emulator: NicaiEmu
type: standalone + libretro
core_classification: pure_libretro
source: "https://github.com/AloysHF/NicaiEmu"
upstream: "https://github.com/AloysHF/NicaiEmu"
profiled_date: "2026-09-03"
source_commit: "6f2522b1cbbf1f2ceac4ecc06059c59b73ffd1b0"
core_version: "0.1.0"
display_name: "MStar - Nicai (NicaiEmu)"
cores:
  - nicaiemu
systems:
  - mstar-nicai

notes: |
  Emulator for Nicai/MStar CBE (Cool Bar Engine) phone games written in
  Rust by AloysHF. The libretro core and the nicaiemu standalone binary
  share the nicaiemu-core crate. A .cbe archive is read whole from its
  full path (need_fullpath = true,
  crates/nicaiemu-libretro/src/libretro/api.rs:181; load_machine,
  crates/nicaiemu-libretro/src/libretro/api.rs:360-364; CbeArchive::load,
  crates/nicaiemu-core/src/cbe/archive.rs:68-94). Code, scenes, maps,
  actors, scripts, images and audio are sections of that archive, and
  installed resource packages are parsed from the same bytes
  (crates/nicaiemu-core/src/machine/packages.rs).

  Phone services are implemented in Rust
  (crates/nicaiemu-core/src/machine/services/). The guest file manager is
  an in-memory sandbox that never touches the host disk
  (crates/nicaiemu-core/src/machine/virtual_fs.rs:14-30). Text is decoded
  as GBK and rasterised from the unifont crate compiled into the core
  (crates/nicaiemu-core/src/machine/drawing.rs:58,
  crates/nicaiemu-core/src/machine/drawing.rs:709). MIDI resources are
  synthesised as decaying sine tones without a sound bank
  (crates/nicaiemu-core/src/audio_engine.rs:270-275); WAV and MP3 are
  decoded with symphonia.

  The libretro crate asks the frontend for no directory. The standalone
  binary reads and writes only the files named by --load-state and
  --save-state (crates/nicaiemu/src/main.rs:162-166). No include_bytes!
  data is compiled in.

exclusion_note: "No file is read outside the content: the .cbe archive is the only input, the guest filesystem is in-memory, glyphs come from the unifont crate and MIDI is synthesised without a bank, no directory is requested from the frontend, no data is embedded with include_bytes!, and the .info declares firmware_count = 0."
files: []