Orchid

A very experimental Switch 2 emulator. Orchid started from Eglantine and has grown into its own project, with fixes aimed at Mario Tennis Fever first, plus the shader, kernel and graphics work other games need.

Note

Orchid is an independent project. Problems with these builds are not caused by the Eglantine or Eden developers, so please do not report them there.

Project scope | Branches and builds | What Orchid adds | Performance | Download | Build it yourself | Documentation | License

Project scope

Orchid's support and development focus is on demonstrably improving these games:

• Mario Tennis Fever
• Both Hyrule Warriors games
• Pokémon Pokopia
• Star Fox
• Super Mario Bros. Wonder
• Yoshi and the Mysterious Book
• Donkey Kong Bananza
• Kirby Air Riders
• Kirby and the Forgotten Land
• Xenoblade Chronicles series (all games)
• Orbitals

These are the project's target games; inclusion here does not mean a game is already fully playable or free of issues. See Performance and compatibility for the currently reported results and their test conditions.

Branches and builds

Branch	Channel	Release name
main	stable	v0.<minor>.<patch>, regular release

.github/version sets the minor version; CI counts the patch up. In 0.5 all branches were merged into main (formerly mario-tennis-fever), including the experimental mario-tennis-fever-perf.

Commits land often, but they do not start a build. Release builds are started by hand (Actions > release-binaries > Run workflow), so the newest release can be several commits behind its branch. To run the newest commit, build it yourself.

What Orchid adds

Compared with the Eglantine it started from:

• Mario Tennis Fever: startup crash fixed, the NVIDIA crash at match start fixed, and per-game defaults (low GPU accuracy, balanced fences).
• Shaders: many more Ampere instructions lowered (IMAD.WIDE, IADD3 carries, LEA.HI, F2I.U64, I2F from 64-bit pairs, bindless TEX modes and others), mainly from the Fire Emblem: Fortune's Weave bring-up.
• System: Switch 2 built-in fonts served from their own shared memory; kernel thread start and finalize races fixed.
• Graphics: query reports flushed before MME DMA reads, layered cross-format texture copies, separate surface and texture descriptor buffers, geometry shaders and framebuffers kept within device limits.
• Experimental branch only: a performance pass (buffer cache, puller, memory trap and kernel locking changes). Faster on some systems, less tested.
• Updates: release builds check this repository for updates and only offer builds of their own channel.

Performance and compatibility

Note

Measured by hand in November 2026 on one PC: AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D, AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT, 32 GB RAM, CachyOS (Linux 7.x, Mesa RADV from git), 1x resolution scaling. Other hardware will differ.

Game	FPS	Notes
Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment	60	after shader compilation
Donkey Kong Bananza	30, 15-25 in heavy areas	30 in lighter areas
Mario Kart World	30-40	lots of off-track asset glitches
Mario Tennis Fever	60	runs flawlessly
Yoshi and the Mysterious Book		first level renders correctly and movement tested; full game not validated
Super Mario Bros. Wonder	60 target	custom FPS targets; Overworld cache churn reduced, some dips remain
Star Fox	30	crashes very quickly
Splatoon Raiders	30	in gameplay
Pokémon Pokopia	60	in gameplay
Pokémon Legends: Z-A	30	in gameplay, the Switch 1 frame cap
Orbitals		does not launch
Nintendo Switch Sports Resort	60	broken lighting, broken controller selection
Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour	30	your own character is fully black
Metroid Prime 4: Beyond	60	until it crashes early on
Kirby Air Riders		crashes while loading a race
Fire Emblem: Fortune's Weave	30	in the first fight, large graphics glitches top left
Fast Fusion		stuck loading into a race, then the emulator crashes
Drag x Drive		no controller support, not playable

Download

Releases are on the releases page. Each one has:

File	For
orchid-<version>-linux-x86_64-pgo.AppImage	Linux, profile-guided build (preferred)
orchid-<version>-linux-x86_64.AppImage	Linux
orchid-<version>-windows-x86_64-pgo.zip	Windows, profile-guided MinGW build (preferred)
orchid-<version>-windows-x86_64.zip	Windows
orchid-<version>-macos-arm64.zip	macOS 15+ on Apple Silicon, experimental

Linux: chmod +x the AppImage and run it; it needs glibc 2.39 or newer. Windows: extract the zip and run orchid.exe.

Build the newest commit yourself

For repeated local Linux testing, use the faster development build with ./tools/build-local.sh after installing the dependencies and ccache.

Linux. Install the dependencies once:

# Arch / CachyOS
sudo pacman -Syu --needed base-devel boost catch2 cmake enet ffmpeg fmt git glslang libzip lz4 \
  ninja nlohmann-json openssl opus qt6-base qt6-multimedia qt6-charts qt6-wayland sdl3 zlib zstd \
  zip unzip vulkan-headers vulkan-utility-libraries libusb spirv-tools spirv-headers

Ubuntu 26.04, Debian 13 and other distributions: see docs/Deps.md.

Clone main, configure and build:

git clone https://github.com/MythosOfs/Orchid.git
cd Orchid
cmake -S . -B build -G Ninja -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -DYUZU_TESTS=OFF \
  -DVulkanHeaders_FORCE_BUNDLED=ON -DVulkanUtilityLibraries_FORCE_BUNDLED=ON
cmake --build build
./build/bin/orchid

Later, to move to the newest commit (only changed files get rebuilt):

git pull
cmake --build build

The first configure downloads further dependencies into .cache/cpm; the two Vulkan flags use the bundled headers, as the release builds do, so a newer system Vulkan package cannot break the build. A self-built binary has no update checker; git pull is the update. Windows (MSVC) and macOS builds are described in the build guide.

Documentation

• User handbook
• Build guide and dependencies
• Fire Emblem: Fortune's Weave bring-up notes
• Switch 2 loading notes
• Development tools
• Fork scan: taking fixes from Eglantine forks

Credits

Orchid takes fixes from Eglantine and its forks; after every release tools/fork-scan.sh lists what they fixed since. Each ported commit names its source and author in its message.

• zortos293/Eglantine (Zortos), the project Orchid started from: paged scalar guest memory access, SPSCQueue value lifetime, timed Event waits on Windows, GPU teardown order, buffer cache and query fixes, native Ampere nanosecond timestamps, the separate pipeline cache file names. Radu Ursache: no mesh pipelines without VK_EXT_mesh_shader. Kaj (co-authored with Claude Opus 5.5): skip guest uploads for new render targets fully overwritten by a clear, adapted with framebuffer render-area, transformed-scissor, linear-attachment and zero-layer guards from 27226d2568c99c70cf78aa37adaf98b60457b2e5. Paulo Tumabing: 32-bit global ATOM.CAS, adapted to Orchid's storage lowering and atomic routing.

• Djihads80/Eglantine and its contributors: merged regularly. Idle staging buffers freed (Takoroka), the RangeSet empty-query guard (néo Luigi), test fixes (kraibse).

• ZnOw01/Primrose (ZnOw01): shader cache invalidation lifetime fix, adapted to renderer-thread retirement.

• exploitizm/Eglantine (exploitizm): signed IADD32 negative-overflow boundary fix for GLSL and SPIR-V, adapted from c2f9811073bfe617524d4413742a4d4406fd287a.

• Selevet Eglantine (sylvieistaken): the windowed GPU mapping table diff, hot loop shortcuts, F2I, local spill and texture query lowering, device memory rebuild on layout changes, decoder end of stream, Windows commit retries, and the GPU wait knobs (EDEN_NX2_GPU_WAIT_SPIN_US, EDEN_NX2_BACK_SPIN, EDEN_NX2_ACQUIRE_QUEUED, EDEN_NX2_SWAP_STABLE, EDEN_NX2_AVX512).

• PokeDinner (Franseven, mirror), partly from Eden-NS2: any cache hint on native LDG, SUST with a partial channel mask, EDEN_AUTO_BUTTONS.

• Forks of those: Dee1, Greencus and exploitizm (audio manager lifetime, macro binds past the start table), LucyferDev (A64 saturating shift and multiply-accumulate instructions), FZout (page table block ids, game list titles), sagaopc (NUP directory cycles), Quixomatic (eden-cli, Switch 2 module names), YLTai (SDL motion after reconnect), Aidan Kinzett and oledz-i (NUP detection, geometry stream 0), NicholasBly and ominixisboss (dynarmic), kipavy (storage CAS loop), adamhahnHU and arisqz (sparse layered images), Pavel Barabanov and andrewleeog (F2I bits, host1x syncpoint actions), MFS-code (Switch 2 GOB order), CarlosKeese and Dennys Kaluzny Pereira (lowering), failaip12 (memory manager bounds).

• After 0.6.3: godpow and its contributors nowhere02, xDarkWindx, Duck912, ZnOw01 and CloudP4bbs (buffer, texture and staging cache guards, descriptor growth, GPU split wake-up recovery, NPad update filter), failaip12 via cira0100 (data races, UBSan fixes, audio and SDL locking), monteger8 for adamd (Donkey Kong Bananza buffer cache skips, indirect draw reset by hash), Aidan Kinzett (NV12 video decoder), Jonas via jojo-chaechae (x64 call reach, Switch 2 channel setup), SavageCore (mod root guards), cblock85, christianball123, Khobzpro, larryliu985, Doughston (n-popescu) and Xnos666.

• After 0.7.0: Zortos (native BRA.U, register-handle image access, uniform shifts, global memory helpers, the H.264 decoder reset, Aftermath dumps, Switch 2 mixer stream audio), zirulo via Zortos (the Ocarina of Time boot fix), Paulo Rossatto (loose base dumps, GPU-only regions, 2D blit formats), Raikaru (ssl:s contexts and socket timeouts), Mcm190 (H.264 packet framing), Yuri Olive (decoder end of stream), rdenno (fence download ranges), kraibse (tessellation pipelines), a55uka (contentless NUP sections), Andreas Heider (ANV barriers), Aidan Kinzett (button glyphs), Jonas (H0_NH1 halves), exploitizm (IMAD, I2F and FSET lowering, memory manager reference counts), christianball123 (device index fallback), kdegonia-star (global atomic add) and Takoroka (ISETP.EX and UIMAD.WIDE lowering).

• rdenno: the Mario Tennis Fever fixes in 0.5.1.

• Drizz1le/Lichii (Inc0rporate, with Claude Opus 5.5): count nested shader returns before reordering demotes for AMD drivers.

• DrSergioRFilho/Lichii (Dr. Sergio, with Claude Fable 5.1): apply LayeredFS mods to NUP titles without reapplying their merged update, from fe29f5c45ef8f8ab826f148827a1b3962c32d7d7.

• chuppatricky/Lichii (chuppatricky, with Claude Opus 5.5): shadow Ampere RED and SURED data registers, adapted from fc5d6dc31b49ae614d06c05302f4ee2abdf8ce4c.

• SoyMoikas/Eglantine (SoyMoikas): uniform-base native Ampere local stores and loads, adapted to Orchid's existing vector lowering and register shadowing from 3c30f286d9631581ea3611c0f30eae46e7f60694 and 8c06623a4651e5f31d7297932f6b9887dfea9006.

• Hydro74000/Edlws (Hydro74000): make UniqueFunction own copies of lvalue callables while moving rvalues, from dd8039f6afc92803938d641a484312931acae9ca.

• DrSergioRFilho/Lichii (Dr. Sergio, with Claude Fable 5.1): check nested config array bounds against the innermost array, from 08d3388f0f5496be67dd5f83dfdcddd0fcd59358.

• Shenopi/Lichii (999sian): preserve active custom settings while reloading global configuration, adapted from the config-only changes in 88ffd1f312f9a38fd45575dc8e1c7d66ef9b4f6e.

• trianglebraindev/Lichii (trianglebraindev, with Claude Opus 5.5): two-source F2IP.U8.F32 byte packing, adapted to Orchid's register shadowing from ac82c78b5ca4cfbcb11e3043f05a3354f444f027.

• leadaenima/Lichii (Cursor Agent, co-authored with leadaenima): AMDVLK dynamic subgroup shuffle workaround, adapted from 957913cf14ca1e3776a4984151b63434af543217 and 201450e90a87b494a8d1dc34d32558033a715438. Graphics use the 32-lane broadcast fallback only when subgroup size 32 can be enforced for that stage. Compute and unsupported graphics stages retain Shuffle; Qualcomm keeps its existing full-subgroup fallback. Pipeline hash diagnostics are omitted.

License

GPLv3 or any later version, see LICENSE.txt. Started from Eglantine, which builds on Eden, yuzu and Sudachi.