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Nintendo 64

Nintendo 64 games run on a bundled standalone Mupen64Plus emulator. Put your ROMs in Roms/Nintendo 64 (N64)/.

Controls

Device button N64 button (Nintendo layout) N64 button (Xbox layout)
Right (A on the cap) A B
Bottom (B on the cap) B A
Top (X on the cap) C-Left C-Down
Left (Y on the cap) C-Down C-Left
Right stick C-Up / C-Down / C-Left / C-Right same
Left stick Analog stick same
D-pad D-pad same
L1 / R1 L / R same
L2 Z same
START Start same

Unlike Dreamcast, the N64 face buttons follow the Button Layout setting. N64 A and B stay on whichever buttons act as A and B. The two C buttons on the face follow X and Y.

All four C buttons are on the right stick. C-Left and C-Down are also on the face, so you can press the two C buttons most games use for items or actions without letting go of the stick. C-Up and C-Right exist only on the right stick.

Brick: no analog sticks

The Brick has no sticks, so most games (Mario Kart 64, Super Mario 64) won't move. Set the FN switch's Dpad mode to Joystick or Both, and flip the switch on to steer with the D-pad.

More detail
  • A stick push counts as a C-button press once it is most of the way over.
  • On the Brick, the D-pad normally drives the N64 D-pad, not the analog stick. That's why games won't move until you change the FN switch.
  • C-Up and C-Right have no button on the Brick.

Video plugin

Two video plugins are bundled, and each game can use whichever one you pick:

Plugin Best for Texture packs
GLideN64 More accurate rendering, and the fullest set of Emulator Options sections. Heavier on the hardware. Yes, the only plugin that loads them
Rice Much lighter to run No

The default plugin depends on your device.

To change it:

  1. Open the N64 emulator's options:
  2. In Video Plugin, the first option section, choose GLideN64 or Rice.
  3. Restart the game. The change takes effect the next time the game starts.

See Emulator Options for how these fit together.

Rice has no true widescreen

Rice's 16:9 and Stretch modes only stretch the 4:3 picture rather than widening the view. Keep Rice on 4:3 for correct geometry. Switch to GLideN64 for a proper widescreen picture, since it adjusts the game's field of view.

More detail

Default plugin per device. Existing installs pick up their platform's default automatically the next time you launch an N64 game or open its options.

Device Default plugin
Brick Rice
Brick Pro Rice
Smart Pro Rice
Smart Pro S GLideN64

Rice performance. On the Brick in testing, Rice used roughly 2.6× less CPU and produced far fewer audio underruns than GLideN64.

Option sections follow the selected plugin. The Emulator Options sections change with Video Plugin: pick a plugin, press B back to the section list, and that plugin's sections appear.

  • GLideN64 has the full set: Rendering, Texture Enhancement, Hi-Res Textures, Dithering, Frame Buffer, Performance, Gamma.
  • Rice has its own smaller set: Rendering, Texture Enhancement, Frame Buffer and Performance.
  • High-resolution texture packs still load under GLideN64 only.

Same behaviour on both plugins. The in-game menu (Continue / Save State / Load State / Quit), quit-autosave and Game Switcher resume all behave the same on both plugins.

Aspect ratio on 16:9 screens. On the 16:9 Smart Pro and Smart Pro S panels, Rice keeps the 4:3 N64 picture with black bars down each side by default, the same as GLideN64. To change it, open Emulator Options → Rendering → Aspect Ratio (4:3 / 16:9 / Stretch) while Rice is the selected plugin. The 4:3 Brick and Brick Pro panels are unaffected. Rice cannot render true widescreen.

High-resolution texture packs

Rice-format texture packs are supported (with limitations due to 1 GB RAM).

Texture packs need GLideN64

Despite the "Rice-format" name, packs load only under the GLideN64 video plugin, not Rice. On devices that default to Rice (Brick, Brick Pro and Smart Pro), switch the game to GLideN64 first.

  1. Place the pack in Roms/Nintendo 64 (N64)/.hires_texture/<ROM NAME>/. <ROM NAME> is the ROM's internal header name (e.g. MARIOKART64), not its filename.
  2. Launch the game. The first launch converts the pack, with an on-screen progress display. Large packs take several minutes.
  3. Later launches start fast.
More detail
  • Finding the header name: run the game once and look for the Core: Name: line in .userdata/<platform>/logs/N64.txt.
  • The cache: the pack is converted into a cache in Roms/Nintendo 64 (N64)/.cache/. It needs extra free space on the SD card (e.g. a 2.6 GB pack produces a ~450 MB cache). Later launches load straight from the cache.

Netplay

Nintendo 64 Netplay supports up to 4 players.

Player count depends on the device

3–4 players need a Smart Pro S on every seat. On the Smart Pro / Brick / Brick Pro, N64 netplay is limited to 2 players (as host or joiner).

More detail

N64 renders a separate split-screen viewport per player. On the Smart Pro, Brick and Brick Pro, the GPU can't hold full speed past a 2-way split.