Changes

[[File:openemu-wimp.png|thumb|[[OpenEmu]] with a <abbr title="Windows, Icons, Menus, Pointer">WIMP</abbr> interface]]

[[File:attractmode-htpc.png|thumb|Attract-Mode with a HTPC interface]]

'''Frontends''' are programs that address a quality-of-life issue that emulators may not fulfill. For example, some emulator developers skip the user interface portion of development by having the user launch them from the command line. This usually means opening Command Prompt in the folder where the emulator is installed and typing something like <code>emulator.exe game.rom</code>. From a usability perspective, this is not optimal; running emulators from a shell can be considered tedious if commands aren't already scripted by the user (and they can't be expected to know how to set up such a thing if their first time loading the program is a black window that pops up and then disappears). To avoid this, many emulators will try to incorporate some kind of ''graphical user interface (GUI)'' in their standalone builds. For the emulators that never receive one however, a separate frontend project usually emerges.

! scope="col"|Latest Version

! scope="col"|Interface(s)

! scope="col"|Active

! scope="col"|[[Recommended Emulators|Recommended]]

|{{✗}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✓}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows|Linux|macOS}}

|HTPC

|{{✓}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✓}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|WIMP

|{{✓}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✓}}

|[[RetroFE]]

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows|Linux|macOS}}

|HTPC

|{{✓}} ||{{✓}} ||{{~}}

|HTPC

|{{✓}} ||{{✓}}<ref group=A name=emulationstation>Only the [https://github.com/RetroPie/EmulationStation RetroPie fork]</ref> ||{{~}}<ref group=A name=emulationstation></ref>

|-

|[https://github.com/quinton-ashley/nostlan Nostlan]

|[https://romjacket.github.io/skeletonkey/index.html skeletonKeY]

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|WIMP, CLI

|{{✗}} ||{{✓}} ||{{~}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows|Linux|macOS}}

|HTPC

|{{✓}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✗}}

|[[HyperSpin]]

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|HTPC

|{{✗}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✗}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Linux}}

|WIMP

|{{✓}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✗}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|HTPC

|{{✗}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✗}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|HTPC

|{{✗}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✗}}

|{{✗}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✗}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|CLI

|{{✗}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✗}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|WIMP

|{{✓}} ||{{✗}} ||{{✗}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|HTPC

|{{✓}} ||{{✗}} ||{{✗}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|[https://www.maximus-arcade.com/pages/maximus-arcade-trial ?.? (30-day trial)]<br />[https://www.maximus-arcade.com/products/maximus-arcade-software-registration-code Licenced ($24.99)]

|{{✗}} ||{{✗}} ||{{✗}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|[https://emuloader.mameworld.info/emucon/downloads.htm 2.7.7]

|{{✗}} ||{{✗}} ||{{✗}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|WIMP

|{{✗}} ||{{✗}} ||{{✗}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|WIMP

|{{✗}} ||{{✗}} ||{{✗}}

!colspan="7"|Mobile / ARM

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Android}}

|{{✗}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✓}}

|-

|{{✓}} ||{{✓}}<ref group=A name=emulationstation>Only the [https://github.com/RetroPie/EmulationStation RetroPie fork]</ref> ||{{~}}<ref group=A name=emulationstation></ref>

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|LinuxARM}}

|[http://attractmode.org/download.html 2.6.1]

|HTPC

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Android|LinuxARM}}

|HTPC, Touch

|-

|RESET Collection

|align=left|{{Icon|Android|AndroidTV}}

|Touch

|-

|[[HyperSpin]]

|align=left|{{Icon|Android}}

|Touch

|}

<references group="A"/>

:A graphical frontend for command line emulators with a completely customizable appearance. It hides the underlying operating system and is intended to be controlled with a joystick, gamepad or spin dial, making it ideal for use in arcade cabinets. Attract-Mode is open source and runs on Linux, macOS, and Windows.

:An excellent FOSS alternative to LaunchBox. It has a WIMP style interface and is Windows only. Compared to LaunchBox it has less eye-candy but it requires a lot less system resources, it's blazing-fast and slowdown free.

:According to the author, skeletonKeY is ''a unified interface for ROMs emulators and frontends''. A dynamic GUI provides granular options for MAME, snes9x, mednafen, emulationStation, retroFE, PegasusFE and a very comprehensive interface for retroArch (including netplay). SkeletonKeY integrates and supports the installation of hundreds of emulators. SkeletonKeY is free, open source and very ugly.

:A general gaming frontend for Linux. At the moment it's not useful for huge ROM collections as it [https://github.com/tkashkin/GameHub/issues/103 seems to crash] when bulk importing.

==Integrated emulator types==

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;" style="width: 75%"

|[[OpenEmu]]

|align=left|{{Icon|macOS}}

|WIMP

|{{✓}}

|{{✓}}

|{{✓}}

|-

|[[BizHawk]]

|{{~}}

|{{✓}}

|-

|HTPC

|{{✓}}

|{{✓}}

|-

!colspan="8"|Mobile / ARM

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|LinuxARM}}

|HTPC

|{{✓}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✓}}

|[[Lakka]]

|align=left|{{Icon|LinuxARM}}

|HTPC

|{{✓}}

|??

|HTPC

|}

<references group="I"/>

|[https://github.com/doZennn/steam-rom-manager Steam ROM Manager]

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows|Linux|macOS}}

|{{✓}}

|{{✓}}

|{{✓}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|[https://github.com/scottrice/Ice/releases 1.0.0]

|{{✓}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✓}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows|Linux|macOS}}

|Most non GL cores

|HTPC

|{{✓}} ||{{✓}} ||{{~}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|[https://www.retrix.me/download 2.1.77.0]

|minir

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows|Linux}}

|Limited

|WIMP

|[[Phoenix (frontend)|Phoenix]]

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows|Linux|macOS}}

|Limited

|WIMP

|{{✓}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✓}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|LinuxARM}}

|Genesis Plus GX, PicoDrive

|HTPC

|{{✗}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✓}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|LinuxARM}}

|Snes9X?

|HTPC

|{{✗}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✓}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|LinuxARM}}

|Most non GL cores

|HTPC

|{{✓}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✓}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Win|W10P}}

|[https://www.retrix.me/download 2.1.77.0]

|{{~}} ||{{~}} ||{{~}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Android}}

|[https://github.com/Swordfish90/Lemuroid#supported-systems Limited]

|Touch

|-

!colspan="8"|Consoles

|{{✓}} ||{{✓}} ||{{✓}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|XB1}}

|[https://www.retrix.me/download 2.1.77.0]

:The flagship project for libretro, and the most widely available.

;[https://wiki.gnome.org/Apps/Games Games (Gnome)]

:A Linux launcher for PC games and a libretro frontend. Very easy to use, almost no setup. You'll need the GNOME Settings app to be able to bulk add ROMs.

:Really nice looking frontend for Raspberry Pi that only support [[Sega Genesis emulators|Sega Genesis]] games. Has a similar UI to the NES/SNES Classic Edition.

:Same as Blast16 but for [[Super Nintendo emulators|Super Nintendo]] games.

===[[MAME]]===

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;" style="width: 75%"

!colspan="8"|PC / x86

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows|Linux|macOS|FreeBSD}}

|[http://qmc2.batcom-it.net/index.php/download/#binaries 0.195]

|{{✓}}

|{{✓}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|[http://www.mameui.info/MAMEUI64.7z {{MAMEVer}}]

|{{✓}}

|{{✓}}

|-

|[http://babelsoft.net/products/negatron.htm Negatron]

|{{✓}}

|{{✓}}

|-

|[https://github.com/strippato/gnome-arcade gnome-arcade]

|align=left|{{Icon|Linux}}

|WIMP

|{{✓}}

|{{✓}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows|Linux}}

|[https://sourceforge.net/projects/pfemame/files/latest/download Latest]

|{{✓}}

|{{✓}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows|Linux}}

|[https://www.emucr.com/search/label/MAMEPGUI?&max-results=12 1.8.2]

|{{✗}}

|{{✗}}

|{{✗}}

|-

====Comparison====

;[https://github.com/strippato/gnome-arcade gnome-arcade]

:A minimal MAME frontend using GTK+ 3. On some Linux distros, you have gnome-video-arcade package: Simple MAME frontend. Available on Ubuntu 16.04+ on official repo.

<br /><hr /><br />

===[[Mednafen]]===

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;" style="width: 75%"

|[https://github.com/Speedvicio/MedGuiReborn/releases {{MedGuiRebornVer}}]

|WIMP

|{{✓}}

|{{✓}}

|[https://github.com/AmatCoder/mednaffe Mednaffe]

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows|Linux}}

|WIMP

|{{✓}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|[https://github.com/Asnivor/MedLaunch/releases 0.5.25.3]

|{{✗}}

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|WIMP

|{{✓}}

!colspan="8"|PC / x86

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows|Linux|macOS}}

|[[Mupen64Plus]]

|WIMP

|-

|mupen64plus-gui / m64p

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows|Linux}}

|[[Mupen64Plus]]

|WIMP

|-

|[https://github.com/dh4/cen64-qt CEN64-Qt]

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows|Linux|macOS}}

|[[CEN64]]

|WIMP

|-

|[http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,159733.msg1680224.html Sega Model 2 UI]

|[[Model 2 Emulator]]

|WIMP

|-

|[https://www.supermodel3.com/Forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=1636 Sega Model 3 UI]

|[[Supermodel]]

|WIMP

|-

|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}

|[https://gofile.io/d/ybtgHv 0.12]

|[[Supermodel]]

|WIMP

|-

|[https://www.emu-land.net/consoles/saturn/emuls/windows?act=showonly&id=4227 MedSat]

|[[Mednafen]] (Saturn core)

|?

|}