My Thoughts On Some Emulators And Apps On Caanoo

[foleyjo]

I'm bored so I thought I would make a list of emulators and a few apps that I use on the Caanoo, say what I think of them and put some requests in for features.
Hopefully in reading this some clever developer guy will think "I can do that" and do just that.

First the ones that I would like to see that were available for the GP2X.
Handy - Atari Lynx emulator. Worked great on the GP2X but have yet to see it ported to the Caanoo
Odyssey 2 - Again a great emulator on the 2X but no Caanoo port
BeebEm - This works through Ginge but there is a sound delay. I think this may have been the same on the GP2X too.

Now in no particular order:
drsms - Works good but I tend to have problems with compatibility. I think this is because I have all the roms in one folder and have not seperated them out.

gp2xpectrum - Full speed Spectrum games. No issues with this one. Would like to see TV Out and/or USB pad support though

Gpsp - Not really a fan of the GBA but have found a few games on this emulator that work fine.

MAME - I'm guessing like most people the only request I have with this is more compatible roms and some extra speed. Apart from that it's a great emulator but I do have one problem. When I try to assign new controls I can't work out how to delete the old controls. So if I change Fire to the B button it becomes A and B

OhBoy- It's on my caanoo but I havent used it much. It worked fine when I did though.

PSX Rearmed - I have found games work on this that don't even work on the PSP. It's great. I get the best performance when I disable SMC checks. Gets rid of memory cards but theres a save state option. No requests other than keep up the good work.

Picodrive - Again a fantastic emulator. Full speed Megadrive and mega cd games without resorting to overclocking. I would like to see the 32X games get more speed and 32X cd games work. I think it would benefit from a TV Out mode too.

PSnes - Most games are perfect. Some are too slow but it's the minority. Just a bit more speed and compatibility needed for this one and a TV out mode

ScummVM - It would be nice to have the ability to view image files during game. So you can look at maps and code books without having to carry them in your back pocket.

Vectex - Wheres the speech? I was looking forward to heading "EEK HELP SPIKE" "OH NO MOLLY"

UAE4All - This can be good on some games with a frameskip of 2 (Superfrog) but rubbish for other games. To be honest it needs a lot of work.
- More graphic modes : Some games don't display images correctly or at all
- More compatibility + Speed : I find a lot of games don't work or run too slow.
- Better sound sync : Try playing It came from the desert. The video ends before the sounds.
- Save states : It's good to be able to stop playing and come back later to the same point.
- Keyboard mapping: There is an option to use X to jump but it doesn't work.
- USB Support : TV Out works so why not an option to add a 2nd player.

Vice 64 - I have seen games run at full speed with no frameskip on this. But they are the ones with not so good graphics and little sound/music. This really needs a speed boost. A new front end would be nice too because the one it has just feels old. I've also noticed some of the options either don't work
or work but the options doesn't change. I'd also like to see save states and TV out. Keymapping would be a bonus too for games like last ninja wher you needed to press the F keys to change weapons

DosBox - Havent really done much with this. The problem is you have to pick the settings outside the emulator. No room for error. If you go wrong it's a hassle to set things right. A nice front end could allow you to change the options on the fly.

So thats the emulators. I thought I would finish it off with a few utilities

PDFV - I like to use this to read comic books in pdf format but I don't like the long delay between pages and find scrolling from left to right to be slow. Any chance this could be sped up?

Ginge - If the emulators that don't work can't be ported, then how about making Ginge more compatible with them?

Arora - Great for browsing but... It doesn't seem to save any favorites or passwords. I also find it does not allow sending information on some forms. (facebook login pages for example. You have to send in text format) Would be nice to see Flash and Java support, and if it gets this how about an option to assign keys to buttons to play some flash games like QWOP.

So there are my opinions on the emulators. If anyone has any other suggestions, comments or is going to look into implimenting any that please let everyone know.


***I would like to say that I appreciate all the hard work that has gone into these apps and emulators and would like to thank everyone who has contributed to get them this far.
This post is not inteded as a critisism of your hardwork it is an attempt to get someone to look at adding the features that are still needed.

 

[DJRoby4]

Well, sadly, the Openconsole scene is now on the Pandora and on Android. I think Pandora is the best but I have no money and android is just.... bad! Well... I would like to see the caanoo scene as it was before but I think the emulators won't be fixed... :S

 

[RP912]

Its sad that the caanoo scene seems kinda dead because of pandora and android. Its such an amazing handheld console with alot of potential isn't getting much recognition from the homebrew scene.

 

[DJRoby4]

Its sad that the caanoo scene seems kinda dead because of pandora and android. Its such an amazing handheld console with alot of potential isn't getting much recognition from the homebrew scene.

+1. Sad +1 D:

 

[sebt3]

Its sad that the caanoo scene seems kinda dead because of pandora and android.

The caanoo have the same hardware as the wiz which was released 2 years before the caanoo. So it does have an hardware which is (at least) 4 years late in a market where everything is obsolete in less than 6 months. At the same time they made sure most wont see the caanoo as an upgrade to the wiz, so most did not buy the new device, including developpers !
Also, while using the same hardware GPH though it was smart to make it binary incompatible with the wiz making sure it started with an empty game library.
That's just the tip of the iceberg when it come to GPH errors with the caanoo (I'm not counting funGP, the screen bezel, the stick, speakers etc etc).

The caanoo scene doesnt look as it should not because the pissdora nor android but because GPH sucks. if the caanoo was indeed a real upgrade to the wiz, then this scene would be way more healthy...

 

[crow_riot]

i also need to add, that the interest in original homebrew is rather low from the user side.
look at the downloads on the openhandhelds pages, there are about five homebrew games in the top downloads. all the rest is emulation related.
so for me this is a major drag-down to continue doing something specifically for the caanoo.
even the amount of downloads is rather bad, 7000 downloads for the pocketsnes emu? this should give an idea how much caanoo's are in the wild - no wonder there is not much going on

 

[DJRoby4]

Its sad that the caanoo scene seems kinda dead because of pandora and android.

The caanoo have the same hardware as the wiz which was released 2 years before the caanoo. So it does have an hardware which is (at least) 4 years late in a market where everything is obsolete in less than 6 months. At the same time they made sure most wont see the caanoo as an upgrade to the wiz, so most did not buy the new device, including developpers !
Also, while using the same hardware GPH though it was smart to make it binary incompatible with the wiz making sure it started with an empty game library.
That's just the tip of the iceberg when it come to GPH errors with the caanoo (I'm not counting funGP, the screen bezel, the stick, speakers etc etc).

The caanoo scene doesnt look as it should not because the pissdora nor android but because GPH sucks. if the caanoo was indeed a real upgrade to the wiz, then this scene would be way more healthy...

This is why I hate GPH but even in the hardware is old it can make a lot more than the actual emus. Think about vice. More laggy tha pcsx rearmed! D:

 

[foleyjo]

It's true there is not much happening on the caanoo scene, however there are still some development going on. In my other thread you can see some of the homebrew projects being worked on and they are all looking good and now and then we see an emulator with an update.

The intention of this thread was too encourage devs, looking for something to do, some ideas.
They may not want to spend time with compatibility and speed issues however they may be able to change some control settings add TV Out or change the menus on some of the emulators with little effort (not because it's easy to do but because they are really good at what they do (A bit of butt kissing always helps the cause)).

With the 3 GP2X emulator I mentioned it might just be a simple case of them recompiling the source code. I don't know because I can't even make an app to say hello world on my caanoo

 

[Akabei]

i also need to add, that the interest in original homebrew is rather low from the user side.
look at the downloads on the openhandhelds pages, there are about five homebrew games in the top downloads. all the rest is emulation related.
so for me this is a major drag-down to continue doing something specifically for the caanoo.

To take a look at openhandhelds download page doesn't always help.
I guess Paperwars would be a Top 10 title there, but you never uploaded it(Audiorace just needs a few more downloads to enter). Not every title(except 5) listed in the most downloads frame is an emulator, there are some essential apps, adapted games and even firmware updates. That's hard to compete against. btw: Take a look at the gp2x and wiz most downloaded titles and you'll see, that there's no big difference. Even the brillant Cave Story just made it into the list.

even the amount of downloads is rather bad, 7000 downloads for the pocketsnes emu? this should give an idea how much caanoo's are in the wild - no wonder there is not much going on

Plus 3800 downloads of the newer 7.2 version, available for download before (in this forum), which 'stole' a lot of openhandhelds' downloads

 

[sebt3]

With the 3 GP2X emulator I mentioned it might just be a simple case of them recompiling the source code.

If that was the case it would be done by now

 

[foleyjo]

With the 3 GP2X emulator I mentioned it might just be a simple case of them recompiling the source code.

If that was the case it would be done by now

Maybe but maybe no-one has bothered trying.
I think you're right though.

I also think that the caanoo needs a new boost of life. It's very cheap now and like me there are quite a few newcommers to the scene this year. I hope some of them are developers