Parallel Launcher

An open source launcher for the ParallelN64 emulator featuring very easy controller configuration, automatic loading of ROMs from given folders, and automatic setup of optimal settings.

The ParallelN64 core for RetroArch has a number of advantages over other emulators: it's faster and more accurate than Project64, it comes with all graphics plugins built in so you don't need to manually install and update them, and it runs on Windows, Linux, and Mac. However, as a RetroArch core, it also has some downsides: setting up controllers in RetroArch is needlessly confusing and difficult, you need to change the default settings for the best experience, and it doesn't have a great way to manage your library of games.

Parallel Launcher aims to fix all of these problems, so you can get the best of Nintendo 64 emulation without all the hastle. Parallel Launcher features a very straight-forward controller setup, shows you the important options with good defaults enabled by default, and has a simple game library interface that allows you to categorize your games and track your play time.

Parallel Launcher also features optional integration with romhacking.com. With this integration, you can download hacks from your playlists (with the recommended graphics plugin and other settings set automatically for you), as well as rate hacks and manage your playlists from within the app. It also features a built-in star display for SM64 hacks to track your progress in each hack.

Parallel Launcher also uses a custom build of ParallelN64 that adds some features, including the addition of the GLideN64 plugin and support for emulated Gamecube controllers (yes, the N64 technically supports that!)

Special Thanks

aglab2 for bringing GLideN64 to the ParallelN64 core and providing some optional tweaks to improve compatibility with older romhacks, as well as getting the ParaLLEl plugin working on MacOS and supporting ARM.
Wiseguy for implementing Gamecube controller support
devwizard for adding SummerCart SD card support

Thanks to the translators:

Italian - Luigi "JakeDower" Orabona
Spanish - Daniel "Reonu" León
German - Kate "CommandMC" Dröge
French (Standard) - Naeso
French (Québécois) - max954
Arabic - Elazul
Portuguese - Lila
Japanese - Rulu

Building Parallel Launcher from Source

Building on Linux

• Install the dev dependencies.
  • Debian/Ubuntu/Mint: sudo apt install build-essential coreutils dosfstools findutils fonts-noto-core fonts-noto-cjk fonts-noto-mono fuse3 libfuse2t64 libgcrypt20-dev libjack-jackd2-0 libqt5svg5-dev libsdl2-dev libsqlite3-dev p7zip-full policykit-1 qt5-qmake qtdeclarative5-dev qttools5-dev-tools udisks2 xdg-utils
  • OpenSUSE: sudo zypper install coreutils dosfstools findutils fuse3 gcc15 gcc15-c++ google-noto-sans-arabic-fonts google-noto-sans-fonts google-noto-sans-jp-fonts google-noto-sans-jp-mono-fonts google-noto-sans-mono-fonts libQt5DBus-devel libSDL2-devel libgcrypt-devel libqt5-linguist libqt5-qtbase-common-devel libqt5-qtdeclarative-devel libqt5-qtsvg-devel p7zip polkit sqlite3-devel udisks2 xdg-utils
  • Fedora/CentOS: sudo yum install coreutils dosfstools findutils fuse3 gcc gcc-c++ glibc google-noto-sans-arabic-fonts google-noto-sans-fonts google-noto-sans-jp-fonts google-noto-sans-mono-fonts libgcrypt-devel libstdc++ p7zip polkit qt5-linguist qt5-qtbase-devel qt5-qtdeclarative-devel qt5-qtsvg-devel SDL2-devel sqlite-devel udisks2 xdg-utils
  • Arch/Manjaro: sudo pacman -S coreutils dosfstools findutils fuse gcc gcc-libs glibc libgcrypt make noto-fonts noto-fonts-cjk p7zip polkit qt5-base qt5-declarative qt5-svg qt5-tools sdl2 sqlite udisks2 xdg-utils
• Build the makefile with ./qmake-release.sh (or ./qmake-debug.sh for the debug build)
• Run make to build

If you are editing the UI, you will also want to install either Qt Designer or Qt Creator

Building on Windows

Setup

Note: if you plan on building both 64-bit and 32-bit builds, I recommend that you create both a release64 and release32 folder, then copy the appropriate one to the mentioned release folder when you want to build.

• Install Visual Studio 2019
• Install "Desktop development with C++" from the Visual Studio installer
• Download Qt from https://download.qt.io/archive/qt/5.12/5.12.12/qt-opensource-windows-x86-5.12.12.exe
• Run the installer and select a custom install
  • Select the following options from Qt 5.15.2 to install:
    • MSVC 2019 32-bit
    • MSVC 2019 64-bit
    • Qt Network Authorization
    • Qt Debug Information Files
  • Select the following options from Developer and Designer Tools
    • Qt Creator 9.0.2
    • Qt Creator 9.0.2 CDB Debugger Support
    • Debugging Tools for Windows
    • OpenSSL 1.1.1q Toolkit
• In Qt Creator, go to Tools -> Options, then set your cmake location if it was not set automatically
• Create a win64 folder (or win32 for building 32-bit) in your checkout directory and put an include and lib directory inside it.
• Copy kernel32.lib, Ole32.lib, AdvAPI32.lib, dinput8.lib, dxguid.lib, DbgHelp.Lib, User32.lib, Version.lib, Shell32.lib, and Virtdisk.lib to your lib directory (should be found somewhere like C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Lib\10.0.18362.0\um\x64)
• Copy dbghelp.dll from C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Debuggers\x64 (or \x86 for 32-bit) to your release folder.
• Copy msvcr100.dll from C:\Windows\System32 to your release folder. (Or, if you are doing a 32-bit build on a 64-bit machine, take the one in the C:\Windows\SysWOW64 folder)
• Download the SDL2 development libraries for Visual C++ from https://github.com/libsdl-org/SDL/releases
  • Copy the SDL2.lib file into your win64/lib (or win32/lib) folder
  • Make an SDL2 directory in your win64/include or win32/include directory, and copy all of the SDL header files into it
  • Copy that dll file into your release folder
• Download the Windows port of dosfstools (mkdosfs) from here and put the exe in your release folder
• Download the sqlite precompiled binaries for windows from https://sqlite.org/download.html and put the dll file in your release folder
• Download the sqlite source code amalgamation and put the sqlite3.h header file in your include folder
• Build sqlite3.lib by following the instructions here https://gist.github.com/zeljic/d8b542788b225b1bcb5fce169ee28c55 and put it in your lib folder
• Download the standalone command line version of 7zip from https://www.7-zip.org/download.html
  • Copy 7za.exe, 7za.dll, and 7zxa.dll into your release folder
• Create a winfonts folder in your checkout directory
• Download (or copy from a Linux install) the Noto Sans font family and the NotoMono font, and store the ttf font files in the winfonts folder
  • The font files should be: NotoSans-Regular.ttf, NotoSans-Bold.ttf, NotoSans-Italic.ttf, NotoSans-BoldItalic.ttf, and NotoMono-Regular.ttf
  • You will also want to add the Arabic and CJK fonts: NotoSansArabic-Regular.ttf, NotoSansArabic-Bold.ttf, NotoSansCJK-Regular.ttc and NotoSansCJK-Bold.ttc
• Download the discord-rpc library from https://github.com/discord/discord-rpc/releases
  • Copy the lib into your win64/lib (or win32/lib) folder
  • Copy the dll into your release folder
• Open the app.pro file in Qt Creator
• Set the build directory to your checkout directory and set your build configuration to release (or debug)
• Build the project for the first time in Qt Creator
• Run windeployqt release/parallel-launcher.exe
• Copy the C++ runtimes DLLs from your system to the release directory (they will be located in a directory path something like C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio\2019\Community\VC\Redist\MSVC\14.28.29325\x64)
• Copy the libcrypto and libssl dlls into your release directory from C:\Qt\Tools\OpenSSL\Win_x64\bin (64-bit) or C:\Qt\Tools\OpenSSL\Win_x86\bin (32-bit)
• Optionally, you can also build the style plugins to make more themes available (see below)
• Run windows-deploy-translations.ps1

Building

• If you made changes to the ui files or changed build configurations, run qmake again
• Build the project from Qt Creator.
• In the release directory, run C:\Qt\5.15.2\msvc2019_64\bin\windeployqt.exe (64-bit) or C:\Qt\5.15.2\msvc2019\bin\windeployqt.exe (32-bit)
• If the translations changed, run windows-deploy-translations.ps1 in the root directory

Building the Styles/Themes (Optional)

• Clone the repository hosted at https://github.com/qt/qtstyleplugins into some temporary directory
• Open the project file in Qt Creator
• Go to the Projects tab and set the build configuration to Release
• Run qmake and build from Qt Creator
• Copy the built plugin DLL files to the style directory in your debug/release folder for parallel-launcher

Building the Installer

• Download and install Inno Setup (https://jrsoftware.org/isinfo.php)
• Open win64-installer.iss (or win32-installer.iss for a 32-bit build) in the source directory
• Click the green play button to build the installer