Talk:Emulators on Windows

Too many emulators

For systems like the NES shouldn't we cut down the list of emulators to recommended. or at least recommended and non recommended active. or some combination of well known, active, and recommended. (which has 20+ emulators)
This article should list emulators that run on current machines with decent specs (IMO).
No point listing older/low emulators when there is a large list. it Makes more sense to at the top of the article suggest the console specific page for older/less demanding emulators.
In my opinion many of the emulators listed work fine on a low/mid spec computer from a decade ago without including ones i've mentioned to possibly remove.
For more demanding/harder to emulate systems it may make sense to include those emulators due to the absence of emulators that would work on older hardware. but i see no point in mentioning those emulators unless there is a significant reason to mention them in 2024 or in the future.
I do understand people may have older systems that need older emulators but it would be better to redirect them to somewhere to find those emulators instead of clogging up the feel of the articles on this site for no reason other than the possibility of extremely old systems using this site to find emulators. Instead maybe have a note at the start of the article to direct them to a better resource?
the articles here would be read to have the first emulators be the ones most recommended but at the bottom would be the recommended for those much older systems. maybe make an article or redirect them to a different site for this extreme case if it is seen as necessary. to both improve their experience on a older system finding emulators and people on newer systems finding emulators.

To put this short. shouldn't this site remove emulators that have better alternatives instead of keeping them here for the possibility of this site being used to recommend emulators to a old system. instead make a separate article for that case or redirect them for their sake and for the sake of people on newer systems finding emulators 172.68.175.17

If I'm to be honest, I'm not sure of the point of this page given Windows is the dominant OS, and pretty much any major emulator will have a build for it. It'd just be a "best emulator" list, without giving the actual reasoning for why a particular emulator would be the better choice.

172.69.235.147

+ Yeah, at least we should get rid of older and non-active/obsolete emulators, there are already dedicated pages for that;

Talk:Main_Page#win9x.2C_dos_or_other_.22ancient.22_emulators

• Emulators_on_DOS
• History_of_emulation

Ahayri (talk) 08:49, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Maybe create a page for legacy systems and format it like the Game_engine_recreations_and_source_ports with the systems supported in the platform(s) box?. Maybe titled "Emulators on Legacy systems" or something similar?, definitely would be better visually and also be a good resource for people on those legacy systems. emulators like UltraHLE are listed because they work on windows but isn't recommended due to the hardware of today far exceeding what UltraHLE needs.
definitely should make a separate article in my opinion, even if it is just an article for windows 9x and XP.

+ I agree completely. Focusing on Win9x emulators for this page will provide a clearer and more helpful resource for users, and then we can add this page to main page. Ahayri (talk) 09:53, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I also agree. i will try to help maintain the article if anyone chooses to create it. definitely seems like a good addition to the site, "Emulators on Legacy systems" seems to be the only title suggested. Ahayri you definitely should create the article and create the rough format on how to list emulators, think that title will give us the freedom to have an article dedicated to also list less common OSes and windows 9x and older NT. I'll follow what title anyone chooses though

+ Done, is there a compelling reason to retain this page anymore? Ahayri (talk) 11:00, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I believe that this page should be kept because most emulators target windows 10 and 11 while Emulators on Legacy OS should only move the ones that target the older windows Operating systems or target older systems by low requirements from speed hacks.

Improving to remove WIP tag

my ideas on how to better this article so the WIP tag can be removed without it being just for aesthetic reasons

• Add info about the history of Microsoft Windows like the console specific pages have to their consoles
• Removing emulators that aren't recommended (to a degree where it makes sense to remove them)/don't work on modern windows (if possible move to Emulators on Legacy systems
• Removing emulators that need workarounds to work on modern windows (such as needing dgVoodoo2) move to Emulators on Legacy systems when possible?
• Possibly having an article that explains the most common ways to setup emulators with (emulated) platform specific sections and linking to it.
• link to articles and create articles for people new to emulating consoles to help them start?