GBA emulators in production?

[bannanapie]

Okay, we all know GP32 is superior to GBA in every way right? From sound down to the processor clock speed. So it's probably true that GP32 can at least decently emulate GBA right? Well someone tell me if I'm right or wrong..Also are there any GBA emulators in production currently? Or any GBA emulators that'll be started soon? I'd like to know, and I believe many others would like to know as well.

 

[bannanapie]

btw, have you all heard about the backlight in production that'll be availiable in a month or so? Post your thoughts about that as well.

 

[DuderJace]

The guy who wrote the GP32 Divx player is working on one at the moment I've heard. He's coding a genesis/megadrive emulator too. He's a bit good really I think he did the gameboy one as well. DuderJace

 

[Hokutoy]

http://www.gp32news.com/?lang=en&page_rec=10

 

[DuderJace]

I think it should be a good speed , because the processors both use the same instruction set, it would just need memory mapping and display stuff. Don't know if the gba has any custom chips. maybe sprite scaling/mode 7. Not sure.

 

[esoteric_]

Well, as far as I know the one major optimization, if done correctly by a good programmer, is that the architectures are very similar.

Unfortunately the GBA has a lot of custom hardware for sprite scaling, mode 7-style graphics, etc. This would all have to be done in software, and not only that.. in hardware without floating point support. This would be the biggest problem to overcome.

The ability of the GP32 to emulate a GBA is still up in the air. My personal, mostly uninformed, opinion is that it MAY be possible, but only if the coder is one of the best that we have. If a working GBA emulator is produced, I think it likely that it would only run 100% without sound or with major inhibitors on what games could be run (ie: games that don't use the mode-7 style chip).

(Others will disagree and say that it's flat out not possible

Time will tell.

 

[timthepig]

I understand where your coming from...BUT

Can we have comments from the real programmers themselves - surely they have the knowledge to diverge on programming emulators/hardware of the gp32.

It just seems everyone is so opinionated about whether the gp32 can or cannot emulator certain systems -- ...Okay its obvious that we won;t be seeing ps2 emulators etc - but my point is --how are you so sure about not having a GBA fully working with 100% sound. Surely a emulator programmer has a more valid opinion.

Too much speculation is seen on these pages -- whether the GBA can be emulated - If any of the experienced programmers could make a reasonable judgement then I'm listening.

I understand that Mode 7\hardware will need to be emulated in software -- but just to simply speculate that this cannot be done with fully sound just kinda destroys all that I've heard??

So...the truth anyone - someone with the expertise?

 

[stolen1]

heya!
i think there is another problem about gba emulation, the gp32 itself has 8mb ram and most newer gba roms g up to 16mb (for example final fantasy tactics advance). so imagine you want to play a rom you have to load it into the ram but the 16mb doesn't fit the 8mb ram, should be clear to everyone , and apart from that loading from the smc itself is really slow, so how should the gp32 be able to play those games in a decent speed, apart from all core optimations and assembler codings and so on, just as a theoretical thought.
i hope it is clear what i mean, if anyone got an idea let me know
stolen1

 

[craigix]

Its quite true, the GP32 could not play games over 8MB unless it was running some kind of memory compression routine (a bit like zipped files).

Unless gamepark release a gp64

-Craig

www.gbax.com

 

[bannanapie]

Is it even possible to run 8 meg GBA games?

 

[Shrike]

i thought someone said one had been made and the person who programmed refused to release it because of the damage it could cause to ninty and also bring a lawsuit down on them

 

[stolen1]

hmm i dunno, but what about reading zip files, i dunno hwo far this is possible, but zip files are below the 8mb border (same example again the ffta zip is about 5mb ) if the gba emu could use the compression rate somehow, read the zip files into memroy and realtime decompress the data or something heh that would be maybe a workaround but i don't know how far this is possible..
stolen1

 

[dan miracle]

i thought someone said one had been made and the person who programmed refused to release it because of the damage it could cause to ninty and also bring a lawsuit down on them

sounds like what happened to UltraHLE...i wouldn't be surprised if this were true