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Atari - 2600 (Stella)

Background

Stella is a multi-platform Atari 2600 VCS emulator.

Author/License

The Stella core has been authored by

  • Stephen Anthony
  • Bradford Mott
  • Thomas Jentzsch
  • Christian Speckner

The Stella core is licensed under

A summary of the licenses behind RetroArch and its cores can be found here.

Extensions

Content that can be loaded by the Stella core have the following file extensions:

  • .a26
  • .bin
  • .zip

Databases

RetroArch database(s) that are associated with the Stella core:

Features

Frontend-level settings or features that the Stella core respects.

Feature Supported
Restart ✔
Screenshots ✔
Saves ✕
States ✔
Rewind ✔
Netplay ✔
Core Options ✔
Memory Monitoring (achievements) ✔
RetroArch Cheats ✕
Native Cheats ✕
Controls ✔
Remapping ✔
Multi-Mouse ✕
Rumble ✕
Sensors ✕
Camera ✕
Location ✕
Subsystem ✕
Softpatching ✕
Disk Control ✕
Username ✕
Language ✕
Crop Overscan ✕
LEDs ✕

Directories

The Stella core's internal core name is 'Stella'

The Stella core saves/loads to/from these directories.

Frontend's State directory

  • 'content-name'.state# (State)

Geometry and timing

  • The Stella core's core provided FPS is (FPS)
  • The Stella core's core provided sample rate is 31400 Hz
  • The Stella core's core provided aspect ratio is 4/3

Core options

The Stella core has the following option(s) that can be tweaked from the core options menu. The default setting is bolded.

  • Console display [stella_console] (auto|ntsc|pal|secam|ntsc50|pal60|secam60)
  • Palette colors [stella_palette] (standard|z26|user|custom)
  • TV effects [stella_filter] (OFF|composite|s-video|rgb|badly adjusted)
  • Crop horizontal overscan [stella_crop_hoverscan] (OFF|ON)
  • Crop vertical overscan [stella_crop_voverscan] (0|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10|11|12|13|14|15|16|17|18|19|20|21|22|23|24)
  • NTSC aspect % [stella_ntsc_aspect] (par|100|101|102|103|104|105|106|107|108|109|110|111|112|113|114|115|116|117|118|119|120|121|122|123|124|125|75|76|77|78|79|80|81|82|83|84|85|86|87|88|89|90|91|92|93|94|95|96|97|98|99)
  • PAL aspect % [stella_pal_aspect] (par|100|101|102|103|104|105|106|107|108|109|110|111|112|113|114|115|116|117|118|119|120|121|122|123|124|125|75|76|77|78|79|80|81|82|83|84|85|86|87|88|89|90|91|92|93|94|95|96|97|98|99)
  • Stereo sound [stella_stereo] (auto|off|on)
  • Phosphor mode [stella_phosphor] (auto|off|on)
  • Phosphor blend % [stella_phosphor_blend] (60|65|70|75|80|85|90|95|100|0|5|10|15|20|25|30|35|40|45|50|55)
  • Paddle mouse sensitivity [stella_paddle_mouse_sensitivity] (10|11|12|13|14|15|16|17|18|19|20|21|22|23|24|25|26|27|28|29|30|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9)
  • Paddle joypad sensitivity [stella_paddle_joypad_sensitivity] (3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10|11|12|13|14|15|16|17|18|19|20|1|2)
  • Paddle analog sensitivity [stella_paddle_analog_sensitivity] (20|21|22|23|24|25|26|27|28|29|30|0|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10|11|12|13|14|15|16|17|18|19)
  • Paddle analog deadzone [stella_paddle_analog_deadzone] (15|16|17|18|19|20|21|22|23|24|25|26|27|28|29|30|0|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10|11|12|13|14)
  • Paddle analog absolute [stella_paddle_analog_absolute] (OFF|ON)
  • Lightgun crosshair [stella_lightgun_crosshair] (OFF|ON)
  • Enable reload/next game [stella_reload] (off|on)
  • Auto-detect PAL-60 [stella_detect_pal60] (OFF|ON)
  • Auto-detect NTSC-50 [stella_detect_ntsc50] (OFF|ON)
  • Palette contrast [stella_pal_contrast] (0|-1|-2|-3|-4|-5|-6|-7|-8|-9|-10|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10)
  • Palette brightness [stella_pal_brightness] (0|-1|-2|-3|-4|-5|-6|-7|-8|-9|-10|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10)
  • Palette hue [stella_pal_hue] (0|-1|-2|-3|-4|-5|-6|-7|-8|-9|-10|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10)
  • Palette saturation [stella_pal_saturation] (0|-1|-2|-3|-4|-5|-6|-7|-8|-9|-10|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10)
  • Palette gamma [stella_pal_gamma] (0|-1|-2|-3|-4|-5|-6|-7|-8|-9|-10|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10)
  • Pitfall II music pitch [stella_dpc_pitch] (20000|10000|11000|12000|13000|14000|15000|16000|17000|18000|19000|21000|22000|23000|24000|25000|26000|27000|28000|29000|30000)
  • Info messages [stella_messages] (OFF|ON)

Controllers

The Stella core supports the following device type(s) in the controls menu, bolded device types are the default for the specified user(s):

User 1 - 2 device types

  • Automatic (from ROM database) - picks the controller the game needs from Stella's ROM database
  • Joystick
  • BoosterGrip
  • Genesis
  • Joy 2B+
  • Paddles
  • Driving
  • Keyboard
  • TrakBall
  • Amiga Mouse
  • Atari Mouse
  • Lightgun
  • QuadTari
  • MindLink
  • AtariVox
  • SaveKey

Controller tables

Joypad

User 1 Remap descriptors RetroPad Inputs
Fire
Select
Reset
Up
Down
Left
Right
Left Difficulty A
Right Difficulty A
Left Difficulty B
Right Difficulty B
Color
Black/White
User 2 Remap descriptors RetroPad Inputs
Fire
Up
Down
Left
Right

Other Atari 2600 cores