jeudi 25 février 2016

Super Mario 64

I just finished again Super Mario 64.
It must be the fiftieth time, but it's always good. A true master-piece.


This time, i played in true 240p (with sweetFx CRT shader) and it was surprisingly pleasant. It was really like playing on a real Nintendo 64 like in my old memories. At first it was just a little nostalgic test but I really got into it and finished it... With 120 stars. \o/
This is not a difficult game, far from it. I finished it in 6 or 7 hours.

Oh in relation with this post, I've changed two lines in core configs. For instance, for mupen64plus_libretro.dll.cfg, I've changed theses lines:

video_fullscreen = "true"
video_windowed_fullscreen = "true"
video_fullscreen_x = "0"
video_fullscreen_y = "0"
to:
video_fullscreen = "true"
video_windowed_fullscreen = "false"
video_fullscreen_x = "1280"
video_fullscreen_y = "720"

Now, before RA launch a game, it switched to 720p. It solves my problem for RA only, but that's already something.








jeudi 18 février 2016

ePSXe 2.0 released!

Two days ago, I was talking about video pluginsPete's OpenGL2 2.9 vs gpuBladeSoft.
We can totally forget them. The new version of ePSXe seems to be much better!


After some tests for an hour, with the native video plugin – ePSXe GPU Core 2.0.0 – , I think I'll never use again ePSXe 1.9.5! I'm hyped!
This one is much more accurate, more flexible, and get the GTE Accuracy hack.

I've tested 20 games, and no problem on anyone (on the first minutes of gameplay, of course). Everything seems to work perfectly. No pixel misplaced, no problem with sweetFx and in addition, it embeds two excellent shaders:  CRT-Lottes and CRT-Hyllian. I imagine there are some glitchs here and there, but nothing apparent at first glance. We will see in the coming days, on reddit, mainly.


A great news for windows users. We can finally say goodbye to PSX-R. Btw, Mednafen is always the best choice (cross plateform, open source, less bugs,...)

Changelog:
  • First of all, ePSXe 2.0 now requires Windows Vista or superior. While it could work on Windows XP SP2, it has not been tested.
  • Multi-language support. Currently there is support for English, Spanish, Japanese (thanks to Nekokabu) and Italian (thanks to Domus). If you want to help us translate the emulator to other language let us know at epsxepc@gmail.com.
  • Added a gamelist window. Now you can open a gamelist window by selecting File->Open Gamelist or clicking on the letters "PSX" from the ePSXe logo.
  • Improved CPU/overall timing accuracy.
  • Improved GTE accuracy. and added support for widescreen and subpixel precision (GTE Accuracy hack thank to Edbla).
  • Ported the Soft GPU from the Android version. The new GPU Core requires a videocard supporting OpenGL2 + GLSL shader. Supporting increased internal resolution at x2/x4, brightness profiles, stretching modes, 2D filters (Thanks to Zenju), Shaders (Thanks to Lottes & Hyllian), Scanlines and Sub-pixel precision. (Special thanks to Pete Bernert :)
  • Included the Pete Opengl2 GPU core with support for sub-pixel precission (gte accuracy hack) and memory detection. Millions of thanks to Pete Bernert, Tapcio and Edbla.
  • Teamviewer incompatibility is resolved with the internal GPU plugins.
  • Added a configuration window to select options for the internal SPU Plugin.
  • Fixed support for CDDA music in external SPU plugins.
  • Improved the internal input plugin. Improved multitap andd added autofire support.
  • Added support for Konami Justifier gun using the mouse.
  • External Input plugins support.
  • Added game profile by game.
  • Improved auto-PPF support. (PPv3 and several files by game)
  • Improved cheat support. Fixed cheatcodes gameshark conditional, added increment/decrement types (0x10-11, 0x20-21) and copy type (0xc2).
  • Improved HLE bios emulation. Starting with version 1.9.25, the HLE bios has been improved to support more games: Wild Arms, Jet Moto, Toca World Touring, Simcity 2000. Memcards support was improved for a lot of games such as Dinocrisis 2, Metal Gear Solid, V-Rally2, Diablo, Ridge Racer Type 4, Driver, Echo Night and Azure Dreamns.
  • Fixes to the CD-ROM decoder and the core which made around to 40 more games playable or better working.

mercredi 17 février 2016

Change screen resolution on the fly

I love my sweetFx crt-shader.
Yeah, it's a matter of personal taste but after so many hours trying to configure it, i like the it is.


1440p monitors are excellents for emulation.
Factor 3 for games in 480i, or factor 6 for games in 240p. It's almost perfect.
Now, let's talk about the crt-shader with sweetFx.

In 480i, sweetFx is ok.


But when i wanted to play 240p games, and changed the SweetFX_settings.txt accordingly, there is always some visual glitchs. Pixels misplaced. Specially on games with small fonts like Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
An example, on Megaman X6


The T is reduced.

Obviously, i spent a lot of hours on notepad++ in order to correct this problem. Without success.
The only solution i found was to simply change screen resolution to 720p. The upscale ratio is always an integer (3) and no more scanline or pixel misplaced.

However, it's very annoying.

One solution, two methods:
Using .bat files manually or through Launchbox.
(source: http://www.computerforum.com/threads/bat-file-to-change-my-screen-resolution.192700/#post-1608460)

You can download my 720p and 1440p .bat files here.

→ Manually: 
No secret, just click on .bat files. Easy as hell. That's what i'm doing with XYplorer shortcuts.

→ Launchbox
Not really complex, but very time consuming. That's why i prefer change the resolution manually. 
You have to edit every game (ctrl+e) and set those .bat like this. The 720p .bat before launch, and 1440p after exit.


When you'll launch Super Mario World, the resolution screen will automatically toggle to 720p and return to 1440p on exit. Sweet!

But you have to do that for every game in your collection... There's actually no method to automate this trick.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯

mardi 16 février 2016

G-Sync, high frame rate and emulators

Yes, I bought a G-Sync monitor.
The Asus PG279Q. A great 27" IPS monitor, 165Hz and G-Sync. I highly recommend it.


Anyway, why would I buy this one ? For the sake of emulation, of course. 
With the help of Freesync or G-Sync and 75Hz monitor and +, you can say goodbye to tearing and input lag output lag! That's not a joke. Theses monitors are simply a godsend. 

Last few months, one of my fixations was these damn input lag output lag. (≧ロ≦)
There's a few things to do in order to reduce the input lag when you don't have g-sync or freesync. And some are worth to be used like hard GPU sync, triple buffering in windowed mode or some tricks with nvidia and ati drivers. You'll reduce it, but never get rid of it. With g-sync and freesync, yes.


But now, I'm free from bad input lag output lag and tearing. 
You've just had to set a frame limit, but almost every emulator set this for you. The little detail I like it's when you use Fast Forward option, everything remains smooth. ^◡^

No more v-sync, no more stuttering, no more tearing, only a smooth gameplay. A must buy for any emulation lover.

EDIT: here's a good video on this subject, thanks to LocutusOfBorges 




lundi 15 février 2016

ePSXe video plugins: gpuBladeSoft

Mednafen is great.
Mednafen is awesome when we talk about accuracy. But Mednafen has a big problem: it needs cue files (with .bin or .img). And when we talk about front-ends, it becomes a real nuisance.
Specially when you want to organize your PS1 library: multipe cds games are boring. 2 or more entries for only one game? No way.

ePSXe, on another side, has a great solution: it can use .PBP format.
With that, we can add only one instance for any multiple cds game (like a lot of Final Fantasy, Chrono Cross or Resident Evil 2). And reduce the files size at the same time!

With PBP files, launchbox's PS1 collection is perfect.


I'd like to use Mednafen, but ePSXe is trully more comfortable in daily use.
Its accuracy is not bad either, and… well… anyway.

My point is this: I use sweetFX for its crt-shader. In this way, I can always play with the same shader, on almost every emulator, and not only in Retroarch. usefull when you want to use Project64 or ePSXe keeping your own shader.

But on ePSXe, I had an annoying visual glitch: a real bad light bleeding (you can see it mostly on the right).


For a long time, I thought the problem was coming from sweetFx. Adding some curvature can mitigate this effect. But, in fact, the offender was the video plugin of ePSXe: Pete's OpenGL2 2.9.

Pete's OpenGL2 2.9 is a good old video plugin. Good accuracy, great options, but closed source and some settings I truly dislike. “Keep aspect ratio”… Yeah I'd like that. I'd like to play in 4/3 but on some games, Pete's OpenGL2 2.9 decides otherwise. Grandia or Street Fighter Alpha 3 are good examples. Some screens are stretched on my 16/9e monitor, while the rest of the game are in 4/3. I tried, of course, every setting you can imagine, but never managed to solve this issue… (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻

Until yesterday. \o/

On this forum, they talked about another video plugin I didn't know: gpuBladeSoft.
It's weird because I've never seen this one anywhere. Emulation.gametechwiki.com doesn't mention it. And a lot of people claimed its good accuracy and great modern graphics options. So… Let's try it !

The source and author (edgbla) are there : http://emu-russia.net/en/files/plugins/psx/
And it's surprising but this plugin is always updated! (September, 19, 2015, for the last one).

Two minutes later, all my problems were resolved! Perfect display, every game in my collection seem to work perfectly (although it wasn't the case with Pete's OpenGL2 2.9 , a lot of glitches on Rayman, for example), and no more stretched screens.


I highly recommend this plugin. Really. 
Until the day we can launch .PBP files in Mednafen… ;-)

Unique features:
  • Interlace mode emulation;
  • Screen settings emulation;
  • Final Fantasy 8 pre battle effect emulation;
  • Pixel perfect geometry (I hope. :));
  • Method of reducing vertex jittering (pcsxr);
Other features:
  • 16/32-bit software renderer;
  • Increased internal resolution;
  • Texture bilinear filtering;
  • Support for gpuPeteOGL2 glsl shaders;
  • Fullscreen filters;
  • High precision GPU commands emulation;
  • Correct polygon cutting;
  • Precise dithering;
  • Correct aspect ratio;
  • Controlling the plugin with keyboard/mice/joystics;
  • 9 lightgun crosshairs;
  • Screenshot creation, video recording;