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M88M - PC-8801 Series Emulator

M88M

M88M is a modern, cross-platform port of the classic PC-8801 emulator M88, originally developed by cisc.

Latest Release License Downloads

While the original M88 was tightly coupled with the Win32 API and DirectX, M88M leverages raylib and raygui for its frontend, making it natively compatible with macOS (Intel/Apple Silicon), Linux, and Windows via a single CMake-based build system.

Dragon Slayer on M88M

Phantasie on M88M

Key Features

  • Cross-Platform: Native support for macOS, Linux, and Windows.
  • Raylib Frontend: Modern, lightweight hardware-accelerated rendering and audio.
  • Core Integrity: Retains the highly accurate emulation core of the original M88 while replacing the platform-dependent layers.
  • Modern Build System: Uses CMake for easy compilation with modern compilers (Clang, GCC, MSVC).
  • Dual-Threaded Architecture: Separate threads for emulation and UI/rendering ensure smooth performance.
  • Enhanced UI: Includes a built-in overlay for disk management, state management, and system configuration.

Status

M88M is fully functional and supports a wide range of PC-8801 software.

Working Features:

  • N88-BASIC (V1/V2) and compatible modes.
  • Soundboard II (OPNA) emulation (FM, PSG, Rhythm, ADPCM) with a built-in volume mixer.
  • D88 Disk Support: Mount/Unmount disks, disk image management, and "Recent Disks" history.
  • State Management: 10 save state slots with visual previews.
  • High-DPI Scaling: Adjustable window scaling (1x, 2x, 3x) and fullscreen support.
  • Input: Keyboard matrix emulation, Mouse, and Gamepad support.

Prerequisites

To run the emulator, you must provide the necessary PC-8801 ROM files. Place the following files in the roms directory:

  • N88.ROM (or N88.ROM + N88_0.ROM, etc.)
  • DISK.ROM
  • FONT.ROM
  • (Optional) KANJI1.ROM, KANJI2.ROM

ROM Directory Locations

The emulator looks for ROMs in the following locations (in order):

  1. Environment variable M88M_ROM_DIR
  2. roms/ subfolder in the same directory as the executable.
  3. Linux: ~/.local/share/M88M/roms
  4. macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/M88M/roms
  5. Windows: %APPDATA%\M88M\roms

Note: You must own the original hardware to legally use these ROM files.

Building

macOS / Linux

Dependencies (Linux)

On Debian-based systems (Ubuntu, etc.), you will need:

sudo apt-get install build-essential cmake libasound2-dev libx11-dev libxcursor-dev libxinerama-dev libxrandr-dev libxi-dev libgl1-mesa-dev libgtk-3-dev

Build

git clone https://github.com/bubio/M88M.git
cd M88M
cmake -S . -B build -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release
cmake --build build -j

The executable will be generated at ./build/m88m (or ./build/M88M.app on macOS).

Windows

cmake -S . -B build
cmake --build build --config Release

Usage

  • F11 / Right Click: Toggle the Main Menu / Settings overlay.
  • ESC: Close sub-menus or the main overlay.
  • Drag & Drop: Drop a .d88 file onto the window to mount it to Drive 1&2.

License

  • The original M88 core is copyright (C) cisc. Please refer to docs/README.md for the original license terms.
  • New code, porting layers, and Raylib integration are provided under the 2-Clause BSD License.
  • c86ctl.h is provided under the 2-Clause BSD License.

This project is a fan-made port and is not affiliated with the original author cisc.

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