Topic: Zsnexbox Coming Soon (Read 409 times)

Chron Johnson · « **Reply #45 on:** April 07, 2006, 04:07:00 PM »

Sorry you feel that way Xarann, but some of us acknowledge the fact that not every emulatable system has been emulated. Some of us want Virtual Boy on our XBox to complete our Nintendo emulation collection. Some of us want Zinc to expand our arcade emulation possibilities. Some of us aren't content to say everything is perfect as it is when clearly there is infinite progress to be made. If emulation on the XBox is so complete and all-encompassing then why can I play Atari 7800 and Panasonic 3DO on my Dreamcast and not XBox.

TMaul · « **Reply #46 on:** April 07, 2006, 05:58:00 PM »

QUOTE(Thraxen @ Apr 2 2006, 06:27 AM)

Well, he's still around... I think he just got sidetracked with other projects. And like I said he made an open offer for beta testers on the forum, but I think most people either ignored or missed the offer. But either way, he didn't say that I could or couldn't distibute the beta, so I'll just stay on the safe side and not distribute. Maybe he'll finish out the project at some point, but if not, this port by nes6502 looks promising... so there may be a publicly available emulator that plays TG3K soon anyway.

I am still trying to work on it when I have time (along with my other Xbox and psp projects) but real life has been very turbulent the last couple of months which has meant that I have had to cut down the amount of time I have spent hanging out on IRC, trying to code, etc. Hopefully my new job (my 3rd or 4th in the last year) will calm down soon and I can start to get myself motivated again.

Also, I don't mind if you release the beta. The only reason I didn't release a build already is that I was/am pretty certain that Lantus is going to release another xbox version when the new snes9x source is released, and his version has a much better UI than mine. Also, I can't remember my xbins login and it always seems like too much stress to get hold of someone who has a login i.e. I am too lazy.

Chron Johnson · « **Reply #47 on:** April 07, 2006, 06:05:00 PM »

Hurts my feelings when people like to kiss ass at the cost of encouraging new development.

nes6502 · « **Reply #48 on:** April 07, 2006, 06:36:00 PM »

I personally would love to play atari 7800 on my Xbox. Are there any good sources avaialble? Don't care anything about 3DO since even on the PC it's not all that great. Zinc is not open source and likely will never be. I don't have much personal interest in Virtual boy either. Now a CDi emulator. I'd definatly like to have one of those. Anybody else out there spend 300.00 bucks on this terrible console? However It was far better than the 250.00 I spent on the "true" 64-bit beast that was the Atari jaguar! And to think I used to try and convicne my friends that it was"cool" to play that sucky tennis game that came with it using that one hand controller...

Anyway,

ZsnexBox update:

As stated earlier the first release will be April 17th. There is still a lot left I have to do.

I made major speed increases last night, but many games are still choppy at times (Chrono Trigger and Starfox are the worst). Hoever, I'm going to try and implement a new blitter I've been working on tonight as well as link the Zsnes core with my new gui. Then will come input, sound, and gui options. Sram actually may or may not make it into the initial 17th release. Hopefully it will. There will not be any "Xport qaulity" gui for this release eaither. This release is more about functionality.

Chron Johnson · « **Reply #49 on:** April 07, 2006, 08:25:00 PM »

The 3DO emulator was a special Dreamcast-only port of that FreeDO project that some guys wanted to profit off back in 2003 I think...the Zinc reference was a renewal of our communal hopes that someone will build a nice stripped down Linux distro prepackaged with Zinc's Linux executable. I'm glad I caught your attention with the Atari 7800 reference, but I'm afraid this might not be open source either, but rather like the 3DO might be a special Dreamcast-only port. In any event, it was all meant to illustrate that porting ZSNES or any other things that haven't yet made it to the XBox are very worthwhile and that everyone's tastes are different. Sort of makes me freak out when someone tries to make the argument that all the work worth doing has been done. I'm going to look into this 7800 thing but I fear that those with more emulation knowledge than me will know off the top of their head why this is ridiculous...as of now, to me, it seems there should be no reason to prevent its emulation (other than the usual open source issues). God speed on the porting...there are plenty of sources for Jaguar as it is, but they've been found to run somewhat disappointingly on the XBox as of now. These tests were performed years ago though and if it interests you it's surely something to consider. Always the future must be considered if the XBox is to remain the premiere emulation console.

Chron Johnson · « **Reply #50 on:** April 07, 2006, 10:40:00 PM »

Source for an Atari 7800 emulator is even more available, current, and open than I'd hoped. http://www.mess.org/download.html Here we have a variety of source code options. This emulator emulates 9000 different things, among them the 7800. To emulate the 7800 on Dreamcast, a programmer ported the relevant portion of the emulator and its 7800-specific driver. Sounds like extra work would be required...but the satisfaction would be that much greater perhaps.

nes6502 · « **Reply #51 on:** April 09, 2006, 09:43:00 PM »

4-09-06 Update

Connected the Zsnes core to my new gui
Fixed the display. The picture now fills the entire screen and looks great.
Added player 1 input (all buttons mapped including U/D/L/R on the digital pad and the left analog stick)

TONS of speedups

All games run full speed (I think) 60/60 with 0 frameskip. Hopefully they will remain this way after I add sound.

Shynkz · « **Reply #52 on:** April 09, 2006, 10:51:00 PM »

screenshots soon maybe?

Sirmatto · « **Reply #53 on:** April 10, 2006, 01:05:00 AM »

This'll be like Christmas in April...which I guess would be Easter... But you get the point.

gonkle · « **Reply #54 on:** April 10, 2006, 11:00:00 AM »

did you integrate preview screenshots?
If not why not use the same format as xport does "gamename/01.png" ...

VampX · « **Reply #55 on:** April 10, 2006, 11:08:00 AM »

*prays for a user friendly xport like gui*

nes6502 · « **Reply #56 on:** April 10, 2006, 11:22:00 AM »

QUOTE

did you integrate preview screenshots?
If not why not use the same format as xport does "gamename/01.png" ...

If I did that then everyone would have to make all new screenshots. I would guess people would like to just copy the screenshots over from xSnes9x previews folder. I may be wrong.

The current setup is:

Roms (folder)
Previews (folder)
Media (folder)
default.xbe

Preview screenshot loading and display is working well. The rom list is on the left, the large screenshot preview is on the right.

QUOTE

*prays for a user friendly xport like gui*

Xport guis are great, but most of my time is being spent on the core features (sound, graphics, input). Graphics and input are done (mostly) and sound is next. I will be adding more to the gui later, but its more like xSnes9x's gui than xports.

Also, the version I release next Monday will be a functional release. i.e. you will be able to select a game and play it with sound. Anything else for this release is unlikely, but will come eventually.

On a last note, I hope people will not be too critical on the overall presentation. I'm not an artist, not good with photoshop (or very creative), and this is my first Xbox app. I'm stil learning as I go.

Zsnes has proven to be a difficult port. However, I'm really pleased at how its turned out so far ( I was playing Top Gear 3000 last and it was awesome).

I hope everyone likes it but also understands that this is a beta release

guybird · « **Reply #57 on:** April 10, 2006, 02:58:00 PM »

As you said its a bit early for requests BUT knowing that you are just starting this emulator up, and open to suggestions, let me ask this:

Would you be willing to support a Surreal/Mame type gui that would allow icon based rom selection (via box art or cart scans)? This would be implemented via a .dat/.ini file ala Surreal or FBA which would link the artwork files to their corresponding roms via the rom's CRC. This would NOT have to be done by you, as myself and others are working on this for other systems as well. This means that you would only have to write the code to display a .png file for a rom via an external file. So all future updates for the artwork could be done independently of your emulator, thereby "washing your hands" of it. Even if the icon selection is too much coding/work for you to do, the alternative of just displaying the screenshot as normal would do, although via the .dat/.ini file.

I know many people out there are looking at our xboxes as all encompassing retro gaming havens, and this would be the icing on the cake.

On a similar note, maybe asking Xport for his gui coding might not be out of the question? He's always said he'd never do SNES emulation, but this would be a good chance for him to help "polish" something he didn't want to touch. I am impressed by your seemingly quick progress, and hope all goes well with this port.

GogoAckman · « **Reply #58 on:** April 10, 2006, 03:33:00 PM »

QUOTE(guybird @ Apr 10 2006, 11:05 PM)

Would you be willing to support a Surreal/Mame type gui that would allow icon based rom selection (via box art or cart scans)? This would be implemented via a .dat/.ini file ala Surreal or FBA which would link the artwork files to their corresponding roms via the rom's CRC.

FBA doesn't use CRC but .zip name, wouldn't be too difficult to implant, png are natively supported by D3D, so again, I think it won't be a problem

.
Glad to see this project, even if as many users, I am happy with xsnes9x, one thing I would have liked to change is maybe the way the roms are listed, I don't know if it is possible, but displaying real name (like when you launch the game) would have been perfect, but maybe you need to extract the rom first to seek the real name in it.
Anyway, good luck with this project

.

nes6502 · « **Reply #59 on:** April 10, 2006, 03:51:00 PM »

QUOTE

Would you be willing to support a Surreal/Mame type gui that would allow icon based rom selection (via box art or cart scans)?

Do mean:
The emulator would scan the roms directory.
If it found a game called Star Fox (U)(!).zip it would look in the dat file to find that entry and get the corresponding "CRC0000000.png" string?
It would then display that png.

My code would have to scroll pictures instead of game name?

QUOTE

but displaying real name (like when you launch the game) would have been perfect, but maybe you need to extract the rom first to seek the real name in it.

I would have to look into it but maybe there is a quick way to get the archive content name without having to extract the entire file (that would be to slow).

Author Topic: Zsnexbox Coming Soon (Read 409 times)