"RetroAchievements login failed: invalid user/password combination. Please try again."

[Jakob Fel]

I started up RetroArch today and tried to launch Super Metroid, only to be greeted with two notifications: the one in the title, followed by "RetroAchievements game load failed: Login required".

What's up with this? I tried to log back in, double checked the login info, but it's still giving me that error. I can't seem to figure out what's going wrong here, does anyone have any ideas of what might be causing this? I saw a Reddit thread from a few years back expressing this issue but it seems like suggestions were very hit-or-miss, involving manually modifying the token in the files, leaving your password in cleartext (which I'm not about to do).

If anyone has suggestions, I'd truly appreciate it. I was working on a Super Metroid playthrough with the Hardcore achievements enabled and I'd like to finish it.

[GorditoCrunch]

Try entering the wrong password, then quit RetroArch. It'll save the token on the config file, then restart RetroArch and enter the right password. Should be working after that.

[Jakob Fel]

That did it, many thanks!

[SteelDiver]

I tried this and it's still not working for me.

[RobotMan #08]

What works for me when it gives me the invalid login/token message is to go and log into the RetroAchievements website, after that...RetroArch and the saved login info works just fine without having to change or re-enter anything. If I remember correctly, the token expires after 45-60 days, logging back into their site reactivates it.

[Jakob Fel]

Well, that sort of expiry is a major pain in the backside. I understand having it expire on a web browser but it shouldn't expire in emulator integrations. I might just say "screw it" to RetroAchievements entirely if that's the case.

[RobotMan #08]

Originally posted by Jakob Fel:

Well, that sort of expiry is a major pain in the backside. I understand having it expire on a web browser but it shouldn't expire in emulator integrations. I might just say "screw it" to RetroAchievements entirely if that's the case.

So I found this workaround that doesn't use the token and only needs UN/PW stored in the config file, I just tried it on my Steam Deck, haven't played for a few months so I was getting the invalid token.

https://www.reddit.com/r/RetroAchievements/comments/145fit6/fix_for_invalid_userpassword_combination_problem/?share_id=lUpbgmgtrFn6NEJcSiKZP&utm_content=1&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_source=share&utm_term=1

I did the first fix mentioned, edited my retroarch.cfg file.

1. Find your Retroarch.cfg file. On my Steam Deck it was located in home/deck/.var/app/org.libretro.retroarch/retroarch.cfg

2. Ctrl+F and search for 'Cheevo' to find a collection of lines related to RetroAchievements. What you want to do is enter your password on the line saying 'cheevos_password'. I deleted the quotation marks surrounding the password as someone else recommended doing this, and it worked fine for me.

3. Delete the entire line titled 'cheevos_token'.

So the only 2 issues for me personally was RetroArch on my Steam Deck kept reverting the changes after saving, and it was still telling me a Password was needed to login.

In the Password field I left the quotations there so it looked like;

cheevos_password = "InsertPasswordHere"

The other thing I did was after saving everything, make the file "read only" so the system couldn't make anymore changes. After those two things were changed, launched a game and it logged me in with full access to achievements.

Hope this helps you, I'm glad I'm not getting the expiry token anymore and didn't even log into the site for this to work.

[Jakob Fel]

Originally posted by RobotMan #08:

Originally posted by Jakob Fel:

Well, that sort of expiry is a major pain in the backside. I understand having it expire on a web browser but it shouldn't expire in emulator integrations. I might just say "screw it" to RetroAchievements entirely if that's the case.

So I found this workaround that doesn't use the token and only needs UN/PW stored in the config file, I just tried it on my Steam Deck, haven't played for a few months so I was getting the invalid token.

https://www.reddit.com/r/RetroAchievements/comments/145fit6/fix_for_invalid_userpassword_combination_problem/?share_id=lUpbgmgtrFn6NEJcSiKZP&utm_content=1&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_source=share&utm_term=1

I did the first fix mentioned, edited my retroarch.cfg file.

1. Find your Retroarch.cfg file. On my Steam Deck it was located in home/deck/.var/app/org.libretro.retroarch/retroarch.cfg

2. Ctrl+F and search for 'Cheevo' to find a collection of lines related to RetroAchievements. What you want to do is enter your password on the line saying 'cheevos_password'. I deleted the quotation marks surrounding the password as someone else recommended doing this, and it worked fine for me.

3. Delete the entire line titled 'cheevos_token'.

So the only 2 issues for me personally was RetroArch on my Steam Deck kept reverting the changes after saving, and it was still telling me a Password was needed to login.

In the Password field I left the quotations there so it looked like;

cheevos_password = "InsertPasswordHere"

The other thing I did was after saving everything, make the file "read only" so the system couldn't make anymore changes. After those two things were changed, launched a game and it logged me in with full access to achievements.

Hope this helps you, I'm glad I'm not getting the expiry token anymore and didn't even log into the site for this to work.

Wow, I appreciate the in-depth explanation! If this issue crops up again for me, I'll definitely try your suggestions.