Friday, August 06, 2004
Mame is a peculiar emulator. Frustrating even.They keep 'improving' it, to make it closer and closer to the original arcade hardware it emulates, but each time they do, it seems to become slower, and less compatible with the game roms that are out there.
So technically they're right, as the roms only stop working coz they're not dumped or ripped in a truly authentic structure, or something, and need nothing but a simple redump, but when most of the roms you find on the web are for older versions of mame and you have to really hunt to find ones that work, these 'improvemnts' become nothing more than a pain in the arse.
On the plus side, I can now play R-Type, R-Type II and best of all, R-Type Leo. All classic and truly brilliant sideways scolling, totally mental, arcade shootemups.
Also on the emulator front... last week I downloaded a Sega Saturn emulator, something I've been waiting for for a long time. The Saturn being a very complex piece of hardware, it's taken a long time for any emulator to even 'claim' the ability to run commercial games software.
So, having got the emulator and OS rom file, it's taken around a week to find a game image I wanted to try on it... ie, not huge, and reputedly a decent game... in this case Radiant Silvergun, a legendary shootemup.
After much messing around converting the file into a useable format, guess what? It didn't run.
Bastard!
Think I'll give up on Saturn emulation for now. What with the size of the files, the complexities of file conversion and unreliablity of the emulator, it's just not worth the effort.
Back in the real world for a moment, *shudder* the trip to Derby is indeed on. My friend phoned me last night... waking me up in the process, and asked if I was still up for the trip. It was kinda funny, coz she was asking if I was gonna be up in the morning, and I said I was... so she (she knows me well) asked if that meant I was gonna be up coz I'd been up all night or if I was gonna get some sleep before then.
"I was sleeping... remember?"
I had to chuckle.
Great thunder storm last night... pity I slept through most of it. I was vaguely aware of some very loud crashes and booms very nearby as I drifted back to sleep, which made for some interesting dreams.
It must've been a good one, coz when I got up an hour or so ago, my laptop was off, meaning the power must've been out for a while. I never turn the laptop off unless I'm going out for some time.
Pity I missed it, but... sleep is good :-)
Steve 1:45 AM [+]
Comments:
Post a Comment
The Benway Empire |
 |