![controller for that console<\/a> is notoriously terrible, and features a non-centering joystick which all but ruins most of the few games that came out for the system.\u00a0 The](\"http:\/\/www.gratuitousscience.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/con_Atari5200.jpg\"){kind=link}
Other old consoles with questionably reliable controllers can be “fixed” and played with the most comfortable controller you own, too.\u00a0 The supremely uncomfortable and unresponsive Sega SG-1000<\/a> controller doesn’t need to get in the way when you play those games through emulation, and the same can be said for almost any system.<\/p>\n And while I’m talking about consoles from this early era of gaming, I can talk about video output.\u00a0 So many consoles in the late 70s and mid 80s had only RF video output<\/a>, which is the lowest possible quality method to get a video signal from any device to your TV.\u00a0 This looks blurry and is riddled with interference, and is not particularly appealing, especially on bigger screens or a new LCD TV.<\/p>\n Emulation can solve this problem too by giving you a direct HDMI signal from your computer to your screen.\u00a0 My personal setup involves an emulation PC that sends an S-Video<\/a> signal to a CRT TV with only composite<\/a> inputs, but it suits me fine and replicates the look of the retro era perfectly.\u00a0 Pretty much any analog or digital output and input setup is possible with the right emulator and the right hardware these days, and a lot of new emulators can simulate things like scan lines<\/a> for those who lack a CRT screen.<\/p>\n When we move chronologically ahead amid our consoles to the fifth generation<\/a>, we start to get into polygon rendering.\u00a0 This is where upscaling<\/a> can make games look better.\u00a0 Games that came out on the Sony PlayStation<\/a> or Nintendo 64<\/a> had much lower screen resolutions than we’re used to today, and when scaled up, things tend to look blocky and pixelated.<\/p>\n I’ve stated before that this very effect is part of the appeal of old games for me, and it still is for 8-bit and 16-bit games.\u00a0 But with the advent of the 32-bit era, many graphics got rendered on-screen in a resolution that was not sufficiently clear to make them easy to see, and this sometimes affected gameplay.<\/p>\n Here are some images of the game “Looney Tunes Racing<\/a>” from two different PlayStation emulators to show you exactly what I mean.\u00a0 The first one emulates the game in native 320\u00c1\u2014224 resolution, and the second one emulates it with polygon graphics upscaled to 1600\u00c1\u20141200 and everything else resized to fit.<\/p>\n Click on the images and open them in new tabs to really compare the detail.\u00a0 The second image is a lot easier to look at, isn’t it?\u00a0 The game is easier to play and a lot more fun, I think, when the graphics are scaled up this way.\u00a0 Not only that, but you can really appreciate the artwork a lot better when the polygon graphics are upscaled to this resolution.<\/p>\n Not all PlayStation or Nintendo 64 games provide so much depth, beauty and detail when they’re upscaled, but a lot of them do.\u00a0 Some emulators for other fifth and sixth generation consoles can upscale the graphics as well, with often stunning results.<\/p>\n It’s for these reasons that I’ve come to prefer playing my collection of PlayStation games on my PC through emulation, even though I own a PlayStation 2 that plays them just fine.\u00a0 There are, however, some issues with PlayStation emulation, and that’s why I’ll now talk about some of the emulators out there.<\/p>\n No$PSX<\/span><\/p>\n This is the first emulator I tried, and I tried it first because I wasn’t sure if my emulation PC could handle PlayStation emulation.\u00a0 That computer is rather old, still runs Windows XP, and doesn’t even have a graphics card.<\/p>\n No$PSX<\/a> is a very good emulator.\u00a0 I’ve found that of all the PlayStation emulators I’ve tried, it has the highest compatibility out of them all.\u00a0 Most games just work on this emulator, and there are only a handful that don’t or cause the emulator to glitch up or crash.<\/p>\n That being said, the gameplay experience with this emulator is quite limited because it does not support analog control or rumble.\u00a0 PlayStation games that utilize the DualShock<\/a> controller simply won’t give you any rumble, and games like “Ape Escape<\/a>” that require the full set of analog controls can not be played.<\/p>\n This is also one of those emulators that outputs the graphics only in native resolution.\u00a0 That screenshot above was taken in No$PSX, and that’s as good as the games ever look.<\/p>\n pSX<\/span><\/p>\n Second out of all the emulators I tried, pSX<\/a> is another that outputs graphics only in native resolution.\u00a0 The graphics don’t look nearly as good as they do in No$PSX, but the brightness, gamma and contrast can be tweaked a bit.\u00a0 There are also sound issues with this emulator, with certain sounds being louder than they ought to be in certain games.\u00a0 Game compatibility is slightly lower than No$PSX, and this is my third choice of emulator to play games with.\u00a0 I use it only if a game won’t run in No$PSX.<\/p>\n This emulator does support rumble and analog controls though.\u00a0 Its method of support is a little tedious, and you must specify which hardware controller you wish the program to emulate before you load your game.\u00a0 If you try to use the DualShock on a game that doesn’t support it, for instance, then none of the controls will work and the game will appear to be unresponsive until you define the correct controller.<\/p>\n This brings up another reason why I don’t much care for using this emulator.\u00a0 It doesn’t work properly with my NUON+ controller<\/a>, which is one that I bought specifically for emulators that support analog control and rumble.<\/p>\n ePSXe<\/span><\/p>\n A very common and popular emulator is ePSXe<\/a>.\u00a0 This is the one that took that bottom screenshot.\u00a0 It upscales the graphics, supports rumble, supports analog, and would be damn near perfect if only it had better compatibility.<\/p>\n I’d say that only about half of my games work perfectly with ePSXe.\u00a0 Some others have graphical problems like missing screens, menus and loading bars.\u00a0 Some of them don’t load at all.\u00a0 It’s for that reason that I have to keep No$PSX and pSX around.<\/p>\n But when it works, man, does it ever work.\u00a0 Games look and play beautifully, and the experience of seeing all the detail that was hidden when I played games on my PlayStation 2 is what made me switch.<\/p>\n XEBRA<\/span><\/p>\n This is supposedly a very accurate emulator, but I’ve never gotten it to work.\u00a0 The interface is about as simple as solving a Rubik’s Cube.<\/p>\n PCSX-R<\/span><\/p>\n I have seen this emulator highly recommended and praised, and it appears to be based on ePSXe, which might sadly be defunct.\u00a0 At first I couldn’t get it to work at all due to a DLL error.\u00a0 What seems to be top-secret and something that nobody likes to ever divulge (least of all not the developers) is that this program requires the Visual C++ runtime libraries from Microsoft to be installed before it will work.\u00a0 Don’t fucking tell anybody!<\/p>\n Once I did get it to work, I promptly found out that the graphics are shitty and blurry and that it does not support my NUON+ controller at all.\u00a0 This emulator isn’t worth keeping around.<\/p>\n Mednafen<\/span><\/p>\n I have heard praise rising to the level of worship over this emulator.\u00a0 So of course, I thought I’d give it a try.\u00a0 The first time I did, I clicked on the program, saw nothing happen at all, and thought “Well, that’s that.”<\/p>\n Turns out you need a front end for the program.\u00a0 This is also top-secret information that the developers would never ever want you to find out.\u00a0 Either you use a front end, or you need to use it with the command line, and god knows I’m not resorting to using the fucking command line.<\/a>\u00a0 I tried it again with a front end called MedGui.\u00a0 And the same exciting state of absolutely nothing happened.\u00a0 Though I did get to click around and pretend to make settings while I was getting frustrated.<\/p>\n So Mednafen is about as useful as a tree stump to me.<\/p>\n![\"Looney](\"http:\/\/www.gratuitousscience.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Looney-Tunes-Racing-NoPSX-300x225.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\n![\"Looney](\"http:\/\/www.gratuitousscience.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Looney-Tunes-Racing-ePSXe-300x225.png\")
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