GP32 Zsnes Gp32

[Compyfox]

After a longer testrage with different games on my GP32 I was thinking about a really serious issue: "why did the fans port SNES9x instead of ZSNES?!". I don't know for sure perhaps the SNES9x is more popular but it has major bugs and even though it's one of the best SNES emulators for Windows, it's still not the best.

That's why I'm writing this wish:
"Please port ZSNES to GP32"

You can find the Source Codes and more information about them here:
http://www.zsnes.com/index.php?page=files

The Reasons:
- Less CPU intensive like SNES9x (with my Windows 98 on my 600Mhz Laptop I had more CPU usage with SNES9x than with ZSNES)
- Better game support (like Secret of Mana, Chrono Trigger, games with the FX chip, layers are better interprated)
- overall a better emulator with small bugfixes that SNES9x doesn't have.

I'd really love to see that emulator on the GP32. Doesn't matter if it's in his old shape or something like the OpenSNES9x, but a lot of problems, especially speed and compatibility issues would surely vanish.

cheers.

 

[blipped4]

ZSNES Is 102% Better.For PC anyway.

 

[Azure]

I believe zsnes is a lot harder to port, something got to do with asm. I asked this same question a long time ago and everybody said that there would be too much busy-work porting zsnes compared to snes9xgp.

 

[centrlink]

Given the very real potential for opensnes to get to full speed (FS0) with sound (at least at 166 mhz) I don't hink anyone could be bothered with zsnes.

 

[angrypants]

I could be wrong about this since I have not taken a look at the source for either emu. However I have heard that zsnes was programed more in asm than snes9x. This is why it does not require as many system resources to run as snes9x. This also means that it will be much harder to port to any other system. Aparently even though snes9x is slower it has been written in a way that is much more portable. This is why you can get ports for xbox, dreamcast, gp32 and so on and you don't see as many ports of zsnes floating around for diffrent types of hardware.

 

[Tobriand]

You mention that zSnes is a lot faster. There is a reason for this, and it is that the emulator is full of x86 assembly language. This is no problem whatsoever in trying to port the emulator to another operating system that still uses an x86 chip, but the problem we have is that we've got an ARM chip - which has a different assemby instruction set.

Now, whilst to newbies that might not seem too big a problem, what it means in reality is that the *entire* program has to be re-written from a language that no-one is familiar with to another one that no-one is familiar with, both of which are very time consuming and hard to learn.

 

[Compyfox]

True that, but isn't it worth trying? Why always relying on "Windows" DirectX coded material if it's sloppy programmed that it jumps right onto your face? The SNES9x has major bugs that show themselves in games and makes them unplayable (like the grafic bugs with Chrono Trigger, Secret of Mana *wuah!*, etc). That's why I mentioned ZSNES, it has better compatibility.

I mean... other codes like "Doom" were also possible to rewrite (also x86 based code or at least assembler, afaik SCUMM too), why shouldn't it be possible with ZSNES too? Didn't say anything against the coders, but I simply don't understand it when I get thrown messages at me like "it's programmed in another languages, takes too much time" or "SNES9x is the best you can get".

If I could code, I'd take it on by myself. But unfortnately I can't, that's why I asked. Perhaps someone takes it on, but I have a feeling this could take very long.

 

[craigix]

The layers problems are fixed in opensnesv3, also zsnes is I believe full of asm. You can't just 'try' to port asm, it just plain does not work on another CPU, it has to be re-written.

Doom isn't x86 based nor is scumm, both are C based.

openSNES is getting a ASM core anyway, this will improve it a lot and most likely make it 'faster' than zsnes in comparison.

Just be patient

-Craig

www.gbax.com