/vr/ - Retro Games

I like to emulate on my Wii, hooked into my CRT. The Classic Controller Pro is great for retro titles.

>>355279
I've been considering picking up a wii just for the virtual console. But alas I've been unemployed. Being poorfag is suffering. A good TV filter would be nice to see either way though.

I just nig rig my laptop to my HDTV which for some reason has a CRT setting. It's not very good though. All it does is lower the image quality and put some scanlines on the screen. It's better to just use one of Snes9x's filters.

That looks pretty good. I might get that.

That looks like it's running in 8:7, not 4:3, but I think square pixels looks way better in the vast majority of games

Right now I use one of the default scanline filters that comes with RetroArch, but it looks shitty at resolutions higher than 4x. I don't want anything more than darkening the lower half of each pixel by 20% or so, but the scanline filter I use creates this ugly gradient effect that makes it look like each row is a shaded cylinder. I'm not at my main computer so I can't dig up an example.

>realistic looking scanlines

>>355351
You could just homebrew it, all it takes is a SD card and a bit of time.

>>355250
>It's not playing on the original ahrdware on an actual TV
Then it's shit. Move along.

This is only emulating CRT image quality, not CRT motion quality. It cannot be called accurate CRT TV emulation. Motion quality is more important, and you can only have CRT style motion quality if you have CRT style flicker.

See http://www.blurbusters.com/ for explanation and possible solutions.

Up close or at a distance, all I can see in that shot are scanlines and no other effect.

>IT'S NOT PIXELATED ENOUGH, I NEED SUBPIXELATION

>>355386
I've been wondering about HDMI to RGB converter boxes. Does anyone have any experience with them?

I emulate it pretty much bare. No scanlines, no filters, no attempts to make it look like a CRT. Just big fat clean pixels.

>>355612
You DISGUST me!
Don't you know the creators INTENDED the game to be played on a shitty CRT?

>>355612
So like the creators INTENDED the output to be seen?

>>355621
But they did. Designers often utilized the color bleed of CRT TVs to create shadows and gradients that otherwise would be lost.

>>355675
Counterexample.

>>355675
That's fine when you're actually viewing it in the same context you would view a TV - six feet away - but when I'm sitting at a desk with my face two feet away from the screen I'd rather have clear, distinct pixels over a headache-inducing blurry mess.

>>355521
It's still in prototype and is a fairly new project. NTSC signal emulation is still being developed and it seems like the focus so far has been on pixel layout. The ambition seems to be to be able to configure various kinds of formats like slot mask or aperture grille and simulating interlaced video.

I dunno, at that scale I still prefer cgwg's CRT-Geom.

At higher scales, however, hunterk's Phosphor-LUT might beat it out.

>>355780
CRT-Geom already simulates interlacing.

Faithful phosphor emulation, though, particularly slot mask phosphors, requires insane resolution, 10x scale to be exact.

>>355860
>Faithful phosphor emulation
Just give us the afterglow and let is combine it with other filters.

>>355747
>That's fine when you're actually viewing it in the same context you would view a TV - six feet away

At six feet away the crisp pixels would create the same effect, if not better. Your eye interpolates on its own, it doesn't need shit-ass blur.

>>355709
The tone shading looks a lot smoother on the left and everything is generally less jaggy. Notice how the shading gives a much better impression of depth, especially noticeable on the cliff wall and the tree and little things like the seemingly arbitrary red line on John's vest on the right which bleeds with the brown surrounding it on the left to create a tone shade. Undoubtedly it's not perfect and it'd look a lot better on an actual TV, but I still think NTSC filters give a much better image than without.

>>355747
Sit a little further away? I've never really had a problem with it personally.

>>355954
>but I still think NTSC filters give a much better image than without.
AT WHAT COST? The rest of the image.

>>355954
>Sit a little further away?
Why would I sit farther away when I can just not use shitty scanlines?

PS. that "seemingly arbitrary red line" is a suspender strap

>>355954
I actually prefer it clean cut like on the left. The blur just pisses me off.

On a CRT monitor running at 320x240

IF THE CREATORS WANTED YOU TO LOOK AT SCANLINES THEY WOULD'VE HARD-CODED THEM INTO THE GAME

>>356023
Why do you hate the way the game was meant to be?

>>356104
>hard-code scanlines into the game
>TV itself uses scanlines as well
>double-scanlines fucking up the entire image
Good idea.

Thread title: MUH PIXELS

Alternatively: STOP LIKING WHAT I DON'T LIKE

>>356137
No,no,no. Listen bro.

You hardcode scanlines into the games to counter scanlines.

Because
if you hardcode scanlines into the game
they compliment the scanlines created by the TV
and you get a whole picture

>>356137

>>355709

That honestly looks like a troll image. I've never seen a filter look that shitty.

>>356104
The whole art style of NES/SNES/PS1 sprite animation is dependent on scanlines to look fluid. That's why strait ports of classic games look wrong on flatscreens. Get over yourself.

>>355954
Guy who originally posted that picture here, I was using the filter that comes with Fusion. Admittedly it's a little shitty, but I don't remember the Genesis having very good video quality anyway so I guess it's a little accurate. The only thing I could think of that's wrong with the picture is the enemy health bar (there's no doubt that the devs intended the dithering on the floor to blend into a gradient), but for all I know that could be what it's supposed to look like on a CRT with color bleeding.

>>356171
That's Kega's NTSC filter, which is supposed to recreate the Genesis composite output. It doesn't look quite THAT bad on RetroArch, but the Genesis did have extremely shitty composite video quality.

>>356186
Also if anyone has a nonretarded filter I could download pls link because I try to avoid playing filterless when I'm going fullscreen.

>>355573
I've got a Monoprice HDMI->VGA converter that works well for HD stuff. Never tried feeding it a 240p/480i signal...

>>356171
Looks like the default RCA filter for Kega Fusion. Looks like my TV when I plugged the wii with RCA cables as well.

>>356172
>The whole art style of NES/SNES/PS1 sprite animation is dependent on scanlines to look fluid.
Actually, it's dependent on signal noise and the types of blurring and inter-pixel effects that occur as a result of a lower quality signal.

Genesis games tend to illustrate this really well.

are people really this particular about the way it looks? not even trolling, this just seems like a lot of effort to make some things look a little bit clearer or something. I mean, i just feel like it's not that big of a deal.

>>356191
>did have extremely shitty composite video quality.
>he does not understand that RCA cables by design was shit

>>356191

Huh. Never was a Gensesis fan, so I guess I spoke to soon.

>>356216
>look a little bit clearer

>looks shitty and blurry as fuck

>>356163
But the reasoning of >>356104 was for devs to hard-code scanlines in so the user WOULD see scanlines.
If scanlines hard-coded in in order to create no scanlines at all would work (due to the various types of TVs that would be hardly possible I'd simply assume, though?),
that'd be an actual reason for people to assume that they DID want the scanlines in there, for they could've dealt with that problem if they wanted to. Though I am very sure that wouldn't even work, and hard-coding them in would make the screen flicker like hell and whatnot on many devices used back then.

>>356164
I hope this happened when taking a photo of your TV or whatever and doesn't actually exist as an actual filter.

>>356216
Technically speaking they're going through a lot of effort to make things look a little bit less clear.

>>356209
No, I know composite is inherently shitty, but there was varying quality for it depending on the console. SNES composite quality, especially on the mini, is actually pretty bearable, but it's HORRENDOUS on the Genesis. You have to see it to believe it. I bought a Genesis not long ago, and it came with an RF cable, which looked like dogshit, so I ordered a composite cable online. Plugged that shit in when it arrived, and the improvement was negligible. It's really, really bad, but unfortunately, this was taken into account for pixel blending and transparency effects and shit.

>>356216

It is to me. I've been using emulators since the late 90s at the same time I was still playing the physical consoles regularly. Bare pixels always looked like shit to me. It was the first thing that struck me about using an emulator and playing on a computer monitor.

>>356224
>>356227
heh, I was thinking about saying that, but I thought someone would miss the point and think I was trolling.

>>356241
You must've had a nice TV, the clarity of emulators over the shitty TV image was the main draw for me.

>>356243
I know what you are saying. RCA was okay for NES due the way it handled image output. Nintendo did something similar for the SNES as well.
I guess Megadrive tried bruteforce 480i, which always looks like dogshit unless its the PS2.

behold

>>356317
I don't think it was an issue of forcing 480i. IIRC Later models of the Genesis, particularly the model 3, have better composite output for some reason. They just fucked the output up somewhere along the line.

>>356358
this isn't even my final form

>>356358

I always look at these things and I just think 'oh that's kinda neat' but I don't want to play with them on.

>>356376
>fisheye

Stop that.

>>356376
It's like I'm really 12 and poor again.
Just needs a monoaural sound option and random cartridge failure to complete the trifecta.

>>356408
NES is mono no matter what, so that's already done.

Anyway, I actually do use CRT shaders, but I don't see the point of the curvature. It's a neat effect, but I'd much rather not distort the image like that. More modern CRTs like my Sony had flat screens anyway.

This is just like the N64 texture pack fags.

>>356392
>using Nestopia's default palette

Enjoy your dull reds.

>>356408
>emulator option that requires you to blow into your mic for a game to load
Why isn't this a thing yet?

>>355250
The problem with CRT emulation is that the scanlines are just too noticeable on anything other than an actual CRT.

>>356369
256p×192p --> 480i means 1.875 conversion. I guess they didn't think about it properly, hence bleed.
Still, should not be that bad on the Megadrive, due SCART.

>>356497
The problem boils down to there just not being enough pixels still to properly do CRTs justice. on 1080p screens, the best we can do with integer scaling is 4x scale, which doesn't give us much room to work with. Not only that, but LCDs have shit contrast, so that also doesn't help.

We need better shaders, yes, but the real limiting factor is resolution and display technology. With 4K displays that use something better than LCD tech, we'll be able to produce much more faithful shaders.

>>356492
Hold up, though, aren't most Genesis games 320x224?

>>356527
Yeah, once we start getting those higher resolutions, we'll be able to start rendering the individual parts of a pixel, rather than simply having a pixel of X color.

>>356535
Checked wikipedia, it could do both. You will have bleed on both 1.875 and 1.5 so long whatever scales the signal does not do a god job considering it. Now add on the bleed from RCA or S-video(still there), and its a little bad.

>>356578
IIRC very, very few games used the 256 pixel wide mode. I think Mega Man Wily Wars does, but I can't think of anything else.

Anyone got some nice OpenGL CRT TV filters/shaders I could use with higan aka bsnes?

>>356594
https://gitorious.org/bsnes/xml-shaders/trees/master/shaders/OpenGL/

Best ones are CRT-Geom and Caligari, I think.

Unfiltered. They dont look good enough.

>>356594
https://www.dropbox.com/s/tqbcq9jz8t65zmx/caligari-scanlines.OpenGL%20-%20light%20version.shader

here's a slightly custom one some anon posted. It's scanlines but they're smaller or lighter or something. it looked nice so I downloaded it but haven't tried it yet

>>356304
This. I've always preferred pixels, whenever I need to watch any low resolution video, I'm forced to disable all the hardware accelerators because it's the only way it will play without blurring and dithering the image, I really wish there was a media player that gave you the option of bare pixels.

>>355621
CRTs were the standard back then. It wasn't that the developers expected gamers to have shitty equipment, but rather that they recognized what equipment was available to everyone, themselves included, and designed games specifically with that in mind.

And really, why wouldn't they? It's foolish to do otherwise. Do you think modern games are designed for CRTs? Nope, because we don't use them anymore.

>>356604
excuse my ignorance, but how do i download the shaders from that webpage?

I have BSNES on OS X, where the hell is the Filter/Shaders folder? or how can i add more filters?

>>356757
thank you

>>356739
There is a "download master" button on the right. Its the one.

>>356358

FCEU's colors look ugly on SMB3, the sky isn't supposed to be tinted green

>>356775
puNES Sony palette is best palette. I'm so glad Nestopia lets you use it.

>>356802
>puNES Sony palette
Where can I get this palette?

>>356936
http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?v1gr1xx67557nsl

>>356626
>>356604
Thanks. Geom is really the best one but when I go fullscreen the game slows down for me 20%. What kinda CPU do you need to run Geom at a constant 60fps?

>>356979
Shaders run on the GPU, not the CPU. If it slows down, you're likely using a budget graphics card or integrated graphics.

You have a few options. Try disabling linear gamma and 3x oversample in the shader and enabling gaussian, which should make the shader run faster. If that doesn't work, try the CRT-Simple shader, which is the same shader but slightly less advanced, but should be faster. If THAT doesn't work, then try Caligari.

>>356979

Shaders are run off the GPU. CRT-Geom has fairly high GPU requirements so if your GPU is weak, it won't run full speed.

>>356775

>>357031
try
>>356959

Nestopia's default colors are a bit too dull. That palette really helps make the games look more colorful without searing your eyes like the RGB palette does.

>>357010
>>357014
I see, what about overclocking my card, would that help and if yes, what parameter plays the biggest role for 2D emulation, core, memory shader?

>>357062
the problem is that i don't know where to place the .pal file

>>357097
I wouldn't really recommend that, but...
Core, i'm guessing. You just want more speed out of it.

>>357118
Anywhere is fine. Put it in the system directory. All you have to do is point the emulator to it under the video settings.

I like it for arcade games.

>>356670

Actually some modern games still have an SDTV or CRT option. Vanquish notably has this as an option.

>>357279
And, appropriately, it's quite a rare thing.

>>355675
Jesus Christ. Thank God I never emulate Genesis games because there aren't any good ones.

>>355250
>Accurate CRT TV Emulation

Does not exist.

True shadow mask emulation needs 4K display.

Just accept that your LCD is NOT a CRT and is NOT designed to handle low resolution games. And accept that a CRT is.

Compare OP image to this for instance.

Also, there's other disadvantages of lcds.

>motion is not as fluid.
>input lag

>>355250
>The prototype samples so far look damn nice. It'd be a breath of fresh air for the emulation scene to have an NTSC filter that doesn't make everything look washed out and have realistic looking scanlines.

You're confusing a few things. NTSC filters are replicating the cables used. Composite, s-video or RGB. These have tons of artifacts, fringing and other problems depending on the quality. These have their place. Some games used dithering, which only really works with blurry composite cables.

>realistic scanlines

Stop again. Current CRT shaders cannot replicate shadow-masks since there just is not enough pixels. You need in the range of 4K displays.

What they do instead is replicate Aperture grille style tvs. Which have strong black scanlines. It is realistic scanlines, it's just not the type of tv that you're familiar with.

>>356775
PLEASE EXPLAIN HOW YOU MAKE THIS LOOK SO GOOD? What emulator and filter are you using? I would be so grateful....

>>355954

>>357932
It says retroarch, but even nestopia can do that, just scanlines, jack out the sharpness and resolution and shit all over your gamma.

>>356612
>Unfiltered. They dont look good enough.

Which would be fine, but typically people then scale the image with nearest neighbor 4 times, which also ruins the sprite-work. Sadly, a lot of people are just used to this and think it's how it's "supposed to look".

The ONLY way to play low resolution 2D games is at native resolution. CRT tvs are the only way to do this.

We may get ultra high resolution displays and those might have perfect motion, no input lag and have shaders that make it look like the image is x1 scale. But that's a long ways off.

CRT or nothing, sorry.

>>357962
>nearest neighbor 4 times, which also ruins the sprite-work.
That is the most fucking retarded thing I've ever heard.
Do you know what nearest neighbor means? When you scale it 4x nearest neighbor you get 4x the size, raw. Period. You didn't do shit to the sprite work except blow it up to size, which when scaled back down to the size of the screen, looks, pretty much fucking exactly the same.

>>357982
>That is the most fucking retarded thing I've ever heard.
>Do you know what nearest neighbor means? When you scale it 4x nearest neighbor you get 4x the size, raw. Period. You didn't do shit to the sprite work except blow it up to size, which when scaled back down to the size of the screen, looks, pretty much fucking exactly the same.

No, it's WAY more pixilated.

Take a 100x100 image. Make it 10x bigger with nearest neighbor. Notice it's way more pixilated? Raster graphcis do not scale well.

I can't stand it. I only play on CRT where sprites actually look like sprites. In an emulator scaled x4 the spirte just looks like a mass of pixels, and I can't tell what they're supposed to be.

Shaders are okay, because it makes the sprites look more like they do at scale 1. But they're too blurry for my tastes. Trying to fix the scaling issue is like trying to square a circle. What's done is done. You can't reverse it.

>>357982

I've heard this argument a few times, and I think it might be true in some technical sense or something. I don't know. All I know is that the games look very, very pixilated at x4 scale, and perfect at x1 scale.

>>357998
It's exactly as pixelated as it was before. There must be something wrong with your eyes if you can't see something because you made it bigger.

>>358037
>It's exactly as pixelated as it was before.

But you couldn't see it because of the scale. Blowing it up shows it.

>>358037
>It's exactly as pixelated as it was before.

Please explain this image. Because it's exactly what's going on.

>>357962
You can argue that console games were intended to be blurry, but DOS games were line doubled to 400 line or 480 line, so the pixels were always clearly visible. DOS games use the exact same pixel art style as American/European console games.

>>357773

My CRT has noticible scanlines as the result of having a sharp picture quality

>>357998
It only looks more jagged because of the fucking scale you're viewing it at, nitwit. The pixel ratio is exactly the fucking same.

>>358037
One of these is 4x nearest neighbor, at 25% one is the original size at 100%. Please, tell me which is which and give me a reasonable explanation for why you think that. Cuz I sed so is not a reasonable explanation.

>>358048
>Please explain this image.
That image is an example of upscaling while not using nearest neighbor.

>>358048
The big version is just as pixelated as the small version. The big version has logical pixels made of multiple display pixels. What is so hard to understand?

>>358074
Looks like nearest neighbor to me. Maybe you are confused because it's an anti-aliased rendering of vector art, instead of the pixel art we were talking about before that anon tried to derail the thread.

>>358084
>It only looks more jagged because of the fucking scale you're viewing it at, nitwit. The pixel ratio is exactly the fucking same.

And I agree.

I don't want to view games at that scale.

The images are not the same.

>>358084

>>358091
>I don't want to view games at that scale.
AND YOU DON'T.
IF YOU SCALE IT UP TO YOUR FUCKING SCREEN SIZE OR DOWN, ITS THE SAME FUCKING SCALE. WTF>>F>SF>>AS

>>358101
>AND YOU DON'T.
>IF YOU SCALE IT UP TO YOUR FUCKING SCREEN SIZE OR DOWN, ITS THE SAME FUCKING SCALE.

I'm not following. It's x4 at fullscreen.

>>358105
Go, go and get me a picture of you playing your 224x220 ness bullshit pixel by pixel without it being fullscreen on your CRT right now. Do it. Go get it.
I'm sure that's what you rock on your LCD as well, pixel for pixel scale with a fucking magnifying glass you fucking cock sucker. Stop being a retard.

>>358110
>with a fucking magnifying glass
But if he does that, it'll be too big again and then he won't be able to make out what's going on.

>>358110

I'm just not following.

With the CRT it's played at the game's native resolution at fullscreen. CRTs have multiple resolutions.

LCD is played at 1080p and the game is scaled x4.

Why is this hard to understand?

Nearest neighbor scaling can't handle non-square pixels used by NES and SNES games without causing distortions of uneven pixel sizes, which can be very noticeable when scrolling.

>>358132
Because this is how you want your NES to look on every fucking screen ever. Non scaled.

>>358198

Yeah, if you play it on an LCD. This is why I'm saying LCDs are awful for playing low resolution video games.

I think we've come to a complete agreement then.

LCDs are not designed for SD games, and they should not be used on them.

>>358210
Or a CRT, they have higher resolutions than that you know. Everytime you change resolution they don't magically remove pixels dipshit. They scale it. But no you don't want fucking scaling.

>>358132
With the CRT, the game is being played at its native resolution stretched across the width of the display surface.
With the LCD, the game is being played at its native resolution stretched across the width of the display surface.

>>358221
>Or a CRT, they have higher resolutions than that you know.

Max for CRT Tv is 480p.

>Everytime you change resolution they don't magically remove pixels dipshit.

Aren't scanlines added? Isn't that why scanlines are there at all?

>>358198
>that awful font rendering

>>358238
>Max for CRT Tv is 480p.

And yes, I know HD CRT tvs exist. So don't correct me. They are not typical however.

>>358221
>They scale it.

Nope. CRT's don't need to scale to display 320x240 or 640x480 full screen.

>>358221
Except CRT's don't have a fixed resolution (Disregarding the "resolution" of the mask).

>>358238
You can actually get HD capable TV CRT's. They are hella rare, though.

>>358264
>>358221
>They scale it.
>Nope. CRT's don't need to scale to display 320x240 or 640x480 full screen.

Thank you. I was feeling like a crazy person, and thinking I was somehow horribly mistaken.

>>358223
>With the CRT, the game is being played at its native resolution stretched across the width of the display surface.

Which is 480p. And they don't scale it. Not in the way you're talking about.

>With the LCD, the game is being played at its native resolution stretched across the width of the display surface.

Which is typically 1080p. And they do scale it.

Notice the difference?

>>358271
>disregarding the resolution mask and scaling alignment to the resolution mask which makes up the colors.

This pixel art was designed for DOS, so it was intended to be displayed line doubled on a high resolution CRT ("high resolution" in the old meaning, not HD) and the pixels were clear not blurred. What about the art style makes this distinctly DOS style, as opposed to Western console game pixel art?

(note that the pixels are not square, so it's not possible to make it any smaller using pure nearest neighbor scaling without distorting the aspect ratio. It's perfectly acceptable to scale this back down with bilinear scaling if it won't fit on your screen.)

>>358084
Still waiting. By all means, output it on a CRT TV and tell me which is jaggier.

>>358325

I don't even know what you're arguing about or trying to prove.

>>358198
>Because this is how you want your NES to look on every fucking screen ever. Non scaled.

... you are aware that CRT tvs can display that tiny image at full screen without any scaling right?

>>358315

>1994
>Win 3.1 or Win DOS

That's pre Windows 95. CRT Monitor. What resolution would be typical in that era? I really don't remember, since I was not a PC Gamer back then. I remember the school computers using 3.1 and being very low res.

I do most emulating on a softmodded wii. Grew up with mostly nintendo and I've always just loved how the Wavebird controller felt.

>>358290
480i, but usually with all fields forced to the same parity to get 240p.

>>358370
>... you are aware that CRT tvs can display that tiny image at full screen without any scaling right?
You do realize it won't use any more pixels than that in doing so, right?

>>358359
640x480 and 800x600 where the popular resolutions back then

>>358359
That's 480p typical, *not* the 480i of consoles. So you have line doubling instead of constant field parity, and you get clear pixels instead of scanlines. And yet the art style is the same!

>>358340
I'm not the one arguing, faggoty mcfaggot is trying to bitch that the same exact pixel to pixel aspect ratio image is more jaggy than the same exact image.
He's saying that if you take a magnifying glass and zoom on printed pixelated non anti aliased text that it magically becomes jaggier because you're looking at it closer despite the fact that it's the same exact fucking thing but you can actually fucking see it and that when you take that magnified image and put it in the same exact space as non the magnified image, it's jaggier. The guy's fucking batshit insane.

>>358384
>640x480 and 800x600 where the popular resolutions back then

Okay, that's what I thought. So the image >>358315 should be at those resolutions, instead of 1600x1200.

>>358383
>You do realize it won't use any more pixels than that in doing so, right?

What does this mean, and how is that a counter argument?

>>358398
>That's 480p typical, *not* the 480i of consoles. So you have line doubling instead of constant field parity, and you get clear pixels instead of scanlines. And yet the art style is the same!

It'd look better at 480p though.

>>358359
A lot of old DOS games used VGA mode 13h, which was 320x200, 256 colors.

>>358395
No it should not, because the native resolution is 320x200, with 4:3 aspect ratio. 1600x1200 is literally the smallest possible nearest neighbor scaling with correct aspect ratio for 1:1 pixel aspect monitors (which everybody viewing this is using).

>>358410
>A lot of old DOS games used VGA mode 13h, which was 320x200, 256 colors.

Which is very similiar to consoles, which ruins their HD argument?

BOom.

Thank you.

>>356387
that may be completely unplayable, but it's really pretty

>>356959
>>356936
>>356802
>>356775
Holy shit, Batman!

>>358410
I run 1280x800 nearest neighbor at 4:3 on a 19 inch monitor, but it's awful because it makes everything so jaggy.

>>358423
There is a very important different to consoles, see >>358398 . DOS games had clear pixels, not scanlines.

>>358441
>There is a very important different to consoles, see >>358398 . DOS games had clear pixels, not scanlines.

Because CRT monitors are a lot better than CRT tvs. But it's still lower resolution than 1600x1200. The game should be played on a CRT monitor at a lower resolution than that.

>>358395
Shit, sorry, I was thinking desktop resolutions >>358410 This guy is right

I see nobody has come up with any argument how DOS game art style is different than Western console games art style (obviously Japanese games have different art style). If there's no difference in style then there's no reason console games should have blurry pixels.

Can somebody please upload retroarch that's ready to play. I want to see how this looks but don't feel like spending hours to set up everything.

>>358451
On a CRT you can choose your pixel aspect, so you don't need 1600x1200. LCDs only have square pixels, so you need to scale to 1600x1200 or you will get uneven pixel shapes. Scaling nearest neighbor with non-integer ratios looks terrible.

>>358479
>On a CRT you can choose your pixel aspect, so you don't need 1600x1200. LCDs only have square pixels, so you need to scale to 1600x1200 or you will get uneven pixel shapes. Scaling nearest neighbor with non-integer ratios looks terrible.

Oh okay. I'm kind of just ignoring LCDs though in my thinking. I don't think you should play these games on them.

>>358461
>I see nobody has come up with any argument how DOS game art style is different than Western console games art style (obviously Japanese games have different art style). If there's no difference in style then there's no reason console games should have blurry pixels.

I'm not following. You shouldn't play the game at a very high resolution, and should instead play it at the lower resolution that it was intended for. Which means a CRT monitor.

Similarly you should play console games at their intended resolution. Which means a CRT TV.

>>358497
The CRT monitor has roughly double the resolution of the CRT TV. The games have roughly the same resolution, so the games intended for the monitor have their lines doubled (or tripled if you were rich). This makes the pixels look clear and distinct. If this is the intended look for DOS games, why can't it be used for console games with the same art style?

>>358198
>>358527
>The CRT monitor has roughly double the resolution of the CRT TV. The games have roughly the same resolution, so the games intended for the monitor have their lines doubled (or tripled if you were rich). This makes the pixels look clear and distinct. If this is the intended look for DOS games, why can't it be used for console games with the same art style?

I can kinda live with scale x2 for console games.

A CRT Monitor at 480p is nice for emulation.

A kind of like the look of console games at scale x1 resolution though. Much more rounded. I didn't play as much DOS, but I do remember them being sharper looking.

>>357967
Nestopia's scanlines are very rudimentary. They're just opaque lines. The shader in that shot adds blur, Lanczos scaling, phosphor emulation, and blooming on bright colors. It's more advanced than Nestopia's simple scanlines.

>>358264
Then, how do they display it fullscreen?

>>358470
>Can somebody please upload retroarch that's ready to play. I want to see how this looks but don't feel like spending hours to set up everything.

Done.

http://www.mediafire.com/?slqg2c8ay2ap8op

Win64

It's a little out of date. There's a few new cores, like Snes9X with an overclocked SFX chip, and Nestopia with Sony TV palette that I haven't added to it.

Also it can be a bit confusing to use. Read this guide:
http://filthypants.blogspot.ca/2011/11/getting-started-with-ssnes.html<wbr>

>>358625
>Then, how do they display it fullscreen?

It uses scanlines to fill it out. Don't ask me the details.

Also, I think I read that the very reason old consoles were not 480i was because they weren't powerful enough. Is this true?

>>358057
Well, it depends on the monitor. I'm pretty sure older monitors showed them in their native resolution, while newer ones line-double them into 400 to 480 lines.

>>358562
Scale x2 won't work for games with non-1:1 pixel aspect. Typical SNES game is 256x224 at 4:3 aspect ratio. Smallest integer ratio scaling for 1:1 pixel aspect is 1792x1344 (x7 in X-axis, x6 in Y-axis). You can then scale this down to your screen with bilinear or whatever. Maybe add a little gaussian blur if you're seriously into blur.

In practice scaling to 1280x896 is probably close enough. Lots of TVs had miscalibrated aspect ratio anyway.

>>358605
Nestopia allows for blur, the scaling is fine if you wanted the same ringing as lanczos add sharpness, the phosphor emulation is the only thing it doesn't do which is shit and the 'bloom' is basically just worse gamma calibration for higher contrast to make it 'pop' while shitting on dark colors more.

>All these emulation plebs

>>358650
If you're talking about really ancient stuff (eg. CGA) then it's possible, but line doubling was the standard for VGA.

>>358669
Or just do what I do and scale everything 3x without caring about aspect ratio then bilinear to screen size and tolerate the minor artifacts. Image quality isn't such a big deal, I get worse artifacts from my 120Hz LCD's temporal dithering (and I can't switch to an 8bit panel because I need 120Hz for black frame insertion so I can get acceptable motion quality).

>>358694
>this one obnoxious puristfag

>>358735
>(and I can't switch to an 8bit panel because I need 120Hz for black frame insertion so I can get acceptable motion quality).

Speaking of, motion quality is shit on my 60hz screen. No way to fix this? It's most noticeable with emulation.

>>358657
i'm interested to learn about this, if anyone would like to share

>>358803
>i'm interested to learn about this, if anyone would like to share

Same.

>>358694
>contributes nothing to the thread
>shitposts with meta images of little girls
>>>/v/

>>358796
You can't have CRT-quality motion without CRT-style flicker. See http://www.blurbusters.com/ for explanation.

Your 60Hz LCD is incapable of displaying CRT-style flicker, so the only option is getting a real CRT or a 120Hz LCD. I use a ViewSonic VX2268wm, which is one of the older 120Hz LCDs, and it has annoying artifacts from the temporal dithering when used with software black frame insertion. I don't care because motion quality is much more important than image quality to me.

>>358852

Thanks.

We should really start some kind of display list recommendation faq.

For instance, list good 120 hz LCD/LED models, and steps to take. Good CRT monitors to use. Good CRT Tvs.

>>358657
I would assume that is a valid reason, and really, why bother with 480i? Most consumer TVs these games would be played on were likely to be small, low quality, and probably pretty blurry. Many people don't even remember seeing any scanlines whatsoever precisely because of this. Also, interlacing produces a flickery image, whereas double-strike mode, or 240p, is pretty stable (although there is still some flickering apparently, but I don't really know the specifics). What would have been the point of 480i for those games? It's not like they had a lot of detail that needed a lot of resolution to resolve. It's why 480i didn't become the standard resolution for consoles until the sixth gen, and even then the Dreamcast already had extensive 480p support, with the GameCube and Xbox also having many games that supported it. If you think about it, the only console in history that was known for 480i was the PS2.

>>358657
Consoles used scanlines to fill it out (actually displaying interlaced fields all with the same parity), DOS games drew each line twice.

I'd really like to say old consoles didn't use 480i because interlacing looks terrible, but actually it probably was because of the performance problems, because they did occasionally use 480i for things like menus (eg. Crono Cross menus are 480i IIRC). I really hate interlacing.

>>358803
Okay. A CRT screen is basically 3 separate (for different colors) electron beams hitting into fluorescent screen. When struck by the beam, the little Tricolor pixel dots light up. Because of the material used in the screens, the color sorta spreads and bleeds around.

That's my understanding of it. No, I don't know how the beam is controlled.

>>358848
>Privilege
/s4s/ is leaking.

>>358852
i guess i replied to the wrong comment chain

i meant how you plug consoles that output different resolutions into a crt and it, more or less, fills the entire screen with the image. this apparently doesn't involve scaling?

>>358889
>No, I don't know how the beam is controlled.
fuckin' magnets

>>358921
No it doesn't, because CRT's are resolution independent. The beam can "skip" "pixels", and the fluorescent blending will fill in for it
.
LCD's and other flat screen tech is basically just a row of little lights, they can't change shape or size.

>>358921
>i meant how you plug consoles that output different resolutions into a crt and it, more or less, fills the entire screen with the image. this apparently doesn't involve scaling?

CRT tvs have the ability to render a multitude of resolutions at fullscreen with no scaling. This flexibility is their main strength.

Check Wikipedia pages for consoles and note the resolutions. This is what CRT tvs could do.

LCDs and other digital displays are fixed at 1080p, and are not flexible. This is their main weakness. No one other than a tiny niche (us) cares about SD games, so they are not going to design their tvs around this.

This is a shot of a work-in-progress shader meant for use with high-contrast 4K displays. To us with our puny resolutions, it will look bad and really dark if you downscale it to fit the screen, but I imagine on the kind of display this is meant for, it's gonna look phenomenal.

Excuse the weird artifact near the top of the screen. It was a pain in the ass just to take this screenshot, and somehow the top didn't scale right.

>>359052

Interesting. Not sure if that's true though. Shouldn't it look better than that, but just zoomed in?

The concept of a shadowmask emulation is neato though

>>359052
Doesn't look right, you've got obvious artifacts where the thickness of the vertical subpixel stripes change.

>>359064
Well, thing is, if you scale it down, the red, green, and blue phosphors are gonna blend in with the black pixels that make up the phosphor borders. It just doesn't scale downwards well.

>>359079
I'm pretty sure the artifacts are a result of the JPEG compression. Unfortunately the PNG original is far too big for me to upload on 4chan.

>>359052
>use $20k 4k monitor to properly simulate the visuals of a $50 CRT

>>359124
>>use $20k 4k monitor to properly simulate the visuals of a $50 CRT

>>359124
>use $20k 4k monitor to properly simulate the static image visuals of a $50 CRT

>>359132
>>359124

They're not going to be 20K forever. They're going to be standard and go for 1,200.

>>359138
Laura!

Anyone knows what's the best way to emulate DK64, it's been a while since I played a while with the graphx plugins but iirc it was pretty buggy just a year ago

>>359203

Ask emulation General in /vg/. I don't know.

>>358635
>http://www.mediafire.com/?slqg2c8ay2ap8op

THANK YOU SOOOOO MUCH <3

>>355675
Due to how the human eye works, most of the screen is going to be blurred outside your focal point anyway.

It's still a nice effect though.

>>359440

TOO MUCH BILINEAR

I like the idea and goal of Bilinear, but man is it way too blurry.

>>359124
>use $20k 4k monitor to properly simulate the visuals of a cheap $2 whore