libretro/emulators/ax360e.yml

emulator: aX360e
type: standalone
core_classification: community_fork
source: "https://github.com/aenu1/ax360e"
source_branch: main
upstream: "https://github.com/xenia-canary/xenia-canary"
profiled_date: "2026-08-11"
source_commit: "b8c1838f21761ac463724e24105eda97b990e704"
upstream_commit: "dc561e4df578c903087f9bdf56ff61d9ef9f2a93"
core_version: "1.18"
display_name: "Microsoft - Xbox 360 (aX360e)"
cores:
  - ax360e
systems:
  - microsoft-xbox-360
mode: standalone

notes: |
  Xbox 360 emulator for Android, distributed on Google Play as aenu.ax360e and
  aenu.ax360e.free. Xenia Canary is vendored whole under
  app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary at canary_experimental dc561e4d, and a JNI layer
  replaces the desktop front end: its own windowed app and window, AAudio and
  OpenSLES audio systems, an Android input driver, and disc image, disc archive,
  STFS and XEX devices backed by the Storage Access Framework.
  ref: app/src/main/cpp/version.h:4-5,
       app/src/main/cpp/CMakeLists.txt:39-75,
       app/src/main/cpp/ax360e_emu.cpp:616

  The version is read from the commit subjects, which carry it: 1.18 is the head
  of main, 1.17 the drop before it. The repository has no tags, and the only
  gradle file committed is app/build.gradle.bak, which still declares versionName
  0.14 and is renamed and completed with the signing block at build time.
  ref: ax360e/README.md, app/build.gradle.bak:13-14

  No Xbox 360 system file is loaded. The kernel, XAM and XBDM are HLE modules
  registered at startup, and every key the emulator needs is a constant in the
  source: the XEX1 retail, XEX1 devkit, XEX2 retail and XEX2 devkit keys tried in
  turn when an image is read, the 0x19 key pair the profile blob is encrypted with, and the
  key vault map XeKeysGetKey answers from. There is no NAND, flash or keyvault
  path.
  ref: app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/emulator.cc:316-321,
       app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/cpu/xex_module.cc:54-65,
       app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/cpu/xex_module.cc:982-994,
       app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/kernel/util/crypto_utils.cc:20-31,
       app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/kernel/xboxkrnl/xboxkrnl_crypt.cc:169-173

  The storage root is the external files directory of the package and is passed
  as a launch argument beside the config path and the log path. Content, cache,
  patches and plugins hang off it, the global configuration is
  xenia-canary.config.toml, and per title overrides live in
  custom_config/<title_id>.config.toml. The custom driver directory sits in
  internal storage instead, because the external filesystem cannot carry an
  executable mapping.
  ref: app/src/main/java/aenu/ax360e/Application.java:14-53,
       app/src/main/java/aenu/ax360e/EmulatorActivity.java:164-170,
       app/src/main/cpp/ax360e_emu.cpp:274-317

  ES-DE starts the emulator with the aenu.intent.action.AX360E action and a
  game_uri extra. The native side dispatches on the name the descriptor resolves
  to: .xex, .iso and .zar each go to their own loader, and anything else is taken
  for an STFS container and launched beside a sibling directory named after the
  file with .data appended.
  ref: app/src/main/AndroidManifest.xml:57-59,
       app/src/main/cpp/ax360e_emu.cpp:555-576

  A default profile ships with the application. Its Account blob is extracted
  from the assets on first run under XUID E0300000A360E000, and the shipped
  configuration logs that XUID into slot 0. Further profiles are created by the
  emulator itself, which writes the blob it encrypts.
  ref: app/src/main/java/aenu/ax360e/Application.java:30-34,
       app/src/main/java/aenu/ax360e/Application.java:92-96,
       app/src/main/assets/config/default_config.toml:371,
       app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/kernel/xam/profile_manager.cc:501-557

  477 game patches ship inside the APK. The patch database reads the patches
  directory only, so a bundled patch reaches the emulator once the user opens the
  patch dialog for that title and presses Apply, which writes the asset out under
  the same name.
  ref: ax360e/app/src/main/assets/game-patches,
       app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/patcher/patch_db.cc:30-56,
       app/src/main/java/aenu/ax360e/Emulator.java:119-149,
       app/src/main/java/aenu/ax360e/MainActivity.java:505-514

files:
  - name: "<driver>.zip"
    required: false
    config_key: "Vulkan|vulkan_lib_path"
    unsourceable: "third-party Vulkan driver built for one GPU family, not an emulator artefact"
    description: "Replacement Vulkan driver package"
    note: >-
      Imported through a picker that keeps only names ending in .zip. The archive
      is read whole, meta.json names the library to keep, and a single .so is
      taken instead when no meta.json is present; the .so files and meta.json are
      unpacked into a directory named after the archive, in internal storage. The
      configured path is read before the instance is created and opened through
      adrenotools when it exists, otherwise the system libvulkan.so is used. The
      setting is greyed out on devices without /dev/kgsl-3d0.
    source_ref: "app/src/main/java/aenu/ax360e/EmulatorSettings.java:732-736, app/src/main/java/aenu/ax360e/Utils.java:165-230, app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/ui/vulkan/vulkan_instance.cc:34, app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/ui/vulkan/vulkan_instance.cc:71-91, app/src/main/java/aenu/emulator/Emulator.java:116-122"

  - name: "<font>.ttf"
    required: false
    config_key: "UI|custom_font_path"
    unsourceable: "any TrueType face the user picks, with no name or version the code expects"
    description: "Replacement face for the overlay text"
    note: >-
      Loaded first when the configured path exists, over the Basic Latin, Latin
      Supplement, Extended Latin, Greek, Cyrillic, punctuation, superscript,
      letterlike and number form ranges. A face that fails to build is cleared and
      the embedded ProggyTiny is used instead, so the absence is covered.
    source_ref: "app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/ui/imgui_drawer.cc:43-45, app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/ui/imgui_drawer.cc:355-394, app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/ui/imgui_drawer.cc:527-534"

  - name: "<title_id> - <title>.patch.toml"
    required: false
    bundled: true
    description: "Memory patch set for one title"
    note: >-
      Read from the patches directory under the storage root, keeping names that
      open with eight hexadecimal digits and close with .patch.toml. The title id
      and title name fields and a hash node are mandatory, the file is dropped
      without them, and each entry of the patch array is applied only when its
      is_enabled flag is set and the module hash matches. Patching is on by
      default.
    source_ref: "app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/patcher/patch_db.cc:17-18, app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/patcher/patch_db.cc:30-98, app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/patcher/patch_db.h:121-122, app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/patcher/patcher.cc:22-35, app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/emulator.cc:308"

  - name: plugins.toml
    required: false
    config_key: "General|allow_plugins"
    unsourceable: "per-title manifest written by whoever authors the mod, with no distributed form"
    description: "Plugin manifest for one title"
    note: >-
      Read from plugins/<TITLE_ID>/ under the storage root, where the directory
      name is eight hexadecimal digits. Each entry of the plugin array needs a
      hash node, and an entry without one is skipped. Plugin loading is off by
      default, so nothing under plugins is scanned until it is turned on.
    source_ref: "app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/patcher/plugin_loader.cc:16-21, app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/patcher/plugin_loader.cc:40-127, app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/emulator.cc:324-325"

  - name: "<plugin>.xex"
    required: false
    unsourceable: "homebrew module built for one title, distributed with the mod it belongs to"
    description: "Plugin module named by a plugin manifest"
    note: >-
      The title directory is mounted as the plugins device and each enabled entry
      whose hash matches the running module is loaded as a user module on its own
      thread. A directory that cannot be mounted is a fatal error.
    source_ref: "app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/patcher/plugin_loader.cc:175-257, app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/emulator.cc:1900-1903"

  - name: Account
    required: false
    bundled: true
    load_from: content_dir
    path: "content/<XUID>/FFFE07D1/00010000/<XUID>/Account"
    description: "Encrypted profile account blob"
    note: >-
      Opened from the mounted profile when a XUID is logged in, and decrypted with
      the 0x19 key, retail first then devkit, against the HMAC the first sixteen
      bytes carry. The application extracts the one it ships for XUID
      E0300000A360E000 on first run, and the emulator writes its own when a
      profile is created.
    source_ref: "app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/kernel/xam/profile_manager.cc:187-229, app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/kernel/xam/profile_manager.cc:39-67, app/src/main/java/aenu/ax360e/Application.java:30-34, app/src/main/java/aenu/ax360e/Application.java:92-96"

exclusion_note: >
  Six file loads present in the vendored tree are not reached by this build and
  are not listed. The notification sound named by notification_sound_path is
  played inside a XE_PLATFORM_WIN32 block, and the setting is dropped from the
  generated preference screen. tahoma.ttf and msgothic.ttc are read by the
  Windows font paths only. The fontconfig CJK match is compiled out by
  XE_PLATFORM_LINUX && !(XE_PLATFORM_ANDROID || XE_PLATFORM_AX360E), and
  platform.h defines XE_PLATFORM_AX360E for this target. gamecontrollerdb.txt
  belongs to the SDL input driver, and xenia-hid-sdl is absent from the link
  list. portable.txt is read by xenia_main.cc, which is not compiled, the
  application supplying its own windowed app. libSPIRV-Tools-shared.so is loaded
  by the standalone shader compiler and needs VULKAN_SDK in the environment.
  librenderdoc.so is opened with RTLD_NOLOAD, which returns a handle only when
  the library is already mapped and never reads the file.
  ref: app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/ui/imgui_guest_notification.cc:49-60,
       app/src/main/cpp/emulator_ax360e.cpp:359,
       app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/ui/imgui_drawer.cc:396-427,
       app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/ui/imgui_drawer.cc:429-513,
       app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/base/platform.h:34-37,
       app/src/main/cpp/CMakeLists.txt:92-132,
       app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/app/xenia_main.cc:485,
       app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/ui/vulkan/spirv_tools_context.cc:28-37,
       app/src/main/cpp/xenia-canary/src/xenia/ui/renderdoc_api.cc:35-48