Nintendo Switch Compilation / Development Guide (libnx)¶
Environment configuration¶
You need the homebrew Nintendo Switch SDK libnx and DevkitA64 toolchain installed. You can find instructions on how to install it on the switchbrew wiki.
Then, install all the required libraries:
- use the devkitpro MSYS2 terminal on Windows
- replace dkp-pacman by pacman on Linux and Mac OS
dkp-pacman -Sy devkit-env devkitA64 libnx switch-tools switch-mesa switch-zlib switch-bzip2 switch-liblzma switch-freetype switch-libpng switch-libvpx switch-ffmpeg
RetroArch Compilation¶
All commands must be issued in the devkitpro environment (MSYS2 on Windows).
Fetching RetroArch¶
Clone RetroArch's repository from GitHub
git clone https://github.com/libretro/RetroArch.git retroarch
cd retroarch
For subsequent builds you only need to pull the changes from the repo
cd retroarch
git pull
Building Cores¶
The easiest way to build all the cores (for Switch) is to use libretro-super. git clone and cd into the base directory, then run:
make -f Makefile.libnx
In case you only want to build one and/or more cores instead of all, you can specify the cores you want to build using the commands below. E.g.:
./libretro-fetch.sh snes9x2010 fceumm
platform=libnx ./libretro-build.sh snes9x2010 fceumm
Once finished, you can find the libretro cores inside directory dist/libnx.
Building RetroArch¶
Each NRO of RetroArch has one and only one core, and each core is a standalone homebrew by itself. That means that building multiple cores means building RetroArch multiple times, once for each core.
The cores you previously built will be called <corename>_libretro_libnx.a, where <corename> is the name of the core that was used to build it.
For each core you wish to build, you will need to copy it to the retroarch directory, and rename it to libretro_libnx.a.
Once the core has been moved and renamed, move to the retroarch directory using cd and run this command:
make -f Makefile.libnx
That will output retroarch_switch.nro: this is your home built copy of RetroArch! It is recommended to rename your '.nro' file so you can remember which core it contains.
You can then use nxlink to send the homebrew to your Switch over Wi-Fi.