Yuber::thread.fork(SIGDERAIL);

[grinvader]

You didn't get a Game Gear? What the fuck is WRONG with you? Get out!

He was known as... the Scourge of AA. Wherever he went, batteries would faint and never wake again, leaving his plague-ridden path with thousands of soulless husks every day.

[kode54]

First portable game system I ever owned was one of those Tiger Electronics things, followed later by the original Nintendo Game Brick, then eventually followed by the original front lit abomination of a GBA SP, then I bought my own DS Lite, then I bought my own launch day 3DS.

To this day, I have never owned any Sega consoles or devices.

[Gil_Hamilton]

First portable game system I ever owned was one of those Tiger Electronics things, followed later by the original Nintendo Game Brick, then eventually followed by the original front lit abomination of a GBA SP, then I bought my own DS Lite, then I bought my own launch day 3DS.

To this day, I have never owned any Sega consoles or devices.

I own more than one Genesis. All acquired well after the war.
Also a Dreamcast, on clearance.

I need a Saturn for maximum street cred.
Had someone was suppoed to dig their's out of storage for me, but it never happened.

[Alfador]

I own more than one Genesis. All acquired well after the war.
Also a Dreamcast, on clearance.

I need a Saturn for maximum street cred.
Had someone was suppoed to dig their's out of storage for me, but it never happened.

Back when I was a kid, we briefly had a game console, I don't know which one, it was in the late 1980s. It was possibly a Colecovision, Atari 2600, or most likely some sort of cheap Atari 2600 knock-off. I have no idea, but whatever it was, it was pretty lousy, and it only had 2 games. If I recall correctly, the 2 games were Q-Bert and Pango. I was not very good at either of them. I think we only had that game console for a month or two before it broke, since my parents got it really cheap at a garage sale, for $10 or something, along with the 2 games. Anyway, I am glad there are emulators nowadays because now I can play all those video games I missed when I was a kid (after that cheap used game console broke my parents refused to ever get another game console ever again). ZSNES is still my favorite SNES emulator because it has the best sound, it is best at speeding up and slowing down games, and its savestate format works with all the savestate editors out there. However I don't know what the best emulator for the game console I had as a kid was, since I don't even KNOW which console it was.

[Gil_Hamilton]

I own more than one Genesis. All acquired well after the war.
Also a Dreamcast, on clearance.

I need a Saturn for maximum street cred.
Had someone was suppoed to dig their's out of storage for me, but it never happened.

Back when I was a kid, we briefly had a game console, I don't know which one, it was in the late 1980s. It was possibly a Colecovision, Atari 2600, or most likely some sort of cheap Atari 2600 knock-off. I have no idea, but whatever it was, it was pretty lousy, and it only had 2 games. If I recall correctly, the 2 games were Q-Bert and Pango. I was not very good at either of them.

Don't hate the game, hate the player. Q*Bert is the shizzle.

I think we only had that game console for a month or two before it broke, since my parents got it really cheap at a garage sale, for $10 or something, along with the 2 games.

Ouch.

[grinvader]

Q*Bert is the shizzle.

[odditude]

Q*Bert is the shizzle.

so is that movie.

[Gil_Hamilton]

Q*Bert is the shizzle.

They spelled @!#?@! wrong.

[odditude]

Q*Bert is the shizzle.

we don't need to see the picture again

They spelled @!#?@! wrong.

nah - he's actually conversing there. it's kind of awesome.

[snkcube]

Q*Bert is the shizzle.

so is that movie.

I concur.

[adventure_of_link]

Q*Bert is the shizzle.

so is that movie.

I concur.

Thirded. That movie is... shall we say, TURBO-TASTIC!!!

[Yuber]

Love the CT reference, Alfador. When I asked about the new ZSNES, apparently it's going to use a different save state format, but yeah I love ZSNES for all the SS editors to fuck around with games I've already beaten. 9x actually has better more accurate sound but the sound seems to crack a little bit more, although ZSNES does it sometimes too. 9x emulates the sound in FF6 and CT much better than ZSNES, but ZSNES is much faster.

I hope the new ZSNES comes out in the next few years or so. As much as I enjoy 9x, ZSNES was my first experience with emulation in general playing FF5 for the first time in 98; it was awesome and so much better than that terrible port of FF5 in the PSX anthology. The load times in the anthology version REALLY pissed me off and it's just a lazy ass port in general. The RPGe fan translation is still the best version imo. Seiken Densetsu 3 STILL needs an official US/EU release, preferably a complete overhaul.

[nintendo_nerd]

Love the CT reference, Alfador. When I asked about the new ZSNES, apparently it's going to use a different save state format, but yeah I love ZSNES for all the SS editors to fuck around with games I've already beaten. 9x actually has better more accurate sound but the sound seems to crack a little bit more, although ZSNES does it sometimes too. 9x emulates the sound in FF6 and CT much better than ZSNES, but ZSNES is much faster.

I hope the new ZSNES comes out in the next few years or so. As much as I enjoy 9x, ZSNES was my first experience with emulation in general playing FF5 for the first time in 98; it was awesome and so much better than that terrible port of FF5 in the PSX anthology. The load times in the anthology version REALLY pissed me off and it's just a lazy ass port in general. The RPGe fan translation is still the best version imo. Seiken Densetsu 3 STILL needs an official US/EU release, preferably a complete overhaul.

You can actually get rid of the crackling by changing the buffer size to 128 or 160 ms, usually. If you're on Windows 7, using the XAudio2 API will help tremendously. Snes9x has far better Nintendo S-SMP emulation, I find it very difficult to go back to Zsnes because of that very reason, old Squaresoft games sound pretty bad comparatively. Super Mario World is another one, especially the shrink/grow sounds

[Yuber]

VERY late reply, but I've tried changing the buffer size with no success. However, the Xaudio2 API does help a LOT(I'm on Win8) and I've been using that for a while. The crackling only seems to happen with bass-heavy sounds(not my speakers) and it's especially noticeable in SF2/SF2 Turbo. In CT, FF6 and other RPGs though, it's basically non-existent and I've gotten so used to 9x that I don't even care anymore. I can play SF2 on my real SNES anyway, but I generally just play the arcade versions on MAME.

Thanks for the help though man, appreciate it. I had already switched to Xaudio2 before your reply, but it does make a massive difference. Now I actually have to listen for the crackling rather than it being blatant like it was using 9x's directsound. 9x is the best emu for RPGs because of how accurate the sound is, and playing with a 48khz playback rate makes it sound better than the real system.

ZSNES is still best for a game like Super Ghouls n' Ghosts though because it runs faster than a real SNES and that game has a MASSIVE amount of slowdown. I've beaten the arcade Ghouls(World version, 1 checkpoint per level) twice but I still haven't beat SGNG. I'm busy replaying FF6, CT and starting FF4DS but I'll eventually beat SGNG. Killing demons in your underwear is one frustrating, dirty job.

[grinvader]

It doesn't go faster for every game. I don't remember SGnG having any notable difference.

[adventure_of_link]

Killing demons in your underwear is one frustrating, dirty job.

Learn to dodge enemies and projectiles better and you won't have to worry about battling in your underwear

[Yuber]

Learn to dodge enemies and projectiles better and you won't have to worry about battling in your underwear

I'm not that great at platformers, but I'm decent at arcade & Genesis GNG because both version have very little to no slowdown. I've beaten the World arcade GNG(1 checkpoint/level) twice and the Genesis version on professional 3 times I think. I need to change my play style in order to beat SGNG; I use a rhythm-based style that's hard to describe, and slowdown in any game cramps my style. Also I'm really bad at the double jump and I miss being able to shoot in different directions. I bet you get hit a lot in SGNG because that game is fucking BEASTLY. I'm actually pretty decent at arcade Ghouls but SGNG consistently kicks my ass unless I have the crossbow, and even then I'm horrible at timing the double jump.

It doesn't go faster for every game. I don't remember SGnG having any notable difference.

There's not a big difference, but SGNG seems to run just a little bit faster in ZSNES than in 9x. Will the new ZSNES support shaders? I just recently downloaded some shaders for 9x and my God the 5xBR shader plus either hq4x or hq3xS/bold looks amazing. Chrono Trigger in 9x with the HQ3xS filter plus 5xBR shader looks absolutely spectacular. It's almost like playing CT in HD since the BR shader eliminates pretty much all pixelation; it's so fucking SMOOTH. The 5xBR shader makes the blurry bilinear filtering option look like total ass.

I hope development is going well; good luck.

EDIT- AUG 18th: Sorry for going so far off-topic in my last few(deleted) posts; I understand why that big long conversation was deleted. It was fun for a while, but it was my fault for going off on a HUGE tangent and straying from the topic of ZSNES development.

they weren't deleted, they were split off into another thread in insane chatter a week and a half ago.

Anyway, I'm guessing some speed will need to be sacrificed in order to attain greater accuracy in ZSNES 2.0, but I hope it's much faster than BSNES/higan but with comparable accuracy. Being just a bit better than 9x 1.53(plus beta builds) especially with SuperFX emulation would be good enough imo. Extra graphical filters/shader support along with the same great sound options that ZSNES already has are my main requests. I'd love to have a nice, fast emulator that's much faster than BSNES and much more accurate than 9x is. Filter wise, FinalBurn Alpha has some xBR filters built into the emulator itself, and SF3: 3rd Strike looks astounding if you use any of the 4xBR filters along with point filtering. JoJo's Bizarre Adventure CPS3 using said filters actually looks better in FBA than the "HD remake" Capcum shit out. Maybe you guys could offer various accuracy options ala BSNES?

Regular HQ4x filters kind of warp certain pixel art but the xBR filters in FBA look nearly perfect while still greatly enhancing image quality. My wild guess about what FBA does with xBR filters is simply stack the HQx and xBR filters like I do in 9x, as the IQ looks pretty similar. 3rd Strike with the 4xBR filters, at least imo looks MUCH better than anything SF4 has to offer; that sprite animation is gorgeous.

[blackmyst]

It's almost like playing CT in HD since the BR shader eliminates pretty much all pixelation; it's so fucking SMOOTH.

oh god please stop i'm gonna throw up in my mouth

[adventure_of_link]

It's almost like playing CT in HD since the BR shader eliminates pretty much all pixelation; it's so fucking SMOOTH.

oh god please stop i'm gonna throw up in my mouth

...is that even possible?

[grinvader]

It's almost like playing CT in HD since the BR shader eliminates pretty much all pixelation; it's so fucking SMOOTH.

oh god please stop i'm gonna throw up in my mouth

...is that even possible?

Quite so.

[Gil_Hamilton]

Certainly easier than throwing up in your ass.

[Yuber]

It's almost like playing CT in HD since the BR shader eliminates pretty much all pixelation; it's so fucking SMOOTH.

oh god please stop i'm gonna throw up in my mouth

So, what's wrong with 5xBR 3.7a coupled with Hq4x or 3xBold/S? The 5xBR shader replaces blurry bilinear filtering and corrects many of the warped pixels HQx filters alone produce(the characters' faces in CT for example). The shader also smooths jagged edges quite a bit which greatly improves overall image quality. Of course, playing CT on a real SNES using a nice CRT is still the best option, but as far as emulation goes the 5xBR shader improves overall image quality the most without warping the pixels NEARLY as much as HQx filters alone.

Saying it almost looks HD was a bit hyperbolic, but it looks infinitely better than, say, HQ4x alone with or without bilinear filtering. xBR filters have a nice edge enhancement effect while still leaving the image nice and crisp for the most part compared to the blurry, warped image of HQ4x+BF. Correcting much of HQx filters' pixel warping is a bonus.

HQ4x alone VS HQx filters+5xBR is kind of like comparing the Japanese version of Tekken Tag Tournament to the US version; the US version has much better IQ due to the AA/pseudo AA the US version employs and everything looks nice and smooth compared to the jaggy ass Japanese version.

[paulguy]

The high detail backgrounds will look bad with any of those sorts of filters.

[Gil_Hamilton]

It almost looks like a professional commercially-released HD release, where they just ran all the old assets through a 2xSAI filter and called it a day!

[Yuber]

The xBR filters aren't perfect, but they significantly improve detail compared to HQx filters alone. There is a little bit of detail lost, but hq4x+5xBR is much much better than the default filters alone. I have a fairly old 1920x1080 60hz monitor, and the CRT filters I've used look very buggy.

Gil, the only thing that looks like a slapped on 2xSAI filter is slapping on 2xSAI in an emulator and calling it a day. HQ4x+5xBR looks MUCH better and retains a lot more of the subtle details. I don't think it eliminates the small details but rather it just looks kinda weird to see the mountains in FF6 and CT with those filters on. Bilinear filtering diminishes small details more than any combination of the other filters mentioned, and xBR is a good replacement.