Homebrew New Megadrive/genesis emulator for the DS

FAST6191 · Jun 7, 2006

When I first heard that the megadrive had been emulated on the DS my heard skipped a few beats or depending upon which ex you spoke to my heart may have in fact starting beating in the first place.
I knew it was a quick and dirty port but that did not matter.

Now a new one has arrived:
http://forum.gbadev.org/viewtopic.php?p=86430#86430

Update new version adds save support and a few gui enhancements:
http://cryptosystem.org/projects/nds/picodriveds-0.1.3/

GBADev post said:
Ported this over the weekend, I think it's in a state now where some people will be able to use it. Initial reports are that it has issues running on CF-based carts, I only have a SuperCard SD to test with so I haven't been able to debug it on CF to see what's going on.

Built against SaTa's modified FAT libraries from REIN (SD users probably want this):
http://www.cryptosystem.org/projects/nds/picodriveds.nds
http://www.cryptosystem.org/projects/nds/picodriveds.nds.gba

Built against chishm's FAT libraries with just CF enabled:
http://www.cryptosystem.org/projects/nds/picodriveds-cf.nds
http://www.cryptosystem.org/projects/nds/p...veds-cf.nds.gba

Copy it to your media, then copy over the Genesis ROMs you want to play (it should be able to play ROMs with .BIN, .GEN, and .SMD extensions). There's no sound, but since it uses the Cyclone 68k core which is optimized for ARM it runs well for the most part. Scaling is done in-software right now so the downscale isn't as fast or good as it could be. There's no double buffering yet so you might see tearing on some games. Y/B/A are A/B/C.

Screenshots:
http://www.cryptosystem.org/projects/nds/p...iveds-0.1-1.jpg
http://www.cryptosystem.org/projects/nds/p...iveds-0.1-2.jpg
http://www.cryptosystem.org/projects/nds/p...iveds-0.1-3.jpg
http://www.cryptosystem.org/projects/nds/p...iveds-0.1-4.jpg

Video:
http://www.cryptosystem.org/projects/nds/spaceharrier2.wmv

I tested it on an EZ4 but it did not work (.ds or .ds.gba extensions).
The intial posts on GBADev say it is quite good and compatibility is not bad, hopefully it will be made open source and a few more people can contribute.

Oh and anyone looking for a good megadrive (and other sega systems) emulator on the PC that works on XP check out:
http://www.eidolons-inn.net/tiki-index.php?page=Kega

alexp2_ad · Jun 7, 2006

Wow, nice! I'm gonna give this one a try asap.

Shame about the sound, but if games are working well now... sound in a future release seems entirely possible.

teh_raf3 · Jun 7, 2006

Looks great, hope the sound will be emulated soon ^^

Opium · Jun 7, 2006

looking good so far

Great work by the author

lumo · Jun 7, 2006

Ive been waiting for someone to port this over. picodrive worked so well on ppc and on s60 phones, sounds even worked on those so im sure eventually the sound code will be optimised for the DS hardware.
Also, it plays great, just tried sonic 3 and gunstar heroes, both run slightly slower than normal, but not enough to damage the gameplay

wohoo · Jun 7, 2006

meh.. emulator without sound... very funny... it's not even fun ;P
BUT, if they get the sound working this emulator may be something good, and defenetly something to get ;D but for now... i have to be happy with the good old NES games ^^

The_Cylon_Surfer · Jun 7, 2006

YEEEEHAAA AT LAST !!!! I've been waiting for this for a long time. I hear that there may be an issue for people using CF cards ? ...anyone tried this on a SuperCard CF? i hope it works !!! cant wait to give this emu a try ...i just hope the author continues to update - i have been waiting for genesis emulation on the DS for ages.

The Teej · Jun 7, 2006

Has anybody got any pictures of this running on a DSL?

smashing · Jun 7, 2006

Can't wait to see the familar "All your base are belong to us" (Zero Wing, 1989) to show up on the DS.

FAST6191 · Jun 7, 2006

@woohoo it is only the first public release give it time, I can not see how sound is that vital for playing: except perhaps the death sounds of the first boss in Streets of Rage.
My understanding of megadrive hardware is fairly limited but I should imagine sound should not be far off seen as it already has some code in that area and the GBC (which has a processor similar to the Z80 which augments the sound and occasionally main processor in the megadrive) was already done on the GBA and a quick deconstruct of the emulator appears to say the ARM7 does not do much. Hopefully the source gets released fairly soon and others can join in.

As for this file system buisness I would prefer a rom builder style like the GBA emulators and NESDS as opposed to the files being read directly off of the cart but this is just me, keep it up Ryan FB.

ShadowXP · Jun 7, 2006

I hate DS flashcard owners so, so much right now.

:'(

gbtemp111 · Jun 7, 2006

i wonder how the display is adjusted to fit into the smaller ds resolution.
anyway, being the big egadrive fan that i am, i can't wait to try this one!!
gooo cyclone core!!
going to try this one on an m3 mini sd.

pduin · Jun 7, 2006

Unfortunately I couldn't get it to work with an m3 minisd

I can choose the romfile form the emulator itself but it hangs on every rom I try to load

moonwalker

Lord Garvals · Jun 7, 2006

Hmmm.
Golden Axe 3
X-men: Clone Wars
Zombies ate my neighbours
Sonic&Knuckles: Sonic 3
Is not working... How pity... -___-

gbtemp111 · Jun 7, 2006

QUOTE(pduin @ Jun 7 2006 said:
Unfortunately I couldn't get it to work with an m3 minisd

I can choose the romfile form the emulator itself but it hangs on every rom I try to load

moonwalker

damn! going to try both builds now and see.

QUOTEI can not see how sound is that vital for playing: except perhaps the death sounds of the first boss in Streets of Rage.

are you kidding man? sound is 100% crucial when playing most genny games, especially the sonic games. without sound, there's no soul

gbtemp111 · Jun 7, 2006

works with m3 mini sd man. use the .nds.gba one, and normal boot, not fast boot.
testing with rocket knight adventures and it works! wish it could run 2x as fast and that it has better scaling, especially since genesis resolution is 320x240, higher than nds resolution.
anyway, big kudos to ryan fb for the port!

ps. what's the speed of the nds's arm?

The_Cylon_Surfer · Jun 7, 2006

O well - tested on SCCF...no good

the emu loads but after choosing a rom i get info of the rom displayed on the lower screen but just a black screen on the top...anyone else had this problem??

AshuraZro · Jun 7, 2006

Works perfectly on the M3 SD. Guys who are having issues, remember these facts. Do NOT run them through the M3 application. And press Start to boot them. In other words, boot them the exact way you would boot a ds demo, or FlashMe.

Anyways it's running pretty fast for a first release and I do have high hopes for this baby.

SpaceJump · Jun 7, 2006

Doesn't work on my M3 Mini. I didn't use the GM (never used it for homebrew) and tried both files with the same result: Bottom screen says game was loaded and upper screen stays black

I wished it would come with a build tool so we wouldn't have these compatibility issues...

ViRGE · Jun 8, 2006

QUOTE(lumo @ Jun 7 2006 said:
Ive been waiting for someone to port this over. picodrive worked so well on ppc and on s60 phones, sounds even worked on those so im sure eventually the sound code will be optimised for the DS hardware.Â
Also, it plays great, just tried sonic 3 and gunstar heroes, both run slightly slower than normal, but not enough to damage the gameplay

Eh, I disagree. The compatibility is amazing, but it's about 1/2 to 1/3 as fast as the real thing, and that makes it hard to play fast games(especially Sonic). The speed seems to vary on the game too, Sonic games seem worse than say Earthworm Jim.

Homebrew New Megadrive/genesis emulator for the DS

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