999sian/melee-pc v0.4.1

on GitHub

Beta, for testing only. Expect crashes and missing features.

You need your own Super Smash Bros. Melee disc image. No game data ships in
these artifacts — the port reads everything, including its font atlases, from
the image you supply at runtime.

USA revision 2 (NTSC-U 1.02, GALE01) is the supported disc. A Europe (PAL,
GALP01) image boots experimentally, running the USA game code on PAL data with
English (UK) text.

Highlights

• Fixed empty off-screen fighter circles on Android and macOS. A byte-order
  mismatch in the image-copy helper is corrected by building it with the same
  GCC toolchain as the game code. Verified with Link and Mario on a Samsung
  tablet; Mac and Pixel hardware confirmation is still pending.
• Expanded the bundled Android shader coverage and prepare recorded shaders
  before gameplay to reduce missing effects and first-use compilation.
• Android compatibility, fullscreen and touch-input improvements since
  v0.4.0-beta.

Fixes

• Corrected magnifier copy dimensions and preserved big-endian image
  descriptors across widescreen copies, also used by Pokémon Stadium.
• Added regression checks for image-copy byte order and compiler selection.
• Fixed the Android touch test's SDL include paths in CI.

Known issues

Open reports are tracked on the issue tracker;
the numbers below link there.

All platforms

• Rendering artifacts and Kirby grab/throw behaviour remain under investigation (#130).
• Online play is a prototype. LAN Play, Direct Connect, Unranked and Ranked are
  implemented and rendezvous through the public DHT, but pairing across two
  NATs in general and live ranked acceptance are unproven, and cross-platform simulation
  determinism is not claimed. Ratings are community-computed and unverified.
  Every datagram is authenticated (protocol 9), and the LAN lobby
  only pairs identical builds, so both players should use the same release. A
  connect code is 8 characters after the #.
• Widescreen applies to fights (VS, Sudden Death, Training); menus, results and
  cutscenes stay at the original aspect. The wide HUD is a separate toggle and
  only moves the timer and the 2-4 player HUD groups.
• A move, stage or effect whose shader is still compiling is missing from the
  picture for a few frames (previously a freeze, #46). The bundled seed is
  queued for compilation on worker threads when the game starts, and the
  launcher waits for that queue when you press Play -- press Play again to skip
  the wait. MELEE_PIPELINE_SYNC=1 restores the old wait-for-compile
  behaviour, and MELEE_PIPELINE_JOBS=<n> sets the compile thread count.
  On Android, shaders compile inline to avoid driver failures seen when
  pipelines are created on a second thread, so expect first-use stutter.
• Only Vulkan, Direct3D 12/11 and Metal backends are shipped; OpenGL and
  OpenGL ES-only GPUs and drivers do not run the game (#64, #66).
• Gamepad buttons, sticks and triggers can be remapped; dash sensitivity,
  tap-jump disable and input buffer settings are not available (#3).
• Some users cannot get past the launcher; if the launcher shows but the game
  never starts, run with the log enabled and attach it (#40).

Browser

• Tested in Chrome only; Firefox and Safari WebGPU support is incomplete.
• Only a raw, uncompressed USA revision 2 (GALE01) image loads: no .ciso,
  .rvz or PAL.
• No online play, and no gamepad remapping (the default mapping is used; the
  keys are listed under the canvas).

Windows

• Classic mode startup crashes remain under investigation (#128).
• v0.1.6-beta and later can close immediately when starting the game from the
  launcher on machines where v0.1.5-beta worked (#62, #63). Attach
  melee-pc.log (or run RUN-AND-LOG.bat).
• Intel Gen7 iGPUs (HD 4000/4400/4600, Ivy Bridge/Haswell, e.g. i5-4200U) are
  refused by D3D12, and the Direct3D 11 path they are meant to fall back to has
  not been verified on that hardware. A DXGI_ERROR_DEVICE_HUNG mid-match
  there (#67) is the 2020-era Intel driver timing out on the GPU; there is no
  further API to fall back to on it. The log names the adapter, backend and
  driver version.

Android

• Battle rendering is reported blank unless paused on Pixel 9 Pro (#129).
  This release does not yet have a verified fix for that device.
• Startup or Play-button crashes remain reported on Retroid Pocket 6 and
  AYN Odin 2 (#136, #137); device logs and hardware verification are outstanding.
• Some devices close the app at launch before the launcher appears, reported
  on an Honor 200 (Snapdragon 7 Gen 3) and an AYN Odin 2 (#59, #23).
• Android 9 and devices without Vulkan are not supported (#66).

macOS

• The macOS builds are experimental; the Intel one is untested on hardware.
  The game's C is compiled with Homebrew GCC (scalar_storage_order), the
  C++ with Apple clang.

Config / save compatibility

• launcher.cfg (key/value text in the melee-pc preference directory:
  ~/.local/share/melee-pc, %APPDATA%\melee-pc, or
  ~/Library/Application Support/melee-pc) loads across versions: unknown
  keys are ignored and missing keys take their defaults.
• Memory cards are Dolphin-compatible .gci files and are unchanged by this
  release.
• Gamepad bindings live in aurora's per-device .controller files next to
  launcher.cfg.
• The pipeline cache (pipeline_cache.db in the same directory) is rebuilt as
  needed; deleting it only costs first-use shader stutter.

Requirements

• Windows 10/11 (x86-64 or ARM64): Direct3D 12 feature level 11_0 or Vulkan
  1.1; a Direct3D 11 fallback exists but is unverified.
  Linux (x86-64 or aarch64): Vulkan 1.1. macOS: Metal (Apple Silicon tested).
  Android: arm64 with Vulkan 1.1. iOS 14+: arm64, Metal. Browser: Chrome or
  Edge with WebGPU.
• Keep resources/ (and on Windows the DLLs) beside the executable.
• A Melee USA 1.02 (GALE01) disc image (.iso, .gcm, .ciso or .rvz).

Downloads

Launch with no arguments to open the launcher and pick a disc, or pass the
image path directly:

./Melee-x86_64.AppImage /path/to/melee.iso

Previous releases

See earlier releases for prior changelogs.

What works

Every game mode runs. The per-feature list, including what is only partly
done, is the status table in
README.md; it is the single
source of truth and these notes defer to it.

Controls

Arrows or WASD = stick, IJKL = C-stick, X = A, Z = B, C = X, V = Y, Q/E = L/R,
Tab = Z, Enter = Start, TFGH = D-pad. Gamepads work through SDL and can be
remapped; an official GameCube adapter is read directly. F1 opens the
settings overlay.

Contributors

Project Contributors

• @999sian — Project Lead, Phase 1 features, multi-core optimizations, file cache, Android & Windows porting, and stability fixes.
• @theofficialgman — Linux aarch64 (ARM64) support, Nod aarch64 prebuilts, 4-core & ARM scheduling optimizations (#44, #47).
• @r-burns — Melee decompilation and 64-bit portability foundations.
• @MarkMcCaskey — Decompilation and core engine maintenance.
• @ribbanya (Robin Avery) — Decompilation and memory card subsystem.
• @PsiLupan (Will Carter) — Decompilation and subsystem typing.
• @itsgrimetime (Mike Grimes) — Decompilation foundations.
• @Joyastick — Real two-machine netplay testing and fixes (#91, #92, #93).

Community Testers & Issue Reporters

Special thanks to our community members whose detailed bug reports and reproduction steps directly helped diagnose and resolve issues in these releases:

• @jennywakeman-xj9 (#30, #31, #32, #33, #34, #35, #36, #38, #39, #51, #53, #54, #55, #56, #57, #58)
• @omega-tuna (#48)
• @VTuberSkye (#45)
• @4zy1 (#49, #50)
• @stevenstallone (#52)
• @mmedeiro1-a11y (#43)
• @Keithmccloud (#59)
• @Smashhacker (#41, #60)
• @whirlwindpedro (#40)
• @zamiba (#42)
• @nitrostemp (#37)

Upstream Projects & Foundations

• doldecomp/melee — The Super Smash Bros. Melee decompilation team and contributors.
• encounter/aurora — Luke Street (@encounter) and contributors for the GameCube hardware emulation layer and WebGPU backend.
• TwilitRealm/dusklight — Architectural inspiration for GameCube PC ports.
• SDL3, RmlUi, stb_vorbis, and Dawn teams for the runtime engine libraries.