Nintendo Ds Technical Hurdles?

[lubidog]

The DS has for me been the best handheld console I have known! So many great games...

And why would anyone want an emulator? Just get a DS and an R4 and play them as they are truly meant to be played. If you really must be a pirate.....

 

[Tobriand]

Just a note: Yes there was an older topic, but talk about using the search function is most definitely off topic by this stage. No more please .

DS emulation on Pandora is going to be an interesting space to watch. I think we shall simply have to see what happens, as Exophase says, after release.

 

[Oncer]

Well, the DS has two screens where the Pandora has only one. That seems like a conceptional problem to me. Even if there was fullspeed emulation, would it be usable?

 

[Tobriand]

Depends. The solutions to that come in several fashions.

1) Display two screens side by side, or vertically.
Advantages: Both screens, and, if vertical, approximately the right size too.
Disadvantages: They'll either be postage stamps, or awkward to use.

2) Display both screens, with one of them taking up most of the Pandora's screen, and the other scaled to be small. The main focus can be switched as and when needed.
Advantages: Both screens are displayed, and are fairly convenient.
Disadvantages: Much detail lost on the smaller sceen. Some games really do make good use of both screens at the same time, and these become hard to play.

3) Only display one screen, options to switch between them.
Advantages: The screen displayed can make the most of the space available on the Pandora. Possibly speed advantages by ignoring writes to one of the DS Framebuffers by the game unless that screen is active (could be wrong about that - think there might be problems, depending on how the screen is updated)
Disadvantages: You only see one screen at any one time. If any information is put to the hidden screen that the player needs, they will miss it.

Personally, I like the idea of 2), especially if it involves a flashy transition between which screen is small and which is large (I think it could look very cool indeed, and probably provides for best usability too), but others may prefer either of the other two options. The extra screen is definately an issue, though.

 

[plopperz]

Well, the DS has two screens where the Pandora has only one. That seems like a conceptional problem to me. Even if there was fullspeed emulation, would it be usable?

Well you could do it like the PSP's (very shitty) DS emulator, and have one small screen beside a normal sized one...or you could split the screen in half horizontally....or you could split it vertically....or, for the games that only use one screen at a time (which is most of them) you could have a button that switches between them....or you could use TV out and use the TV as the top screen and the Pandora's as the bottom.

You see, there are plenty of ways to do it

 

[TaG]

or you could use TV out and use the TV as the top screen and the Pandora's as the bottom.
Is that possible? I thought I'd read that it wasn't. Very happy to be corrected though.

 

[Tobriand]

It wouldn't be possible on the GP2x's TV-out. The Pandora, however, has independent output for screen and TV-out, so unless there are bandwidth issues with writing a lot of extra framebuffer (of course, there may be), split-screen via TV out ought to be possible.

As I understand it anyway.

 

[Firefox]

I've just cut a piece of card to the size of a DS screen (assuming DS lite screens are the same size as the original DS's screens?) and tried placing it on the Pandora's screen.

If you could stand to turn the Pandora sideways ninety degrees you could fit two DS screens on it with room to spare between/above/below them.

If you didn't turn the Pandora and could stand the emulated DS screens being about 2/3 the width and height of real DS screens then you could fit them side-by-side or above each other. In fact, you'd then have room for four emulated DS screens on the Pandora's screen.

I think Tobriand's idea of one full-size screen and one shrunken (half-size) screen may have some mileage in it - perhaps it would be tolerable to have two screens overlapping slightly at one corner, then the shrunken screen could be bigger?

(Not that I'd be first in the queue to work on a DS emulator.)

 

[quadomatic]

I've just cut a piece of card to the size of a DS screen (assuming DS lite screens are the same size as the original DS's screens?) and tried placing it on the Pandora's screen.

If you could stand to turn the Pandora sideways ninety degrees you could fit two DS screens on it with room to spare between/above/below them.

If you didn't turn the Pandora and could stand the emulated DS screens being about 2/3 the width and height of real DS screens then you could fit them side-by-side or above each other. In fact, you'd then have room for four emulated DS screens on the Pandora's screen.

I think Tobriand's idea of one full-size screen and one shrunken (half-size) screen may have some mileage in it - perhaps it would be tolerable to have two screens overlapping slightly at one corner, then the shrunken screen could be bigger?

(Not that I'd be first in the queue to work on a DS emulator.)

Hmmm...turning the Pandora on its side probably would be very problematic for controls, unless you were using a gamepad. I think the Side by Side option would be realistic.

 

[TaG]

Not that I'd be first in the queue to work on a DS emulator.
Oh Go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, GO ON!





(please?)

 

[Firefox]

Oh Go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, GO ON!

 

[adsharma23]

it should probably be different for every game
in some games the touchscreen is vital and even more important than the main screen (possibly NDS best game The Legend of Zelda The Phantom Hourglass) but in others the main screen is more important
also it will be a matter of preference for the screens orientation to fit both screens
but i'm just dreaming lets first wait for someone to actually start developing

 

[Vince2501]

I think displaying both screens side by side could work, the LCD seems wide enough to handle both at the same time.

 

[fusion_power]

I've just cut a piece of card to the size of a DS screen (assuming DS lite screens are the same size as the original DS's screens?) and tried placing it on the Pandora's screen.

If you could stand to turn the Pandora sideways ninety degrees you could fit two DS screens on it with room to spare between/above/below them.

If you didn't turn the Pandora and could stand the emulated DS screens being about 2/3 the width and height of real DS screens then you could fit them side-by-side or above each other. In fact, you'd then have room for four emulated DS screens on the Pandora's screen.

I think Tobriand's idea of one full-size screen and one shrunken (half-size) screen may have some mileage in it - perhaps it would be tolerable to have two screens overlapping slightly at one corner, then the shrunken screen could be bigger?

(Not that I'd be first in the queue to work on a DS emulator.)

A dynamic screen management would be awesome. Drag and drop the Screens like windows onto the LCD, Zoom/resize 'em how you like it, pull one screen over the other or put one screen by side while zooming the other screen to Full LCD Size etc... ^^ Maybe the Pandora can do Hardware Zoom features in Realtime?
It would feel like these Picture/Photo handling onto the IPhone Minus the Multitouch of course. maybe not while the emulated DS Game is running but even with moving during a pause Mode it would be a useful feature.

 

[efegea]

A dynamic screen management would be awesome. Drag and drop the Screens like windows onto the LCD, Zoom/resize 'em how you like it, pull one screen over the other or put one screen by side while zooming the other screen to Full LCD Size etc... ^^ Maybe the Pandora can do Hardware Zoom features in Realtime?
It would feel like these Picture/Photo handling onto the IPhone Minus the Multitouch of course. maybe not while the emulated DS Game is running but even with moving during a pause Mode it would be a useful feature.

It should if opengl is used as renderer

 

[Tobriand]

The other interesting thing in terms of side by side screens would be having a bar down the middle of the screen that, when dragged, would set the central point between them, and resize accordingly.

Personally, I'm still in favour of big screen/little screen, possibly with some overlap, though.

 

[quadomatic]

The other interesting thing in terms of side by side screens would be having a bar down the middle of the screen that, when dragged, would set the central point between them, and resize accordingly.

Personally, I'm still in favour of big screen/little screen, possibly with some overlap, though.

The trouble I see with that is because the little screen (assuming it would probably be the lower screen) is needed for touch screen input, and you would probably need to get the most size for that. Imagine trying to play Osu Tatake Ouendan or Elite Beat Agents on a really small "touch screen" space.

 

[God Ginrai]

The other interesting thing in terms of side by side screens would be having a bar down the middle of the screen that, when dragged, would set the central point between them, and resize accordingly.

Personally, I'm still in favour of big screen/little screen, possibly with some overlap, though.

I'm in favor of all 3 choices you mentioned and the TV-out choice all being available, and can be set by game. That way you could use the most advantageous layout for each game.

-God Ginrai

 

[Oncer]

QUOTE

2) Display both screens, with one of them taking up most of the Pandora's screen, and the other scaled to be small. The main focus can be switched as and when needed.
Advantages: Both screens are displayed, and are fairly convenient.
Disadvantages: Much detail lost on the smaller sceen. Some games really do make good use of both screens at the same time, and these become hard to play.

Well, I didn't think of that before. This solution would make sense for most of the games I think.