or PS3 I'll just get that emulator anyway. RetroDeck looks like it may...
An additional upside to this is that I generally have more up-to-date emulators. From what I've read, the RetroArch cores often lag behind the individual releases.
That's not a huge concern for me, as I've never really felt like I missed anything with RetroArch. If I want to do Gamecube or PS3 I'll just get that emulator anyway.
RetroDeck looks like it may just be a RetroArch wrapper, which is frankly unnecessary.
I don't particularly love RetroArch myself, and in my emulation digging it turns out there's some bad blood in the emulation community regarding it (the DuckStation developer specifically pulled his emulator from RetroArch). I also just found that EmuDeck uses RetroArch as a backend, I assume for everything up to PSX/N64, so that's another point where I've solved the problem.
I wish I could not use RetroArch for this, because apparently it's one of the factors that lost us byuu/Near, but I feel I'm too bought into the ecosystem. I'll see how my guilt guides me because I'm not new to manual setups. I'd just rather not have to set them up.
I was thinking of setting up my own emulators and syncing the saves, as I'm already doing that with syncthing, but I was also stoked when I found RetroArch has cloud saves, so I may stay there for a while. Otherwise I'll look into Ares, started by the late Near, as I prefer multi-system software as a one-stop shop.
I had no idea RetroArch was involved with Near’s passing (as far as I knew it was mostly the result of another site which I won’t name). That makes me sour even more on it, which is a shame,...
I had no idea RetroArch was involved with Near’s passing (as far as I knew it was mostly the result of another site which I won’t name). That makes me sour even more on it, which is a shame, because the convenience of RA is unparalleled.
And yeah, there’s nothing stopping you from using RetroArch for some of your systems and stand-alone emulators for others. That’s what EmuDeck and RetroDeck both do.
Regardless of where you end up, I hope you enjoy your emulation! The Deck is absolutely incredible for it (unsolicited protip: I use the back paddles for save-states, which I find ULTRA convenient).
It was the project lead, who apparently has a reputation as a grade-A asshole. I explored other solutions, such as Mednafen + Mednaffe and Ares, but nothing quite worked as well as RetroArch, so...
It was the project lead, who apparently has a reputation as a grade-A asshole.
I explored other solutions, such as Mednafen + Mednaffe and Ares, but nothing quite worked as well as RetroArch, so I'll just settle on that for now. I'm frankly not going to be emulating much anyway, especially not newer systems. I definitely want to look into setting up save states and rewind functionality.
Excuse me while I cuss... SONOFABITCH I received the email from Steam the other day saying my 512GB version was ready (I was marked as "after Q3" so didn't expect it yet). I am in the midst of...
Excuse me while I cuss...
SONOFABITCH
I received the email from Steam the other day saying my 512GB version was ready (I was marked as "after Q3" so didn't expect it yet).
I am in the midst of getting rid of the old console games we don't play any longer.
I had just looked up the state of Wii, Gamecube, PS2, and PS3 emulation for the games I was planning to keep with the idea of getting rid of all of the consoles as well.
I had this story bookmarked to watch progress and completely forgot about it.
I decided I didn't really need the Steamdeck because most of the PC games I play aren't small screen friendly, I rarely adopt first gen tech, and I could emulate the console games I do play, just have to be at my desk to play them instead.
So I let my reservation expire.
Oh geez, that's brutal. I'm sorry. To be fair, emulation for the consoles you're interested in is still sort of a mixed bag on the device. And if it's easier for you I can just say those consoles...
Oh geez, that's brutal. I'm sorry.
To be fair, emulation for the consoles you're interested in is still sort of a mixed bag on the device. And if it's easier for you I can just say those consoles are all FLAT OUT BROKEN and you're not missing anything!
If you're really re-thinking it though, maybe try contacting Steam Support? I've read a few success stories of them working favors for people who missed their reservations. It of course might not work for you, but could be worth a shot.
I'm interested in more than just those, I just knew that emulation for them wasn't as perfected as it was on older hardware that I also play. I don't need it immediately. So I just put went and...
I'm interested in more than just those, I just knew that emulation for them wasn't as perfected as it was on older hardware that I also play.
I don't need it immediately. So I just put went and put in a $5 reservation again.
Just the damn timing since I received the refund notification yesterday then pop onto Tildes and see this again.
Disclaimer: I haven't used this at all (no Steam Deck yet) so I have no idea how good it actually is, but WOW am I excited to use my device for emulation once I get it. I really like that it gives the option between integrating the games in your Steam library and keeping them separate. Very convenient.
This is old as hell, but I just got my deck and had some thoughts I hope are relevant:
I just set up RetroArch on my desktop and my Deck, which I received yesterday and have been loading up, and put it on my Deck just now, and it synced my saves over, which meant all I had to do is manage my ROMs. I was just jamming some Tony Hawk's Pro Skater (this entire series is problematic for emulators) with desktop-level performance, and was able to load my save. If you just use the defaults, your saves will go to the Steam cloud.
I guess my question is, months after this post, what did @kfwyre, or maybe anybody else, settle on for emulation? I find RetroArch to be easy to use, and it's what I'm most familiar with, as well as providing an amazing experience that actually negates the need for something like Emudeck, at least for my purposes. I can probably get any PC game I wanted running through Steam thanks to Proton as well.
Congrats on getting your Deck!
When I got my Deck I looked into the emulation options, and ended up opting against using EmuDeck. Some people had great success with it, but I also saw some that had issues. Given that it's just a setup script, if something goes wrong it's not really easy to undo, and I'm not savvy enough to resolve or work around something like that.
There's also RetroDeck which looks promising but, as of the last time I checked, needs some more time to cook.
I went with installing emulators individually through Discover in Desktop mode. You have to add Flathub as a source (super easy) and then you have access to any emulator that has a Flatpak, which covers probably 90% of the systems out there. I installed a bunch but, honestly, have only emulated PlayStation games (via DuckStation) so far. It's a bit more to manually set up the emulators individually but 1) that can kind of be fun in and of itself and 2) I have a far better knowledge of what's going on with them. I don't particularly love RetroArch myself, and in my emulation digging it turns out there's some bad blood in the emulation community regarding it (the DuckStation developer specifically pulled his emulator from RetroArch). As such, I opted to just set up an individual system and load the ROMs from there.
An additional upside to this is that I generally have more up-to-date emulators. From what I've read, the RetroArch cores often lag behind the individual releases.
The tradeoff for this is that I have to manually configure everything, and I also don't have individual games with box art in Game Mode. Instead, I just open the emulator itself in Game Mode and then open whatever specific game I want to play from within the emulator. I don't mind this at all, but I can definitely see why some people would want something like EmuDeck to integrate individual game shortcuts into Game Mode.
If RetroArch works for you, that's definitely the easiest way to go about things though. It's a powerful one-stop-shop. I also think (but am not sure) that it's the only way to get cloud saves, since it's the only one that's integrated with Steam.
That's not a huge concern for me, as I've never really felt like I missed anything with RetroArch. If I want to do Gamecube or PS3 I'll just get that emulator anyway.
RetroDeck looks like it may just be a RetroArch wrapper, which is frankly unnecessary.
I wish I could not use RetroArch for this, because apparently it's one of the factors that lost us byuu/Near, but I feel I'm too bought into the ecosystem. I'll see how my guilt guides me because I'm not new to manual setups. I'd just rather not have to set them up.
I was thinking of setting up my own emulators and syncing the saves, as I'm already doing that with syncthing, but I was also stoked when I found RetroArch has cloud saves, so I may stay there for a while. Otherwise I'll look into Ares, started by the late Near, as I prefer multi-system software as a one-stop shop.
I had no idea RetroArch was involved with Near’s passing (as far as I knew it was mostly the result of another site which I won’t name). That makes me sour even more on it, which is a shame, because the convenience of RA is unparalleled.
And yeah, there’s nothing stopping you from using RetroArch for some of your systems and stand-alone emulators for others. That’s what EmuDeck and RetroDeck both do.
Regardless of where you end up, I hope you enjoy your emulation! The Deck is absolutely incredible for it (unsolicited protip: I use the back paddles for save-states, which I find ULTRA convenient).
It was the project lead, who apparently has a reputation as a grade-A asshole.
I explored other solutions, such as Mednafen + Mednaffe and Ares, but nothing quite worked as well as RetroArch, so I'll just settle on that for now. I'm frankly not going to be emulating much anyway, especially not newer systems. I definitely want to look into setting up save states and rewind functionality.
Excuse me while I cuss...
SONOFABITCH
I received the email from Steam the other day saying my 512GB version was ready (I was marked as "after Q3" so didn't expect it yet).
I am in the midst of getting rid of the old console games we don't play any longer.
I had just looked up the state of Wii, Gamecube, PS2, and PS3 emulation for the games I was planning to keep with the idea of getting rid of all of the consoles as well.
I had this story bookmarked to watch progress and completely forgot about it.
I decided I didn't really need the Steamdeck because most of the PC games I play aren't small screen friendly, I rarely adopt first gen tech, and I could emulate the console games I do play, just have to be at my desk to play them instead.
So I let my reservation expire.
Excuse me while I cuss again...
SONOFABITCH
If it makes you feel better I missed my Q3 email while traveling...
We shall suffer together, deckless.
see @kfwyre's comment, it might help you
I was traveling as well and caught mine, literally ordered it on the way to breakfast that day.
Oh geez, that's brutal. I'm sorry.
To be fair, emulation for the consoles you're interested in is still sort of a mixed bag on the device. And if it's easier for you I can just say those consoles are all FLAT OUT BROKEN and you're not missing anything!
If you're really re-thinking it though, maybe try contacting Steam Support? I've read a few success stories of them working favors for people who missed their reservations. It of course might not work for you, but could be worth a shot.
I'm interested in more than just those, I just knew that emulation for them wasn't as perfected as it was on older hardware that I also play.
I don't need it immediately. So I just put went and put in a $5 reservation again.
Just the damn timing since I received the refund notification yesterday then pop onto Tildes and see this again.