Hey guys, just updated a few more of the 'S' games.
Great work today everyone, the list is really shaping up and we are getting some very nice settings happening thanks to some invaluable collaboration!
I just thought I'd write a bit of a guide for finding the best settings for a game. Now this is just a guide, and is not intended to be the only or the best way of testing a rom, but might help people find the best settings for each game easier.
Step 1. Get the rom to run. If a rom wont open at all with the default settings in 1964, these are the things I would try, and in this order:
- Set sound to Basic Audio ( I can't believe how many games this fixes
)
- Try PJ64 (with either Jttl or Basic audio)
- Try Rice 5.10, then 5.31, then Ultra HLE (maybe I haven't seen this work for many games)
- Check your rom, make sure it is the right size in MB and (U) (!)
Step 2. Get the game to run full speed. For me this is the most important part of the settings, if a game is too slow it is pretty much unplayable )
If the game doesn't seem to run at full speed with default settings in 1964, these are some things to try.
- Take notice of 'how' the games is slowing down. Is it slow all the time, or just when a 3d scene is being rendered? Does it slow down more where there are more things on the screen, or when some sounds are being played? When you change a setting observe how it changes and by how much.
- If it is slow all the time, try setting to Basic Audio (again i cant believe how many games this fixes)
- If it is only slow when there are lots of things being rendered, try Rice 5.10
- Check the amount of available ram while a relatively complex 3d scene is being rendered, if there is more than 4 MB available all of the time, then you have some spare ram and can add that amount of ram to the settings. So if you have 8MB free, you have 4MB to work with.
- Up the Dynarec memory by however much free ram you have, to around 12MB should be enough to notice a difference.
- Up the Video Memory to 8MB, see if that helps at all.
- Try PJ64, LLE RSP and other combinations and pay close attention to the differences they make to the speed of the game.
Step 3. Fix Graphical Glitches.Pay close attention to the graphics in a game and look for any graphical glitches. Certain glitches occur commonly with certain video plugins, and so can make the choice of the best video plugin easier. Such as:
- Rice 5.60 doesn't render 'fog', use Rice 5.10 or 5.31 (or maybe Rice 6.11) to render fog.
If objects in the distance seem to be jumping out at you, like in a driving game where trees and houses appear the the distance, then you are probably using Rice 5.60 and should try rice 5.10 or 5.31
- Rice 5.10 sometimes doesn't render 2d images properly, Rice 5.31 is often better, or Rice 5.61 is even better if the game doesn't use fog (Rice 6.11 is worth a try too)
I find that experimentation and close attention to detail is best here. Sometimes one video plugin will fix one glitch and produce another, which is common with Rice 5.60 because it renders 2D images better, but then messes up the distance fog, which in many games is essential. Rice 6.11 does render fog but has random glitches and freezes in some games, but is still worth a try if nothing else is working.
- Switching between 1964 and PJ64 and paying attention to the different way things are rendered should also help to eliminate graphics glitches.
- Also, just as a note, Rice 5.10 seems to give a much faster FPS than Rice 5.31, but it is rarely noticeable. I sometimes find that Rice 5.31 seems to be smoother than Rice 5.10, while having a lower FPS. So i think just 'going by feel' of how fast the game is, rather than relying on FPS is the way to go
Step 4. Fix Audio glitchesPay close attention to the sound. Is it crackly, like a popping and crumpling sound? Is it stuttering? Or are some sounds ok but not others?
- If you are using Jttl (Default), try switching to Basic Audio, or LLE RSP (I know, this is the first thing to try for everything
)
If it sounds better with either Basic Audio or LLE RSP, make sure you observe the overall speed of the game after each change because the audio plugin can have a great effect on the game speed. As long as the audio plugin doesn't slow down the game, then it's an improvement
- If you are using Basic Audio for normal speed or stability, and you are getting crackly sound, try switching to PJ64.
Basic Audio seems to produce crackly sound with 1964 sometimes, and since we often need it to make the game run at full speed, we need to try a different emulator. So try PJ64.
- If the sound is stuttering, sometimes increasing the Dynarec memory sometimes helps, make sure you have enough free ram to increase it without crashing though (see video settings above)
The stuttering is sometimes caused by the sound 'repeating itself' to slow down to match the slower speed of the game. If you can speed the game up with more Dynarec memory, then this can help fix stuttering sound.
The rest is pretty much up to experimentation and personal preference. I personally would rather have a game that has some slight audio crackling, than one with a constant audio stuttering.
And that's pretty much all there is to it
Wow this turned out to be a much more in-depth guide than I had expected! Oh well, I have been meaning to post up some of these pointers at some stage, so it's good to have them all in one place.
If anyone else has any suggestions about finding the best settings then please feel free to post them up here.
Also, if anyone has any comments or critique's of this method then I am always open to friendly suggestion
- Monkeys
Author
Topic: Surreal 64 B5.1 Ce Compatibility And Settings List (Read 2466 times)