Emulation kinda sucks. Kinda really sucks.

[GENESISNES]

In my opinion, I cant stand emulation. its SO much better to have the original game and the original system. and play it with the original controllers. Most people will disagree with me, but we all know the truth. It sucks. (and its illegal. but the FBI wont ever come to your door to check if you have a copy of Mickey Mania for Sega Genesis.) oh and anyone who has Shaq Fu in their rom collection should be smacked in the face with a rubber chicken.

[NE146]

Well duh we all know emu's can never match the real thing 100% in many ways (arcade games moreso... well maybe neo-geo and JAMMA emus come close). So what you're saying isn't exactly enlightening to most of us.

But quite honestly I don't know of an easier way to play 2600 Quadrun, SNES Puyo Puyo, then a round of Major Havoc while sitting at my desk at work. :P

[GENESISNES]

What you should do is actully work. isn't that what ur supposed to do instead of kickin back and playin on the ZSNES

[Revolt]

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

[NE146]

Well obviously I do work since I'm sitting here right now.. And these little game breaks are what's known as executive priviledge! (But don't tell anyone here). Anyway if push comes to shove I just tell the staff that works under me what to do and that takes care of most things. :lol:

[kainemaxwell]

True, emulation can't beat owning the real thing, but it's also good for those of us who used to have the classic consoles and games to relive playing them since we might have sold or lost them sometime over the years.

Also a good and cheap way to bring new people into gaming by showing them where their favorite games started from and letting them figure their own way as to what games and systems they like..and perhaps from there, they'll buy the games and consoles and get into collectting like the rest of us.

Emulation is a good way to try out games before buying them, if you can anymore. Instead of buying a game for x system and hating it, download it and see if you do like it enought o buy. it's like renting...but not having to deal with late fees!

[zektor]

It is absolutely true that nothing can beat the real thing, but since I don't have the space nor the cash to accomodate 3000+ arcade machines, I'll just use Mame. Can you really say you hate Mame as well? Hmm...sounds kind of closed minded to me..

[raziel78]

I'll agree that emulation is not as good as the real thing. Not only the "look and feel" aspect, but also, let's face it.. it's VERY hard to -perfectly- emulate a particular CPU type on another CPU architecture. Thats one reason why emulators may work great with some games, and others not work at all.

Even with its downfalls, it's still nice to have one machine be able to play all the classics from just about any console you can think of.

As for the "emulation is illegal" comment.. I'm not going to turn this into a flame war, but the only thing I'm going to say is, emulating one hardware type on another is PERFECTLY legal. The fact that over 80% of emulator users disregard copyright laws and download games they don't own DOESN'T make emulation illegal. The same applies to the MP3 audio compression scheme, but since I'm on enough of a tangent already, I'll leave it at that.

Don't confuse legality with stupidity.

[Lady Jaye]

Emulation may not be the same as playing the original games, but it's a good alternative when a) the game was never released in English (for example, Final Fantasy II and III) and b) the game has an inflated value due to demand and/or rarity (ex. Ogre Battle SNES). It's also good for people who have little storage space for real consoles.

Anyway, I used to have a lot of roms on my computer, but I lost them all when my puter crashed a few months ago. In the meantime, I started to get more consoles (aside from my SNES) and I now try to get, if possible, actual carts.

Also, when all the battery-backed games like Zelda lose their save feature, we can all recreate the Zelda experience through emulation. That's a great long-term solution to the no-brainer fact that Nintendo has not included a way to actually change the damned batteries in those games!

[zektor]

Battery backup emulation is absolutely great. My Zelda cart's battery actually did die not too long ago. At least I can still play AND save my game through emulation.

[Kid Ice]

Wrong! (insert sound of Family Feud buzzer here)

With the right setup, emulation is just as satisfying as having a real arcade game in your house. More so, in some ways (and yes, less so in some ways).

the kid

[Kid Ice]

Oh, you mean console emulation. OK, I can kind of see your point there. Atari 2600 games look better on a PC, though.

the kid