Retro Multi Tools v5.0

New Features

Disc Tools Utility

A brand-new cross-platform Disc Tools utility has been added to the Utilities section. You can now:

• Burn disc images (ISO, BIN/CUE, IMG, NRG, TOAST) to physical disc drives.
• Burn files and folders directly to disc.
• Create disc images from physical discs or from files/folders.
• Choose write speed, enable post-burn verification, and cancel operations at any time.
• Works on Windows, macOS, and Linux with native tools auto-detected.

USB Tools Utility

A full-featured USB Tools utility is now available, providing:

• File Explorer — Browse, add, move, and delete files on USB drives.
• Format — Format USB drives with FAT, FAT32, exFAT, or NTFS in MBR or GPT mode.
• Write Image to USB — Write ISO, IMG, BIN, and other image files to USB drives.
• Create Image from USB — Create a full backup image from a connected USB drive.
• Auto-detects USB plug/unplug events and refreshes the drive list automatically.
• Confirmation dialogs protect all destructive operations (format, write, delete).

Modern Big Picture Mode

A second "Modern" Big Picture Mode layout inspired by streaming services is now available, selectable from Settings:

• Hero Spotlight — Large artwork, game title, system badge, star rating, play stats, and launch buttons at the top.
• Horizontal Carousel Rows — Scroll through Recently Played, Favorites, Top Rated, Most Played, All Games, and per-system rows.
• Card hover effects, right-click context menu (Launch, Favorite, Rate, ROM Info, Artwork, Open File Location, Copy Path), and mouse-wheel horizontal scrolling.
• Sort by Play Count option added to both Classic and Modern views.
• Full gamepad, keyboard, search, filter, screensaver, gallery, and Discord Rich Presence support.

First-Run Guided Tour

A 13-step animated onboarding tour now runs on first launch, walking you through every feature of the app:

• Covers ROM Browser, Patching, Analysis, Headers, Utilities, Emulator Integrations, Big Picture Mode, and Settings.
• Step indicator dots, Back/Next/Skip navigation, and smooth animated transitions.
• Can be restarted anytime from Settings.
• Keyboard navigation supported (Enter/Right to advance, Left to go back, Escape to skip).

Emulator Configurators

Three powerful new configurators let you edit emulator settings directly inside RetroMultiTools — no need to open each emulator separately:

• RetroArch Configurator — Edit retroarch.cfg with a 10-tab UI covering 355+ settings (Paths, Video, Audio, Input, Core/Saving, Menu, Network, Frame Throttle, Achievements, Misc). Includes search/filter, 3 additional tabs, and expanded settings coverage (175→355).
• MAME Configurator — Edit mame.ini with a 6-tab UI for 170+ settings (Paths, Video, Sound, Input, Performance, Misc). Includes per-window multi-monitor options and search/filter.
• Mednafen Configurator — Edit mednafen.cfg with an 8-tab UI covering all 22 emulation modules (General, Video, Sound, Input, Paths, Per-System, Netplay, Advanced). Includes search/filter.

All three support: auto-detection of config files (including Flatpak/Snap installs), unsaved changes warnings ("dirty state" tracking), save/save-as, reset to defaults, and create new config.

Packaging & Distribution

• Linux: AppImage, Snap, Flatpak, DEB, RPM, APK (Alpine Linux), and Pacman (.pkg.tar.zst) packages are now built automatically.
• macOS: DMG drag-and-drop installer added alongside PKG and ZIP.
• FreeBSD: New build workflow and installation guide added.
• Flatpak: Production-ready Flathub submission files (AppStream metainfo, desktop entry, manifest) are now included in the repository (not yet submitted).

Documentation & Website

• GitHub Pages documentation site with dark theme matching the app's color scheme.
• Comprehensive install instructions for all Linux distributions supported by .NET 8.
• New feature documentation for Disc Tools and USB Tools.
• README overhauled and compacted with download tables for all package formats.

User Interface

• Sidebar navigation replaced from a flat list with a collapsible TreeView, making it easier to find tools by category.
• Sidebar search added — quickly filter and jump to any tool by typing its name.
• Drag-and-drop file input added across 11 tool views — drop ROM files or images directly onto input fields.
• Keyboard shortcuts added throughout the app for common actions.
• Tooltips added to all action buttons and toolbar items for better discoverability.
• Progress indicators added where previously missing.
• ROM Browser context menu improved with organized submenus, direct tool navigation, and new actions (Open File Location, Copy File Path).

Builds

• Removed non-self-contained builds — all releases are now self-contained (no .NET runtime required).
• Maximized compression across all builds for smaller downloads.

Auto-Updater

• Fixed the updater not detecting new releases when GitHub's "latest" endpoint didn't return the newest version. Now scans all recent releases and picks the highest version.
• Fixed network errors being silently swallowed, making them indistinguishable from "no update available."
• Fixed large update downloads timing out due to an overly aggressive 30-second limit on the entire download.
• Fixed temporary update files never being cleaned up after installation.
• Fixed UI buttons not resetting properly after cancelling a download.
• Fixed version comparison bugs where tags like v4.0 didn't compare correctly with v4.0.0.
• Fixed stale update state remaining after a failed check, leaving the UI inconsistent on retry.

Security

• Path traversal vulnerabilities fixed — file operations now validate paths to prevent escaping intended directories.
• Credential validation added where previously missing.
• Fixed socket resource leak in Discord Rich Presence when connection fails.

Emulator Integration

• Fixed macOS .app bundle detection selecting the wrong application when multiple apps existed in the same folder.
• Fixed Discord Rich Presence not being set when launching a game from Big Picture Mode.
• Fixed Mednafen launcher missing Flatpak detection paths (RetroArch and MAME already had them).

Stability & Reliability

• Fixed process deadlocks that could freeze the app when running external tools.
• Fixed race conditions in concurrent operations.
• Fixed several null reference crashes across ROM info display, gallery navigation, and artwork viewing.
• Fixed missing exception handling in settings loading that caused crashes in sandboxed environments (Flatpak, Snap).
• Fixed URL opening (links, download pages) failing inside Flatpak sandboxes — now uses xdg-open on Linux.
• Fixed CUE file path handling returning invalid paths in certain scenarios.

User Interface Fixes

• Fixed view layouts stretching incorrectly and not resizing properly.
• Fixed radio button options reading stale values from sibling buttons, causing wrong settings to be applied.
• Fixed format dropdown resetting unexpectedly when switching between views.
• Fixed button states not updating correctly (buttons staying disabled or enabled at wrong times) across 9 views.
• Fixed sidebar items getting clipped and scrollbar overlaying content in the TreeView (still not perfect but better).
• Fixed mode switching not working in several tool views.
• Fixed hardcoded English strings that weren't going through the translation system.

Big Picture Mode

• Fixed screensaver activating during gallery slideshow mode.
• Fixed search box swallowing normal keyboard input.

Packaging

• Fixed Linux DEB package missing runtime dependency declarations.
• Fixed Inno Setup (Windows installer) not offering a desktop shortcut option.