Where, how and what do you emulate?

[roushimsx]

I am very much intrigued. (The other slightly daunting thing about PSX emulation is that things like SSSPSX and Emurayden pop up with relatively little information about them.)

SSSPSX is quite nice as far as psemupro-spec emulators go. It's built off of the PCSX sources and really rivals ePSXe in terms of compatibility. The one thing I don't like about it is that for whatever reason fraps doesn't like to work with it so I can't take screenshots

So by "snazzy visual effects" I guess you mean that you're stuck running things in the default Playstation resolution with no nice jaggy reduction or anything?

Yep, you'll be running in the original resolution and then have it stretched to full screen. Here's some examples (I play in 1280x960 since it's my desktop resolution):

By the way, what's up with Virtual Boy emulation lately?

-edited because i can't read-

Haven't been keeping up with that, but I've been meaning to look into it for a while. I've kinda been holding out for a finished copy of Dragon Hopper to get dumped before I really get interested

[sabre2922]

I emulate anything pre-PSX and MAME mostly for 2-D fighters and KILLER INSTINCT, meaning just about everything that was a cartridge based system.

My favs are:

Visualboyadvanced

FCE Ultra for NES

Zsnes

and GENs

[InsaneDavid]

I would probably have settled for DC emulation years ago if it wasn't so hard to compile the games (at least then).

Bah, it was never that hard, really all that needed to be done was to write a batch file that wound run a bunch of DOS apps in the proper order. (I still use one I wrote years ago to compile my NESterDC v7.1 builds)

[Cryomancer]

Well lets see on my desktop I have shortcuts for....

Stella, FCEUltra, Magic Engine, ZSNES, KEGA, GENS, ePSXe I rarely use, NeoPop, Visualboy Advance, Modeler, MAME32, and blueMSX. I use some of these fairly often (MAME32, KEGA, and VBA mostly).

I've got others as well, for the X68000, Saturn (SSF, again, barely ever use), Handy, FreeDO, Project 64 and Daphne, and a tamagotchi simulator. Those I don't use much.

The xbox also has snes9x, xenesis, FCE for xbox, MAME, and that three-emulator n64 thingie. That's mostly used for travel.

Most of my emulation is to try stuff to see what i should pick up, or to take screenshots or such. I do play about with hacked games and stuff from time to time as well. The other thing I use emultion for is discovering systems I've never touched, such is the case for the MSX and X68000 emulators.

Controller wise I use a homemade xbox controller adapter, or my super joybox that does DC, saturn, and psx controllers. I wish someone would make one that does N64, SNES, and cube, that would be damn handy.

[B - Mark]

I emulate games in my PC.

My list of emulators:

*Master System and Game Gear
- MEKA
- Gens Plus

*Mega Drive / Genesis
- Gens
- Gens Plus

*NES
-Nesticle
-NNester J

*Super NES
-ZSNES

*Game Boy Classic and Game Boy Color
-Visual Boy
-Smygb

*Game Boy Advance
-Visual Boy Advance

*CPS 1 and CPS 2 Arcade Systems
-Winkawaks

*Neo Geo
-NeoRage X

*Neo Geo Pocket
-Neopop

*Wonderswan
-WSCAMP

[fishsandwich]

I used to play stuff on my PC but I've just run ouit of time with work and life. PORTABLE GAMING is another story. I use my Tapwave Zodiac for portable emulation and my N-gage for REALLY portable gaming. I'd be wrecked if I lost or broke the Zodiac so it's pampermed more but the N-Gage gets chucked around quite a bit as its much easier to replace.

I'm done.

[Sweater Fish Deluxe]

I do most of my emulation in pure DOS. I use:

Stella for 2600
Nesticle for NES
BRSMS for Master System, Game Gear and Coleco
Hu-Go! for TurboGrafx
Genecyst for Genesis
ZSNES for SNES

All of those except Hu-Go! are fullspeed (0 frameskip) with my laptop's CPU stepped all the way down to 166MHz for maximum battery life when not on AC.

I use the Game Launcher universal frontend for a nice unified experience, with backgrounds like this one but different for each system:



And everything is controlled by this controller:

which is a really nice one both in terms of quality and layout, plus it plugs straight into the PS/2 port and acts as a keyboard, so there's never compatibility issues and it can control things that can't be controlled by normal gamepads and it has four completely remappable setting as well as one default setting with the buttons mapped as they're labeled.

When in Windows, I use FCEUltra, Gens Plus, SNES9x and NGPocket, but that's just for quick stuff like taking screenshots or testing hacks or something, for real playing I reset into DOS.

For MAME, I have MAME32IP set up in Windows, but I haven't gotten around to setting up a version of MAME for DOS to use with Game Launcher. I also need togo through all the MAME ROMs and par the collection down to just the stuff I want to keep (about 500MB is what I'm planning to allot). One of these days.


...word is bondage...

[Jorpho]

That is one darn spiffy gamepad! Are they still widely available?

I guess you use DOS since you're running those at 166 MHz? (Nesticle leaves something to be desired, methinks.)

[Sweater Fish Deluxe]

That is one darn spiffy gamepad! Are they still widely available?

I don't know about widely, but they are still available from the manufacturers website and for only $10, too, which is a great deal for this controller, I think.

http://www.act-labs.com/scripts/proddetails.asp?pid=38

But don't buy too many of them, please, because I need to buy another one for myself. I recently realized that since they have a PS/2 passthrough plug intended for a full keyboard, you could actually plug two of these controllers into a PS/2 port for two player games (assuming that many keypresses doesn't wig out DOS or the program you're running).

I guess you use DOS since you're running those at 166 MHz? (Nesticle leaves something to be desired, methinks.)

Yeah, Nesticle is anything but ideal, but I want to need to use DOS just because I want the fastest boot up and I also want every extra bit of juice free for the games. I tried all the other DOS NES emulators I could find and while they have better accuracy and compatibility, they are either too slow or don't offer resolution modes I like, so I stick with Nesticle. It's not *THAT* bad.

BrSMS isn't perfect, either, since it doesn't allow any button remapping and I don't want to have to use up one whole setting on my controller just for BrSMS. It does have a fabulous 512x384 w/ scanlines setting, though, that looks absolutely perfect on my laptop's screen.


...word is bondage...

[Jorpho]

I wonder if there's a USB controller that can work the same way? (Most BIOSes provide legacy USB keyboard support to let you use a keyboard in DOS, so presumably one could have a USB gamepad that simulates keyboard input.)

I want to need to use DOS just because I want the fastest boot up and I also want every extra bit of juice free for the games.

It is tempting to suggest a flavor of Linux, but I don't think there's something that quite does what you want to just yet. (I'm sure someone has thought of it, though.) The games variants of Knoppix might come close, but since they still has a full window manager (I think) it certainly won't boot up very fast.

[Snapple]

I haven't had any real problems with PS1 and GBA emulation. Especially GBA. VirtualBoy Advance is extremely easy to use.

[tanda]

I've fiddled around with emulators on a pc, and I found the experience to be underwhelming. It is great to check out arcade games never ported to home systems, or titles too expensive to take a chance on buying the board.

I have played around on a modded xbox, and that really was a nice experience to use a console controller on a large television. A nice way to go.

[mdk]

What: MAME
Where and how:



That is my MAME cab I build from the ground up a few summers back. I did sell it off recently but have a new one in the works. I'll post some updates when I have it near completion.

[dankicksass]

I emulate typically only NES, SNES, and Genesis games I actually own, generally on my PC or laptop when I'm not feeling like bothering anyone who is trying to watch TV. I use Nuby's Capcom Street Fighter anniversary PSX/Xbox Saturn-style pads when I emulate, and sometimes a regular PS2 or Xbox pad if it's already connected. The Nuby SF pads are nicer than people give them credit for. I actually have both the PSX and Xbox versions. I like the PSX version a bit better, since it is lighter due to no memory card port built in, and it seems to have nicer buttons in the ABC/XYZ area. It cost me twice as much as my Xbox pad though, so I guess you get what you pay for. But, since I have multiples of these pads, it does make multiplayer emulation more satisfying, like you're using the real thing.

Once I finish off my NES-encased home theatre PC, I'll probably load emulators on that too. I've got the case and processor for it, I just have to bring together the other components and build it up. That ought to be a fun project.