EmulationStation Command Line Arguments

If you've come from another distribution such as RetroPie (or you've just been around for a long time) you might be familiar with EmulationStation's command line arguments. You'll notice there's no real way to implement these arguments with the version of EmulationStation included in Batocera, unless you're willing to re-compile the entirety of Batocera.

Well no more! As of v32 Batocera now includes the ability to accept user-defined custom arguments for ES at launch. All you have to do is add the appropriate es.customsargs=--mycommand key to /userdata/batocera.conf.

For example:

es.customsargs=--screenoffset 50 100

You can view the current list of accepted arguments (Batocera's version of ES has a few more) by using the `emulationstation –help` command from terminal or SSH. Please keep in mind that most of these settings can be set within EmulationStation itself or are handled by Batocera automatically.

Below is the output of that command (correct as of v32).

[root@BATOCERA /userdata/system]# emulationstation --help
EmulationStation, a graphical front-end for ROM browsing.
Written by Alec "Aloshi" Lofquist.
Version 31, built Aug 28 2021 - 14:33:21

Command line arguments:
--resolution [width] [height]   try and force a particular resolution
--gamelist-only                 skip automatic game search, only read from gamelist.xml
--ignore-gamelist               ignore the gamelist (useful for troubleshooting)
--draw-framerate                display the framerate
--no-exit                       don't show the exit option in the menu
--no-splash                     don't show the splash screen
--debug                         more logging, show console on Windows
--windowed                      not fullscreen, should be used with --resolution
--vsync [1/on or 0/off]         turn vsync on or off (default is on)
--max-vram [size]               Max VRAM to use in Mb before swapping. 0 for unlimited
--force-kid             Force the UI mode to be Kid
--force-kiosk           Force the UI mode to be Kiosk
--force-disable-filters         Force the UI to ignore applied filters in gamelist
--home [path]           Directory to use as home path
--help, -h                      summon a sentient, angry tuba

--monitor [index]                       monitor index

More information available in README.md.

This is in the order which they are processed internally. No documentation is available for using these arguments (you're on your own). Check the main file in the source code for the current commands.

--home [path]                   Directory to use as home path
--videoduration                 ?
--video                         ?
--monitor [monitorId]           ?
--resolution [width] [height]   resolution when using --windowed
--screensize [width] [height]   output resolution, increasing will stretch the image out to the right and down
--screenoffset [x] [y]          move the canvas by x pixels right and y pixels down
--screenrotate [rotate]         rotates the screen 90 degrees, rotate values: 0, 1, 2 or 3
--gamelist-only                 only parse the gamelist xml files, don't scan for changes
--ignore-gamelist               always manually scan for files
--show-hidden-files             show all hidden games
--draw-framerate                display the framerate
--no-exit                       don't show the exit option in the menu
--exit-on-reboot-required       ?
--no-splash                     don't show the splash screen
--debug                         more logging, show console on Windows
--fullscreen-borderless         run emulationstation at fullscreen resolution in a borderless window
--fullscreen                    run emulationstation in fullscreen
--windowed                      run in windowed mode, not fullscreen, should be used with --resolution
--vsync [1/on or 0/off]         turn vsync on or off (default is on)
--max-vram [size]               Max VRAM to use in Mb before swapping. 0 for unlimited
--force-kiosk                   Force the UI mode to be Kiosk
--force-kid                     Force the UI mode to be Kid
--force-disable-filters         Force the UI to ignore applied filters in gamelist
--splash-image                  Show an alternate splash image
--help                          summon a sentient, angry tuba