Super Nintendo emulators
Revision as of 18:18, 13 August 2013 by 173.206.150.93 (talk)
The Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) is a 16-bit, 4th generation console released on 1990 in North America. In Japan, it was known as the Super Famicom.
Emulators
Chart
Name | Operating System(s) | Latest Version | Accuracy Rating | Recommended |
---|---|---|---|---|
bsnes (higan) | Windows, Linux | 0.92 | High | ✓ |
Snes9x | Windows, Linux, OS X | 1.53 | Mid | ✓ |
RetroArch (Snes9x, bsnes) | Multi-platform | 1.53 (Snes9x), 0.92 (bsnes) |
Mid (Snes9x) High (bsnes) |
✓ |
BizHawk | Windows | 1.4.1 | High | ✗ |
(bsnes) |
Multi-platform | 0.9.29-WIP | High | ✓ |
ZSNES | Windows, Linux | 1.51 | Low | ✗ |
Comparison
1. bsnes (higan)
- The most accurate of the bunch. Should play any and all commercially released games without trouble, assuming you have the power.
- A Core 2 Duo at 2 GHz is the weakest I've seen run the balanced version full speed for most games.
- Balanced works. You do NOT need the accuracy build for anything but one game. And I believe it is a minor issue even for that.
- ROM hacks designed around emulator quirks will most likely not work. Same as with real hardware.
- LLE audio sounds amazing.
2. Snes9x
- Compatible with most games, even many romhacks that make use of emulator quirks.
- Fast enough for pretty much any toaster
- LLE audio, same as bsnes's.
- Often buggy graphical output and shader support in standalone
- Driver/GPU dependent.
- Remember those diagonal lines of offset across older 3D games on certain graphics cards? Yeah. Finding a picture.
- Hit and miss controller support, especially when it comes to XInput devices.
3. RetroArch, which has bsnes, and Snes9x cores.
- The same points as the emulators themselves
- Amazing graphical output
- At any resolution
- At any fullscreen resolution and refresh rate
- Vast shader support
- Dynamic rate control kills off most any and all audio distortion, such as crackling.
- Does not require Game Folders or anything like higan standalone.
5. BizHawk
- Useful for TAS (Tool Assisted Speedruns)
- Written in C#, requires .NET 4.0
- Windows-only
5. Mednafen
- The SNES core is based on an old version of bSNES, 058. This is before the performance/accuracy/balanced cores with a couple of changes. The reasoning is that it's much faster than the current version of bsnes.
6. ZSNES
- Will run full speed on ANY toaster, supposedly back to the weakest of Pentium 3s, maybe P2s.
- Assuming it's an x86 toaster, since it's written in ASM.
- Romhacks were often designed around it's malfunctions
- Many romhacks won't work properly on anything else.
- Outdated as hell, with seemingly no hope for updating.
- Many bugs and lacked functions for many games, see ZSNES review