Digital Foundry Retro Discussion [2016 - 2017]

[Cyan]

Yeah, that one's been around for a while. Still early stages for much of what it supports, and etc. It's in the "Lots of stuff will work, lots won't" stage of emulation development.

The compatibility List is quite nice and includes the Carmageddon, Resident Evil 2, Tomb Raiders, Quake 1 and 2, Unreal, Final Fantasy 7 and so on. You can consult the emu website for more info.

https://pcem-emulator.co.uk/index.html

There is also a XT bios it can use. My crappy Trident VGA card of the time is also emulated!! It had bad drivers that crushed the OS a lot -never knew of better drivers, no internet then for me, September 1995, first PC, first OS (Win95)-, and my Trident drivers floppy had a virus along with those dysfunctional drivers.

Also, a friend had an Operation Wolf floppy that he shared with me, and it also had a virus. But hey, I used both floppys the same knowing the had virus, I was a survivor.

Thankfully the Monster 3D came along and 3D graphics looked good but my desktop graphics were very soulless.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Out of curiosity, how do they emulate those old 3d accelerators? I guess most modern CPUs should be able to do away with software emulation nowadays.

 

[Cyan]

Out of curiosity, how do they emulate those old 3d accelerators? I guess most modern CPUs should be able to do away with software emulation nowadays.

that's a good question, actually. Glide cards are legendary and pretty known, but the more obscure hardware like my mediocre Trident and it's floppy contaminated with a virus, is also in the list.

 

[Cyan]

lots of memories...how fun it was the campaign and the multiplayer with bots...
First Voodoo2 videos. The v12 version might come out in January-February and will probably have full voodoo2 support.

There is an experimental version of PCem, 86box, that runs the emulation of the Riva TNT and I think that it also supports the 440fx chipset (the one of the pentium II).
The day that we get support and good emulation for a 350MHz pentium II and the voodoo2 then the emulator is going to beat the games of the time.

 

[Reznor007]

MAME has supported 3dfx emulation for some time now, although it's not hooked up to the generic PC drivers yet. It's used for arcade hardware such as NFL Blitz, Gauntlet Legends, Golden Tee Fore!, and several others.

https://github.com/mamedev/mame/blob/master/src/devices/video/voodoo.cpp

 

[Cyan]

MAME has supported 3dfx emulation for some time now, although it's not hooked up to the generic PC drivers yet. It's used for arcade hardware such as NFL Blitz, Gauntlet Legends, Golden Tee Fore!, and several others.

https://github.com/mamedev/mame/blob/master/src/devices/video/voodoo.cpp

Now that you mention MAME, someone I admire a lot is a MAME expert and completed more than 1000 Arcade games with a single credit -he has a youtube channel where he uploads a couple of videos every week from games he has beaten with 1cc, he is at episode 544, he has enough videos to keep uploading 1cc heroic deeds for about 4 or 5 years-, and I learnt a lot about MAME from him, but he barely played 3D games using MAME, because it works perfectly for most classic 2D games but when it comes to 3D games it's an entirely different matter and you need to find alternatives.

So those games you list come out as a surprise. It's also surprising how much HD space they need for a MAME game, especially Gauntlet Legends.

That channel is my favourite youtube channel, actually, because the guy has a lot of friends, and beats arcade games cooperatively in some cases, ALWAYS with a single credit. Some of those videos are sooooo good, specially when a game is beaten squeaking through -with the last life or just a little slice of life-.Heroic stuff in me cases.

It is even more praiseworthy if you take into account that he has a family and to beat some games he had to go through sweat and tears, and I mean literally..

 

[Reznor007]

Gauntlet Legends isn't too big, it's just under 1GB. Some of that is because it has a fair bit of FMV. But those games in particular actually used hard drives in the real machine, so MAME uses a drive image of the original drive compressed with their own format called CHD.

Gradius4 might be a good target for him. It's another 3dfx using arcade, but it's classic 2D gameplay.

 

[Cyan]

Gauntlet Legends isn't too big, it's just under 1GB. Some of that is because it has a fair bit of FMV. But those games in particular actually used hard drives in the real machine, so MAME uses a drive image of the original drive compressed with their own format called CHD.

Gradius4 might be a good target for him. It's another 3dfx using arcade, but it's classic 2D gameplay.

I've downloaded the mame rom already. It's obvious it has 3D acceleration but smartly keeps 2d gameplay.

Time for a timeless classic, new DF Retro feature, the groundbreaking Shadow of the Colossus:

 

[Cyan]

next stop is Halo: Combat Evolved as told in the very last seconds of the Shadow of the Colossus video, darn, that Halo music gets to me every time. Can't wait to watch that episode as I actually played that game quite a lot!! -not as much as Halo 2 though, which was my first Halo game-

 

[AlNom]

They ought to contact @HTupolev for HaloCE assistance.

 

[Cyan]

They ought to contact @HTupolev for HaloCE assistance.

haha, that's an excellent point, actually! I can quite remember the discussions on the matter with him, and it was always interesting stuff --I saw a few tricks too, that were unknown to me (and most people) like flying from a tower to another tower and so on using the game's physics.

 

[HTupolev]

Heh, I was wondering if Halo was due to come up. A lot of people have requested it, and Linneman clearly has some interest in the game.

 

[Davros]

@Cyan
you dont need to use pcem if you want to play unreal, windows 10 will do just fine

 

[Cyan]

@Cyan
you dont need to use pcem if you want to play unreal, windows 10 will do just fine

Unreal...I didn't check if you can get it at GoG. For games like one of my favourites ever, Need for Speed 3 Hot Pursuit, I don't see a better solution.

 

[Cyan]

Heh, I was wondering if Halo was due to come up. A lot of people have requested it, and Linneman clearly has some interest in the game.

I think contacting you would be the sensible thing to do.

on another note, Halo Theme Song sang by a guy, quite impressive.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BOVvOkcjRjX/

 

[Cyan]

for those playing it thoroughly these days....

 

[Clukos]

This is a fantastic DF retro

 

[Newguy]

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2017-df-retro-halo-the-console-shooter-evolved

Article to go with it

 

[Cyan]

This is a fantastic DF retro

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2017-df-retro-halo-the-console-shooter-evolved

Article to go with it

it gave me goosebumps....

 

[cheapchips]

There's still something special about Halo's detail textures. Or at least my memory of them. :smile2:

Few games feel like they gain detail if you try and get up close to things.