Google Stadia: how do you do fellow kids edition

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

Afaik they have to make a custom emulator for every ROM they offer because of how shite everything is.

[Kugelfisch]

You mean tweak the settings of the open source one they grabbed off the web?

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

It's only fair for them to steal from thieves.

[mad bum]

N64 emulation is a LOT better now, unlike 10 years ago where every game was a black screen.

[Kugelfisch]

Yes, on a computer. Not on the underpowered Switch.

[rabidtictac]

Switch (online) emulation seems to vary between "complete dogshit" and "decent but lacking in even the most basic emulator features." Their N64 releases are stuck firmly in the former category, while the nes stuff (from what I've heard) runs at least alright.

That's why it's such a big deal whenever the good ports get lost to time behind defunct storefronts. Here we have some porting jobs which are arguably superior to what you can get from piracy. But if they're locked to a storefront you can't access, then they may as well not exist. And due to the fragile nature of publisher-and-porter alliances, these ports are unlikely to receive reprints. You may have already heard about the sanic mania fags falling out with soyga over the latest (shitty) sonic classics collection. At least in that case, the far superior M2 ports are still available. For those games, anyway. Not for Afterburner. Not for Power Drift. Not for Streets of Rage 2 or Super Hang-On. But yeah, Sanic 2's m2 port is still on modern storefronts. So the super mainstream shit gets to keep a decent port.

But my point out publishers and porters is that these agreements come to an end at a certain point, and most of the (good) official porting jobs seem to not receive reprints on more modern consoles later. It's like a one-and-done arrangement, and the copyright holders (publishers) tend to set up a new porting deal (often going in-house, with shit results and using stolen emulation software) whenever they want to milk the old shit again.

[Kugelfisch]

I had online for Smash. NES and SNES runs as they should. Then again, you'd be able to run those on any phone past the flip phone era.

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

Switch (online) emulation seems to vary between "complete dogshit" and "decent but lacking in even the most basic emulator features." Their N64 releases are stuck firmly in the former category, while the nes stuff (from what I've heard) runs at least alright.

When do these officials "Ports that are actually just a ROM plus emulator" ever have more than the most basic emulator features?
Maybe there's some option to quicksave and -load. But most of the time you're stuck with a widescreen option (which just stretches the screen, looks like garbage, and may or may not be turned on by default), a rudimentary bilinear filter (wich looks like garbage and tends to be turned on by default), and 1-2 scanline settings (which might be passable if you've never seen an actual CRT screen before).

[Kugelfisch]

The Switch one has 4:3, original resolution or 4:3 with a shitty CRT filter. At least for SNES.
So a cheap as Hell Raspberry Pi or equivalent, which I already have, is more portable, uses less electricity and works better than a Switch for emulation. Plus that one also runs PlayStation games.

[rabidtictac]

Switch (online) emulation seems to vary between "complete dogshit" and "decent but lacking in even the most basic emulator features." Their N64 releases are stuck firmly in the former category, while the nes stuff (from what I've heard) runs at least alright.

When do these officials "Ports that are actually just a ROM plus emulator" ever have more than the most basic emulator features?
Maybe there's some option to quicksave and -load. But most of the time you're stuck with a widescreen option (which just stretches the screen, looks like garbage, and may or may not be turned on by default), a rudimentary bilinear filter (wich looks like garbage and tends to be turned on by default), and 1-2 scanline settings (which might be passable if you've never seen an actual CRT screen before).

There actually are some official porting jobs which add content to the original game:

The M2 port (sega ages) for Outrun has added gadgets (basically superpower items) for gameplay, independent online leaderboards for every category and route, both Arcade and Arrange/New modes as well as a massive suite of display and control options (including fully mappable controls.)

The same holds true for basically all of their sega ages ports. Sega Ages Thunder Force AC adds special playable ships not found the original release. Sanic 2 lets you play with the drop dash from Sanic Mania IIRC. As well as select characters including Knuckles to play as.

It's mostly fuckers like Digital Eclipse, and Sega/Nintendo in-house teams who fuck up their official emulation attempts really hard. Cue the fog-removed screenshots of Ocarina of Time.

Most scanline filters look like dogshit, official or not. Arcade Archives ports allow you to apply a very soft blurring effect which helps take the edges off jaggies without completely ruining the look. That's about the most I can tolerate when it comes to filter options.

Many commercial ports end up stretching the screen to look like shit. Thankfully, the Hamster and M2 ports generally don't have this issue and you can display them however you wish.

Probably the worst commercial porting job I've seen was the Sega Classics Collection. Ugly-ass interface. No input mapping. Shit display options. 8-10 FRAMES of input delay. Savescumming system that forces you to exit the game window to load a save. Actually, I can't tell if that one was the worst, or if Johnny Turbo's Arcade are the worst. No input mapping, shitty crt filter, no savescumming or loading and bizarre default control maps (you can't change.) Only reason I don't say it's the worst one is I never saw the Johnny Turbo games lag-tested anywhere.