Emulation Discussion

[Strangelove]

i found an old dvd-rw, couldn’t see anything on it and all i had written on the label was ‘?’ so thanks past me, that was super helpful. i formatted it but for some reason the image burning software didn’t want to write to the disk. so i just. dragged and dropped the file onto it in the explorer window. so i have the iso file, i have a dvd, i have a usb with the fmcb installer on, i should be ready to go

but first i want to complain about my horrible setup



the hdmi adapter needs to be powered by usb, which you can do with the ps2 ports but it means trailing the cable over the console. the placement of the socket on the adapter also means it has to squeeze on top of the power cable. this tv doesn’t have a headphone socket and bluetooth won’t work with it, so i thought having this adapter with a headphone output would be handy. but that means another wire trailing out from this tiny box.

and the picture isn’t even that sharp. i feel like i got a better image out of composite cables back in the day (component cables? there were 5 colours and i needed another adapter for some reason, just endless pain). i might just plug in my old elgato and use that as an adapter instead, but i don’t know where the cable that fits the ps2 is

anyway to top it all off the dvd didn’t even work. just got that red screen asking for a compatible ps1/2 disk

to check if it wasn’t a problem with the console’s laser i picked up the first dvd in reaching distance. which was an old famitsu dvd with a special feature about xenosaga ep 2 and one of the trailers. why do you have to remind me of what i can’t have ?

(i have my old jp ps2 out so i could just play ep 2 and 3 on that but I only have ep 1 reloaded and i want the japanese voices and for that i need to use this iso file)

thought about trying a raspberry pi (although still need to reinstall fmcb first) but they seem either out of stock or £100+ and i couldn’t get this memory card thing to even work. maybe that’s too advanced for me

i did see a knockoff hd adapter for the old model ps2, and i have access to two of those now. so i was thinking about that (you just install fhdb to the hard drive for that and i won’t have to mess around with all this guff)

if i have to keep buying stuff eventually i might as well have just gotten a better laptop that can run old games well

just wanted to play old rpgs and horror games, that’s all. it shouldn’t be this difficult

 

[ForceStealer]

I spent a much less devoted evening than you have trying to figure out how to emulate Lost Odyssey on my PC, from the real disc!

Apparently you need a 360 to rip/read its games, so ironically you can only emulate ripped ISOs, at least it seems ironic to me.

 

[Strangelove]

i have considered getting an old xbox, but when i think of games i want lost odyssey is the only one that comes to mind (and maybe that blue dragon one). or they can just port it to modern consoles (or would it work on a new xbox. also is there japanese text/voices on the uk copies)


found a dvd that i could format and worked with the iso burner, took ages for a file that's like 1.5mb. booted up ps2 and tried the disk... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ it either wouldn't even try to read it, or it would but it would just keep on reading it endlessly. apparently the ps2 has trouble reading some types of writeable dvd like dvd-rw

so i have ordered a little spool of blank dvd-r for this sole purpose. i am grumpy and mad

i think you can use the same disk method to boot homebrew disks (and potentially copies of games) but there are single layer dvds. and i want to play xenosaga, which is one 8+gb disk.

feeling like i should have just gone on ebay or buyee and just. bought a copy of the game and played that

 

[Strangelove]

i tried the xenosaga iso on a pc emulator, it was working pretty good. getting through the opening cutscenes without skipping or slow down, i thought i might be able to play it like this if i plugged it into a tv. but as soon as kos-mos showed up for some reason it all started going downhill. speed went down to about 60% at its lowest, tried skipping the cutscene in case that was it (although what's the point of playing xenosaga 1 if you're not watching the cutscenes). but the tutorial area had slowdown too. weirdly, when i opened the menu it started running fine. but going onto kos-mos' character screen slows it down again. is there something about kos-mos you don't like, computer.

i did have other stuff running so maybe if i closed everything else down it might run smoother, but possibly not.

in the mean time, i have a fresh blank dvd-r with free dvd boot on waiting for me to test out. if this doesn't work i am becoming the joker

 

[ForceStealer]

the Hilbert Effect is messing with your systems

 

[Strangelove]

had a dream i crushed this pre-made fmcb memory card open with my bare hands, which might be my annoyance finally seeping down into my subconscious

i have made my own fmcb card with an official sony memory card (after copying all my old saves from it) because the one i bought looks like it's a cloned card and they don't have magicgate which can stop it working. when i installed fmcb it also installed two versions of opl for some reason. i decided to test out reading an iso from a usb drive, which isn't the best way since the usb ports are slow but i haven't managed to get it to recognise any files yet so i threw the kuon iso onto the drive and finally got something. it even started to play, although i didn't really try it for long.

after having a proper look at the mc2sio adapter, though, it looks like the one i have is a chinese copy and not an original one. even though i bought it from the site that was suggested on the original maker's page for people in the uk. from what i read these clones don't necessarily work well/the same as the original one. does this one even work. do i just need to have the right combo of versions to make it work. idk and i am just. so tired.

i am on ebay buying a physical copy of xenosaga 1, with the expectation that i will just end up plugging my japanese console back in. i am losing all hope.

i thought about trying to run it from the network connection, but the only ethernet cables i have are plugged into stuff, several meters long, and running through the basement. i'd have to run it from my laptop as a media server, which i didn't want to do for space reasons and not having to run the laptop at the same time. but also i am losing it right now. don't know what you want from me.

(also bought a small ethernet cable)

(just wanted to play xenosaga)

 

[Strangelove]

https://imgur.com/JEhUL1p

i just had to reformat the card using a program to make it format in fat32 instead of exfat. could have saved myself a lot of trouble if i had just downloaded that program first instead of being lazy. but i did it now, and it works. i have gotten through the first section of xenosaga after all this time (bit of a weird feeling because i played 2 and 3 and freaks with japanese voices but only played ep 1 reloaded so even though i'm more familiar with the japanese cast overall, it's different going back to ep 1 without the english voices)

i haven't noticed any significant glitches or bugs, except one where doing the a.w.g.s. practice battle caused the ui elements (character portraits and turn window) to stay on the screen leaving a trail as everything got into place, but once it was finished loading it disappeared and was back to normal.

more generally, the image isn't very sharp and there's a blocky quality to the image. i took a picture of the tv to show this lol but here's the title screen:

it's got that kind of rectangular artifacting around the letters

it's more noticeable in cutscenes but doesn't show up as well in still images, but it's visible at the edges of character models:

my initial thought was it was a cutscene thing related to compression, but you can also see it in the field screens. but the text is generally fine (voice subtitles have a bit of a jaggy edge to them)

it has been years since i played this, and when i did it was on a crt television which gives it an innate blur that smooths out the image so maybe it was always like this and i just didn't notice until playing it on a fancy new 4k tv. i'm not playing on a fancy emulator (lol emulator, like the zohar) with modern graphical settings to clean up the image. or maybe it's this cheap ps2-to-hd adapter i threw on my order when getting the mc2sio card. so now it is playing games at last, i guess i will look into the best way to play on a modern tv.

feeling very nostalgic replaying this, but with the passage of time and understanding more japanese than when i first played it and this time focusing on the japanese dialogue and not the english voiceovers. i found this guy saying they should let realians get 'ass fucked' by the gnosis and i was scandalised. i definitely didn't remember that the first time i played it.

 

[ultima espio]

The Vita's finally getting a DC emulator, and it's pretty good so far:

I remember someone tried to make one for the PSP back in 2009 that was released recently. Sadly never got anywhere since these videos:

 

[Strangelove]

it's more noticeable in cutscenes but doesn't show up as well in still images, but it's visible at the edges of character models:

my initial thought was it was a cutscene thing related to compression, but you can also see it in the field screens. but the text is generally fine (voice subtitles have a bit of a jaggy edge to them)

i've seen the term 'stair-stepping' and it might be due to the type of hdmi adapter i have. in this video, the third still (here named 'ps2 to hdmi b') from resident evil 4 at this timecode looks like the image i'm getting

unfortunately it doesn't seem like you can tell which type of adapter, a or b, you're getting from these unknown brand sellers.

i don't have a problem with seeing sharp 'jaggies' or anything like that, that's part of the charm. but these that i am getting look more fuzzy, like they kind of blur into each other but not in a way that makes it look smoother. you still have a noticeable rectangle shape, it's just blurry looking

i am considering trying some old, pre-hdmi cables if i can find them out. i have an older tv with a scart connection, i'm not sure what the newer one has. i don't know if i have component or composite ports on any of these. the downside to this would be not having a headphone port on the adapter. the older tv doesn't have headphone ports, the new one does but it's shared so i can't use it whenever i want. but it would at least let me see if it gets rid of the stair-stepping for comparison

also i could do with the old cables so i can do a horrible hack to use headphones with the ps3 for the tv with no headphone output. why won't you just let me use bluetooth headphones for game audio, sony. (without having to get some second hand playstation gold/platinum headphones which are one of the only ones that work)

edit; another thing that i thought might be affecting it is that the picture is output in widescreen and i can't remember if originally had that. i should probably try some of the other games i had loaded up to see how they go but honestly i got too excited being able to play xenosaga that i forgot to check lol

 

[Strangelove]

i decided to change the console and tv settings to 4:9? 8? (pls don't tell the video professionals i work with that i never remember what these resolution ratios are lol), thinking it might solve the issue. it doesn't, but i guess it not being stretched out so much

i had a go at silent hill 3 first just to try something different, still got the blocky look. and while it seemed to play fine, i think i heard a few audio glitches but sometimes i wasn't sure if it was that or the soundtrack using harsh noise.

i decided to only play up to "it's bread" and not start a proper playthrough right now, also i was playing in korean so i can only really manage so much. by which i mean very little lol

빵 이다.

there's slightly diagonal lines on the screen, which stand out in the ps2 browser, and i'm wondering if that's causing issues during games. you can kind of see them in that image, there's stripes on her arms and vest

i went back to xenosaga, and have started noticing errors now. it started with the audio in cutscenes stuttering at times, which would put the audio out of synch until the next segment starts. but one scene gave a 'seek error' about 5 seconds in. it would stop, rewind a second, restart with no sound then the error message pops up. you can try reloading but it was just the same, so i had to skip it. this is the first real error i've seen. bit disappointing, but i can find the scenes online so it's not as big a deal. it only happened in that one scene so far, hopefully it doesn't happen much more.

trying to think of what might the problem, the 4 possibilities i came up with are:

a) the iso file had to be split up to go on the micro sd card and that caused issues
b) the original iso had some fault or corruption
c) there's currently a heatwave and the console doesn't like it (me neither)
d) this second-hand ps2 has some issue

if it's a problem with the iso, i'm still waiting for the physical copy i bought to arrive. can't do anything about the heatwave, and it would suck if there's a problem with the console but there's not much i can do about that.

been looking to recommended cables for better picture quality, but i don't have the connections for a component cable in any tv. one tv has a scart port if you can get a component adapter for it. there are cables i see recommended but they are like £30+. there's upscaling/line-doubling boxes you can get, but the cheaper one is starting at like £110 and the other one is like £400 or something. spending another £30 on cables just for this feels steep, i'm not going to spend hundreds on little boxes for use with maybe two early 2000s consoles. i am not expecting razor sharp hd graphics, i'm not even expecting it to be sharp at all. just would be nice not to have it look like there's a textured glass filter over it or something. also i'm not getting a crt television, i don't have anywhere to put one.

 

[Strangelove]

in my time i have gotten, boxed and brand new, two separate ps2 consoles, and two ps3 consoles. and i cannot for the life of me seem to locate any of the cables from them. there's very little chance i would have got rid of them, unless someone else did. they would only be the standard issue composite cables that came with the consoles and not as good as component cables, but i don't have a tv that takes component cables

although i do have a component cable, having bought them for my ps2 towards the end of when i still using it. i just have no idea where they are now either lol. i am inching closer to getting the more expensive hdmi converter (and losing my headphone jack) but i'm not ready to take the leap yet.

there is a homebrew app called graphics synthesizer mode selector/gsm(s), which i am thinking about trying. i downloaded the file and it's confusing me with all its contents so i might have to read up more on it first

 

[Lulcielid]

Denuvo by Irdeto launches the first Nintendo Switch Emulator Protection technology to safeguard games launched on Nintendo Switch.

https://t.co/MAZu45ICtM

 

[Lulcielid]

Wii-U emulator is now open source.

https://www.reddit.com/r/cemu/comments/wwa22c

 

[Lulcielid]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1562790596221100036

 

[Strangelove]

(i realised that what i've been posting isn't technically emulation but please cut me some slack, i didn't want to make a new thread so let's pretend this is emulation and homebrew)

i am wavering slightly on if i would recommend this mc2sio thing based on what i've currently played. it's probably less of a pain if you're not a dumbass like me and format the card properly the first time, but there's still little minor issues that stop it from getting a full recommendation:

- i tried xenosaga freaks, but while it started okay when loading up the encyclopedia it got stuck on on a white screen and i had to reset the console (not tried it again)
- silent hill 3 seemed okay but there were a few times when there might have been audio glitches (a short burst of noise) but i'm not sure
- the main thing i've played is xenosaga episode 1, currently around 19 hours, and it's been mixed. gameplay-wise it is absolutely fine (bar the one graphical glitch i mentioned before), load times are a bit slow but i remember the game always being like that? but it plays perfectly fine. the only issues have been the cutscenes, which is a major problem in a game like this that's large part cutscene. audio stuttering had gotten more and more frequent to the point that it's pretty much in seemingly every scene, so the audio will go out of sync until the next cutscene loads. it does spoil the experience a bit. i've only had the one seek error so far (where the cutscene will start but fail to load and has to be manually skipped), and once when a cutscene should have started but never did and hung on an unresponsive black screen which meant resetting the console. that meant losing gameplay progress, which thankfully wasn't too much from the last save but it's still not pleasant and gives me a bit of dread going forward.

i am wondering how much is related to the format of the game. it's one of the few dvd-9 games for the console, which can have problems even on disk with certain models reading the disks. although that issue shouldn't really carry over here where it's not being read from the disk.

i think for a number of games, especially older ones, cutscenes that look in-game would be video files if they used a lot of graphical effects that would be too taxing or complex to render in-game. which would probably be the case here. so i am wondering if other games that have less cutscenes like this would work better. if the cutscenes were voiced text boxes, would that play more smoothly? which gives me hope for xenosaga 3 which has a lot of those.

i want to try some other games first, hopefully with better results. even though the results here are mostly fine


although i did suddenly want to play xenosaga on a handheld but i am holding back on looking at a steamdeck. i am thinking about getting a mini pc if it can also handle graphics/video production stuff and hopefully games as a nice bonus.

 

[Nandemoyasan]

I've been kind of an Emulation Afficionado for some years now (since iNES on a Macintosh Performa 6116-CD, which for reference had a 60 MEGA hertz processor and 8 mb of RAM), and I recently had my PC refuse to take the latest Windows Update. And like Daphne Zuniga in Spaceballs, I had this moment of clarity: "Hey...I don't have to put up with this...! I'm RICH" lol. I'm not actually rich, but I could afford to get a new Mini Tower at NewEgg.

I went from an HP Compaq Elite 8000 CMT with a dualcore processor clocked at 3.17Ghz and a 250gb SATA magnetic hdd, to a Dell OptiPlex 7010 with a quadcore processor at 3.2 Gzh and a 128gb Solid State Drive. It's basically fast enough to make my old PC cry.

And, it means I am now capable of making this happen:

Dragon Quest 8: Journey of the Cursed King, running on my PC

 

[Strangelove]

i got myself a gaming laptop, maybe mid level but i really don’t know the technicals. so now in addition to the pc games i have amassed over the years, i can try out more emulation

i have downloaded a bunch of emulators to test out, but keeping with my posts in this thread i started with pcsx2 and xenosaga 1.

first off, it starts up so that’s always good. i did not watch all the opening cutscene, baby i love you but i just wanted to test this out a bit. things look nice, but i did get some stuttering on the character screen and in battle. so i messed with some settings after having a brief look online and went into the opening encephalon area. after changing the setting the models looked sharp, but the shadows and the character are attached with weird stringy things. seen this mentioned but i haven’t sorted it

because then my laptop shut down lol. after waiting a minute i turned it back on, tried a bit more and it shut down again. after that i stopped trying for now. i am worried about my new laptop but it has only happened with this so i am hoping it’s not a hardware issue

i have never really been a pc gamer before, except for having a few cd based games in my early teens when i first got a pc. so it’s all overwhelming and new to me. i have tried some pc games and seeing all the setting and staring blankly because i don’t get what all these mean. (also i switched the language settings to korean which was just a foolish idea if i wanted to understand stuff because i can maybe understand english loanwords and little else right now lol) i need each of these things explaining to me in very simple terms

okay the laptop just shut down again while i was writing this and not using pcsx2 so now i am getting concerned lol.