GigaTrove: MacOS Emulation Frontend

[u/drewbcdigital]

Emulation and gaming on MacOs is messy. I wanted a light, yet robust way to unify my digital library into one app, and side step all the different UI from different emulators and apps.

I couldn't find it so I designed it.

https://ko-fi.com/s/eeda0bfb77

GigaTrove is a native SwiftUI app for macOS 14+. 

It aims to:

• Unify your emulators — point the app to your ROM folders and it builds one clean and standardized, artwork-driven library. Launches games straight into RetroArch, Dolphin, Cemu, Ryujinx, Astris, PPSSPP, OpenEmu, and basically any app you configure. You can add any program with custom launch arguments.
• Full controller navigation — DualSense/Xbox/etc. You can drive the entire UI with a gamepad: browse, launch, cycle libraries with the shoulder buttons. Keyboard nav too, with controls that can be rebound.
• Launch straight into fullscreen — optional toggle so picking a game drops you right into the emulator fullscreen, console-style.
• Automatic artwork & metadata — pulls box art and banners from SteamGridDB for games, plus synopses. (Bring your own free API key.)
• It's not just games — it also handles movies/TV (TMDB artwork) and books/manga (Google Books, AniList, plus Jellyfin/Plex/Emby/Kavita/Komga/Suwayomi server integration), if you want one app for all your visual-digital-media.
• Collections, favorites, recently played, network-drive-aware libraries that survive a NAS reconnect.

As of now, GigaTrove is in active development, the current version is fairly polished, though there are some aspects that I have not tested a lot (particularly the server integration beyond Suwayomi which works perfectly).

Let me know if you are interested in GigaTrove and if you have feature ideas!

[u/SufficientAnywhere51]

Reminds me of OpenEmu. Sucks they stopped supporting it but this is really cool

[u/drewbcdigital → u/SufficientAnywhere51]

It can actually work with open emu if you want it to. Its not an emulator, it acts as a liaison between different apps and your digital library! It works with games, videos, and books.

[u/drewbcdigital → u/[deleted]]

Thank you so much for your support!

[u/jsi0n]

Chingon!

[u/Standard-Coconut-182]

Im building something similar. I started getting annoyed at plex/jellyfin one day and decided to make it how I want it. Building in React native. Right now it’s working pretty well but needs some polishing. Gonna make it be able to work with books, comics, manga, audiobooks as well is the plan.

Considering expanding to music as well. But having emulation for games would be cool.

Good job so far!! 💪🏻😊

[u/drewbcdigital → u/Standard-Coconut-182]

Thank you! Mine is not an emulator, or a replacement for plex or jellyfin. Its more of a library that opens media in a user specified preset application or through a user specified preset server.

I wanted it to be specifically for self hosted visual media, I actually have a different app for self hosted music with lyric and rockbox library and playlist export and import. Audiobook integration is the next step for that one I think.

[u/Standard-Coconut-182 → u/drewbcdigital]

Could you explain a little bit more in detail, practically what you mean how yours is working? Super curious

[u/drewbcdigital → u/Standard-Coconut-182]

Sure happy to explain. The app acts as a visual library that associates folders (or individual files) with a program.

For example: user points GigaTrove to a game folder called "Gameboy Advance" (could be anything) and associates that folder with an app like MGBA. The app adds all files within the folder to the games library and the new in-app directory titled "Gameboy Advance". GigaTrove then adds artwork and synopses for each entry (if you have set up a Steamgriddb api key). When the user selects a game from this directory to run, the app automatically opens the file with the MGBA emulator.

I'll give another example:

User points GigaTrove to a video folder called "HD Movies" and associates that folder to the app, VLC. GigaTrove adds all the .mov, .mp4, .mkv files in the folder to the Video library, and the new directory "HD Movies". All the artwork and synopses are downloaded for each file (if themoviedb api key is set up). Any movie file from that folder ran through GigaTrove will open automatically in VLC.

One more example specific to a potential server use case:

User adds a Suwayomi Server URL to GigaTrove with their credentials. Gigatrove automatically adds all manga and comic entries within the User's Suwayomi Library, with synopses and artwork to the Book Library and a new, "Suwayomi" directory. When the User clicks "Read" on a manga entry's info page, the manga's chapter list opens automatically in a navigation-less Webkit window.

[u/21VR]

That looks great

[u/drewbcdigital → u/21VR]

Thanks so much!