Questions on the forthcoming 1964

[CrispyXUK]

Hi all,

I'd like to ask a few questions on the forthcoming 1964;

1) As 1964 is an emulator, will it emulate N64 slowdown? games like Jet-Force Gemini have terrible slowdown on the N64, would there be an option to emulate without or with real N64 slowdown?
2) Will the GUI have confiqurable keys ie; the ability to assign any action to a key, say ESC key will quit emulator, or even an option to run without gui?
3) Could it make me a cup of coffee?

Anyway, thanks so far for the great work, it is nice to see all the progress you have made over the years and with a bit of luck this should be the best N64 Emulator available.

Thanks

CrispyXUK

 

[schibo]

Hi all,

I'd like to ask a few questions on the forthcoming 1964;

1) As 1964 is an emulator, will it emulate N64 slowdown? games like Jet-Force Gemini have terrible slowdown on the N64, would there be an option to emulate without or with real N64 slowdown?
2) Will the GUI have confiqurable keys ie; the ability to assign any action to a key, say ESC key will quit emulator, or even an option to run without gui?
3) Could it make me a cup of coffee?

Anyway, thanks so far for the great work, it is nice to see all the progress you have made over the years and with a bit of luck this should be the best N64 Emulator available.

Thanks

CrispyXUK

1) Each game is run under an operating system. To maintain consistent gameplay speeds, the OS will give more or less time to different tasks based on the value in a register called COUNT, which holds a constantly increasing value derived from elapsed cycles (until it is reset). This is why you sometimes experience choppier framerates on the real thing. To date, no emulator emulates the N64 to cycle-accuracy, and it is very unlikely that any ever will, but usually we can get reasonably close. Depending on the speed of your system, meaning if your computer can maintain 59.94 VI/s in an NTSC-timed game--which in simpler terms is full speed with the speed limiter on, and if you use a Counter Factor of 1, it will run smoother than the real thing. This is one of the benefits of faster hardware to run games. Looking at your specs, your box will eat 1964 for breakfast with room for seconds. If you don't know what CF is, I urge you not to ask someone in here...it will be explained correctly in the release.

2) Keys for controller input are configurable via controller plugins. The GUI has usable shortcuts for GUI commands but the shortcuts cannot be altered by the user. Regarding running games "directly" without use of the GUI, Rice can better discuss the new command line options as I have admittedly not studied this part of the code--however, the environment will still be invoked.

3) If you make a donation, we'll see what we can do .

Thanks for your questions.

 

[CrispyXUK]

Hi, (shibo)

Thanks for the quick reply, I will be using the Counter Factor 1 option then . Would there be any chance of including a -nogui commandline option (with esc/anykey for quit) for use with frontends in a future release?

Anyways, thanks for you and your teams hard work and I look forward to your new release, this app seems it would definately be worth a cup of coffee and a donation once i have my grubby mits on it and an Adaptoid

 

[schibo]

Hi, (shibo)

Thanks for the quick reply, I will be using the Counter Factor 1 option then . Would there be any chance of including a -nogui commandline option (with esc/anykey for quit) for use with frontends in a future release?

Anyways, thanks for you and your teams hard work and I look forward to your new release, this app seems it would definately be worth a cup of coffee and a donation once i have my grubby mits on it and an Adaptoid

CrispyUK,

Yep, a front end would actually work, since it can send commands to the emulator, and you could then remap shortcuts. At this stage, we have completed features, but here's the command-line parameters:

"-v" -> video plugin name
"-a" -> audio plugin name
"-c" -> controller plugin name
"-g" -> game name to run
"-f" -> play-in-full-screen
"-r" -> rom path

 

[CrispyXUK]

CrispyUK,

Yep, a front end would actually work, since it can send commands to the emulator, and you could then remap shortcuts. At this stage, we have completed features, but here's the command-line parameters:

"-v" -> video plugin name
"-a" -> audio plugin name
"-c" -> controller plugin name
"-g" -> game name to run
"-f" -> play-in-full-screen
"-r" -> rom path

Sounds fantasic (shibo)! I'm really looking forward to the next release.
One thing I would like to mention about commandline usage;
would it not be simpler to run a game like this;

n:\1964\
\1968.exe super mario 64 (u)!.zip -f

as this seems to be the standard for most emulators, or am I misreading your post about "-g"

 

[pandamoan]

Sounds fantasic (shibo)! I'm really looking forward to the next release.
One thing I would like to mention about commandline usage;
would it not be simpler to run a game like this;

n:\1964\
\1968.exe super mario 64 (u)!.zip -f

as this seems to be the standard for most emulators, or am I misreading your post about "-g"

can i say w00t and more w00t?

w00t!

 

[CrispyXUK]

can i say w00t and more w00t?

w00t!

Well you have totally confused me you crazy fool!

 

[Matata]

Well you have totally confused me you crazy fool!

Same here!

 

[CrispyXUK]

Sorry but a last question if you dont mind,

Im not sure of what the default plugins are but in you opinions are they better than the current Jabo plugins available with Project 64 as for all I know these are no longer in development but currently seem to be the most compatible with my system bar Jabo's input plugin for which I use Nrage's input intead.

Thanks again.

 

[Trotterwatch]

Rices is better in some regards worse in others. Both are great plugins, and both come highly recommended

 

[CrispyXUK]

Rices is better in some regards worse in others. Both are great plugins, and both come highly recommended

I assume we are talking about Graphics plugins? if so what are the sound plugins included, do they sync with graphics properly?

Thanks again, again.

 

[Trotterwatch]

Yeah, was talking about graphics plugins. Schibos audio is the default audio, and it works brilliantly in the vast majority of games - yes the audio does stay in sync

 

[CrispyXUK]

Rices is better in some regards worse in others. Both are great plugins, and both come highly recommended

Oops double post, first time ever in 7 years !!!!

Anyway, I really do appologise but could I ask one more? Woth the default settings, what is the pause menu like on the Zelda games

I will stop thanking you as I think you get the point

 

[Clements]

Hmm, I was just wondering myself about something about audio...

Would schibo's audio have something like an option to change the sampling rate of the audio? Is this actually possible? It could help guys with slow processors to get good sound without killing the frame rate or resorting to switching the audio off, and it could help guys with fast processors to use high sampling rates like 96KHz for better quality.

Or am I just a crazy guy with a stupid idea

 

[CrispyXUK]

Hmm, I was just wondering myself about something about audio...

Would schibo's audio have something like an option to change the sampling rate of the audio? Is this actually possible? It could help guys with slow processors to get good sound without killing the frame rate or resorting to switching the audio off, and it could help guys with fast processors to use high sampling rates like 96KHz for better quality.

Or am I just a crazy guy with a stupid idea

I dont think it is a good idea to try and make an emu more compatible with lower spec machines as it is to get a more accurate emulation (isnt this what Emulation is really for?) and to be honest resampling of audio real time is very processor intensive to do it right and on your average soundcard, will not give much improvement if any at all.

If you really want resampling you are better of with a card that can either do this in hardware or with the included drivers ie; RME or M-Audio soundcards, but these soundcards are expensive and while aimed at music are not as good at PC Gaming (not emulation) like EAX and the like.

 

[Clements]

Well, the main purpose I feel of 1964 was meant to be the fact that it was fast on low spec. machines what with the new option of using faster cores.

And my current on-board audio can do 32-Bit 96KHz audio just fine (which I use with FCE Ultra and SnesAMP) and my current processor (which will soon be a 3000+ Barton) can hold up at that kind of sampling rate quite easily in fact, and there are guys with insanely good systems that use 1964.

True, wouldn't boost quality that much, but I was thinking more of low-end users who could use 22KHz audio compared to the default sampling rate of the N64 (which is higher but can't remember the exact value). This would save them switching the sound off in games such as Goldeneye 007.

 

[CrispyXUK]

Well, the main purpose I feel of 1964 was meant to be the fact that it was fast on low spec. machines what with the new option of using faster cores.

And my current on-board audio can do 32-Bit 96KHz audio just fine (which I use with FCE Ultra and SnesAMP) and my current processor (which will soon be a 3000+ Barton) can hold up at that kind of sampling rate quite easily in fact, and there are guys with insanely good systems that use 1964.

True, wouldn't boost quality that much, but I was thinking more of low-end users who could use 22KHz audio compared to the default sampling rate of the N64 (which is higher but can't remember the exact value). This would save them switching the sound off in games such as Goldeneye 007.

Fair comment mate,

True it a great aceivement that this emu can run a console game that originally run on a 90Mhz-ish console on a P3 700 I truly think that is amazing, but I have always stuck to the idea of accuracy first. Currently of the mainstrain systems the N64 hasn't had much luck with all the legal wranglings of emulation going on in recent times, and I feel now that we have that behind us, we should concentrate on getting an accurate emulation of this great system, hey and maybe one day a Cel-shading plugin

 

[Trotterwatch]

Schibos audio doesn't have options to change the sample size, though to be honest on this machine for example audio usually takes 1%-2% total emulation time, so limiting the sample rate probably wouldn't do much to speed up emulation. I have been wrong before, and no doubt will be wrong again, so don't take that as gospel, lol

Anyway, I really do appologise but could I ask one more? Woth the default settings, what is the pause menu like on the Zelda games

I will try to do that for you later.

 

[Clements]

Fair enough! Got to get the ideas rolling while 1964 is still active! :happy:

 

[CrispyXUK]

I will try to do that for you later.

Thanks mate,

anyways, I'm not saying any of these things should be integrated I merely meant that I think the guys working on this would better themselves by getting a more complete emulation and add the bells & whistles after.

hey clements! do you live in the UK or Enlgand