/vr/ - Retro Games

Somebody needs to start building a DuckStation 2 already

>>8231230
NiggerStation 2000

>>8231230
more like only ps2 emulator.
It does run like shit its not very good
Look up the best way to configure the emulator for whichever game you're playing and if its actually playable.

have your (you) i guess

PCSX2 is the only worthwhile PS2 emulator, OP. Either learn to make it work better or softmod a real PS2.

I repect the effort but this shit need to become obsolete, they don't give a shit about accuraci and you need to hack the games in different ways to make them work. Atm it's better to just get a PS2 and mod it (You can install a hard drive or even solder a SD card reader in the memory card slot) or get a backwards compatible PS3.

>>8231230
have you tried not running it on a toaster pc?

my i9 10th gen runs it fine

>>8231230
softmod a PS2. Seriously, it's the best we're going to get for a long time.

I paid $50 total for a fat PS2 at Value Village, a FreeMCBoot card and cheap SATA hard drive adapter from ebay.

>>8231230
You probably tried this, but do not use OpenGL in Windows. Even with an Nvidia card.

I drove a nail in my own cock

>>8231230
>>8231230
>>8231230

"In summary, it is not possible to achieve close-to-perfection PS2 emulation with actual PC hardware, and even if it was possible, the results would most likely be unplayable. The PS2 is simply a very complex machine that even game developers struggled to work with."

>Oh no my ocd is flaring up again

>waaaah waaaah ps2 too complex pcsx2 is never going to be better
Meanwhile, the play! dev keeps ginding fuck ups in pcsx2. Even major fuck ups like totally different bus timings between hardware components in pcsx2 compared to real hardware.

Basically pcsx2 was a work of guessing and throwing shit at the wall to see what stuck. Then for the cases that it didn't work, literally put "if" conditions in the code to force hacks for specific games.
Totally retarded design.

>>8231341
>interlaced video

Getting and modding a PS Two isn't the issue.

>>8231690
if you want a modern display there are upscalers that handle interlacing well now

>>8231680
>Meanwhile, the play! dev keeps ginding fuck ups in pcsx2.
>PCSX2 game compatibility = 98%
>Play! game compatibility = literally 0%
Hmm...

It's a good idea to not use the stable release and use a nightly/dev build instead. Fixes a lot of problems that you might have.

>>8231230
Could you be possibly ANY more cryptic and non-descriptive? Or is this just a thinly veiled "lets shit on pcsx2" thread?

It emulated King's Field 4 without a flaw, so I'm okay with it

>>8231886
>without a flaw
Fun fact: you will never truly know this unless you have real hardware or video footage.

>>8231893
Yeah but I do, I played the PAL version on PS2 a few years ago

>>8231903
>PAL version
Then your whole experience was flawed and your frame of reference is fucked

>>8231925
it runs the same as the NTSC-U (though I only know that from youtube videos)

>>8231359
Why is that?

>>8231230
That IS the best PS2 emulator, sadly. At least as far as I'm aware of. If you put the right settings on you can get some pretty good results, but it still has a lot of really weird issues. For 20 year old games, you'd think they'd be a lot less intensive. At least Dolphin works.

What game are you trying to run, OP?

>>8231239
I really cannot wait for some real competition to come in and make an actually decent emulator. The potential is there for something cool.

>>8231230
the best PS2 emulator is a fat PS3 if you can find a working one of those. Otherwise you're stuck with PCSX2 or softmodding actual hardware (which I did after giving up on emulation)

>>8231230
PCSX2 sucks, but it's the only one that really works right now. Cope, make sure the settings are correct, and use an older version if you're on less-powerful hardware or use software mode more frequently if you have a strong CPU.

>Play!
Only being developed by one man and has seen virtually no progress in years. Pretty much a dead-end but I commend the dev for not giving up on it and doing what he can considering how much of a clusterfuck the PS2's hardware is.

>DobieStation
Only started development within the last few years and the dev has multiple other projects in the pipeline so don't count on this replacing PCSX2 anytime soon.

>hpsx64
Another dead-end like Play!, not even sure if this one's still in development.

>DamonPS2
A spyware-riddled chink bootleg Android port of PCSX2, not even worth mentioning.

>>8231230
On my 4500U laptop I can run pretty much anything on 720p
It ain't much but I hardly need anything more

>>8231384
Pretty sure I remember seeing this exact same post about the SNES before

>>8231983
The OpenGL plugin on PCSX2 has shit compatibility with Windows and was only designed to be used on Linux.

>>8232023
Ok thanks, I just tried it on MGS2, first playable scene on the back of the Tanker, with the hard rain, and yes I get severe slowdowns with opengl but 60 fps with d3d.

>>8231705
That's what happens when you're searching for accuracy. Things are very slow to start, but then games start being 100% playable really fast.

Also, it's a one man project. He's never going to get it finished because of that.

>>8231341
I've never earnestly looked into modding my PS2 because I want to still play disc games, but that's only lost if you do hard modding, right?
I know I can look this up but I need another person to push me.

>>8231230
Not retro.

>>8231230
>PCSX2 is the only worthwhile PS2 emulator, OP. Either learn to make it work better or softmod a real PS2.
>spend $3,000 on top of the line PC
>can't even play ps2 games
PC bros, tell me its gonna be ok

>>8232315
If you have a top of the line PC then it should run everything in SW mod with no slowdown. SW mode is basically hardware-accurate so HW rendering is mostly just a bonus for he games it plays well with.

>>8232315
i can play most games fullspeed with a 500 dollar prebuilt pc that i bought from walmart

>>8232050
Yeah, best to stick with it. If you have exceptionally-powerful hardware though OpenGL is indeed better for a handful of games like Red Dead Revolver due to graphical bugs that can't be fixed on Direct3D.

How is play! coming around? I'm fucking tired of pcsx2, been strongly considering just buying a ps2 with one of those pricey upscale things like OSSC

>>8232505
it'll be a while. you're better off buying a ps2 than continuing to use pcsx2

>>8232505
Play! hasn't made any real progress in years, it's not really a viable alternative unfortunately.

I just play the related game's PSP port on PPSSPP

Does it play the ratchet and clank games now? If so, I like it.

>>8231370
based

>>8232520
Didn't Play! had a couple of updates these last few months? Or it was just meaningless things?

>>8231230
Something I've observed as a user of both PCSX2 and RPCS3:

RPCS3 would be a fucking nightmare to use if not for its UI/UX, which allows the user to right-click on a game in their library and "change custom configuration" so they can adjust the emulator's settings according to what's best for that particular game instead of having to redo the whole fucking thing every time you want to play a different game.

This is the big problem with PCSX2. It's a complex emulator for a complex machine that demands specific settings depending on the game you want to play, but there's no way to set custom configs for each individual game because its UI design is based-on ancient emulators like ePSXe where you pretty much just adjust the settings once according to what your machine can handle and then you rarely ever have to touch it again, but with PCSX2 you're ALWAYS having to make adjustments to what hacks you're using and what GPU plugin settings so the game looks and plays optimally. This wouldn't be such a huge fucking asspain and a detriment to the emulator if it had a similar option to RPCS3. I would argue hat "right-click to change custom config" feature is absolutely crucial to a complex emulator like PCSX2- it is in DESPERATE need of a UI overhaul but that doesn't appear to be a high priority to the emu devs currently.

This begs the question: How difficult would it be to program a frontend of sorts- (like Mednaffe for Mednafen) to overcome PCSX2's dogshit UI and add features like per-game configs and automatic updates like Dolphin and RPCS3? Because I highly doubt it's going to be on any of the main builds anytime soon and as far to my knowledge no such thing currently exists for PCSX2, if this were available I doubt we'd see so many anons shitting on the emulator because they're frustrated they have to keep fucking with the settings to play a new game, then try to go back to the other game they were playing only to find that it was fucked.

>>8232536
Not necessarily meaningless things, but very minor improvements that don't really make significant differences to game compatibility in the grand scheme of things, and anytime I've tried it myself or seen demonstration videos on YouTube games are either slow as Hell or have more severe graphical glitches than even PCSX2 does. Keep in mind that emulator's being developed by just one guy.

>>8232601
I see. I know it's just one guy, which is sad. PS2 would be one of the best consoles to emulate, but it looks like buying a PS2 will be the best choice for a long time.

>>8232651
I think PCSX2 would be tolerable with a better UI like >>8232586 said. Quite a few games would still look and play like shit but at-least you'd only have to set hacks and shit for the game only once based-on what the Wiki or other anons recommend and then not have to worry about tinkering with them again for the remainder of your playthrough, just like Duckstation.

>>8231359
gl in RetroArch works great for anything pre N64, but for modern systems I find glcore or DX11 works best. Some people find success with Vulkan but I don't really like it

>>8231239
Ironically the author of DuckStation is contributing to the PCSX2 project. He's currently making the new QT GUI.

>>8232586
https://github.com/valters-tomsons/Spectabis

Never heard of it, but this looks promising. I'll try it later.

>>8232586
bro, just download a portable installer for PCSX2 and make a separate folder for each game. having multiple copies of the emulator takes up barely any space and you'll be able to customize each game's settings individually and if you're a real badass you'll make a shortcut for each game to launch PCSX2 without menu and boot directly to full screen for a classic experience.

>>8232586

>>8232695
>>8232696
Damn. Programmer/UI bros coming in clutch.

>>8232695
if duckstation dev isnt a tranny then this is based

>>8232586
>>8232707
I don't mind fiddling with pcsx2 or even playing in software mode, but even in software mode I get the odd artefacting and missing effects, nvm hardware mode because then you can never get everything to work properly

I also think it adds input lag, at least in Yakuza 1 everything takes like 0.5 seconds after key input, maybe that's how it was on ps2 too but I doubt it

>>8232717
>I also think it adds input lag, at least in Yakuza 1 everything takes like 0.5 seconds after key input, maybe that's how it was on ps2 too but I doubt it
it does. i've compared the same game on pcsx2 and hardware. the input lag is massive and it really fucks with some complex action games.

>>8232717
like I said, make a folder for a game, put a copy of PCSX2 in it, set the iso you want, configure, make shortcut to the exe with target options for the iso and fullscreen and you now have a one click game.

>>8232695
DuckStation is trash, I don't know why people like it so much. Constant crashing, poor performance, poor compatibility for most of the enhancements, global run-ahead breaks it, and internal run-ahead is way more demanding than on Beetle PSX.

>>8232695
>>8232696
>>8232710
HOPE RENEWED

>>8232586
>This is the big problem with PCSX2. It's a complex emulator for a complex machine that demands specific settings depending on the game you want to play, but there's no way to set custom configs for each individual game
RetroArch does this except with much more features and global settings beyond just those offered by the emulator/core. You can save options, global settings, shaders, or controller rebindings on a per-game, directory, or core basis.

>>8232727
What? I've played like 100 games on DuckStation. No crashes at all and pretty good performance with some enhancement settings, considering I have a shitty $300 laptop

>>8232742
duckstation is my dream come true, PGXP and widescreen are just a click away and you get the bonus of near mednafen accuracy, wish there was some way to increase frame too though

>>8232527
Yes, I recently played the first one in PCSX2 with 3x resolution without issues. I assume the others will work too.

>>8232775
Well almost without issues. I remember on Orxon I had major texture glitches but the other planets worked fine.

>>8232759
>>8232742
Beetle PSX does everything DuckStation does with much better performance, way less crashes, and can actually utilize run-ahead with a much smaller performance impact

>>8232807
>Beetle PSX does everything DuckStation does with much better performance
Nope
>way less crashes
I've had retrotranny crash on me multiple times.
>and can actually utilize run-ahead with a much smaller performance impact
runahead is a retarded meme, input delay fags are like FLACfags of the audiophile space, they pretend to notice a difference when there is none

>>8232727
Works on my machine.

>>8232835
>runahead is a retarded meme, input delay fags are like FLACfags of the audiophile space, they pretend to notice a difference when there is none
lmao what. this is an absolutely retarded comparison. People don't notice any difference at all in audio quality without good equipment above a certain point, and even with good equipment, vast majority of people still can't tell the difference when compared to lossless. Each improvement of input latency meanwhile is basically directly improving your reaction time by that many ms.

>Nope
Right, you can use ebin emulation hacks and PGXP bullshit that breaks the games.

>I've had retrotranny crash on me multiple times.
yes, only with DuckStation and Mupen64 though

Also for some reason the stupid fucking core resizes the video to 16:9 even with options set to PAR 1:1, so I have to manually set a core override for 4:3. Beetle PSX doesn't have this issue. DuckStation is just inaccurate, buggy garbage that constantly crashes.

>>8232878
Oh also the screenshot function just straight up doesn't work on DuckStation even though it works fine on every other core. Probably the worst popular core aside from Mupen64.

>>8232878
>using duckstation on retrotranny
oh it makes sense now, you're retarded

>>8232878
>Right, you can use ebin emulation hacks and PGXP bullshit that breaks the games.
You only think it's bad because you're so used to Beetle HW's terrible implementation of it. Duckstation actually does a good job of upscaling, and it looks pretty good in some full-3D games.

>>8232878
>Each improvement of input latency meanwhile is basically directly improving your reaction time by that many ms.
Runahead literally makes no discernible difference outside of constantly read/writing on your SSD and slowly killing it.

>>8232892
I'm literally talking about on DuckStation. It looks like utter garbage and you have to manually configure it per-game and usually it looks worse than just disabling everything.

>>8232896
>the human eye can't see below 32ms bro!
kek

>>8232878
>>8232884
Oh yeah and integer scaling completely breaks DuckStation and causes it to actually stretch the image to sides of the screen, and adjusting the aspect ratio through RetroArch or in core settings doesn't fix this, all you can do is disable integer scaling and save that as a core override.

pcsx2 used to ran every game I threw at it, as long as I used gsdx in software mode. In D3D mode it had some bugs in some games, but none at all in software mode.

Yeah, you won't be able to upscale games to 4k but who fucking cares.

>>8232907
>the human eye can't see below 32ms bro!
It can't. Which is why everyone uses a slowmotion camera to "prove" their point. Yeah no shit bro, let me just open up audacity and show you the bitrate of that FLAC file compared to OPUS bro, look, big number good!

PS2 has issues even on the original hardware, such a bizarre machine.

>>8232963
Do you not understand that any reduction in input latency is an improvement in your reaction time? You literally see the information sooner and can react quicker. It's something where you may not consciously perceive minor changes, but even just like 10ms can be pretty significant. If you've ever played a racing game or done time trials or anything like that, you'd realize how when trying for a time you can consistently be within just a few ms of that time consistently.

Literally just coping.

>>8233030
>Literally just coping.
Well if you can do that elsewhere we'd appreciate it, we're trying to have a serious discussion in this thread

>>8231690
get a CRT or a GBS-Control, it has near identical performance to the mike chink retrotink but cost less than 40$. You can even build it yourself.

>>8233029
it sure has kiddo, sure has.

>>8233030
>Do you not understand that any reduction in input latency is an improvement in your reaction time?
It doesn't improve your reaction time. I know you love RA so much you think it's literally the second coming of Christ, but changing a setting on RA doesn't change things inherent to your body.
>You literally see the information sooner and can react quicker.
See above
>It's something where you may not consciously perceive minor changes, but even just like 10ms can be pretty significant.
10 ms is not significant at all. What the fuck? Literally imperceptible without a high refreshrate camera.
>If you've ever played a racing game or done time trials or anything like that, you'd realize how when trying for a time you can consistently be within just a few ms of that time consistently.
Literally no racing game in history requires you to have <1 ms reaction speeds to beat it.

Fuck off with your snakeoil bullshit. I'm not going to say that input lag doesn't exist, but most modern emulators do not have significant input delay issues, this is an issue of the past. There are more effective ways of reducing input delay (exclusive fullscreen, variable refresh rate, reducing buffering, operating system etc.) that don't require you to use something as intensive as runahead.

Pls help /vr/! How can I make pic related work, without the splitter/ extension rca cable? Thanks in advance.

>>8233075
>It doesn't improve your reaction time. I know you love RA so much you think it's literally the second coming of Christ, but changing a setting on RA doesn't change things inherent to your body.
Do you understand how input latency works? Like at all? It does not physically improve your reaction time you retard, but it gives you information sooner and effectively makes your window to dynamically react larger.

>Literally no racing game in history requires you to have <1 ms reaction speeds to beat it.
what the actual fuck are you even talking about you braindead retard? When did I ever say that or anything remotely close to that? The average human reaction time for visual stimuli is like 175-250ms

>There are more effective ways of reducing input delay (exclusive fullscreen, variable refresh rate, reducing buffering, operating system etc.)
lmao these are the actual snake-oil. Exclusive fullscreen does essentially nothing and hasn't for years, variable refresh rate is only an improvement over V-Sync, OS really doesn't make a difference (no, linux is not faster you autist).

Framerate and GPU utilization are the primary factors affecting it. Anything besides a PC seems to always have much worse input latency (console, RetroPie, handhelds, etc.) Display and controller can make a difference, but generally if you buy a decent controller and monitor, the differences between them are fairly small. Disabling V-Sync and buffering helps, but depends a lot on the game.

>>8233123
>175 to 250ms
That's plain wrong. People can see (but not act) up to 50ms or maybe a bit lessseeing and reacting can be as low as 100ms

>t. Make people do rapid reaction stuff for a living

>>8233123
>OS really doesn't make a difference (no, linux is not faster you autist).
OK good job outing yourself as a tech illiterate retard I guess. No point in arguing with you anymore. I hope you're not running your emulators on a drive or partition you care about.

>>8233139
I'm talking about on-screen change to human reaction. Show me someone who can get 100ms on human benchmark, I'll wait.

>>8233149
My drive is literally at 99% health, and I get next frame response in retroarch on Windows 10 as tested filming a button presses with a slow-motion camera. seethe and dilate linux tranny

>>8231341

softmodding is too hard. i dont understand what to do at all. Nobody gives a clear direction on what to do so i just buy ps2 games still

>>8233149
>I hope you're not running your emulators on a drive or partition you care about.
Meds. NOW

>>8233164
human benchmark isn't an accurate gauge of reaction time, if you're using that as your point of reference then your perception input lag is warped

why would you ever need your games to have lower input lag than real hardware? the difference is insignificant, emufag are so retarded

>>8233178
It's an accurate gauge of reaction time in the context of a videogame. The only issue would be input lag in browser, as Windows only tends to optimize for input latency in games/full-screen application afaik

>>8233182
>NOOO YOU NEED TO HAVE THE 15 FRAMES OF INPUT LAG OR IT'S NOT ACCURATE EMULATION!!
mental illness

>>8233196
spending your time making this webm instead of playing video games already signals your intentions in this thread

also not retro, kill yourself

>>8233201
>also not retro, kill yourself
absolutely fuming lmfao

>>8233207
you probably haven't even finished contra III

i have a full tower pc and it has a lot of 5.25 drive space so i just shoved my ps2 in there. it works fine and seamlessly.

>>8231340
Bro idk I've had games run in pcsx2 and it would run like trash. Then I'd try the same exact game in dolphin and it would run 60 fps the entire time.
Like I tried to play def jam fight for NY. That ran at 20 fps in pcsx2 dolphin same exact game 60 fps.

>>8233196
Input lag so undetectable you have to slow the video down at a rate below the eyes normally can see, nice, guess emulation really does work well

>>8233213
>>8233224
absolutely fuming

>>8233223
Dolphin emulation is just much better than PS2 or Xbox. For pretty much any game that has a GCN version just play it on Dolphin instead.

>>8233247
but thats soulless. i have a gamecube

>>8233252
Emulation is better than original hardware in every way.

>>8233262
Being able to have Discord open on your second monitor doesn't make emulation an improvement, tranny.

>>8233247
Very true very true

>>8233252
Same here I started emulating the cube for games I couldnt afford. Then I got a wii and nintendont but if one doesnt have it and wants to play a multiplat six gen game on their pc. Gamecube version is the one that'll run good even on a semi shitty pc.

>>8233273
No, but the numerous settings, features, and customization of both RetroArch and Dolphin, input latency reduction, support for any controller plus full rebinding/turbo/sets, shaders, upscaling, AA, save states, fast forward, retro achievements, screenshot/record/stream, and being able to save all these settings, features, and rebindings on a per-game, directory, core, or global basis.

Stay mad retard

>>8233312
>input latency reduction
Sugar pill
>support for any controller
Use the intended controller
>plus full rebinding/turbo/sets
Use the intended control scheme instead of cheating.
>shaders
Will never look as good as the real thing.
>upscaling
Kill yourself zoomer
>AA
Kill yourself zoomer.
>save states
If you used save states, you never beat the game.
>fast forward
If you used fast forward, you never beat the game.
>retro achievements
Kill yourself zoomer.
>screenshot/record/stream
Kill yourself zoomer.

>>8233334
Triggered.

>>8233334
im 32 and you're gay

>>8232737
it's a shame that retroarch sucks as a frontend. the interface and user experience are shit.

>>8233334
I love how he made you mad bro! But to some extend I agree with you. There is just something about real hardware…..I just can’t describe it.

>>8233334
>why have all that when you can have le heckin' MAGIC of original hardware!!!

>>8233334
Turbo based.

>>8232727
The only shitty aspect of DuckStation are the shaders. They suck ass.

>>8233643
if this were the genesis or PS1 or something we were talking about this might be apt, but we're not. PS2 emulation sucks and real PS2's are cheap, plentiful, and extremely easy to softmod. whether you want to burn discs, have an internal HDD, or stream games from your pc/nas/etc the options are well developed and versatile. and playing on a CRT will look better than some gay 16:9 hack upscale on a shitty IPS monitor 10 times out of 10. so to conclude, it is in fact you that is the s0ijak

>>8232695
fantastic

>>8232696
I've been tinkering with this frontend for a bit, it's not great and the boxart fetching barely fucking works but being able to set custom configs for each game in your library is a revelation and should make the emulator a lot less trouble to use for the time being, but I'm sure the QT GUI overhaul will make it obsolete if it's true that DuckStation dev is making one and it doesn't end up taking years to implement in the main build.

>>8231690
This is /vr/ and you don't even have a CRT?

>>8232696
Spectabis is the best we have right now but it hasn't been updated to take advantage of the newer PCSX2 builds which dropped plugins and has a fair amount of issues on top of that

>>8231230
PCSX2 is best and only option. Shit been in development for almost 20 years and still a bitch to run due to how the PS2 works.

>>8235452
>PCSX2 is best and only option
Best sure but not only, there's Play! which is a fair way off PCSX2 but is actively developed. About 18% of all tested games are classed as playable in it.
There is also DobieStation but that hasn't had any updates in a few months, which is a shame because the dev worked really hard to comprehend some bizarre PS2 behaviours which led to him blogging the finds and solutions and sometimes even pushing code to PCSX2.

>>8235794
>There is also DobieStation but that hasn't had any updates in a few months, which is a shame

PSI-Rockin's a busy man, he has a couple of DS emulators he's been working on which iirc have also contributed nicely to MelonDS and Citra.

>>8235445
I've noticed that during my testing. That kind of sucks but that's how it goes with PCSX2.

>>8235814
Is he still doing stuff outside of DobieStation?
I hope so, in one of his latest blog entries for that he said he doesn't feel any motivation any more.

>>8231230
Runs my games fine. Stop running it on a toaster

>>8236112
>my games
here's the problem

>>8235794
can you play R-Type Final on Dobiestation?

>>8236602
According to its compatibility list you can, yeah. As you can in Play! (not excited about it, just that's what it's called).

>>8233207
>>8233196
>LCD screen

It can literally just be your TV as well in these cases. I've had issues of input lag switching the TVs I used with my PS3

>>8232601
Why haven't more devs started working on Play?

>>8236973
Not sure. the only 2 pull requests are for things unrelated to the actual emulation
https://github.com/jpd002/Play-Compatibility/pulls?q=is%3Apr+is%3Aclosed
and both were approved.

>>8231241
The stinkiest emulator

Bump

>>8239026
What's left to talk about really?