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Post by kingmike on Jan 4, 2016 11:00:39 GMT -5
There have been several pay emulators. Though it's something that mostly died out in the early 2000s. Perhaps most well known in early days were Pasofami and Super Pasofami. The former used a format with ROMs split by PRG, CHR and header. I only saw the format once. And the somewhat ironically named no$gmb. The author gave monochrome GB emulation for free but charged for color (at the time when Nintendo was still selling actual GBCs). He REALLY did not take piracy of registration keys well. (when developing the successor no$gba he moved to a different practice of only charging for the latest "gamer" version and "developer" versions) There was also another emulator author who made several My??? emulators. One particular was MyNES. He had dumped several pirate Famicom games (including Chinese translations, like the Dragon Quest games) but encrypted them to only work on his emulator. The demo version he released was written to expire after such a time (say six months) after it was released, and his site went down so you couldn't download it anymore. Luckily people later on broke his encryption making the ROMs playable again. I recall there was also an emulator author that made several console emulators, including MSX and Game Boy. One of the popular early GB emulators, I really should remember the name Virtual Game Boy or something maybe? Anyway he released his emulators as freeware EXCEPT for those a CERTAIN popular Microsoft OS.
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Post by Weasel on Jan 4, 2016 12:24:05 GMT -5
Perhaps most well known in early days were Pasofami and Super Pasofami. The former used a format with ROMs split by PRG, CHR and header. I only saw the format once. I have an ancient version of this emulator in backups somewhere, that I once tried (and failed) to make work through Win 3.11 in DOSBox. I remember it working quite badly on an actual old machine, running too fast, having wildly incorrect colors, and piping the sound channels through Windows MIDI Mapper, resulting in one hell of a psychedelic Super Mario Bros. experience.
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Post by lavabeast on Jan 4, 2016 21:00:37 GMT -5
that is yet another thing I need to do. Is figure out the process of running the CD titles. I have tried in the past with little to no success but that was some time back. The urge to play Rondo of Blood and forget about Dracula X is strong lol!!! Someone even took the translation from the PSP version of Dracula X and put it into an ISO of the PCE version. I'd suggest going that route, if possible. Nice! Yeah, that is actually the copy I am downloading.
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Post by Allie on Jan 6, 2016 13:09:13 GMT -5
I recall there was also an emulator author that made several console emulators, including MSX and Game Boy. One of the popular early GB emulators, I really should remember the name Virtual Game Boy or something maybe? Anyway he released his emulators as freeware EXCEPT for those a CERTAIN popular Microsoft OS. Marat Fayzullin. The MSX and GB emulators (fMSX and VGB) were ported to DOS (for free, as fMSX-DOS and VGB-DOS) by Marcel deKogel. He wouldn't allow a DOS port of his NES emulator (iNES), though.
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Post by Allie on Jan 6, 2016 13:13:28 GMT -5
Perhaps most well known in early days were Pasofami and Super Pasofami. The former used a format with ROMs split by PRG, CHR and header. I only saw the format once. I have an ancient version of this emulator in backups somewhere, that I once tried (and failed) to make work through Win 3.11 in DOSBox. I remember it working quite badly on an actual old machine, running too fast, having wildly incorrect colors, and piping the sound channels through Windows MIDI Mapper, resulting in one hell of a psychedelic Super Mario Bros. experience. Pasofami worked fine for me, for the most part, back in the old days. It's just that there were only so many games that had been in the split-cart format (and were available in 10 packs of pre-split titles) at that time (1994-95), and using a utility to split a .nes format (which iNES used) ROM file into split-cart usually did not work.
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Post by surnshurn on Mar 18, 2016 19:07:46 GMT -5
I was recently trying out some old roms for turbo cd (I'm not keeping them or selling them, and I'm not paying hugely inflated prices for my cursory playthroughs). This being 2016, I was having trouble finding a program that: A. worked with linux and B. could recognize virtual cd drives After hours of researching cd mounting programs, searching for bugs, performing trial and error executions... I found Mednafen, a command-line multi system emulator that is working great for me so far. mednafen.fobby.net/ There is a bit of learning curve to it, since the base package is command-line only. There are GUI's to be found online, but I couldn't get any of those to work. It's pretty basic in linux, simply executing the program with an argument of the rom's location is enough to start the emulator. F1 gives a basic help function. There is a pretty rich config file, you can edit specific system preferences with a text-editor's search function (ie 'snes' to look for snes-specific functions). There is a LOT in the config file, and I haven't really delved into it too much. So for anybody looking to streamline their emulator experience for old games (it supports PS1, but not PS2) I would def look into this. addended: The official supported systems are: Atari Lynx Neo Geo Pocket (Color) WonderSwan GameBoy (Color) GameBoy Advance Nintendo Entertainment System Super Nintendo Entertainment System/Super Famicom Virtual Boy PC Engine/TurboGrafx 16 (CD) SuperGrafx PC-FX Sega Game Gear Sega Genesis/Megadrive Sega Master System Sony PlayStation and the controller setup is actually pretty simple once you figure it out. press (ALT+SHIFT+1)(for controller one) and follow the commands, repeat the previous command to move on to the next.
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Post by reasonance on Mar 19, 2016 12:46:03 GMT -5
I'm partial to RetroArch [because of really good renderer, huge selection of shaders, and ever-evolving library of cores [individual emulators for specific systems working within it]] - though configuring it is a bit of pain. and shmupmame for shmups and arcades in general [mamebranch that had drivers modified to get lowest amount of input lag possible]
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Post by FreightMan07 on Jun 15, 2016 21:40:57 GMT -5
Hello all...newbie to the forum here...NOT a newbie to gaming however...
Recommendations (or at least, emus I have found work pretty well):
ColecoVision-- Started out with Virtual Coleco, but found the options quite lacking and some game compatibility issues, then discovered ColEm (I have version 3.6), and that has a few filters you can work with and have had no problems with any roms thus far. That all said, word is Blue MSX (an MSX emulator, duh...hehe), can ALSO emulate ColecoVision. I have yet to put blue MSX through it's paces, but if it does what it advertises and has no issues with Coleco games, then THAT would be the go-to.... ColecoVision was my very first console I ever owned, so it holds a special place in my gaming heart.
MSX--- I hear Blue MSX is good, plus what I said above for Coleco fans.....I have yet to really mess with it though to see it's true capabilities.
Atari 2600-- Using Stella right now, but to be honest, the interface pisses me off. Plays games well enough, but some days the clunky interface is just too much a hassle to mess with. Hmmm...maybe RetroArch can help me there?
NES-- LOOOOONGtime FCE Ultra user, then updated to FCEUX 2.2.2. A fine emulator, plays hacks of all sorts....but it has some weird sound crackling problems if you use the hardware acceleration option in conjunction with any of the VSync options. Bascially you have to decide between playing with the minor sound crackling with a smooth, non tearing screen, or play with some tearing on the screen, but clean sound. Not a huge deal, but it can bug some people. I have since moved to the latest Nestopia (1.47) and it does away with any sound issues....yet have discovered some issues playing some patched rom games....oh well. Toss up here, I keep both on hand.
Sega 8 and 16 bit Systems---- I have used Kega Fusion for a long time, and honestly, I see no reason to change from it. Does it all for me...Genesis, Master System, 32X, Sega CD, Game Gear, SG-1000, and plays any and all hacks I have thrown at it, has a nice collection of filters to suit your tastes, and runs full screen even on low end PC's. I've tried Gens, and its good...but so far, it hasn't compelled me to switch over, or to even have it as a secondary. Closed source or not, Fusion is the shit as far as I am concerned.
SNES--- Like many others, I used ZSNES for a long time. Pretty reliable emu, runs great even on a pc with lower specs, but discovered some time back that it DOES have sound accuracy issues, and some games run at a different pace than the original games, has some compatibility issues (mainly Puyo Puyo games, which I LOVE), and yes, it's true, it has not been updated for quite a long time. Enter Snes9x 1.53. Needs a bit higher specs to run flawlessly than ZSNES, but if you can run it, the accuracy is pretty damned good and thus far, have had no compatibility issues...main gripe against it? Don't like the save state system...uses a slot system, rather than letting you write your own file using a save file extension. At least, that's how I see it...unless I missed something there....good overall emu though
N64--- Project 64 version 2.1. No problems so far, nice plug in system that lets you configure things on a per-rom basis, and excellent accuracy (though I won't claim it's 100 percent as I have yet to try that Mupen64 I keep hearing about...)
GameBoy systems---- Visual Boy Advance M. Was using the 1022 version, then stumbled upon a WX version (someone told me it is the WII version of it...yet I am running it on Windows 10!). Anyways, this WX version does everything I need, plays hacks, runs GB, GBC, GBA games pretty flawlessly, so that is my go-to there
Nintendo DS---DeSmuMe...only one I ever tried, does a good job, will stick with it till I see something better.
TG16/PC Engine--- I have a full version of Magic Engine, and yes, it IS pay to play, hasn't been updated in a long time, but dammit, it runs my TG 16 and Supergraphx roms and hacks just fine. No CD image support is a bummer, and thus I am looking for an alternative to have alongside my trusty Magic Engine...perhaps this OOtake some speak of...or perhaps one of the multi-console emulators....hmm...
Some of you guys seem pretty high on RetroArch...I may look into that for odd emulation I don't want to keep a stand alone emu for....or as an alternative to some of the emus I already run. I used to have a pretty pedestrian pc, but nowadays, sport a very nice setup that can run just about anything (just downloaed Dolphin not too long ago and was amazed by the graphics and speed I was capable of running it at on my rig....though I haven't fully investigated that GC and Wii emu)
Win10, 3.2GHz i5 Intel processor, 16GB RAM, Nvidia 950GT 2GB video card is what I run now.
Thanks to many posters for some info on this thread that has given me food for though on investigating alternative emus and doing some comparison test runs on stuff.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 15, 2016 22:50:52 GMT -5
No Saturn emulation? Denied.
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Post by FreightMan07 on Jun 25, 2016 15:43:20 GMT -5
No Saturn emulation? Denied. Well, I can put it on my "to investigate" list I suppose. Looked into Sat Emus some time back, but A), my PC at the time was not really capable and B) Saturn emulation still seemed problematic. Even now, I keep hearing Saturn emulation still isn't quite "there"...but then, I haven't really looked in earnest to see what new developments on the state of emulation for the system have come about. SSF, Yabausa (sp?)....those seem to be the ones I hear about the most, yet still, ppl don't seem 100% satisfied with their performance. Another thing: Before I invest time and storage space to an emu and it's roms/isos, I'd like to have a pretty heft desire to play a good deal of its games. Many of the great Saturn 2D games can be found as arcade games through Mame, the other 3d games can be gotten as PS1 versions through ePSXe (though that is another emu I have yet to really dig into), which leaves some of the Saturn exclusives or games that just run 'better' on the Saturn. Hmm..Fighter's Megamix, Dragon Force, Power Slave (supposedly runs better on SAT over PS1)? Surely will look into it....at some point, but for now, just have no desire for it. These days I am in full retro gaming mode though.....so mostly playing pre-32bit stuff anyways. Now...if you will excuse me, I have a few rounds of Kangaroo, Popeye, Revenge of Death Adder, and Magic Sword to get to via MAME.....and I promised my son we will have some serious head to head Bomberman 93 matches via Magic Engine later as well....
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Post by hudakj on Jun 26, 2016 5:50:46 GMT -5
Saturn emulation is at least as good as current N64 emulation right now, and for personal experience better. I mainly used SSF a few years ago, though Yabause is apparently still active and making new builds. SSF seems to have better game compatibility. Haven't come across one it won't play.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 27, 2016 19:58:13 GMT -5
SSF is amazing. Physical copies of Saturn games are just insanely expensive anymore, so it's amazing to have a way to play these things without giving a ton of money to asshole collectors.
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Post by Magma MK-II on Jul 6, 2016 13:16:03 GMT -5
Is there a standalone Astrocade emulator out there? I'm trying my hand at a handful of old console emulators, and I don't want to rely on MESS.
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Post by Weasel on Jul 6, 2016 20:43:05 GMT -5
Is there a standalone Astrocade emulator out there? I'm trying my hand at a handful of old console emulators, and I don't want to rely on MESS. It would not appear so; not even Zophar's Domain lists the Astrocade in its wide variety of emulators both new and old.
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Post by toadofsky on Jul 11, 2016 19:52:24 GMT -5
Didn't know if this really needed a separate thread, but does anyone know of places to order a GD Emu for Dreamcast? It's a board replacement for the Disc Drive to play games via SD (it even plugs into the old GD-ROM's slot!!) I'm really thinking about investing in this to play games without the worry of the drive dying.
I also wonder about hooking it up to HDMI, I know a VGA adapter is the easiest method which I'm looking into doing. But before I make significant investment I just wanted the question on the GD Emu answered.
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