Emulation central - recommendations in 1st post

[Duraframe300]

PCSX2 advertising AetherSX2 themselves and clarifying PCSX2's license

AetherSX2 brings PCSX2 to mobile

An exciting bit of news! As you have probably seen by now, there is a new Android emulator in town called AetherSX2, which shows to have very promising performance and compatibility. While the latter is due to it being based on an LGPL licensed emulator for PC (that's us!), the former is due to the clever work of the developer Tahlreth.

As you can expect, at first we were very skeptical about this, due to the whole situation with DamonPS2 that you may remember; a new Android emulator appearing needed to be approached with caution. But instead of being met with hostility, the developer was very forthcoming and friendly, and was more than willing to discuss the remaining barriers, and the path to overcome them.

Since there have also been several people concerned about the licensing behind PCSX2, we decided to try and explain the situation and how it pertains to the GPL and LGPL license.

PCSX2's core code is LGPLv3 licensed, which is compatible with the GPLv3 license, and all the plugin code which has been merged during the 1.7 dev cycle was relicensed to LGPL with authorisation from the authors, too. However, there's also 3 bits of GPL code used in the project that remain:

• Some debugger code from PPSSPP
• The FreeType library which is used for our OSD
• libmpeg2 which is used for video decoding

The existence of these 3rd party GPL parts means that PCSX2 as a combined works needs to comply to the GPLv3 license but our source code that we own remains LGPL. By distributing the code when requested we comply with the GPLv3 license. See the GNU FAQ here and here. If these mentioned libraries are removed, the entire project would become purely LGPL licensed.

These concerns of course extended out to this new emulator, and we had to reach out about it to Tahlreth. After a good discussion with him about these issues, we have been assured that it will no longer be a problem by the time the emulator releases. Right now the only piece of GPL code they need to contend with is libmpeg2, which can be replaced with FFmpeg, which is under the LGPL license; this is something we planned on doing in the future, since libmpeg2 is over a decade old. As for the aforementioned debugger and Freetype code, they no longer exist. Aether has its own OSD and no debugger, meaning the emulator will be entirely LGPL.

In addition, the developer very kindly let us see an early alpha of the emulator, and it runs better than most of us expected! We are really looking forward to recommending it to all those wanting PCSX2 on Android, as this is probably the best it's gonna get.

For final words, we'd like to warn the community about false information and fake software. So far, even we have caught numerous fake APKs, (ongoing) impersonation attempts, faked/stolen videos, brigading, and misinformation regarding AetherSX2. We want to emphasize that it is currently in closed beta, and is only available for select people. While there is currently no version available to the public, the emulator is going to be free once released, collect no data, and is not planned to be distributed outside of the Google Play Store.

For your own safety, be sure NOT to:

• Download or install any APKs that are shared through youtube links or other sources, as likely contain viruses or copies of different emulators
• Pay attention to people claiming to be a developer other than /u/Tahlreth on Reddit
• Believe anybody is affiliated with AetherSX2 unless confirmed by /u/Tahlreth
• Trust any social media outlet except the official subreddit /r/AetherSX2, unless trusted news sources report on it, Tahlreth (at time of posting) has no other social presence such as Discord

Please wait for follow-up announcements and information from Tahlreth directly on /r/AetherSX2.

 

[spekkio]

In before drama / epic meltdowns / usual fare.

 

[Don Peste]

I think these are some of your favourites

 

[Jack Of Owls]

How do you guys get Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots to boot in RPCS3? I see all these videos on YT where they're playing this under PS3 emulation and it looks glorious in 4K with a stable 60 FPS yet when I installed it in the latest build of RPCS3 (it took almost an hour to compile the shaders and modules, btw) it just crashes and closes as soon as I try to run it with not so much as a boot logo. Is there a special build for it or settings? I can't use the official RPCS3 forum or compatibility lists because it's listed as "InGame Only" and if I try to post on their forum, I get some monkey of a mod/administrator putting my question in a queue indefinitely. I'm pleased that other games like MotorStorm Pacific Rift play very nicely with RPCS3 under my rig (i9).

 

[Puukko]

How do you guys get Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots to boot in RPCS3? I see all these videos on YT where they're playing this under PS3 emulation and it looks glorious in 4K with a stable 60 FPS yet when I installed it in the latest build of RPCS3 (it took almost an hour to compile the shaders and modules, btw) it just crashes and closes as soon as I try to run it with not so much as a boot logo. Is there a special build for it or settings? I can't use the official RPCS3 forum or compatibility lists because it's listed as "InGame Only" and if I try to post on their forum, I get some monkey of a mod/administrator putting my question in a queue indefinitely. I'm pleased that other games like MotorStorm Pacific Rift play very nicely with RPCS3 under my rig (i9).

There's a special build for MGS4, check that out.

 

[Jack Of Owls]

How do you guys get Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots to boot in RPCS3? I see all these videos on YT where they're playing this under PS3 emulation and it looks glorious in 4K with a stable 60 FPS yet when I installed it in the latest build of RPCS3 (it took almost an hour to compile the shaders and modules, btw) it just crashes and closes as soon as I try to run it with not so much as a boot logo. Is there a special build for it or settings? I can't use the official RPCS3 forum or compatibility lists because it's listed as "InGame Only" and if I try to post on their forum, I get some monkey of a mod/administrator putting my question in a queue indefinitely. I'm pleased that other games like MotorStorm Pacific Rift play very nicely with RPCS3 under my rig (i9).

There's a special build for MGS4, check that out.

Oh well. I don't think I want to go down that fetid rabbit hole after all of trying to troubleshoot if it's a GPU driver version issue, my OS version, or something with my hardware config. Thanks anyway

 

[Jack Of Owls]

I think these are some of your favourites

I recently tried to play Shin Megami Tensei V in emulation and I think it was the first time playing a jRPG my ladyboy-O-meter actually redlined. Man, what a disorientating experience.

 

[ghostdog]

How do you guys get Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots to boot in RPCS3? I see all these videos on YT where they're playing this under PS3 emulation and it looks glorious in 4K with a stable 60 FPS yet when I installed it in the latest build of RPCS3 (it took almost an hour to compile the shaders and modules, btw) it just crashes and closes as soon as I try to run it with not so much as a boot logo. Is there a special build for it or settings? I can't use the official RPCS3 forum or compatibility lists because it's listed as "InGame Only" and if I try to post on their forum, I get some monkey of a mod/administrator putting my question in a queue indefinitely. I'm pleased that other games like MotorStorm Pacific Rift play very nicely with RPCS3 under my rig (i9).

There's a special build for MGS4, check that out.

Oh well. I don't think I want to go down that fetid rabbit hole after all of trying to troubleshoot if it's a GPU driver version issue, my OS version, or something with my hardware config. Thanks anyway

Consider yourself lucky. You've been spared of 15 hours of a mundane clusterfuck of cringy cutscenes. MGS5 is better, especially in the gameplay department.

 

[Puukko]

On that note, Xenoblade 2 is quite surprisingly the best behaved Switch game I've emulated so far. Very few issues and stable performance on ryujinx. Considering it was still unplayable earlier this year, that's impressive development. It's also a technical marvel considering the console in question. There's a 60 fps patch but it ties the game speed to the framerate and no CPU on the market can hope to hit a stable 60 in this game yet.

 

[Nifft Batuff]

A question for the Codex experts: Is there a way to compress the Switch roms and to be able to use them directly in Yuzu/Ryujinx?

 

[Duraframe300]

A question for the Codex experts: Is there a way to compress the Switch roms and to be able to use them directly in Yuzu/Ryujinx?

Technically there is, but neither emulator supports it because *muh piracy*.

So, no. It's going to be a rarity for modern consoles anyway.

 

[lightbane]

A question for the Codex experts: Is there a way to compress the Switch roms and to be able to use them directly in Yuzu/Ryujinx?

Technically there is, but neither emulator supports it because *muh piracy*.

So, no. It's going to be a rarity for modern consoles anyway.

That's odd, considering there's no way to tell if the ROM you're using is legal or not as far as I know, right? Would it be possible to modify the emulator to accept compressed images then? How would you do that?

 

[Duraframe300]

A question for the Codex experts: Is there a way to compress the Switch roms and to be able to use them directly in Yuzu/Ryujinx?

Technically there is, but neither emulator supports it because *muh piracy*.

So, no. It's going to be a rarity for modern consoles anyway.

That's odd, considering there's no way to tell if the ROM you're using is legal or not as far as I know, right? Would it be possible to modify the emulator to accept compressed images then? How would you do that?

There's probably a variety of reasons, the most of which is that the compressed format already includes the keys you would normally supply to Yuzu. Of course, you still need to supply them regardless when compressing your stuff, but *MUH PIRACY* wins nonetheless. (Emulator devs, amIright?)

There's a workaround planned anyway for your second question, but I have no idea if and when that happens.

https://gbatemp.net/threads/nsz-hom...essor-decompressor.550556/page-4#post-9190025

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

I'll check the first few pages (assuming they're up to date). What I want is the best & easiest to use Mac emulator so I can test my copy of Ultima III on it and other games.

what to use and how much did you like it?

 

[Morpheus Kitami]

what to use and how much did you like it?

I took the emulator from The Fool's Errand and use it for games that aren't The Fool's Errand. Didn't require any setup on my end, but you have to turn down the speed for most games. Works fine, haven't had any complaints so far.

 

[Duraframe300]

PCSX2 has now fixed the sky in Burnout games in its latest dev build. One of the more longstanding and annoying issues.

 

[Great Deceiver]

I just discovered something in Xenia Canary that is really cool. I had tried the emulator before to play the M2 ports of Cave shmups (Mushi Futari, Espgaluda 2, Deathsmiles - which has more accurate slowdown than the Steam version, etc.), and although it ran fine visually, the audio was always enormously delayed, around a second or so.

I decided to try it again tonight on a whim and was looking for some sort of config file, as the emulator doesn't have a config option through its GUI. Sure enough, there is a file called "xenia-canary.config.toml" that gets created in Windows' Documents folder (/user/Documents/Xenia/). You can edit it in any text editor. Inside, there is this variable right at the first block, under [APU]

max_queued_frames = 64

This is the default audio buffer delay expressed in frames (64 frames is slightly over a second in a 60fps refresh rate). I played around with it and managed to get it down to 3 (!) on my machine. 2 makes the sound glitch out and crackle, but 3 works perfectly. So, as far as I can tell, the audio is nearly perfect at only 3 frames of delay.

I'm not sure if the current mainline build (non-Canary) has this variable.

Another helpful variable to keep in mind is

gpu_allow_invalid_fetch_constants = false

I wasn't able to run Mushi Futari 1.5 Arrange on the latest Canary build, switching that variable to "true" made it work.

I can now enjoy these great M2 ports with properly synced sound. Hopefully this is helpful to some of you as well.

 

[Puukko]

I haven't dabbled with Xenia much but one oddity I noticed was that bumping up the resolution scale has far more of an impact on performance than with other modern emulators. RCPS3 doesn't break a sweat when you double the resolution scale, Switch emus are pretty game dependent but it's usually a worthwhile tradeoff (in my opinion), but Xenia drops to less than half the fps. The Lost Odyssey intro went from 60-80 to 22-30 when I tested it just now, on DX12 (Vulkan crashes). Also, one of the more amusing high fps issues - the game speed seems correct, but every time an enemy attacks, the camera spazzes the hell out. Oh yeah, and very glaring flickering polygons on models. I don't remember those being there back when I first tried this last year.

I'm not particularly interested in shmups or XBLA titles and the very few exclusives I care about like LO can wait for the emulator to mature.

 

[Hirato]

I just discovered something in Xenia Canary that is really cool. I had tried the emulator before to play the M2 ports of Cave shmups (Mushi Futari, Espgaluda 2, Deathsmiles - which has more accurate slowdown than the Steam version, etc.), and although it ran fine visually, the audio was always enormously delayed, around a second or so.

I decided to try it again tonight on a whim and was looking for some sort of config file, as the emulator doesn't have a config option through its GUI. Sure enough, there is a file called "xenia-canary.config.toml" that gets created in Windows' Documents folder (/user/Documents/Xenia/). You can edit it in any text editor. Inside, there is this variable right at the first block, under [APU]

max_queued_frames = 64

This is the default audio buffer delay expressed in frames (64 frames is slightly over a second in a 60fps refresh rate). I played around with it and managed to get it down to 3 (!) on my machine. 2 makes the sound glitch out and crackle, but 3 works perfectly. So, as far as I can tell, the audio is nearly perfect at only 3 frames of delay.

I'm not sure if the current mainline build (non-Canary) has this variable.

Another helpful variable to keep in mind is

gpu_allow_invalid_fetch_constants = false

I wasn't able to run Mushi Futari 1.5 Arrange on the latest Canary build, switching that variable to "true" made it work.

I can now enjoy these great M2 ports with properly synced sound. Hopefully this is helpful to some of you as well.

I can't speak for how xenia works...
But usually audio is played asynchronously from a ringbuffer; The buffer is simultaneously written to and read from.
The game usually writes a large chunk all at once (I dunno, let's say 800 bytes per frame or so), and then there's something in the background that consumes the written bytes rapidly at a similar rate to play actual audio.

As long as the two are relatively in sync, the audio plays normally in sync, even if the buffer is large enough to hold several seconds worth of raw PCM data.
If the reader catches up with the writer, you encounter an artefact known as a " buffer underflow", this usually manifests as really annoying pops during playback.
If the writer catches up to the reader, not only will the audio go out of sync, you'll very likely experience skippy/loopy audio too, with it likely sounding slowed down (e.g. playback is 44100Hz but the writer is 48000Hz).


I don't know why xenia's like that, but what you've described makes it sounds like the writer starts behind the reader

 

[Lyric Suite]

Funny, i was just testing the Cave shmups on Xenia those past few days. I'm surprised at how well they worked.

One question. Is there a way to reduce the size of the iso? I know roms and isos can be compressed in other emulators, wonder if it can be done with Xenia too.

Also, i heard that for some games there were patches that were released through Xbox Live. Can those be installed as well?

 

[flyingjohn]

In celebration of pcsx2 adding a hack and calling it progress i too shall add a hack that makes you run pcsx2 on windows 7.
-Download this: https://github.com/doitsujin/dxvk
-Extract 32-bit dxgi.dll and 32bit d3d11.dll and put them in pcsx2 directory.
-Start emu and you should probably select opengl since this is not really guaranteed to work properly with dx stuff.
The only flaw is that the xaudio is still fucked but you can use the alternative audio option.

 

[Don Peste]

PCSX2 advertising AetherSX2 themselves and clarifying PCSX2's license

AetherSX2 brings PCSX2 to mobile

Spoiler

An exciting bit of news! As you have probably seen by now, there is a new Android emulator in town called AetherSX2, which shows to have very promising performance and compatibility. While the latter is due to it being based on an LGPL licensed emulator for PC (that's us!), the former is due to the clever work of the developer Tahlreth.

As you can expect, at first we were very skeptical about this, due to the whole situation with DamonPS2 that you may remember; a new Android emulator appearing needed to be approached with caution. But instead of being met with hostility, the developer was very forthcoming and friendly, and was more than willing to discuss the remaining barriers, and the path to overcome them.

Since there have also been several people concerned about the licensing behind PCSX2, we decided to try and explain the situation and how it pertains to the GPL and LGPL license.

PCSX2's core code is LGPLv3 licensed, which is compatible with the GPLv3 license, and all the plugin code which has been merged during the 1.7 dev cycle was relicensed to LGPL with authorisation from the authors, too. However, there's also 3 bits of GPL code used in the project that remain:

• Some debugger code from PPSSPP
• The FreeType library which is used for our OSD
• libmpeg2 which is used for video decoding

The existence of these 3rd party GPL parts means that PCSX2 as a combined works needs to comply to the GPLv3 license but our source code that we own remains LGPL. By distributing the code when requested we comply with the GPLv3 license. See the GNU FAQ here and here. If these mentioned libraries are removed, the entire project would become purely LGPL licensed.

These concerns of course extended out to this new emulator, and we had to reach out about it to Tahlreth. After a good discussion with him about these issues, we have been assured that it will no longer be a problem by the time the emulator releases. Right now the only piece of GPL code they need to contend with is libmpeg2, which can be replaced with FFmpeg, which is under the LGPL license; this is something we planned on doing in the future, since libmpeg2 is over a decade old. As for the aforementioned debugger and Freetype code, they no longer exist. Aether has its own OSD and no debugger, meaning the emulator will be entirely LGPL.

In addition, the developer very kindly let us see an early alpha of the emulator, and it runs better than most of us expected! We are really looking forward to recommending it to all those wanting PCSX2 on Android, as this is probably the best it's gonna get.

For final words, we'd like to warn the community about false information and fake software. So far, even we have caught numerous fake APKs, (ongoing) impersonation attempts, faked/stolen videos, brigading, and misinformation regarding AetherSX2. We want to emphasize that it is currently in closed beta, and is only available for select people. While there is currently no version available to the public, the emulator is going to be free once released, collect no data, and is not planned to be distributed outside of the Google Play Store.

For your own safety, be sure NOT to:

• Download or install any APKs that are shared through youtube links or other sources, as likely contain viruses or copies of different emulators
• Pay attention to people claiming to be a developer other than /u/Tahlreth on Reddit
• Believe anybody is affiliated with AetherSX2 unless confirmed by /u/Tahlreth
• Trust any social media outlet except the official subreddit /r/AetherSX2, unless trusted news sources report on it, Tahlreth (at time of posting) has no other social presence such as Discord

Please wait for follow-up announcements and information from Tahlreth directly on /r/AetherSX2.

Don't miss this, it's very cool. Even on it's current alpha state, I've been able to try a bunch of interesting PS2 titles using a crappy Exynos tablet.
Games like Forbidden Siren, LOTR The Third Age, Maximo, Rule of Rose, Chulip, Deus Ex, FFX, Grandia II, BloodRayne, Dragon Quest V (fan-translated!), Kingdom Hearts, Oni, Persona 3, The Thing... and many others are quite playable.
Try it, even if you don't have a fancy Snapdragon device. You will be surprised. Finally, a Portable PS2!

 

[Puukko]

I figured I might as well note down my experiences emulating Xenoblade 2 since I'm further in now. My gametime says 100 hours, but the game promotes idling. I've been using Yuzu + Vulkan for the vast majority of normal gameplay with Ryujinx on the side for occasional testing, which is also how I played SMTV so that'll make for a good comparison. For reference, this is arguably the most demanding Switch game, running at 720p on a good day on native hardware with frequent dips below that and it only became somewhat playable on emulators half a year ago and has made huge strides since.

The TL;DR:

If you want good performance with minimal issues: Ryujinx at 1x. I can't vouch for the stability, but this should enable people with slightly older CPUs (9th-10th gen/3000 series) to be able to play it.

If you want the best looking game and are fine with some issues that come with using cutting edge tech: Yuzu + Vulkan at 2x with Reshade.

Yuzu has the superior resolution scaler and Vulkan handles both higher resolutions and Reshade like a champ, where OpenGL buckles. 3x made zero difference in visuals to my eye and just introduced box patterns that were definitely distracting. OpenGL is there as a fallback but it gave me 10-15% worse performance at these settings which was enough to make me drop below 30 fps at times and thus the game slowed down. This game greatly benefits from Reshade in my opinion and that's the main reason I am using Yuzu.

Notably, the game has not crashed once during those 100 hours and suffers from far fewer graphical issues than SMTV did, though they're definitely still there. Many of these are Vulkan specific, it being an early access feature and all. SMTV meanwhile had a whole variety of these issues on top of crashing every few hours - compared to that, Xenoblade 2 is a much smoother experience. I only just came across an issue that was noticeable enough and seemingly permanent for the area in question that I opted to switch to OpenGL which renders correctly. Characters had bigtime rainbow lighting applied to them which while not the absolute worst, was definitely unsightly. Other than that, facial animations work very inconsistently (makes for a rather macabre scene when the gang is attending a funeral and the deceased in question is staring into nothingness with a literal dead eye stare), a thin dotted line across the screen (seemingly fixed in the very latest builds, or I got lucky), fullbright/super dark lighting in one indoors area and very rare texture explosion/corruption. I've had one instance where the graphics got so majorly fucked up that I was forced to restart, so that's the closest thing to a crash I suppose. Generally speaking, these issues don't seem to affect regular overworld traversal, so you won't be pestered by them during combat and exploration.

Now, as for the quality of the game itself, I'll save that for the JRPG thread once I've actually beat the game. Lots to talk about for sure.

 

[CyberWhale]

When did Yuzu introduce resolution scaling? Obviously missed that update, but it must have been quite recent.

 

[Puukko]

When did Yuzu introduce resolution scaling? Obviously missed that update, but it must have been quite recent.

It's been in the EA builds for months.