EmulationStation-X (experimental)

[Renetrox]

Proposal: Include ES-X (EmulationStation-X) as an optional experimental extra

Hello RetroPie-Extra team,

I would like to share a personal fork of EmulationStation I have been working on, called ES-X (EmulationStation-X). It does not try to replace EmulationStation, and I fully respect and admire the original project and its developers.

ES-X is an experimental variant, created mainly to explore:

• Runtime language support using human-editable .ini files (no recompilation needed)
• Extended theme parameters (logo spacing, opacity, alignment, scale)
• Basic groundwork for possible future sound hooks (early stage, not functional)
• Concept testing for optional layout features inspired by ES-DE and Batocera

It stays compatible with RetroPie, builds successfully, and works with existing themes, but also enables theme creators to test extended features such as:

<logoScale>, <scaledLogoSpacing>, <minLogoOpacity>
(proposed but not yet active):

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<centerLogoOffsetY>, <zIndexOffset>, <centerLogoPos>
Why I think it could be suitable for RetroPie-Extra
Reason	Description
🌍 Localization	Allows users to edit translations in .ini files without compiling
🎨 Theme experimentation	Useful for users creating advanced themes (PlayStation-X style, ES-DE style, Batocera-inspired)
🔧 Does not affect original ES	It’s isolated, does not alter the standard EmulationStation package
🧪 Ideal for RetroPie-Extra	Fits perfectly as an optional/experimental build for advanced users

I am not asking for it to replace anything — only to suggest it as an optional experimental extra, much like Kodi, Pegasus or AttractMode.

Repository
GitHub: https://github.com/Renetrox/EmulationStation-X
License: MIT (same as original EmulationStation)

Thank you for your time and for keeping RetroPie alive.
I am not a developer, just a curious user and educator from Paraguay, and this fork helped me learn and explore.
If someone finds it useful for testing or expanding features, that would be wonderful.

Thanks again 🙏
— Renetrox (Dino René)

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[Exarkuniv]

sorry i just saw this. (don't know why i didn't get a notification on your post. )

yes i have no issue with including your program in my collection.

personly i think the ES that we use now is very dated and there are better ones out there, like ES-DA and the one that batocera uses.
there is so much more that can be done with ES

so i welcome something new

[Exarkuniv]

@Renetrox
i now have a script in my repo for this. i used the one from RapidEdwin08 since his was really good. i just took a patch out of it since its not needed for normal builds

[Renetrox]

Thanks a lot, I really appreciate the support.
I’m just trying to improve things as far as the current ES base allows, exploring what can still be done without breaking compatibility. Hopefully it can also encourage other people to experiment, contribute, or share ideas.
Thanks again for being open to it.

[Exarkuniv]

i hope more people start to use it. The current ES we have is very dated compared to what the other groups have. thats one of the main reasons why alot of people thing that retropie is dead

[Cyborg-Taco]

personally i think the ES that we use now is very dated and there are better ones

I agree I have been working on Batocera-ES-for-Retropie to fix this. I don't think its ready quite yet but is there any way this could be added in the future.

[Exarkuniv]

Funny, I was already thinking about working on a script to do just that.

I just forgot to reach out to you and ask. When I came across your repo

I can't agree more with the basic ES being dated. For me I feel that that is a really big part on why a lot of people have moved to on from RP.

[Cyborg-Taco]

I would love the help because I don't really know what I am doing I just wanted my RetroPie to look better. So far I have got it to run a lot of features still don't work.

[Renetrox]

The reason I didn’t use Batocera-ES as the base is that, as far as I know, its fork is much more deeply integrated with the Batocera system structure than RetroPie’s EmulationStation is.

Before creating ES-X as a fork, my initial idea was actually to port or adapt Batocera-ES to RetroPie. But after looking into it, I felt that it would require recreating too much of Batocera’s environment, paths, scripts and system integration. So I decided to take the RetroPie EmulationStation base instead and gradually add Batocera/Recalbox-like features while keeping RetroPie compatibility.

[Cyborg-Taco]

Yeah. I do feel like I am making my own version of RetroPie with the amount of stuff I am adding. And that probably makes yours much more stable then mine.