CD-i member "countmammamia972" succeeded in running Link: Faces of Evil on his Android phone. That's an achievement as running Mame CD-i on Android was still a tricky thing to do (while possible as we explained in this tutorial). As we explained before, it seems that the latest versions of Mame offer less compatibility with CD-i. The latest major bug in cdimono was introduced with Mame v0.222. The current version is 0.229. In the community we hear comments that v0.217 offers better compatibility with games like Zelda: Wand of Gamelon and The Apprentice. But 'countmammamia972' used v0.174. To play Link: Faces of Evil on Android, yYou'll need to download the Mame 0.174 core from 2016. In this link you can find the file: mame2016_libretro_android.so.zip. You'll also need the config file, which is available in the files section in our Community page: (join here and download).
Let's help you with more steps to guide you through the process to get CD-i running on your Android device:
- Go to Google Play and install RetroArch on your device if you don’t already have it.
- Download the Mame Core 0.174
- Download the config file that pre-configured the CD-i parameters in Mame
- So, you will need both the mame (current) and mame2016 retroarch cores depending on what you want to do. I assume the current core has some better emulation on wahtever works, like Hotel Mario, Arcade Classics or Zelda's Adventure. The older core is for games that ceased to work, like Zelda: Wand of Gamelon, Link: Faces of Evil and The Apprentice. Both cores work a tad differently from each other. They share the same folders though: retroarch/system/mame (if you had any experience with mame, you'd know what goes in that folder):
- a hash folder for hash .xml files
- a roms folder for roms
- and an ini folder for settings
- Now, the tricky part is how the games themselves need to be put. You'll need .zip dummy files
- Within mame/roms, create a folder called "cdimono1" (that's where you will put the cdi bios files (cdimono1.zip, cdimono2.zip, cdibios.zip)
- Now, the games themselves. You'll need chd files. The chd files will go either in the same folder as the dummy files, that being cdimono1 (if you run them with mame2016) or in a separate folder named after the dummy file (If you run then with mame(current)).
- A core config file for retroarch for mame2016 you can download here. Simply copy it in retroarch/config/mame 2016.
- Make sure there is a cdi.xml file in the hash folder
- If all are in the correct folders, run the blank dummy file
- If upon boot you see an aqua screen, it means you did it correctly (be patient while it is loading)
Hotel Mario also is confirmed to work with this setup. 'Countmammamia972' found one specific bug: "I found one bug with the zelda games. The in-game cutscenes don't work correctly. You have to hold down the button until all sprites on screen dissapear, when the cutscene should play. then you release the button and the cutscene will play. Otherwise the cutscene will not play, and all you can do is return to the game."
There are some things to note:
- CD-i game chds have to be renamed if used for mame 0.220 and up. most chds you'll find online will have a [!] in their name. This is an issue with newer mame. If you want to play cdi games with mame 0.220 and up, make sure to remove the [!] - this isn't an issue for mame 0.174.
- Configuring controls is tricky. Upon loading a game, here's what you do with mame(current): press select and y togheter to bring up the mame menu. scroll to "input (this machine) and press b. change the mouse buttons to a and b and the mouse analog inc dec and whatever else to their according joystick buttons. [!] (Warning: Do not mess with the mouse analog Y and X, as they will lock the mouse vertically or horizontally. Only the mouse X, Y Inc and Dec.
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- Make sure it looks like the picture above.
- With mame2016: go into quick menu -> onscreen overlay. Change it from neo-retropad to modular keyboard -> opaque -> big
- Go back in the game and bring up the menu by pressing tab. Go back into quick menu and change the onscreen overlay back to retropad-neo. Go back to the game and configure the controls
- Optional: go into 'input (general)" -> user controls and map a button to bring up the menu instead of having to swap overlays. Use one of the l or r buttons since you won't be needing those with the CD-i.
When the links do not work anymore, contact us by commenting below or via the social channels. Please share your experience with us so we can share more insights how to run CD-i on your Android device!
[Thanks, Countmammamia972]