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[IlGialloMondadori]

Now someone do it for GameCube so I can play a perfect version of rogue squadron II

 

[Ulysses 31]

Now someone do it for GameCube so I can play a perfect version of rogue squadron II

Wouldn't it be cheaper to get a Wii that can play NGC or a homebrew Wii/WiiU?

 

[Buggy Loop]

Buggy Loop

A few comments. Most of the stuff you wrote are basically one of my points on my first post. That, with a CPU you need more power to achieve the same level of accuracy. But you can achieve the same level of accuracy.


Yes, not all software emulators aim for cycle accuracy. Some do, some don't. I'm not sure what you are trying to say here though. It's not because you can't make a cycle accurate emulator if you want, it's because some want to make something different. Once again, it depends on the project/author/skills/knowledge. Not all FPGA cores are cycle accurate either so? Again, it depends on what the author wants to do or can do, i'm not sure why i have to repeat that so many times.

And it's not only Higan. There are plenty of other cycle accurate emulators for different systems.

Yes, all accurate at costs of high CPU and often high RAM, even SNES.

Sorry, but this is wrong. A few years ago? Zsnes has been obsolete since 2004. Back then SNES9X wasn't that great either but you could still play Yoshi's Island without issues on SnesGT on a Pentium 4.

I have my doubts on that claim. You probably traded off something. On emulator discussion, only BSNES is accurate 100%. The same author made Higan to sacrifice a bit accuracy for speed for like 98% accuracy.

A 3DS is not powerful enough for BSNES, sure. But that doesn't prove "FPGAs are more accurate" it proves that accurate emulators require more power. You don't expect the 3DS to offer accurate emulation for anything other than the NES or Game Boy maybe.

Handhelds in general. They cut on accuracy. Analogue pocket showcases what’s best for FPGA, sucks that the core size is too limited for more support.

Handheld mister fpga was in discussions. The heaviest good core is ~10W

SNES9X is not a cycle accurate emulator nor it tries to be. So i don't know why you are comparing that to FPGAs. Also, none of those things, the OS, drivers, etc, have anything to do with the accuracy of the emulator. They have to do with it's ability to run on the host machine.

I picked it for the GitHub support page, i could have picked any software emulator GitHub for the same showcase. It’s eternal support. That’s the points. Bugs creep up, there’s a ton of issues reported. These guys are locked in supporting it forever or abandon it. For an old ass emulator like SNES9x, you would think the report page would be empty.

An example I experienced recently, and before you even mention it as a GOTCHA moment, I know there’s no Xbox FPGA… ninja gaiden black was bugging out with the latest version of xemu. A bug that didn’t appear for years and years, the water texture was completely broken. Again, they update for something to fix some X problem, another bug appears in Y. It’s constantly high maintenance.

Speaking about support and communities, did you know the Analogue NT people used BSNES as a reference to fix their own bugs?

Didn’t know but sure, why not? A point of reference. Do you think software engineers don’t make test runs? VHDL or verilog on top of that, it’s a complete change from typical coding.

it’s not in the same league of power and hardware requirements though, so there’s a purpose for FPGA

These machines you mention are already covered by cycle accurate software emulators that are indistinguishable from real hardware. Some long before the FPGA cores showed up.


NES - Messen, PuNES
SNES - Higan/Bsnes
SMS - Ares
Genesis - BlastEM, Exodus

Sorry but the moment you use a Pi device in order to compare it to an FPGA... I can't take it seriously. The Pi is, literally, the worst platform to play emulators on accurately at full speed. It can't be done. Performance wise you are better of using a mid-range phone from 6 years ago. This is very well known so i'm not sure why you use it as an argument. You are only proving my point, that accurate emulation needs more CPU grunt compared to an FPGA. Not that it's impossible at all.

First reflex peoples are looking at for a cheap small box attached to a TV for emulation is a rasp pi.

Even creeps up in previous mister FPGA threads

MiSTer FPGA; one year of ownership...damn it everyone should just buy one!

Obviously I make no money off anyone buying a MiSTer...so I am no shill...but damn it everyone should seriously own one of these things if they even had a remote interest in retro gaming. Every console basically from the 80s and 90s, multiple PC cores including Sharp X68000 (saved myself a...

www.neogaf.com

Nobody really thinks of building a PC just to plug on TV and for it to be easy to carry around. Yea they know they can sit at a desk to play emulators, so why is there such a marker for looking into putting them on a simple small efficient device?

And what being "good" depends on?

Yup. The author's work/code.

Just like software emulation then.

Software emulation has decades of fixes and workarounds patched in.

Core is 100%? That’s it. No support line.

Not quite like software emulation

So tell me, although I have a powerful PC. If I want a small device connected to TV. Simple to setup. I can carry and bring to a friend easily, tell me what device I should buy and setup. Tell me why FPGA is bad. I met halfway with you with saying software emulators can be accurate, try to meet me halfway too.

 

[64bitmodels]

This isn't an issue with N64 emulators anymore. Ares doesn't even have plugins. And the only accurate video plugin that matters for Mupen/PJ64 is Parallel RDP. Simple 64 is also a Mupen fork that uses Parallel and doesn't let you change plugins either.

The whole plugin system is a relic from the past. Current N64 emulators such as Simple 64 and Ares have advanced a lot the last few years, it's not like it was during the plugin era. And the Mister N64 core has not yet reached the compatibility of Simple64 or the accuracy of Ares.

Well, I stand corrected. I have not really explored modern n64 emulation since mupen & retroarch, I didn't even know simple 64 and Ares were a thing

 

[nkarafo]

Buggy Loop

Forgive me but what's your argument here? I thought we were talking about whether or not emulators can be as accurate as FPGAs?

And now you changed the discussion on whether or not emulators can be as accurate in small boxes?

Well, no but that wasn't the original discussion, was it?

Also, look at my first post. I specifically wrote this:

-They are more compact than a PC powerful enough for the same accuracy in emulation.

So i already met halfway with you from the start, you didn't have to ask. I posted all the benefits of FPGAs before you started arguing with me.


Now, about the "eternal support" you arguing.... Know that there is no such thing as a "complete" open source emulator, unless it stops being popular and gets abandoned. 100% compatibility/accuracy is not even the end game here. Emulators are much bigger projects than FPGAs and have tons more other features and extras. And when they finish adding stuff, they add some more. They usually have many forks and are ported to many different OSes. They support many different APIs, drivers and hardware. All with their own behaviors and set of potential issues that have nothing to do with emulation compatibility and accuracy. And there's always room for more optimizations and clean ups. Even after 100% compatibility/accuracy is reached, you are kidding yourself if you think the work is finished.

FPGAs, sure. Theres nothing else to do after 100% accuracy/compatibility is reached. Nothing else to add if the FPGA chip doesn't have more room left. And isn't Analogue closed source? That means you don't really know how "perfect" or optimized the core is or if it can be improved further.

On emulator discussion, only BSNES is accurate 100%. The same author made Higan to sacrifice a bit accuracy for speed for like 98% accuracy

Higan doesn't sacrifice anything. Newer BSNES has the OPTION to sacrifice absolute accuracy to gain a ton of speed (while still being 99% accurate), only because such absolute accuracy is only useful for a single game in the whole library. And again, it's an option. The older BSNES (before Higan) had 3 different versions (performance, balance and accuracy). The "accuracy" one was the heaviest and was meant for that one game (Air Strike Patrol). Balanced had this sacrifice you are talking about. Performance was not accurate anymore but still more accurate than SNES9X back then.