Been working through what works emulation wise on Windows 10. So far Snes and Nes stuff has caused no problems as both FCEUX and Higan work perfectly.
Both Yabause and SSF are working perfectly for Sega Saturn stuff and if I cared about Megadrive or lower then I suspect that it would work as well.
I finally managed to get both Playstation 2 and Gamecube and Wii emulation working at full speed so PCSX2 and Dolphin are working well. Tested with a disc version of Final Fantasy 12 and Bubble Bobble Plus and as an aside found that Wii games cannot be played directly from disc unless you have a specific drive to play them on (thanks a bunch Nintendo).
Hand held wise BGB works for Gameboy and WScamp for Wonderswan does OK as well.
I haven't tested either arcade or old computer things yet although I do have copies of MAME, FBA and Raine on an old drive that I can test out and a Sharp X68OOO emulator that hasn't been updated in years.
In fact the only problems I can find is Playstation emulation. EPSXE crashes "everytiem" and has never gone in game despite multiple plug ins and configurations. PCSX is massively fast when we tested it with Front Mission 3 and eventually ends up with a blast of noise that would make Masami Akita proud. In fact its only PSX which works despite it being abandoned now.
The online home of Bear or Bust.
Showing posts with label PCSX2. Show all posts
Showing posts with label PCSX2. Show all posts
Sunday, 14 August 2016
Sunday, 2 December 2012
Aqua Aqua Review
We recently picked up from one of our charity shop trawls, Aqua Aqua from the Pickford brothers software house Zed two now (Zee 3 digital). It was one of those games that always seemed to be available for other systems. The original Wetrix I believe was a N64 exclusive (Wikipedia suggests some other ports including GBC among the line up) making use of the analog sticks and swish water animation, for a rather nice looking puzzler.
Like I say it was one of those games that either slipped through the cracks by either being not available or on a system I didn't own, so when I had the chance to get a copy of the PS2 follow up I snapped at the chance.
For those uninitiated its a nice little puzzler where you have to make rock pools on an isometric landscape. Land tiles will drop from the sky and its up to you to terraform square pools (and not so square pools) to catch water drops from the sky (make a perimeter wall is the best advice I can give here). Often, stuff will ruin these plans though. Bombs and level down land that will lower your precious walls and blow a hole in the level, as well as an earthquake that wreaks havoc with your plans. Often though its your own incompetence and the slightly dodgy perspective that'll be your undoing as the water sloshes over the edge of the level. Theres a gauge that will keep track of all spilt water and if it fills up then its game over and your elf drowns (yeah there are elves as well).
However, its not all bad, you'll get a fireball to dry out those lakes for a meaty bonus and ice cubes falling at random to freeze whatever is in its path, giving you time to shore up walls and plug those gaps. There is also a bingo board for when those fireballs connect you get bonuses, fill a row and you get all sorts of bonuses (though we haven't managed to get anything yet due to being lame at it).
Modes.
Though there is some supplementary guff about mythical beasts awakening and kicking arse for supremacy, most of the time you won't notice that and its you vs computer.
The tutorial is a bastard as well, you'll fail more often due to dodgy perspective then not doing it right which is frustrating.
Other modes need to be unlocked as well as the ever present option screen.
Music and graphics.
Theres a nice ambient score going on that complements the action nicely as well as some good n crunchy effects. In fact the best thing is the voices in it (by Janet James), every time your areas fill up with water you get a crazed sounding X lakes (x standing for the amount of lakes you have). It sounds like its from an old kids show which makes it all the nicer.
Gameplay.
Thanks to the controls you often make mistakes due to perspective leaving stupid gaps for precious water to drain away. However it is pretty addictive with a hearty one more go gameplay, it just that perspective and pathfinding makes it tough to control.
Overall score 7. An addictive puzzler due to shonky controls (many times I've created a small gap where I wanted a seamless wall) keeps it from its greatness.
Incidentally the Pickfords went on to create Future Tactics with Digi's Mr Biffo on script duties (and Tim Follin on sound duties) and make Magnetic Billiards for smartphones. You can read more about what they made and more on Aqua Aqua here.
Like I say it was one of those games that either slipped through the cracks by either being not available or on a system I didn't own, so when I had the chance to get a copy of the PS2 follow up I snapped at the chance.
For those uninitiated its a nice little puzzler where you have to make rock pools on an isometric landscape. Land tiles will drop from the sky and its up to you to terraform square pools (and not so square pools) to catch water drops from the sky (make a perimeter wall is the best advice I can give here). Often, stuff will ruin these plans though. Bombs and level down land that will lower your precious walls and blow a hole in the level, as well as an earthquake that wreaks havoc with your plans. Often though its your own incompetence and the slightly dodgy perspective that'll be your undoing as the water sloshes over the edge of the level. Theres a gauge that will keep track of all spilt water and if it fills up then its game over and your elf drowns (yeah there are elves as well).
However, its not all bad, you'll get a fireball to dry out those lakes for a meaty bonus and ice cubes falling at random to freeze whatever is in its path, giving you time to shore up walls and plug those gaps. There is also a bingo board for when those fireballs connect you get bonuses, fill a row and you get all sorts of bonuses (though we haven't managed to get anything yet due to being lame at it).
Modes.
Though there is some supplementary guff about mythical beasts awakening and kicking arse for supremacy, most of the time you won't notice that and its you vs computer.
The tutorial is a bastard as well, you'll fail more often due to dodgy perspective then not doing it right which is frustrating.
Other modes need to be unlocked as well as the ever present option screen.
Music and graphics.
Theres a nice ambient score going on that complements the action nicely as well as some good n crunchy effects. In fact the best thing is the voices in it (by Janet James), every time your areas fill up with water you get a crazed sounding X lakes (x standing for the amount of lakes you have). It sounds like its from an old kids show which makes it all the nicer.
Gameplay.
Thanks to the controls you often make mistakes due to perspective leaving stupid gaps for precious water to drain away. However it is pretty addictive with a hearty one more go gameplay, it just that perspective and pathfinding makes it tough to control.
Overall score 7. An addictive puzzler due to shonky controls (many times I've created a small gap where I wanted a seamless wall) keeps it from its greatness.
Incidentally the Pickfords went on to create Future Tactics with Digi's Mr Biffo on script duties (and Tim Follin on sound duties) and make Magnetic Billiards for smartphones. You can read more about what they made and more on Aqua Aqua here.
Sunday, 21 March 2010
PCSX 2 Damnation update
"I'll get it working no doubt, 3 years from now with alternative plugins and a lot of cursing, but for now I'll give it a couple of years to see if the specs drop on this."
Hah more like 3 weeks.
We downloaded from Emuasylum, a beta version of PCSX2, and added the old plugins from a previous install. Plus three new Bioses. What do you know, not only does it keep our files, it even plays games inevitably with varying degrees of slowness, but by Dog it works.
So far Global Defence Force runs far too slow, Unlimited SaGa varies its speed, Shikigami No Shiro is slow (although this does make it more sporting) best of the lot is Raiden 3 which has some filtering but is at least playing at full speed.
Nice work PCSX2 team. Lets see what its like in 2 years time.
Hah more like 3 weeks.
We downloaded from Emuasylum, a beta version of PCSX2, and added the old plugins from a previous install. Plus three new Bioses. What do you know, not only does it keep our files, it even plays games inevitably with varying degrees of slowness, but by Dog it works.
So far Global Defence Force runs far too slow, Unlimited SaGa varies its speed, Shikigami No Shiro is slow (although this does make it more sporting) best of the lot is Raiden 3 which has some filtering but is at least playing at full speed.
Nice work PCSX2 team. Lets see what its like in 2 years time.
Sunday, 7 March 2010
PS2 Emulation Damnation special,
Want to spend a hateful way of ruining a weekend, try configuring this bastard and by this bastard I mean PCSX2.
With a downloaded Playstation 2 Emulator and my trusty quad core PC + onboard graphics card that probably wont fit the required specs, we'll set out on the journey of a lifetime to actually get the bastard to work.
Step one. Go through several hoops on the extensive config screen.
Set up graphics display, check, make sure Direct X 9/10/11 is updated check.
Step two. Set up audio, and Lillypad oh and find a way of adding a PS2 pad to your PC cos it won't accept anything else. (Converter from Game will sort this, though they don't stock any PS2 hardware apart from Pads anymore).
Step three. Set up Drive plugins. These will be refused and in one case actually point to a D: drive instead of E:.
Step Four. Add a space for memory card loading this of course will be routinely ignored by the system.
Steps 5-8 Go through all that you need to go through oh and don't forget to torrent / grab a Bios Set from wherever you can, because they're not included.
Pressing set up means you'll get an error message that reads something like could not read null please redo the above steps over again.
Redoing the above steps will get you the actual load screen of the PCSX2 and then you insert a game and it all goes to hell. In my case not read the memory card location and then not open the DVD drive before failing spectacularly. Time to do steps 1-8 again Sysiphus.
Incidentally I had less headaches setting up PS1 Emulation than this and that was down to Plugins and drama. I'll get it working no doubt, 3 years from now with alternative plugins and a lot of cursing, but for now I'll give it a couple of years to see if the specs drop on this.
With a downloaded Playstation 2 Emulator and my trusty quad core PC + onboard graphics card that probably wont fit the required specs, we'll set out on the journey of a lifetime to actually get the bastard to work.
Step one. Go through several hoops on the extensive config screen.
Set up graphics display, check, make sure Direct X 9/10/11 is updated check.
Step two. Set up audio, and Lillypad oh and find a way of adding a PS2 pad to your PC cos it won't accept anything else. (Converter from Game will sort this, though they don't stock any PS2 hardware apart from Pads anymore).
Step three. Set up Drive plugins. These will be refused and in one case actually point to a D: drive instead of E:.
Step Four. Add a space for memory card loading this of course will be routinely ignored by the system.
Steps 5-8 Go through all that you need to go through oh and don't forget to torrent / grab a Bios Set from wherever you can, because they're not included.
Pressing set up means you'll get an error message that reads something like could not read null please redo the above steps over again.
Redoing the above steps will get you the actual load screen of the PCSX2 and then you insert a game and it all goes to hell. In my case not read the memory card location and then not open the DVD drive before failing spectacularly. Time to do steps 1-8 again Sysiphus.
Incidentally I had less headaches setting up PS1 Emulation than this and that was down to Plugins and drama. I'll get it working no doubt, 3 years from now with alternative plugins and a lot of cursing, but for now I'll give it a couple of years to see if the specs drop on this.
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