Genesis Neogeo Snes Turbografx Nes Gameboy Emu

[Jon_J]

Cresho, I hate to bother you, but is there any updates on Mame or joystick support?
Thank you,
Jon

[Cresho]

Yes.  I do have something that works at the moment but these are already availalble.  zmame and xmame.  zmame works the best and even then, it is so slow that it will play a game like galaga but at a terrible 1-7 fps even with tweeks.

I'm looking at the source files and currently trying to comply with missing libs on the zaurus.

The joystick support is already available online but most links and websites are in other languages than english.  It is a chore.

For joystick support, i need to do a few things

1.  use available ipk files to avoid creating new ipk's
2.  find a joystick which you already have that is recognized.
3.  create sh files which will work for both joystick and keyboard without conflicts to each other.


here is a few things i learned from what i read.......
zemu ex works with joystick support by adding a few lines in the sh.  when you use the emulator to launch the game it looks in the sh files within the qtpalmtop bin directory's zemuex sh files.  These files tell the emulator how to behave and adding the extra lines will point it to the joystick enabler files which will activate the joystick.  If you use the terminal to launch the game, you can also use the same line added to the command to enable joystick support.  at the moment, nothing is incorporated because i need a joystick and none of the lines ar added, and i need to finish the mame.  These are side projects and don't expect it to come out soon.  I think i been promising the mame for about a year now so school is definetly screwing my time around.

be patient, if I don't do it, someone else will.  

[mbagsh55]

Hi Cresho/ Jon,

The joystick support is already available online but most links and websites are in other languages than english.  It is a chore.
...
be patient, if I don't do it, someone else will. 
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I had a brief play with the ZNester joystick enabled Emus, but gave up because of the lack of speed.  At first I thought it was because of tweaks via the ZEmuEx tool, but running from the command line shows otherwise.

[a href=\"http://www.piro.hopto.org/~piro/pukiwiki/pukiwiki.php?%5B%5Bzaurus%CD%D1%A5%A8%A5%DF%A5%E5%5D%5D]Piro's Z-Emu page[/url]

I tested both the standard and SDL versions with joystick support and although they work from the command-line the reduction in speed compared to running the ZNester included in Cresho's ZIP is extreme.  The drop in performance in the games I tested (DigDug and Galaxians) occurs even when the --joystick option was not used and makes the games near unplayable.

Regarding the actual hardware, I have an SL-C3100 and have found both my no-name joypads are detected and work (albeit too slowly).

Regards,
Marcus

[Cresho]

Hi Cresho/ Jon,

The joystick support is already available online but most links and websites are in other languages than english.  It is a chore.
...
be patient, if I don't do it, someone else will. 
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I had a brief play with the ZNester joystick enabled Emus, but gave up because of the lack of speed.  At first I thought it was because of tweaks via the ZEmuEx tool, but running from the command line shows otherwise.

[a href=\"http://www.piro.hopto.org/~piro/pukiwiki/pukiwiki.php?%5B%5Bzaurus%CD%D1%A5%A8%A5%DF%A5%E5%5D%5D]Piro's Z-Emu page[/url]

I tested both the standard and SDL versions with joystick support and although they work from the command-line the reduction in speed compared to running the ZNester included in Cresho's ZIP is extreme.  The drop in performance in the games I tested (DigDug and Galaxians) occurs even when the --joystick option was not used and makes the games near unplayable.

Regarding the actual hardware, I have an SL-C3100 and have found both my no-name joypads are detected and work (albeit too slowly).

Regards,
Marcus
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Yeah, this is the page i been looking at along with a few others.

when you were expiriencing drop in performance, are you saying that the znester ran poorly?  even with keyboard only being used?

[mbagsh55]

Yeah, this is the page i been looking at along with a few others.

when you were expiriencing drop in performance, are you saying that the znester ran poorly?  even with keyboard only being used?
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Hi Cresho,
  Sadly yes, that is why I gave up on that compiled version.  With Galaxians the speed drop is very noticable, even just with the start-up screen and no input.  With the IPK you provide it scrolls smoothly and speedily up the screen.  The .GZ joystick enabled versions shuddered a small amount and took noticably longer to scroll the game title.

In all cases I was simply running the game from the commandline, with all three executables in the rom/nes folder, without any options (including --joystick).

Out of interest, is atty.jp the source of the IPK you use, or something you customised?  I was thinking about dropping the developer a quick email to ask how he managed to optimise ZNester.

Regards,
Marcus

[Cresho]

NO...

ZNESTER RUNS 100% SPEED.  Infact, everything runs at 100 percent speed.

even neogeo games run at 70-100 percent speed depending on what game it is.

I posted these because they all run fast and.  If your having problems running the games, follow the install instructions i provided.  all your games should run 100 percent speed.  The way I see it, since i spent months getting this information together, I figured someone can benefit from this and posted the files I have and modified ones to benefit everybody.  

Now after i'm done tinkering with mame, ill put it up but i just been so busy.  I tried once but failed.  mame ran fullscreen and was playing pacman 80-100 percent speed of original.  I even made it run of zemuex and it made it go fullscreen no problems.

the dgen, gngeo, znester, snes9x, turbo are done by various dudes.  zemu ex was done by someone else.  I modifed zemu ex 's sh files to work for zports and slapt everything in a small zip file so everybody can grab it and play the games right off the bat on the new z's with the zports sdl and 1.2.5 cvs.  I literally spent months looking and combining stuff just to make the zip package work.  Did alot of reading on configuring and this is what i came up with.

ill be incorporating the joysticks as soon as i find one that my z can identify easily.

yes...I suggest you look into the ipk's and ask questions to the real developers.

-------------------------------------
update.....
since i been having a tough time trying to make the damn mame work, ill look into the joystick and see if i can use the stuff available to work.  I have 2 joysticks im gona try before i go shopping.  probably use jon_j's joystick.

[bam]

seem to have the dgen freezing my zaurus, any ideas guys? trying to play phantasy star series...just goes the portraite mode zoomed then freezes.

[xamindar]

yeah, genesis freezes.  But all the others work great!

[Cresho]

phantasy star is buggy!  look for a working rom.  jon seems to have one that works.

[Jon_J]

phantasy star is buggy!  look for a working rom.  jon seems to have one that works.
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I don't know why the Phantasy Star series "just works" for me, but here's what I did.
When I first got the emulater version with Genesis "dgen" included, I played some golf games, which play with very few problems.
Read about the golf games here:
[a href=\"https://www.oesf.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=14102&view=findpost&p=129911]https://www.oesf.org/forums/index.php?showt...ndpost&p=129911[/url]
The golf games, sometimes, have stuttering background music during scene changes and screen updates.
Then I found Phantasy Star 2 & 3 and tried them.
I later found a "good" version of Phantasy Star 4
The Phantasy Star Genesis cartridge has a battery backup system for saving games.
The Phantasy Star ROMs, (which are being discussed here), create a folder under /.dgen
called "ram"
/home/zaurus/.dgen/ram
This is where Phantasy Star stores it's saved games.
I'm not sure if this is the problem that bam is having, but this folder needs to have it's permissions relaxed.
All three Phantasy Star versions, (that I have on my Zaurus), start by checking this folder for a "saved game"
Just to make this discussion on "saving games" complete, this other location is where the emulator's "save state/load state" files are stored:
/home/zaurus/.dgen/saves
Phantasy Star always works without any glitches except for a couple situations.
Phantasy Star 3 stutters when moving from a building to the outdoors, (this is when the background music changes).
Actually, it's the music that stutters.
Phantasy Star 2, I haven't played this one much, since I already finished the cartridge version 14 years ago.
In Phantasy Star 2, the game stutters during battles. (I think there are too many complex or overlapping sounds occurring, plus background music playing all at the same time).
Phantasy Star 4, this version of the game is the smoothest and best playing version of the three mentioned ROMs.
Phantasy Star 4 didn't have any playability problems until the 5th character joined the group, (Rika, the pink haired girl).
The game will sometimes stutter, (video & audio), in a busy city when the 5 characters are walking through.
I think this is because there are too many things occurring onscreen at once.
This is the only problem I have had with Phantasy Star 4.
I hope this clears up any problems that anyone is having with these 3 ROMs.

2 things to check:
1. Permissions of the directory: /home/zaurus/.dgen/ram
2. Just a guess, try renaming the ROM to a short filename with no uppercase characters.

EDIT: Yesterday, just after installing "mplayer-bvdd-iwmmxt", the emulator froze when I launched Phantasy star 4.
Rebooting my Zaurus fixed that.
So, if a ROM freezes after launching, when the screen goes sideways, try rebooting.
Also, this may be unrelated, I have a 128 MB swapfile setup in Cacko.
EDIT2: (Sorry for all the editing, but I keep remembering other pertinent things that pertain to the Genesis ROMs)
If you find a ROM for the Genesis, and it has the *.bin or *.rom extension, rename it to *.smd
Jon

[Cresho]

yeah...

from what i read.

swap file enabled and also all lowercase and no spaces.  Should help a bit.  Directory permission change?  HUH!

[bam]

i will try it...

[Jon_J]

yeah...

from what i read.

swap file enabled and also all lowercase and no spaces.  Should help a bit.  Directory permission change?  HUH!
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The directory permission change is only for the directory which Phantasy Star uses.
/home/zaurus/.dgen/ram
When I first tried saving my game within Phantasy Star 3, it wouldn't save, using Phantasy Star's Save method.
It acted like it was saving, but the next time I started Phantasy Star 3, there was no data in the saved games dialog.
Here's a screenshot of the very first dialog that opens in Phantasy Star 3, right after you press Enter on the main screen.
This is the part of the game that checks the above folder for saved games.

I'm talking about saving the game in an, (INN or hotel, inside the game), not the "save state" method.

[mbagsh55]

Hi Cresho,

NO...

ZNESTER RUNS 100% SPEED.  Infact, everything runs at 100 percent speed.

...

ill be incorporating the joysticks as soon as i find one that my z can identify easily.

yes...I suggest you look into the ipk's and ask questions to the real developers.

A bit confused by the NO...  yes... reply.  

In case it wasn't clear I have no speed problem at all with the IPK you provided (znester_7.1-1_arm.ipk),  only with the .GZ joystick enabled versions from Piro's page.  I have yet to find other joystick enabled versions on the Internet in compiled form.

I'll touch base with the developer at aaty.jp and see if he knows any reason why the IPK is significantly faster than the GZ joystick enabled versions.

Regards,
Marcus

p.s.  My limited experience has shown that most cheap USB joypads are detected and work with JSTest OK.

[mbagsh55]

NO...
...
yes...I suggest you look into the ipk's and ask questions to the real developers.
...

Hi Cresho et Al,
  Agawa-san the developer who compiled the ZNester7-1-1.ipk has responded that he didn't do any special optimization of the ZNester IPK, but rather compiled with the latest SDL for the SL-C3000.  

The implication therefore is that it may simply be that the joystick compiled versions available in binary format are compiled with a less optimal SDL (for the SL-C series).  I guess the only way to confirm this is to compile from the source without joystick support with the latest SDL and confirm if it runs at the same speed.

No promises on when I will get time to do this, (I don't have a seperate Linux PC, so it will be GCC on my Z), but I will post again if/when I am successful.  -- In the meantime, I will stick with the IPK Cresho includes and just take care I don't hammer the Zaurus keyboard too much  

Cheers,
Marcus