Retro games and emulation - Discuss retro shit in case you're stuck in the past or a hipster

Got this really nice Toshiba CRT the other day, GameCube games look really nice running through component on this
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This is a fun watch. Just under a year ago Spanish dude named Alejandro Martin announced that he was releasing an FPGA powered console called the SuperSega. The first alarm bells started to ring when he claimed that the SuperSega would be able to play Dreamcast games from original DC discs... and the story gets a whole lot crazier from there.

Irrespect of your opinion of DJ Slopes, this is well worth spending a couple of hours to watch.


How Alejandro Martin has escaped the attention of our Agricultores españoles is beyond me. He's prime lolcow.
Another spaniard gaming scam? (remember the Smach Z?), what is it with spaniards and gaming scams.
 
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It always baffled me how this was not a part of Mario Maker or Mario Maker 2.
Because Nintendo would rather have you pay for the Online subscription to be allowed to play it, and because they are morons who are greedy as fuck, yet refuse to actually sell their back catalog to the people clearly willing to buy it. See the NES Classic Mini and SNES Classic Mini being limited-run items as an example.
 
The Pikmin Wii port with Keyboard+Mouse controls is amazing. Selecting Pikmin with a mouse feels just as natural as any PC game having all the Pikmin commands bound to a 5 button mouse feels great.

Wii games on Dolphin aggravate my autism. Dolphin displays Wii game banners but only after a save file is created. So I have to launch a bunch of games I know I'm never going to actually play just so the menu looks nice. Very tedious to do for hundreds games.
 
The Pikmin Wii port with Keyboard+Mouse controls is amazing. Selecting Pikmin with a mouse feels just as natural as any PC game having all the Pikmin commands bound to a 5 button mouse feels great.

Wii games on Dolphin aggravate my autism. Dolphin displays Wii game banners but only after a save file is created. So I have to launch a bunch of games I know I'm never going to actually play just so the menu looks nice. Very tedious to do for hundreds games.
It's really good with a Wii remote too, it's a shame Pikmin 4 didn't include a similar controls. I wouldn't play the first 3 any other way.
 
In more RetroArch woes I've just seen how it handles cheats and I'm spellbound. So it downloads cheats tables automatically so you think they'd be loaded to each individual game so you can select them when playing right? RIGHT?

Nope, you have to use the in game cheat menu to go to the file browser to find the specific cheat file from the cheats folder and then enable them manually. It also doesn't save once you leave the game so you have to do it all over again if you want to cheat again.

Compare this to Dolphin where you can just download cheat files from the ingame menu or PCSX2 where you can just download a stack of PNRCH files and boom, you can select them before playing each game.

To top it off, I've discovered that it checks games against an internal database and only displays them if they match. Even ROMS that work are unable to be found if they don't have the correct metadata.

It's amazing. It was hyped up as a massive emulation station that JUST WORKED but so many things seem to be put out of harms way in order to be retard proof. It's the Mac of Emulators, locked in junk that requires fucking around in illogical ways to get what you want done.
In the top menu, go to Online Updater, then hit Update Cheats. You will then get cheat databases organized by emulator. They are located in RetroArch/cheats by default. Load the game you want (pay attention to what region it is like USA or Japan and if it's a revision, like 1.1 or Rev 1 - if it doesn't have a revision don't worry about it) in the emulator (core) you want, then open the in-game menu and scroll down to Cheats. Hit Load Cheat File (Replace) (if you already have cheats loaded and want to add more from a different cheats list, hit Load Cheats File (Append) instead), you should be in the cheats folder and there should be a list of emulators. These have the cheat lists in them. Open the folder that matches the emulator you picked, then hit the file that matches the game you picked, its region and (if applicable) its revision. Scroll down, enable the cheats you want, then hit apply. If you're not noticing the cheats taking effect, try restarting the game from the in-game menu. If it still isn't working, you may have the wrong game version.

If you have several cheats loaded from different lists you can hit Save Cheat File As to save them to a new file. Also a good rule of thumb with Retroarch, whenever you change settings make sure to save your configuration in the top menu or set it to do so upon quitting through the menu. Just alt-F4ing or closing the app will usually lead to your changes being lost
 
With how popular CRTs are amongst retro gamers as well as their willingness to spend the money to play old games just like as they remember it, I'm surprised no company has taken advantage of this and started to make new CRTs. Is there a reason why this isn't the case or does the Tink 4k just kind of outpace any CRT that is still around?
 
With how popular CRTs are amongst retro gamers as well as their willingness to spend the money to play old games just like as they remember it, I'm surprised no company has taken advantage of this and started to make new CRTs. Is there a reason why this isn't the case or does the Tink 4k just kind of outpace any CRT that is still around?
If you could even make them economies of scale would not be in effect and they would be extremely expensive and not very well produced.

But you probably can't even make them anymore due to environmental regulations as CRT tubes are coated in lead to prevent radiation which isn't allowed in consumer products these days.
 
With how popular CRTs are amongst retro gamers as well as their willingness to spend the money to play old games just like as they remember it, I'm surprised no company has taken advantage of this and started to make new CRTs. Is there a reason why this isn't the case or does the Tink 4k just kind of outpace any CRT that is still around?
Basically, there is no CRT manufacturing capacity in the world anymore, and it would be way too expensive to tool up for, given the miniscule market for them.
 
With how popular CRTs are amongst retro gamers as well as their willingness to spend the money to play old games just like as they remember it, I'm surprised no company has taken advantage of this and started to make new CRTs. Is there a reason why this isn't the case or does the Tink 4k just kind of outpace any CRT that is still around?
Nobody makes the tubes anymore sadly. There are still some military vehicles that use specific high resolution CRT screens but the US government sources those from old stock that has probably been rotting in a warehouse since the mid to late 00's.
 
With how popular CRTs are amongst retro gamers as well as their willingness to spend the money to play old games just like as they remember it, I'm surprised no company has taken advantage of this and started to make new CRTs. Is there a reason why this isn't the case or does the Tink 4k just kind of outpace any CRT that is still around?
The good news is that 8K resolution (which the industry is already flirting with atm) is high enough res to start hitting the point where filters blend together seamlessly to look like CRT phosphors, so there's a potential future in 99% sRGB curved outward LCD panels with built in filtering to give a CRT appearance to make up for the loss of CRTs.
 
With how popular CRTs are amongst retro gamers as well as their willingness to spend the money to play old games just like as they remember it, I'm surprised no company has taken advantage of this and started to make new CRTs. Is there a reason why this isn't the case or does the Tink 4k just kind of outpace any CRT that is still around?
There were attempts to replace the CRT back in the day. Canon tried with the SED technology while Sony backed up the FED, but both were ignored in favor of the LED. Both technologies had the advantages of a CRT with a small footprint and were more energy efficient than a LED at the time. It was just that LED came up on top probably because it was cheaper to produce.
 
The good news is that 8K resolution (which the industry is already flirting with atm) is high enough res to start hitting the point where filters blend together seamlessly to look like CRT phosphors, so there's a potential future in 99% sRGB curved outward LCD panels with built in filtering to give a CRT appearance to make up for the loss of CRTs.
Even 4k is enough to do this now, the problem is the brightness. When you enable scanlines, masks and black frame insertion you loose so much brightness you need to compensate with HDR, not to mention you need at least 120Hz for BFI, ideally 240, and those screens that match these criteria are fucking expensive
 
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You can get super nice looking filters and ultra low lag on a modern TV today, and yet I still prefer to sit in front of a 13 inch bedroom TV on a desk to play old games.

While I am curious how much CRT beam emulation that the Retrotink 4K has would influence my decision, that's pushing $1000 CAD on top of the hundreds I've already spent on scalers to even try.
 
With how popular CRTs are amongst retro gamers as well as their willingness to spend the money to play old games just like as they remember it, I'm surprised no company has taken advantage of this and started to make new CRTs. Is there a reason why this isn't the case or does the Tink 4k just kind of outpace any CRT that is still around?
because you can still buy them on eBay for 20$
 
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I mean, my main issue with non-CRTs is input delay. I can’t count the number of times when I thought, “No, fuck you, I pressed the button at the right time” when playing something like Punch Out or the minecary segments from DKC. If I can’t do that on a regular TV, it’s not good.
skill issue
Are you using wired controllers? And if so, USB or SNAC? Run-ahead in emulators?
 
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