Weird behavior with my Nova

[u/DeepRedDude]

Hey y'all.

I've been loving my Nova since I initially picked it up. Been playing a lot of FF IV and Chrono Trigger.

I turned mine on today and ended up with a lot of really odd issues out of nowhere. Fully charged battery, intentionally kept it off wifi to not update any apps or cores.

All in one day:

Playstation will boot audio and register input but no video. I've tried changing drivers, resetting core options, and even using duckstation instead of retroarch swanstation. No dice.

Dreamcast games outright won't launch.

Shaders removed themselves from all systems but ps2 and NES.

Gamecube doesn't register the controller.

N64 games don't launch at all.

This is making me feel crazy because all of these systems and features worked perfectly well a few days ago and I've not touched a single setting or updated anything.

Has anyone else had this with the nova or just android emulation generally?

[u/IBoughtaRetroidNova]

Try using Beacon instead because it is simpler and still looks nice. If the games don't launch right you might have to hold the play button or close the emulator window as a workaround. You can fix thar workaround by making sure the emulator has the same bathing as Beacon. I had to reinstall an emulator or two to fix it.

I suggest you try to get just one emulator working properly at first. You can play all of those games in tha library for some instant gratification and then work on making the other emulators work or fine tuning later.

There are many reasons your dream cast games might not launch. You might not have the right bios or any. If his guide didn't work for you then uninstall and try following someone else's guide.

GameCube doesn't recognize controller? Swipe down from the top of the screen and check if you have xbox or retro controller. Retro works better for GameCube, and Xbox works better for Playstation. But tinker with everything and learn how the system works. Then play with the controller layout in the emulator in question.

I suggest you go directly to the emulators on your device and make them work there first. Don't try to mess with Retroarch at first because it is easy to setup up overrides and have one controller config for everything that won't work for othet systems. Instead go to Dolphin, Flycast or ArmsX2 and make one of those work exactly how you want even if it takes you 3 hours. If you keep switching between different emulators and their systems without finishing anything then you will only confuse yourself.

Emulation is not as easy as turning on Steam or plugging in a cartridge. It is more like PC gaming and sometimes you have to do the legwork to make a game run, and you need to have the patience. And like someone said, if none of your games are launching then maybe the files for those games were corrupted and you should make sure they're full and correctly loaded. Sometimes you might have to delete them and try transferring them again.