Emulation catch-all

Rykin wrote:

I have the Super Nt and I love it. It made sense for me because I have 60-70 actually SNES carts. The main drawback with it so far is that it is only for SNES games even with the jailbroken firmware. I really wish it could run NES ROMs or carts with an adapter.

Why jailbreak it? Is it genuinely region locked or something?

If they made more combo systems I'd definitely be tempted, even for a higher price. There's so much crap above/under/behind the TV these days.

Rykin wrote:

I have been looking into MISTer stuff and I am totally wanting to build an arcade cabinet using it. The project seems to be very active right now. I have been looking for some of the components though and it isn't always clear where you can get them from. The main FPGA board is on Amazon, but many places that sell the RAM upgrade are out of stock.

It definitely has a hand-crafted, small-batch, artisanal feel re: how the various pieces are manufactured. I bet it's made only from the finest hand-sifted sand from pure white beaches and fired in natural gas powered bespoke furnaces.

ccoates wrote:

So, to summarize. There's a tiny wizard inside of it and when you load one of the cores Jonny's referring to he casts a magic spell to try and shapeshift it into a specific system's chip. Gotcha.

Well, yes, if by 'wizard' you mean 'electricity'. When you download a new firmware blob to an FPGA, the components change type and layout, magically making a new circuit that might do something entirely different. It's a brooch, it's a hat, it's a pterodactyl!

There's been some musing that this sort of chip could be integrated into computers, and then programs could download custom builds to give themselves hardware acceleration for new functions, but nothing ever came of it.

Got my New PocketGo. Just messed a bit with it so far. A few quibbles:
- Volume is too loud on the lowest setting.
- Main SD card is formatted to Linux partition format so I can't easily access it on my Mac. I can use a second SD card for content (there are 2 slots), but seems like a waste of 20GB or so of free space on the primary 32GB card.
- D-pad is a little stiff. Probably will either loosen up or not bother me particularly in the long term.
- Brightness control is a bit flakey. You need to hold down select and a volume button but there are so many gradients that it takes time to actually notice any difference. Also, during that time, the select button is still registered so whatever function is currently assigned to that will occur.
- The default GBA emulator doesn't have a full-screen/stretch mode.

ccoates wrote:
Rykin wrote:

I have the Super Nt and I love it. It made sense for me because I have 60-70 actually SNES carts. The main drawback with it so far is that it is only for SNES games even with the jailbroken firmware. I really wish it could run NES ROMs or carts with an adapter.

Why jailbreak it? Is it genuinely region locked or something?

To run ROMs. Currently all of my SNES games (and like 90% of my possessions in general) are packed away in a storage facility down the street while my GF and I try to live together without killing each other in an 800 square foot condo My Super Nt is one of the few things I kept out.

ccoates wrote:

If they made more combo systems I'd definitely be tempted, even for a higher price. There's so much crap above/under/behind the TV these days.

Rykin wrote:

I have been looking into MISTer stuff and I am totally wanting to build an arcade cabinet using it. The project seems to be very active right now. I have been looking for some of the components though and it isn't always clear where you can get them from. The main FPGA board is on Amazon, but many places that sell the RAM upgrade are out of stock.

It definitely has a hand-crafted, small-batch, artisanal feel re: how the various pieces are manufactured. I bet it's made only from the finest hand-sifted sand from pure white beaches and fired in natural gas powered bespoke furnaces.

Yea with the exception of the mainboard it seems that everything is a bit bespoke.

Mr GT Chris wrote:

- The default GBA emulator doesn't have a full-screen/stretch mode.

This is disappointing. For better or worse I compare every emulation solution against the PSP and its full 4" screen.

Looks like you can download a different version of the GBA emulator, I need to try that when I have time. Will report soon! PSP is great but I often found GBA performance a bit off.

Dell/Alienware is showing off a concept device at CES that is basically my dream portable emulation machine:

Mr GT Chris wrote:

Looks like you can download a different version of the GBA emulator, I need to try that when I have time. Will report soon! PSP is great but I often found GBA performance a bit off.

Definitely some games never fully work (notably Mario Golf). I've finished a couple Advance Wars games and both USe Fire Emblem games on PSP emulation just fine, though. Sometimes I have to choose a different emulator, but I've gotten through fine one way or another.

Rykin wrote:

Dell/Alienware is showing off a concept device at CES that is basically my dream portable emulation machine:

As long as it isn't crazy expensive I will be there.

It looks really uncomfortable to use, hopefully this isn't the final design and they can shrink it a bit and make the controller a little more user friendly.

If they could keep in the $200-300 range I'd be interested.

pizzaddict wrote:

It looks really uncomfortable to use, hopefully this isn't the final design and they can shrink it a bit and make the controller a little more user friendly.

If they could keep in the $200-300 range I'd be interested.

I like the size (the Switch is too small for my gigantic gorilla paws), but yea the shape of the controller and the trigger/shoulder buttons don't look very good. I basically just want them to saw an Xbox One controller in half

DSGamer wrote:
Mr GT Chris wrote:

- The default GBA emulator doesn't have a full-screen/stretch mode.

This is disappointing. For better or worse I compare every emulation solution against the PSP and its full 4" screen.

Good news, fixed by copying a different version of the emulator over, pretty seamless. Don't have access to the partition on the main card but I could copy the file to my 2nd SD card and then use the system file manager to just move it between the two cards.

Volume is still an issue but with headphones it's fine on the minimum setting. So, just without headphones is problematic.

So far I've put about an hour into Lufia (SNES) and 10 minutes into Symphony of the Night (PS1), very pleased with what I've seen.

pizzaddict wrote:

It looks really uncomfortable to use, hopefully this isn't the final design and they can shrink it a bit and make the controller a little more user friendly.

If they could keep in the $200-300 range I'd be interested.

The price is whats going to make it for me, the fact it shows alienware makes me think instead of 300 it'll be 3000

JohnKillo wrote:
Rykin wrote:

Dell/Alienware is showing off a concept device at CES that is basically my dream portable emulation machine:

As long as it isn't crazy expensive I will be there.

Did this heretic just diss the Dreamcast controller? Best controller ever.

GT Chris,

Is the New PocketGo as small as it looks? It appears to be slightly bigger than a GBA Micro. I might be convinced to give it a try so I have something I can discretely slip into my pocket for when I don't want to pack around a Switch.

Yeah the Alienware name alone doubles the cost of whatever hardware is in there.

DSGamer wrote:

GT Chris,

Is the New PocketGo as small as it looks? It appears to be slightly bigger than a GBA Micro. I might be convinced to give it a try so I have something I can discretely slip into my pocket for when I don't want to pack around a Switch.

I think the 3DS is probably still better for discretely slipping into your pocket because of the clam shell design. The size is just a little smaller and thinner than the New 3DS but the weight is not even close, feels like it could float out of your hand. However, I saw someone on the reddit that said they cracked the screen with it on their pocket. You could order it with the $5-10 case (I did), it's pretty solid but does add to the size of it. Still fits in my pocket but less discrete.

Put some more time into it. Adding emulators was a lot easier than I expected. You drop the application packages in the apps folder and the OS just adds the icon to the appropriate screen (apps, games, emulation). I added a TG16 emulator with no problems. Presumably the developer adds some meta-data so it knows where to go. Actraiser doesn't work at all on PocketSNES, the default emulator, no idea why. Had more luck after I added SNES9x but for some reason the menu in SNES9x isn't displaying correctly. Otherwise, no issues with cart games. CD games like MegaCD and Turboduo seem to require uncompressed formats for the cd images which is a bit of a pain but I guess it's a restriction of the emulators on that hardware.

Sound is still an issue so headphones only if you want sound. The main unit also only has a mono speaker which is a bit of a bummer.

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/FM6nX6R.jpg)

I got the 8bitdo Lite controller to fit in a xbox one clip.

Why?

I dunno but it travels nicely and plays fairly well with my phone.

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/E6YWnfq.jpg)

Arise, thread, arise!

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/bbKxqk9.jpg)

Thanks for getting this thread going since a lot of us seem to have this on our minds right now.

To repeat my own situation from the 3DS thread in case people need recommendations or hands-on experience, I own an Anbernic RG351V, PowKiddy RGB10 Max Pro 2 and I have an Ayn Odin on the way.

I tried an RG351P and RG351MP as well as a Retroid Pocket 2, but returned them all for various reasons.

Kurrelgyre wrote:
hbi2k wrote:

Do we have (or do we need) a dedicated "retro emulation handheld" thread? I'm loving the conversation, but it's only tangentially 3DS-related. (-:

I'm resurrecting https://www.gamerswithjobs.com/node/....

hbi2k wrote:

I picked up a Retro Pocket 2 during that first bad summer of lockdown. On paper it checks all the boxes, but somehow it just didn't click with me. I wound up never actually using it much. Fighting against their weird outdated flavor of Android and with Retroarch, which is a UI disaster in the best of circumstances, just never felt worth it.

The RP2 did get an upgrade to Android 8.1 late in its life, and has been succeeded by the RP2+, which runs Android 9 and is both faster and adds a touch screen. RetroArch is still awkward, but the newer Android version means you can install a lot more standalone emulators, up to and including ones for Dreamcast games.

I think the key thing I’ve learned after a couple of months at this, is that most general purpose emulation is handled perfectly by firmware like RetroOz or AmberElec. However, if you want to emulate difficult systems like Dreamcast, N64, DS, etc it’s better to have standalone emulators and Android is better for running commercial standalone emulators.

DSGamer wrote:
Kurrelgyre wrote:
Mr GT Chris wrote:

Well Vita sucks for SNES/GBA but...

I found that the MGBA port worked well enough for my needs, but the system was so locked down compared to other systems that it made moving my saves off and on more complicated that I wanted to put up with.

That was my experience as well. Games look gorgeous on the screen, but it’s just not the same as dropping games / saves onto an SD card.

I couldn't get full performance without compromises for either GBA or SNES. I tried all the Retroarch cores and a few standalone emulators. Not a big deal since I have other options.

Regarding files, if you connect via USB to a computer then run the command shell on your Vita, your Vita memory card will show up as a USB drive and you can drag and drop files simply enough that way. Alternatively, these days you can buy an SD card adapter that fits into the Vita game card slot. So you can have an SD card for additional storage in parallel with your Vita's main memory card. I personally haven't tried that one because I have the 64GB Vita memory card and that's basically enough for me.

DSGamer wrote:

Thanks for getting this thread going since a lot of us seem to have this on our minds right now.

To repeat my own situation from the 3DS thread in case people need recommendations or hands-on experience, I own an Anbernic RG351V, PowKiddy RGB10 Max Pro 2 and I have an Ayn Odin on the way.

I tried an RG351P and RG351MP as well as a Retroid Pocket 2, but returned them all for various reasons.

That Ayn Odin is pretty close to what I want for my next retro handheld. Ideally I'd like a reliable way to play the majority of PS2 games on the go, preferably for under $200. So maybe in a couple of years...? My PS2 backlog is ridiculous but I don't have a convenient way to play them right now. Still, even seeing reliable 1080p N64 and Saturn emulation in that video is pretty awesome.

Mr GT Chris wrote:
DSGamer wrote:

Thanks for getting this thread going since a lot of us seem to have this on our minds right now.

To repeat my own situation from the 3DS thread in case people need recommendations or hands-on experience, I own an Anbernic RG351V, PowKiddy RGB10 Max Pro 2 and I have an Ayn Odin on the way.

I tried an RG351P and RG351MP as well as a Retroid Pocket 2, but returned them all for various reasons.

That Ayn Odin is pretty close to what I want for my next retro handheld. Ideally I'd like a reliable way to play the majority of PS2 games on the go, preferably for under $200. So maybe in a couple of years...? My PS2 backlog is ridiculous but I don't have a convenient way to play them right now. Still, even seeing reliable 1080p N64 and Saturn emulation in that video is pretty awesome.

I'm interested in a Ayn. I can't find any reviews for the base configuration. Most are for the pro version.

JohnKillo wrote:
Mr GT Chris wrote:
DSGamer wrote:

Thanks for getting this thread going since a lot of us seem to have this on our minds right now.

To repeat my own situation from the 3DS thread in case people need recommendations or hands-on experience, I own an Anbernic RG351V, PowKiddy RGB10 Max Pro 2 and I have an Ayn Odin on the way.

I tried an RG351P and RG351MP as well as a Retroid Pocket 2, but returned them all for various reasons.

That Ayn Odin is pretty close to what I want for my next retro handheld. Ideally I'd like a reliable way to play the majority of PS2 games on the go, preferably for under $200. So maybe in a couple of years...? My PS2 backlog is ridiculous but I don't have a convenient way to play them right now. Still, even seeing reliable 1080p N64 and Saturn emulation in that video is pretty awesome.

I'm interested in a Ayn. I can't find any reviews for the base configuration. Most are for the pro version.

That's what I've seen as well. Most early adopters have purchased the Pro. I've seen some comments to the affect that the extra ram and better processor are mostly useful for future proofing, but I wouldn't want to spend $200 without some confirmation of PS2 games working on the base.

I would have purchased the base or the lite if that confirmation existed, but it just didn't.

Here is Taki showing off emulation (including PS2) for the Odin Lite back in August.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwd7...

And this guy who I'm not familar with looks to cover PS2 a bit on the Base model

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YfZw...

Also a list being put together by the community.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...

I'm looking at getting the Odin as a Geforece Now/Gamepass streaming machine so I can game in bed. I'm a little worried it might be to laggy though as sometimes when I try to stream gamepass games through my tablet I notice just enough lag when doing things like turning in first person that it makes it hard to aim. I would imagine that is due to my network and not something I'd see improvement with on an Odin.

pizzaddict wrote:

I'm looking at getting the Odin as a Geforece Now/Gamepass streaming machine so I can game in bed. I'm a little worried it might be to laggy though as sometimes when I try to stream gamepass games through my tablet I notice just enough lag when doing things like turning in first person that it makes it hard to aim. I would imagine that is due to my network and not something I'd see improvement with on an Odin.

I would recommend a few things.
1. Hook up the pc to Ethernet.
2. If possible be close to the router.
3. Get on the fastest wifi network speed you got.

For what it’s worth I’ve seen some criticism of the Odin’s sticks for remote play. So definitely research that first in case the travel isn’t enough to play console games.

I've seen a few reviews showing remote play and it's all been positive so far but I'll specifically look up that issue or ask on the Discord. Thanks!