endrift, the developer behind the multi-platform mGBA emulator, revealed that his April fools prank was actually real. He is indeed working on a new DS emulator that he plans to merge with mGBA and create Medusa, a GB, GBA and DS emulator in one application.

He says that it's currently an early alpha with about 80% of the DS' hardware implemented. Be sure to head over to his website and check out his post, that also includes new information about the next versions of mGBA.

Check out the downloads page for early Medusa builds for Windows, macOS and Ubuntu. Source can be found on his Github. Issues can be reported to the bug tracker.

If you want to support the developer, you can do so via his Patreon or donate page.

Source

 

[NoNAND]

Will this be dsi enhanced

 

[StarTrekVoyager]

Necrobump: The actual reason for which 3 new DS emulators are being developped is because zerimus sabotaged the DS emulation scene. He sabotaged Wifi emulation in DeSmuME, sabotaged Pokémon emulation, and his emulator is utterly crap. It runs so slow that even running DraStic through BlueStacks Android emulator is faster than it. On my computer it runs slower than Dolphin at 2x native resolution.
The 3 emulators developped are:
-melonDS, by StapleButter (dev of blargSNES & lolSNES)
-medusa, by endrift
-GBE+, by Shonumi.

 

[the_randomizer]

Necrobump: The actual reason for which 3 new DS emulators are being developped is because zerimus sabotaged the DS emulation scene. He sabotaged Wifi emulation in DeSmuME, sabotaged Pokémon emulation, and his emulator is utterly crap. It runs so slow that even running DraStic through BlueStacks Android emulator is faster than it. On my computer it runs slower than Dolphin at 2x native resolution.
The 3 emulators developped are:
-melonDS, by StapleButter (dev of blargSNES & lolSNES)
-medusa, by endrift
-GBE+, by Shonumi.

What the heck is GBE+? I never heard of that. DeSmuME hasn't been updated in a long time, either.

 

[StarTrekVoyager]

What the heck is GBE+? I never heard of that. DeSmuME hasn't been updated in a long time, either.

Yeah, like mGBA/medusa, it was originally a GB/GBC/GBA emu but recently went into DS. (https://github.com/shonumi/gbe-plus) actually, SB is working mostly on accuracy. And for now, it already has basic sound emulation and decent 3D, after only 4 months of work. Oh, and it also runs MUCH faster than DeSmuME. The reason for which there haven't been any new DeSmuME updates is because the development on this emu is pretty much dead because of the main dev. The code is also pretty much a mess.
Here's melonDS' official website: http://melonds.kuribo64.net/

 

[ShadowOne333]

You can bitch and whine all you want, but mGBA has without a doubt surpassed almost every other GBA emulator at the moment, not to mention endrift is going the portability approach, and trying to get the emulator running to as many platforms possible.
mGBA is already running on Wii, 3DS, Vita, Windows, Linux and Mac, with even an ARM build in the plans (or was it ARM dynarec?), and that's without taking into consideration the Retroarch ports of course.
The PC ports of mGBA include a lot of debugging tools really helpful for romhackers, which I have to say the No$ emulators area really tricky and hard to get going if you have zero experience with them.

With that said, endrift has a lot of knowledge about the GBA/DS hardware, and I have total faith that this DS emulator will be one of the best DS emulators out there some time down the road.
You can shove your Desmume and No$GBA up your ass for all I care, but I know this will become something exceptional.

 

[StarTrekVoyager]

@ShadowOne333 Yeah, I know, that's what I was saying. Basically, I think that the biggest weakness of DeSmuSHIT is that it relies at 100% on the CPU no matter what you do. As a result, II just tested the latest build, and basically I get 23fps on Super Mario 64 DS on the bloody title screen. Yes, the title screen. And with JIT recompiler at maximum speed. I call that utterly crap.

 

[Sonic Angel Knight]

So is this worthy of replasing desemu as top NDS emulator only comparable to no$gba? Cause desemu has some bad sound i think but it also has tas tools, i like using.

 

[AtlasFontaine]

Very good for a first release with only an interpreter.

There's also MelonDS which is in a similar (or more advanced) state of development, it is being done by StapleButter (3ds's BlargSnes creator)

 

[ShadowOne333]

@ShadowOne333 Yeah, I know, that's what I was saying. Basically, I think that the biggest weakness of DeSmuSHIT is that it relies at 100% on the CPU no matter what you do. As a result, II just tested the latest build, and basically I get 23fps on Super Mario 64 DS on the bloody title screen. Yes, the title screen. And with JIT recompiler at maximum speed. I call that utterly crap.

We gotta be honest, Desmume is poorly optimized.
And with Drastic being closed sourced, that leaves very few good open source options for anyone who wants to port it to another platform.
endrift surely has this in mind and I have no doubt Medusa will be accurate and with good optimizations to its code.

 

[spotanjo3]

What the heck is GBE+? I never heard of that. DeSmuME hasn't been updated in a long time, either.

Yes and no. DeSmuME team is still developing it under GitHub regularly and they didn't release the newer version just yet.

 

[AtlasFontaine]

We gotta be honest, Desmume is poorly optimized.
And with Drastic being closed sourced, that leaves very few good open source options for anyone who wants to port it to another platform.
endrift surely has this in mind and I have no doubt Medusa will be accurate and with good optimizations to its code.

Fun fact, if you run Drastic on an android emulator on PC it'll run better compared to using Desmume.

 

[ShadowOne333]

Fun fact, if you run Drastic on an android emulator on PC it'll run better compared to using Desmume.

Speaks leagues of just how well coded Desmume is.

 

[StarTrekVoyager]

Even funnier fact, if you run DraStic at 2x Internal Resolution on a 2013 phone, it still runs better than DeSmuME at 1x IR on a 2016 CPU.

 

[the_randomizer]

Yes and no. DeSmuME team is still developing it under GitHub regularly and they didn't release the newer version just yet.

They're sure taking their sweet time though

Fun fact, if you run Drastic on an android emulator on PC it'll run better compared to using Desmume.

I can run DeSmuME just fine on my PC DraStic is all well and good, but it close sourced XD

 

[DarthDub]

Hurray for optimized code!

 

[spotanjo3]

They're sure taking their sweet time though


I can run DeSmuME just fine on my PC DraStic is all well and good, but it close sourced XD

Mine too even thought I am on Mac!

 

[Flame]

why are people bitching about another DS emulator.. more the merrier.


Pokemon Soul silver on Vita plox!

 

[the_randomizer]

why are people bitching about another DS emulator.. more the merrier.


Pokemon Soul silver on Vita plox!

"Because DeSmuME is enough" Or so they say.

 

[lAkdaOpeKA]

Uhm... where do I put the BIOS file?

 

[tiamat999]

Will it run better than demume if so that alone makes it better