Emulation Dreamcast on Retroarch?

RareKirby

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  • Would be nice having Dreamcast on Wii U or Switch. Usually when there's emulator on a console like my moded xbox, there's gba snes n64 ps1 etc but never dreamcast. Why? I'm really am just curious why it hasn't been done. is it not possible? Or just nobody wants to work on it?
 

Darth Meteos

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Dreamcast was from the PS2 generation. Gamecube is uniquely easy (relatively) to emulate, especially on Wii U which has a hardware solution to that problem. However, the PS2 is a shitshow with regards to emulation and OG Xbox is pretty much impossible, so this generation has its difficulties. Dreamcast is definitely easier than those two, but the specs required for such a thing simply aren't available on a Wii U. Our emulation dreams for Switch often include overclocking the Tegra, so Dreamcast will be on Switch at some point, if we manage that- which we almost certainly will.
 

TehCupcakes

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A few factors:

A) Emulation difficulty
B) Necessary specs
C) Open source, cross-platform emulator code availability

Dreamcast is more powerful than the systems you typically see emulated on consoles; more powerful consoles generally require more powerful machines to emulate, but there are some other factors. I don't know this for a fact, but I also assume it is more difficult to emulate than systems like SNES, GBA, or even N64. "More difficult" can refer to the fact that there is relative complexity to the system, as well as the architecture being fundamentally different from modern devices which require more emulation trickery. (The Dolphin team did a good job of explaining this and how Gamecube is equally or sometimes more taxing than Wii to emulate for this very reason.) Lastly, there are 5 or so Dreamcast emulators that have ever reached a decent state. Chankast, NullDC, and DEmul are all designed for Windows - they don't port well. Redream is closed source. The only viable choice that I see is Reicast, and compatibility is pretty spotty last I heard...

Aside from that, there is also the factor of user demand and personal interest. That is, console hacking is niche in itself, so to see a port requires of a particular console requires that someone with the right skills has a vested interest in the project. Dreamcast is beloved by many, but it's certainly not the most "popular" retro gaming system. Some individuals may prefer to port the more heavily requested and/or easier consoles to satisfy your everyday CFW user.
 

Pleng

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Reicast only has x86 and ARM dynarecs so it wouldn't work on WiiU. It should be able to run extremely well on Switch, though*. I've used Android devices with far lower specs to play Daytona and it's run very nicely indeed.

*as long as the game you want to play doesn't make use of the MMU, which is not emulated in Reicast (Sega Rally 2 :cry:)
 

CORE

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Architecture and Coding and above all time consuming , the Console is very capable of Dreamcast Emulation but you cant just type out {Play Game = Do it now so please load ASAP} Break = Does not Load Error not a Wii U Game End. Lines Upon Lines Of Code Patience and again Time.
 
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