DGEN(1)

📦 version 1.33, in arch rolling, nixos 26.05, nixpkgs unstable

🌸 DGEN(1) — the dgen girl's guide to the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive emulator 🌸

okay bestie, sit down, grab a strawberry drink 🍓, because we're talking about dgen, the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive emulator, and honestly? she's iconic. this is the General Commands Manual page for her, and i'm gonna walk you through every single thing so you never have to squint at boring manpage prose again. 💅

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

dgen [-Pfhmv] [-R (J|U|E)] [-H HZ] [-D DEMONAME] [-d DEMONAME] [-n USEC]
     [-p CODE,CODE...] [-r RCFILE] [-X XFACT] [-Y YFACT] [-S FACT]
     [-g (0|1)] [-G XxY] [-s SLOT] [romname [...]]

💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

So here's the vibe: the ROM image sitting in the file romname gets executed, emulated as if it were running on a Sega Genesis or Mega Drive in 60Hz NTSC mode. unless you pass the -P option, in which case it's 50Hz PAL mode instead. that's the whole plot. 🎀

romname should be in raw binary or SMD format, and it may be compressed with gzip(1), zip(1), or bzip2(1). yes queen, compressed ROMs are supported, you don't have to unzip anything first. 🦋

When romname isn't specified, DGen starts without a ROM. no drama — it can be loaded later from the prompt. and when more than a single romname is specified, they are executed sequentially, one after the other, like a little playlist. 🎵

The options are as follows:

🔥 OPTIONS 🔥

  • -H HZ — use a custom frame rate. highkey useful if you wanna accelerate or slow down emulation. (yes, deliberately. it's a whole thing.)
  • -P — emulate 50Hz PAL mode, as used in European models of the Mega Drive. 🇪🇺
  • -R (J|U|E) — set the emulator region. without this option, DGen uses the first region mentioned in the ROM header. it should be combined with -P for PAL mode. see the lil' table below 👇
    • (none) — autodetect (NTSC, 60Hz)
    • -P — autodetect (PAL, 50Hz)
    • -R J — Japan (NTSC, 60Hz)
    • -R J -P — Japan (PAL, 50Hz)
    • -R E — Europe (NTSC, 60Hz, music will certainly play too fast) 😭
    • -R E -P — Europe (PAL, 50Hz)
    • -R U — America (NTSC, 60Hz)
    • -R U -P — same as -R E -P
  • -f — run fullscreen, if possible. main character energy, filling the whole screen. 👑
  • -h — show a brief synopsis of all options. the "help me help you" flag. 🫶
  • -m — MinGW only. this option prevents DGen from detaching from its control console. (iykyk)
  • -v — show the version number, and exit. short and sweet, she said what she said. ⭐
  • -D DEMONAME — play back a demo recorded with the -d option. rewind era. 🙈
  • -d DEMONAME — record a demo of the program running, which can be later replayed with the -D switch. capture the moment bestie 📸
  • -n USEC — sleep for a number of microseconds after every frame, to give time to other processes. sharing is caring, be a good citizen. 😴
  • -p CODE,CODE... — modify the ROM image in memory, using Game Genie or Hex style codes. Game Genie codes are of the form ABCD-EFGH and Hex codes are in the form 123456:ABCD. to specify more than one code, separate them with commas — do not use spaces. ⚠️ like, genuinely, no spaces. (cheat code queen behavior tho 💅)
  • -r RCFILE — parse another rc file after $HOME/.dgen/dgenrc. values in the specified file override those in the preceding files. newest wins, periodt.
  • -X XFACT — scale the window XFACT times in the X direction. XFACT must be a positive integer. ↔️
  • -Y YFACT — scale the window YFACT times in the Y direction. YFACT must be a positive integer. ↕️
  • -S FACT — scale the window FACT times in both directions. FACT must be a positive integer. big mood, literally. 🔍
  • -g (0|1) — enable/disable OpenGL (if compiled-in). 🖥️
  • -G XxY — desired window size (e.g. 640x480, 800x600, etc.) 📐
  • -s SLOT — load the saved state from the given slot at startup (0-9). nine little time capsules. 🎁

🧚 INTERACTIVE PROMPT 🧚

There's a minimalist interactive prompt, inspired from vi(1), and you can use it to perform the various operations described below. It's triggered by pressing colon (:) — that's the default key. Command-line editing, history and completion are all supported, so you're not typing blind like a fool. ✨

🎀 Commands 🎀

  • {quit, exit, q} — quit, or load the next romname from command-line, if any. like closing a tab but make it emulator. 💀
  • {load, open, plug, o} filename — load a given ROM filename. so many ways to say "gimme". 🫶
  • {unload, close, unplug} — unload the current ROM. bye bestie 👋
  • config_load filename — load configuration from file filename.
  • config_save filename — save current configuration to file filename.
  • reset — Genesis reset. the classic "have you tried turning it off and on again". 🔄
  • {ctv_push, ctv_pop, ctv_none} — manage the stack of Crap TV filters (if compiled-in). stack queen. 📚
  • calibrate number — interactive calibration of the specified gamepad (1 or 2). if number isn't specified, default to 1. 🎮
  • unbind binding [...] — remove specified bindings (variables prefixed with "bind_"). see dgenrc(5) for more information about them.
  • vgmdump start filename — (see below, bestie, they share a bullet 💖)
  • vgmdump stop — manages VGM dumping/logging. if the second argument is start, VGM dumping will be started at the path specified by the third argument. if the second argument is stop, VGM dumping will be stopped and the dump finalized. 🎶

🦋 Variables 🦋

All configuration variables from dgenrc(5) can be displayed and modified interactively, with immediate effect. no reload needed, it's giving instant gratification. ⚡

  • {int_name, bool_name, key_name, joy_name, ...} {value} — affect value to variable name.
  • {int_name, bool_name, key_name, joy_name, ...} — display current value for variable name.

🌈 FILES 🌈

  • $HOME/.dgen/dgenrc — contains user settings for the emulator.
  • $HOME/.dgen/dgenrc.auto — generated file containing saved user settings.
  • $HOME/.dgen/saves/* — save states generated by the emulator.
  • $HOME/.dgen/ram/* — battery-backup RAM images, generated by the emulator for ROMs with save RAM.
  • $HOME/.dgen/screenshots/* — screenshots are generated there. 📸
  • $HOME/.dgen/roms/* — ROMs default search path.
  • $HOME/.dgen/demos/* — Demos default search path.

⭐ SEE ALSO ⭐

gzip(1), bzip2(1), zip(1), dgenrc(5)

👑 AUTHORS 👑

This manual page was written by Joe Groff <joe@pknet.com>. Updated by zamaz <zamaz@users.sourceforge.net>. legends, both of them. 🫶

💀 BUGS 💀

There are known emulation bugs, see BUGS in the DGen source package. not me pretending everything's perfect 😭

Report bugs to <http://sourceforge.net/projects/dgen/>.

ok that's the whole page, no cap, every flag and file path accounted for. go forth and emulate, bestie. 💜

mwah 💋 — this came from the Debian edition of the page, dated July 26, 2014, and yes she's still serving.

📦 where this page comes from