Let's discuss emulation.

[Crazycrab]

Now a little disclaimer before the mods close the door on this topic.  This is NOT about piracy and I would expect any post drawing any attention to sites that allow access to illegal ROM's or BIOS' to be deleted and rightly so.  I'm posting this topic because there are points and purposes to emulators that have nothing to do with piracy.

 

The first one I'll point out is preserving gaming history.  There are games that were released on older platforms and arcades that now cannot be played in any other way... Unless you have access to the original hardware but that won't last forever.  Game's (including demo's like PT) should be archived and be playable because they are part of our culture.  With the gaming industry moving more and more into the realms of DRM and digital distribution aspects of this piece of our cultural heritage is a greater risk than ever of being reduced or lost completely.  The only way to save it is through emulation.

 

The second is that despite continuous complaint's for publishers, there are game's that they are not making and most likely will never make any money on, often through willful negligence.  One example would be Ubisoft and Driver San Francisco.  This is considered to one the best if the THE best game in the franchise despite not being a huge commercial hit.  To this day Ubisoft do not distribute the game on any platform, not even on their own UPlay storefront on PC.  There have even petitions from fans asking Ubisoft to release the game on UPlay but they have refused.  So unless you have an original disc there is no way to buy the game outside the second hand market which generates Ubisoft no revenue anyway.  So should one really feel guilty about playing this game through other means?  It is Ubisoft that continue to slam the door shut on it.

 

The third being that emulators by themselves are not illegal.  It all depends on how you get the ROM's.

 

There are exceptions but these are mostly older games that can no longer be purchased by any legitimate means.  So if there is no way for the publisher to make money off the game anyway is it really wrong to download and/emulate it for free?

 

Well that's my two cents, how about you?  Do you use them and if so which ones?  Post but of course keep it clean.

[Shagger]

You're spot on with this. I've talk about Abandonware on the forums before that pretty much exists to preserve unsupported games. Not all of the games on thier need to be emulated of course, but there are a lot that do, especially older games. However, just because a game is older, don't assume that it's legal to download a ROM for it. A lot of such games are still sold, so obviously downloading a ROM is likely not legal. Then there is situation where publishers and the owners of IP's don't sell them, but get petty with thier copyright. I completely understand the moral justification to download such games, but it doesn't change the fact that posting links to such ROM or websites that host them won't be permitted here.

 

Emulation is important though, like you said. Without it many games would simply perish and be lost. So of course this topic will remain open and I encourage people to share what emulators they use. and discuss emulation in in general. Just a few parameters for me, as a mod, to set.

 

Do;

1. Discuss and link to your favourite emulators and post instructions for others on how to use them.
2. Ask what emulators are recommend for the games you have. If by any chance that game has been acquired by means that may not be legal, keep that you yourself.
3. Respect that this topic is about emulation, not piracy, so stick to the topic at hand. Feel free to discuss emulation in general without posting anything specific if you wish.
4. Post links to legal sites to download game files, such as the aforementioned Abandonware and digital storefronts.

Don't

1. Link to illegal ROM's nor any website that hosts them, as previously stated.
2. Link to software or post instructions with the purpose to crack or hack games to bypass DRM and other copyright security.
3. Make promotional posts, links to forbidden websites and obviously pirate games and software in accordance with our current Rules and Guidelines.

 

On topic. DOSbox is a great emulator I have use for emulating DOS games, but it can be difficult to use. RetroArch is similar, but with a more modern interface and i feel is easier to use with more compatibility options. That's really about all I use at the moment.

Edited September 11, 2021 by Shagger

[m76]

The thing is that most emulators only work with ROMs. Yeah you can technically dump the ROM of your own console, instead of downloading one from the internet,  but that is still considered illegal by the console makers as it is reverse engineering. Not to mention it requires know how that no average gamer has. The few console emulators that didn't require ROMs to play games are usually shut down by legal action.  So if you are deep diving into console emulation prepare to swim the high seas.  So in my opinion the greatest obstacle in game preservation are the actual companies who made them.

Edited July 12, 2021 by m76

[The Blackangel]

Personally, I hate the idea of emulation. Maybe it's my nostalgia talking, but I think classic gaming should stay on classic systems. If you really want to preserve gaming history, that is the only way in my opinion. You can't cherry pick what to preserve. Either preserve all of it, or none of it.

[Shagger]

22 hours ago, The Blackangel said:

Personally, I hate the idea of emulation. Maybe it's my nostalgia talking, but I think classic gaming should stay on classic systems. If you really want to preserve gaming history, that is the only way in my opinion. You can't cherry pick what to preserve. Either preserve all of it, or none of it.

 

The problem with that is technology isn't physically designed to last forever. It will suffer wear and malfunction as time goes on.

[TopSilver]

Gamestop and other companies are actually now selling old consoles and games so while expensive, you can still relive your childhood that way. Although no one wants to pay for it. I don't emulate because it's not worth the risk to me when there are numerous and so many good games already released for the Xbox Series X and what used to be the Xbox One. There's just no point.

[killamch89]

Personally, I use a good number of them - PPSPP, Retroarch, Dolphin, and Citra are just a few of the most notable ones I use. I typically play games like Mario Kart on them and it's an absolute joy because some game aren't available anywhere else. On another note, there's a YouTuber that I follow name ETA prime who specializes in emulators and gives you the latest updates as well as what kind of devices can run the games. You can check him out here for anyone who's interested in getting into emulation.

[m76]

13 hours ago, Shagger said:

 

The problem with that is technology isn't physically designed to last forever. It will suffer wear and malfunction as time goes on.

Plus it is mighty inconvenient to have a number of systems up and ready to play at all times. Even if you own those systems.

I much prefer all my gaming to be centralized to one location and a single platform. Heck I used to have my PS2 hooked up to my PC through a TV Capture card so I can play it on my desktop.

[The Blackangel]

22 hours ago, Shagger said:

The problem with that is technology isn't physically designed to last forever. It will suffer wear and malfunction as time goes on.

True, but if you take care of it, and know how to repair it, they can last much longer than people give them credit for. I've repaired dozens of NES and SNES systems over the years.

2 years of electronics taught me how to troubleshoot and repair damaged electronics. When my systems start to malfunction, I look into them to figure out what went wrong, and can usually fix it easily. Typically it's a resistor that burned out, or a chip pin that became unsoldered from the board. Easy fixes, and the system runs like new.

[Shagger]

26 minutes ago, The Blackangel said:

True, but if you take care of it, and know how to repair it, they can last much longer than people give them credit for. I've repaired dozens of NES and SNES systems over the years.

2 years of electronics taught me how to troubleshoot and repair damaged electronics. When my systems start to malfunction, I look into them to figure out what went wrong, and can usually fix it easily. Typically it's a resistor that burned out, or a chip pin that became unsoldered from the board. Easy fixes, and the system runs like new.

 

 

Edited July 14, 2021 by Shagger

[killamch89]

9 hours ago, The Blackangel said:

True, but if you take care of it, and know how to repair it, they can last much longer than people give them credit for. I've repaired dozens of NES and SNES systems over the years.

2 years of electronics taught me how to troubleshoot and repair damaged electronics. When my systems start to malfunction, I look into them to figure out what went wrong, and can usually fix it easily. Typically it's a resistor that burned out, or a chip pin that became unsoldered from the board. Easy fixes, and the system runs like new.

Fair play - Some of us just prefer the convenience of have everything in one place.

[Heatman]

On 7/15/2021 at 1:56 AM, killamch89 said:

Fair play - Some of us just prefer the convenience of have everything in one place.

Who doesn't? I believe that most of us don't fancy stress at all because it's not fun one bit. 

[PGen98]

Emulation has always been a popular way for people to game, but for very obvious reasons it has always fallen into a legal grey area, as it can be used to circumvent copyright and outright steal games; however, there are also those who, rather rightly, argue that emulation is a means to enjoy extremely rare games without devaluing the physical copies, and yet also letting the average person who could never afford those rare physical copies a chance to play the game itself.  I can see both sides, because it is, strictly speaking, illegal to own and play downloaded copies of games that you do not physically own, but I appreciate that emulation gives us the chance to experience games we could otherwise never play.

Where do you stand on the emulation topic, do you think it's just theft or do you believe it serves a valid role in preserving historical games that the average person would never get to experience otherwise?

[Shagger]

8 minutes ago, PGen98 said:

Emulation has always been a popular way for people to game, but for very obvious reasons it has always fallen into a legal grey area, as it can be used to circumvent copyright and outright steal games; however, there are also those who, rather rightly, argue that emulation is a means to enjoy extremely rare games without devaluing the physical copies, and yet also letting the average person who could never afford those rare physical copies a chance to play the game itself.  I can see both sides, because it is, strictly speaking, illegal to own and play downloaded copies of games that you do not physically own, but I appreciate that emulation gives us the chance to experience games we could otherwise never play.

Where do you stand on the emulation topic, do you think it's just theft or do you believe it serves a valid role in preserving historical games that the average person would never get to experience otherwise?

 

As you can see, We've had a thread discussing pretty much the exact same thing already, so I've merged the two threads together.

 

On topic, emulation is not illegal. People will often use emulators to run physical game copies of old console games on PC's and other hardware, something that doesn't involve downloading ROM's. Even if it does involve downloading ROM's, there are ways of doing so that don't break the law, like Abandonware.com. Obviously, downloading, let's say, God of War for the PS4 onto your PC then using an emulator or some other method on your PC to crack it and make it run is clearly illegal and I don't think ignorance is an excuse. Anyone who does this, runs a website to host illegal ROM's and game copies or develops software to that facilitates this dose so that knowing what they're doing and knows it's against copyright law.

[PGen98]

5 minutes ago, Shagger said:

 

As you can see, We've had a thread discussing pretty much the exact same thing already, so I've merged the two threads together.

 

On topic, emulation is not illegal. People will often use emulators to run physical game copies of old console games on PC's and other hardware, something that doesn't involve downloading ROM's. Even if it does involve downloading ROM's, there are ways of doing so that don't break the law, like Abandonware.com. Obviously, downloading, let's say, God of War for the PS4 onto your PC then using an emulator or some other method on your PC to crack it and make it run is clearly illegal and I don't think ignorance is an excuse. Anyone who does this, runs a website to host illegal ROM's and game copies or develops software to that facilitates this dose so that knowing what they're doing and knows it's against copyright law.

My apologies, I went looking for a emulation topics and found a couple, but nothing generalized.  I suppose I didn't go back enough pages!

You're quite right, emulation has very legitimate purposes and the rom-hacking and rom creating scenes are very active and very innovative.   They add to the legitimacy of emulating and emulation software, without question!