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Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES)

Overview

The Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) application is an emulator for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System game console.

Super Boss Gaiden by Dieter von Laser

Controls

The emulator supports up to five controllers (when Multitap is enabled). The keyboard and gamepad mappings are listed in the tables below.

Keyboard

Keyboard support is only available for controller one.

Name
Keys
 Comments
Move
A
B
X
Y
Left Shoulder
Right Shoulder
Start
Select The Right Shift Key.
Show Pause Screen

Gamepad

Gamepad support is available for all controllers.

Name
Gamepad
 Comments
Move  or 
A
B
X
Y
Left Shoulder
Right Shoulder
Start Not available for Xbox and not recommended for iOS (see alternate)

Press the Menu (Start) Button.
Start
(Alternate)		  and  Hold down the Right Trigger and click (press down) on the Right Thumbstick.
Select Not available for Xbox and not recommended for iOS (see alternate)

Press the View (Back) Button.
Select
(Alternate)		  and  Hold down the Right Trigger and click (press down) on the Left Thumbstick.
Show Pause Screen  and  Not available for Xbox and not recommended for iOS (see alternate 3 or 4)

Hold down the Left Trigger and press the Menu (Start) Button.
Show Pause Screen
(Alternate)		  and  Not available for Xbox and not recommended for iOS (see alternate 3 or 4)

Hold down the Left Trigger and press the View (Back) Button.
Show Pause Screen
(Alternate 2)		  and  Not available for Xbox and not recommended for iOS (see alternate 3 or 4)

Hold down the X Button and press the View (Back) Button.
Show Pause Screen
(Alternate 3)		  and  Hold down the Left Trigger and click (press down) on the Left Thumbstick.
Show Pause Screen
(Alternate 4)		  and  Hold down the Left Trigger and click (press down) on the Right Thumbstick.

Battery-backed SRAM

Some SNES cartridges include battery-backed SRAM as a means of preserving state between sessions. The SNES application supports persisting this SRAM state into the browser's local storage or optionally to cloud-based storage. The SRAM contents will be persisted to storage whenever the pause screen is displayed (or the game is exited). Therefore, the menu should be displayed periodically for games that support battery-backed SRAM to ensure the state is properly persisted.

Feed

This section details how SNES application instances can be added to feeds.

Types

Two SNES application types are available, each offering different trade-offs in compatibility, features, and system resource requirements. Libretro SNES9X is the default (⭐) and is mapped to the snes alias. The default can be overridden globally in Settings > Applications, or on a per-item basis in the Feed Editor.

Name Type Filters Cheats Low CPU
Libretro SNES9X ⭐ retro-snes9x ✅ ✅
SNES9X snes9x ✅

Properties

The table below contains the properties that are specific to the SNES application. These properties are specified in the props object of a feed item.

Property Type Required Details
cheat URL No URL to a cheat file for the current ROM. See the Cheats Tab in the Item Editor for details on assigning cheat files.

(Libretro SNES9X only)
pal Boolean No Whether to force PAL video mode for the specified ROM.
port2 Numeric No The type of controller that is plugged into port #2 (defaults to Standard).
  • 0 : Standard controller
  • 1 : Multitap adapter (up to 5 controllers)
rom URL Yes URL to an SNES ROM file or a zip file containing a ROM file.
zoomLevel Numeric No A numeric value indicating how much the display image should be zoomed in (0-40).

This property is typically used to hide the black borders that are present on some games.

Example

The following is an example of a complete feed that consists of a single SNES application instance (type value of snes). The rom property value is a URL that points to a Dropbox location that contains the excellent homebrew game Super Boss Gaiden by Chrono Moogle and Dieter von Laser.

{
  "title": "SNES Feed",
  "longTitle": "Super Nintendo Entertainment System Example Feed",
  "categories": [
    {
      "title": "SNES Games",
      "longTitle": "Super Nintendo Entertainment System Games",
      "items": [
        {
          "title": "Super Boss Gaiden",
          "type": "snes",
          "props": {
            "rom": "https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/uzjekhtrrfyik5h/superbossgaiden.sfc"
          }
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}

This example can be tested by adding a feed with the following URL within the webЯcade player:

https://tinyurl.com/sample-snes-feed

References

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