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Installation

Prerequisites

  • Unity 6000.0+ with a Universal Render Pipeline (URP) project
  • Git installed and available in your system PATH
  • Windows, Linux, or macOS (Apple Silicon)

Universal Render Pipeline

Your Unity project must use the Universal Render Pipeline. When creating a new project, select the Universal 3D template.

Step 1: Install SplashEdit in Unity

  1. Download the latest SplashEdit release as a .tgz file from the releases page
  2. In Unity, go to Window -> Package Manager
  3. Click the + button and select Add package from tarball...
  4. Select the downloaded .tgz file
  5. Unity imports the package

Step 2: Open the Control Panel

Go to PlayStation 1 -> SplashEdit Control Panel (or press Ctrl+Shift+L).

The Control Panel is your central hub for dependencies, scene management, and building.

Step 3: Install the Native Project

In the Control Panel's Dependencies tab:

  1. Under Native Project, click the release dropdown and select the version that matches your SplashEdit package version
  2. Click Clone to download the psxsplash C++ runtime
  3. Wait for the clone to complete (this uses Git under the hood)

Tip

Alternatively, click Browse to point to a local copy of the psxsplash source if you already have it cloned.

Step 4: Install the Toolchain

Still in the Dependencies tab, the toolchain section shows the status of each required tool:

Tool Purpose Install Method
MIPS Cross-Compiler Compiles C++ to PS1 machine code Click "Install" (Win/Linux)
GNU Make Build system Click "Install" (Win/Linux)
PCSX-Redux PS1 emulator for testing Click "Download"
psxavenc Audio conversion to ADPCM Click "Download"
mkpsxiso ISO image creation Click "Download"

Each tool shows a green Ready badge when installed. On Windows and Linux, SplashEdit handles downloading and setting up all of these for you. On macOS, some tools require manual Terminal commands first — the Dependencies tab shows yellow badges and the exact commands to run (see macOS Setup below).

Minimum requirements

You need at minimum the MIPS compiler and Make to build. PCSX-Redux is needed for emulator testing and Lua compilation. mkpsxiso is only needed for ISO builds.

macOS Setup

On macOS, some tools can't be auto-installed. The Dependencies tab shows yellow badges for anything that requires manual action — Needs setup, Needs CLT (Xcode Command Line Tools), Needs brew (Homebrew), or Needs deps (build dependencies) — with the exact Terminal commands inline. Install the prerequisites below, then click Refresh — the badges will turn green.

Prerequisites (run in Terminal before opening SplashEdit):

# Install Xcode Command Line Tools (provides GNU Make)
xcode-select --install

# Install the MIPS cross-compiler helper
brew install nikitabobko/tap/brew-install-path

# Download the compiler formulas from pcsx-redux
curl -LO https://raw.githubusercontent.com/grumpycoders/pcsx-redux/main/tools/macos-mips/mipsel-none-elf-binutils.rb
curl -LO https://raw.githubusercontent.com/grumpycoders/pcsx-redux/main/tools/macos-mips/mipsel-none-elf-gcc.rb

# Install (builds from source — expect 15-30 minutes)
brew install-path ./mipsel-none-elf-binutils.rb
brew install-path ./mipsel-none-elf-gcc.rb

Don't have Homebrew?

Install it first: /bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/HEAD/install.sh)"

Why so many steps?

There is no prebuilt MIPS compiler for macOS. The formulas above are maintained by the pcsx-redux project (the same team behind the PCSX-Redux emulator). The brew-install-path helper is needed because Homebrew no longer supports installing from local formula files directly.

psxavenc build dependencies — psxavenc has no prebuilt macOS binary, so SplashEdit builds it from source. The Dependencies tab will show Needs deps until you install:

brew install meson pkg-config ffmpeg

Once installed, click Refresh, then Download to build psxavenc.

The remaining tools are handled automatically:

  • PCSX-Redux — Click "Download." SplashEdit downloads the macOS ARM build, creates a launcher wrapper, and configures font paths.
  • mkpsxiso — Click "Download." Works the same as Windows/Linux.

Verifying Installation

When all required tools show green badges, the Control Panel status bar shows "Ready". You're good to go.

If SplashEdit detects a missing toolchain on first launch, it automatically opens the Control Panel to guide you through setup.