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Nintendo 64 emulators

1,253 bytes added, 13:45, 24 December 2021
Emulators
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The '''Nintendo 64''' is a 64-bit fifth-generation console released by Nintendo on September 29, 1996 for {{inflation|USD|199.99|1996}}.
|[[Project64 Netplay]]
|align=left|{{Icon|Windows}}
|[https://pj64netplay-emugithub.mlcom/download.html {{Project64NetplayVer}}Project64Netplay/Project64-Netplay-2x git]
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;[[Project64]]:An open-source emulator for Windows, as well as one of the oldest. Its official release builds are more up-to-date than Mupen64Plus', and the current version, 3.0.1, is roughly as accurate as the development versions of Mupen64Plus when both are played with recommended plugins. It has a more user-friendly interface than the Mupen64Plus attempts and supports more features such as overclocking and Transfer Pak emulation. It does come with GLideN64 out-of-the-box, but the default audio plugin isn't even the best in the box. For the most part, it works well in [[Wine]], but, if you're on a different platform, use Mupen64Plus instead.
;[[CEN64]]:Aims for cycle accuracy while, at the same time, aiming to eventually be usable on modern PC hardware. It currently lacks many features and has spotty compatibility, but it's gradually improving. It can already emulate some well-known edge cases such as the picture recognition in Pokemon Snap.
;[[1964]]:Along with its various versions and forks, it was once a decent, speedy open-source alternative to Project64 and Mupen64, though it usually lagged behind the two compatibility-wise. Nowadays it has completely fallen off the radar as development has halted, and there is no longer a central code repo to speak of. There is little reason to use it nowadays outside of historical purposes, very specific edge cases, or if your device is too slow to run Mupen64Plus or Project64. However, a fork named 1964 GEPD is regularly updated and remains the go-to choice for emulation of 007 Goldeneye and Perfect Dark. This is for a number of reasons, the most notable are a 60 FPS hack and a mouse injector plugin, which happens to include an FOV slider.
;[[Sixtyforce]]:is macOS-only, closed-source, and asks you to pay for full access to its features. It was once one of the only choices for Mac users, particularly those with older Macs since it's the only emulator with a <abbr title="Power PC">PPC</abbr> [[Dynamic recompilation|dynarec]]), but, with the switch to x86 and Mupen64Plus being ported to macOS, it has now become less relevant. However, development is still ongoing and is currently in its [https://sixtyforce.com/rosetta/ third rewrite] to support the upcoming [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple-designed_processors Apple Silicon].
;[[UltraHLE]]:marked a milestone in Nintendo 64 emulation, in that it was the first to play some popular N64 titles at full speed on hardware made at the time of its release through [[High/Low-level emulation|high-level emulation]]; it isn't without its drawbacks though - pressure from users, combined with legal threats from Nintendo, forced them to discontinue development. Besides being for historical value, there's not much to expect from this emulator anyway due to compatibility issues.
;[[Ryu64]]:is a Nintendo 64 emulator made in C#. The 'Ryu' word is named after the "RyuJIT" used in both Visual Basic & C#. But it might have been inspired by the lead author's sole (so far) [https://github.com/Ryujinx/Ryujinx/commits?author=Dudejoe870 commit] at Switch emulator, [[Ryujinx]]'s Git repository, and his depreciated [https://github.com/Dudejoe870/RyujinxAutoUpdate Ryujinx Auto Updater] tool. "86RYU", an x86 JIT compiler, is being developed alongside this emulator too.
===[[High/Low level emulation|High-level vs. low-level]] graphics===
One of the biggest hurdles to emulating the Nintendo 64 is was the Reality Display Processor (RDP), which used a custom design that had to be fine-tuned to get more performance out of the system using microcode. To emulate the RDP accurately, one would have to execute said microcode the way the RDP did, which differed from PC graphics cards of the day. To complicate matters further, API standards that were available on PCs two components decades ago were nowhere near as flexible as they are today. If you wanted to make an accurate GPU-accelerated RDP plugin in 2003, you simply couldn't with the APIs of the Reality Coprocessor made by SGItime (OpenGL 1.x and Direct3D 9). The Reality Display Processor was For the most powerful consumeraverage user, hardware-grade accurate GPU at the acceleration would be out of reach for a long time of . [[UltraHLE]] offered a compromise. In contrast to earlier consoles, whose video chips in hindsight had been easy to render to the consolehost CPU's release; this was a selling point that Nintendo wanted framebuffer, performant RDP emulation had to emphasize as a result of working with SGI. Howevertake shortcuts, reverse engineering efforts for popular Nintendo 64 including programming around specific games showed that Nintendo's software development kit included microcode to cleanly translate their graphics commands into API calls using Direct3D, OpenGL, and even Glide. With this, the theoretical system requirements plummeted, and the host graphics card could reproduce a common microcode for functional equivalent rather than the RDPexact method. It's possible Nintendo didn't want This also gave way to give developers access at prettier, higher resolution graphics, though whether or not this is an improvement is subjective and a lower level out common point of fears that doing so would damage consumer unitsdiscussion. Unfortunately it proved to be hit and miss, but that meant most of the effort spent emulating the RDP would go towards figuring out how owing to handle the nature of per-game microcodedetection and having to tweak settings to prevent some games for running into graphical glitches.
* Most developers Low-level RDP emulation was continually improved in 1999 and that time, most notably by [[MESS]] up until its merger with [[MAME]], where its RDP code was turned into a plugin by Angrylion. Compatibility-wise, Angrylion's RDP was considered flawless by the early 2000s opted to approximate functions through various APIs such community, though reception wasn't as Direct3D, OpenGLwarm overall, since it ran only on the CPU and even Glidewas thus painfully slow on mid-grade machines. While this resulted in much more reasonable A dozen forks attempted to bring the system requirements for down and the current incarnation that does so is Angrylion RDP Plus, using multithreading. Accurate low-level emulation, along with prettier, higher resolution graphics, this method proved would only come to be hit and missthe GPU in 2020, often requiring perwhen a new version of the Mupen64Plus-game tweaks and settings to prevent graphical glitches on many gamesbased ParaLLEl [[libretro]] core was released containing a rewritten RDP plugin using compute shaders in Vulkan. Some games flat out didnThough it isn't worka direct fork of Angrylion, because it wasn't clear what Themaister says the Angrylion code was the central point of reference for developing the microcode did or whyplugin, and required extensive hardware testing<ref>[https://github.com/Themaister/parallel-rdp#disclaimer README] for parallel-rdp repository on GitHub. § Disclaimer.* On the low"While paraLLEl-level side, developers would either completely emulate the RDP or autodetect the microcode and use uses Angrylion-Plus as an appropriate implementation for the gamereference, it is not a port, and not a derived codebase of said project. It is written from scratch by studying Angrylion-Plus and trying to understand what is going on. The former would mean test suite uses Angrylion-Plus as a software renderer accurate reference to the hardware but major performance bottlenecks unless optimizations like vectorization validate implementation and multicross-threading were implementedchecking behavior. The latter would mean faster performance but developers would still have "</ref> meaning ParaLLEl uses the same strategies that Angrylion does to figure out how to account for edge casesemulate the RDP while running on the host GPU (as long as said GPU supports Vulkan).
On the high-level side, gonetz and one or two assistants have spent a large portion of development improving GlideN64's microcode handling of microcode throughout 2016-2018.<ref name="gliden64_blog-1">{{cite web|url=https://gliden64.blogspot.com/2017/|title=Public Release 3.0|publisher=Blogspot|accessdate=2018-06-17|date=2017-12-29}}</ref><ref name="ZSortBOSS">{{cite web|url=https://github.com/gonetz/GLideN64/issues/1685#issuecomment-364436534|title=Initial implementation of BOSS ZSort ucode (WDC, Stunt Racer)|publisher=GitHub|accessdate=2018-06-17|date=2018-02-10}}</ref> This means that [https://youtu.be/HfCOnmRHI0o Factor 5]'s games are now working in the high-level graphics mode].<ref name="Indiegogo">{{cite web|url=https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/indiana-j-infernal-machine-high-level-emulation#/updates/all|title="Indiana J. & Infernal Machine" HLE|publisher=Indiegogo|accessdate=2018-06-17|date=2018-05-17}}</ref><ref name="gliden64_blog-2">{{cite web|url=https://gliden64.blogspot.com/2018/05/hle-implementation-of-microcodes-for.html|title=HLE implementation of microcodes for "Indiana Jones" and "Battle for Naboo" completed.|publisher=Blogspot|accessdate=2018-06-17|date=2018-05-26}}</ref> Other games may still have issues with RDP quirks like frame buffer/depth buffer access (including issues with how the frame buffer framebuffer is used as well as performance issues), VI emulation, and how combine/blending modes are emulated (such as noise issues and combiner accuracy).
It should be noted that most games technically work through the HLE method, but it's not an accurate representation of what the video output actually looked like, but rather a rough approximation by your graphics card. Whether this is an improvement or not is subjective.
<gallery widths="300" mode="packed">
Majora's mask accurate.png| Low-level emulation of Majora's Mask using SoftGraphic
</gallery>
==Peripherals==
===Voice Recognition Unit emulation===
The Voice Recognition Unit (VRU) is an accessory used primarily by ''Hey You, Pikachu''. No emulator or input plugin supports this, although there is an on-going effort to get it working.<ref name="emutalk">{{cite web|url=http://www.emutalk.net/threads/55279|title=Hey You! Pikachu - Possible HLE Implementation|publisher=emutalk|accessdate=2018-06-17|date=2014-10-27, Last edit: 2016-04-04}}</ref>
* CEN64, like Project64, had 64DD emulation ported to it from MAME. However, it focuses on accuracy and plays much slower than other emulators, aside from the 64DD emulation itself is imperfect.
==Hardware variants==
===iQue Player emulation===
Before the GBA, DS, and 3DS, Nintendo released a modified version of their Nintendo 64 system for the Chinese market, which was called the iQue Player, through their not-quite-subsidiary iQue. Fourteen games were translated into Simplified Chinese, including Sin and Punishment, Ocarina of Time (the Majora's Mask port was canceled), Super Mario 64, and others.
* Eleven Beat: World Tournament
* Hi Pai Paradise
* Hi Pai Paradise 2
* Kuru Kuru Fever
* Magical Tetris Challenge
* Vivid Dolls (official eroge game on a Nintendo console)
The already available [http://assemblergames.com/l/threads/aleck64-on-retail-consoles-poc.55041/ patches] to convert arcade ROM dumps to regular N64 ROM format can be found [http://micro-64.com/database/aleck64.shtml here]. While Mupen64Plus-based emulators can't run these conversions out of the box, Project64 does just fine.
The remaining ones from the system's library not yet covered are:
* Hi Pai Paradise 2
* Rev Limit
* Variant Schwanzer
[[Category:Nintendo consoles]]
[[Category:Nintendo 64 emulators|*]]
[[Category:Emulated By MAME]]
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