160°

Game emulation: Is it morally defensible?

Many retro gamers have asked the question: Are emulators illegal?  The answer is no; you can download them without a problem. Don’t get excited, though. The emulators are legal, but they are kind of useless on their own.

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ghettogamer.net
ApocalypseShadow1143d ago (Edited 1143d ago )

Emulation is an interesting thing. It's not right but it's also right when it comes to game preservation of decades old games. Or even making the game look better or run better than the hardware that ran those games. Or the televisions that had limited resolution and scan lines.

Not only that, but fans of these old games have released fully translated languages of foreign ROMS for others to understand and enjoy those games that the developer never got around to doing or thought of doing or release in another country.

Some ROMS have fixed bugs. Some have returned music or characters or moves to games that were taken out from porting to more censor heavy counties and the games can be played as originally intended.

There are games that no longer have an owner because the parent company is no more. Creating new fans of an old title. Some hacks of these old ROMS have crossovers of playable characters that were never in the original release because most companies never collaborate. All these things and more are part of the emulation and ROMS discussion.

It should never be right to "test" a new release game as the developers should be paid for their hard work and dedication. Games that are 20, 30, even 40 years old that made their money and never see the light of day today because the parent company is only happy to sit on history. Those games are a little hazy like an old copyright or trademark that expires. As long as you're not selling or profiting off of playing old titles, the crime is a little bit easier to swallow.

AnnaDea1143d ago

I agree with everything except this.

"Or even making the game look better or run better than the hardware that ran those games. Or the televisions that had limited resolution and scan lines."

One problem is that some emulators runs the game faster than intended so it becomes a problem with the clock speed. And all these games were made with the amount of pixels that are shown on a crt. So those teves produces the best available picture of a retro game. Today you need to have scalers and filters that makes the games look like ass most of the time.

luckytrouble1143d ago

Well, the big example people usually use when they say a game looks better is Dolphin. And you can probably expect the same from PS3 emulation long term as well. Really retro definitely needs a little help to look the best it can be, but by and large emulators account for that anyways in default options.

ManMarmalade1143d ago (Edited 1143d ago )

There are plenty of mods to fix a lot of those issues. Here's a specific one from Jan 2019 that upscales PS1 graphics:
https://www.pcgamer.com/mod...

AnnaDea1142d ago

You people can just look at this picture and decide for yourselves which looks better.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media...

Scanlines help enhancing the pictures and this is what I mean when I say that the games were made with scanlines in mind.

uth111142d ago

The good emulators do things "cycle exact" which will make the game run at the correct speed. PC emulation presents a problem because some old PC games were developed to run correctly on the PCs of the mid 80s, but didn't anticipate the ever increasing clock speeds of the platform. Some of those games will run way too fast now. Some have patches available to fix this.

Not every scaler is great, but SD content tends to look awful on HD screens, and some scalers will provide CRT-like emulation that displays the game closer to how it looked back then, so I like to use the ones that do this well

+ Show (1) more replyLast reply 1142d ago
ManMarmalade1143d ago (Edited 1143d ago )

I use a ps1 emulator because of my budget. The pandemic shut down the art events I was attending which took away about half of my income and I was forced to sell a lot of my physical possessions, including a lot of my older games, trading cards and other collectibles and media. Getting a ps1 emulator is the best way I have been coping with a lot of the stress that's been happening the past year and also re-living my childhood with games like rival schools, croc, and even playing teletubbies when I smoke 😅

ShadowWolf7121142d ago

You're conflating Emulation with Piracy. They're not interchangeable terms.

Orchard1143d ago

I personally don’t see any problem with emulating a game provided it isn’t readily available anymore - either via the original console + game being on sale or via backwards compatibility.

Ristul1143d ago

Emulating hardware is not illigal, we can even make backups of our games.

Pirating is a different issue.

Shiken1143d ago (Edited 1143d ago )

As long as you directly rip the game from your actual copy yourself is it legal. Downloading and distribution of the ROMs themselves is still illegal, even if you already own a copy in its physical form.

Duke191143d ago (Edited 1143d ago )

YoU wOuLdN’T DoWnLoAD a CaR!!

Lol

deleted1143d ago

Just you wait, the 3D printing technology will eventually get there! XD

XxINFERNUSxX1142d ago

If that was possible with torrents I would actually 😁👍

isarai1143d ago

Easily yes, there are games that only exist through emulation now. Not only that, it's not like the devs/publishers get anything out of these games. Emulation is 99.99% for games no longer in print, so whether you pay or not makes no difference to them. Only one standing to gain is some rando who just happens to have the game, likely at an absurd price. It's great for preservation, and for those that want to experience the devs work without having to pay potentially hundreds of dollars, or spend days, or even years hunting down a copy.

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150°

10 Biggest Xbox Mistakes of All Time (So Far)

The Xbox brand has done a lot of good over the years, but their various blunders are pretty wild to look back on in their magnitude.

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culturedvultures.com
piroh4d ago (Edited 4d ago )

Ironically number 9 can save them at this point (releasing games on multiple platforms)

ChasterMies2d ago

By “save them” you mean make more profit for Microsoft. Xbox will still be a dying hardware platform.

OtterX3d ago

You could add the naming scheme for the consoles, it just confuses customers. I know they wanted to avoid traditional numbering bc it would always be lower than their competitor, but this whole 360 then One then Series thing is confusing af. Imagine a Soccer Mom trying to figure this stuff out. I still mistakenly call the Series X the One from time to time on accident.

RNTody3d ago

Don't forget about the Xbox One, Xbox One X and Xbox Series X! Good luck to Soccer moms around the world.

S2Killinit2d ago (Edited 2d ago )

They did that on purpose to confuse and direct attention away from the generational numbering.

MS doesn’t like reminding people that they joined the industry after others had already been involved in gaming.

For instance, they called the xbox “360” to combat PlayStation “3” because they wanted to seem like “more” than “3”, so instead of xbox 2, they opted for xbox 360. Also this had the additional benefit of selling consoles to uninformed parents who might purchase a “360” instead of a “3” by mistake, or because they thought 360 was more than 3. Kind of a disingenuous move.

They have been continuing with their confusing naming patterns for pretty much the same reasons. Frankly, it fits with who and what they are as a brand.

FinalFantasyFanatic2d ago

I can understand their reasoning, but whoever came up with that naming scheme should be fired, bad naming schemes have killed consoles (I'm pretty sure it was the major reason for the downfall of the WiiU). They should have had unqiue names like Nintendo and Sega have had for their consoles, far less confusing for the consumer.

Cacabunga3d ago (Edited 3d ago )

Phil Spencer is the worst that has happened to Xbox.
They built a respectable brand up to Xbox one. Then this guy took over and things became a joke

Reaper22_3d ago

He still has his job. Something you can't say about Jim Ryan.

Cacabunga3d ago

Both bad execs. One is on job and one thankfully retired.

FinalFantasyFanatic2d ago (Edited 2d ago )

I didn't like either person, both people damaged their respective brands and produced worse outcomes, but Phil did save the Xbox brand from being retired by Microsoft. Although in hindsight, he should have just let it die, rather than languish in limbo like it is now.

Rainbowcookie1d 13h ago

Yeah but the one that was "bad" didn't even affect sales.

bunt-custardly2d ago

Phil Spencer was also on the team back when 360 was around, alongside Shane Kim, Peter Moore etc. I think the damage that did the most harm was the Don Mattrick "Always Online" console (ahead of its time basically). They handed Sony and Nintendo a free-pass when that was revealed. It went downhill from there. Then the corporate machine went into full swing to try and recover. They have to a degree as a games company for the masses, and less so for the core gamer. Outside USA, the Xbox brand does not sell as well as Japanese based consoles (citation needed).

Cacabunga2d ago

Want a decision maker. The always online and TV plans was a disaster yes, but they caught up by announcing 1st party games that gamers actually kept the hype going.. until this moron took over and introduced the PC day one release.. e all know where that ended..

S2Killinit2d ago

I dont think they were ever a respectable brand, not since the beginning, when their goal was never to be involved and share in the gaming space. I think the OG xbox was an exception because MS as a brand was still getting its foot in and so the people behind that were people of the gaming industry.

FinalFantasyFanatic2d ago

The 360 was the brand in its prime though, everything went downhill towards the end of that generation. Its staple games like Halo, Forza and Gears are what kept the console relevant and afloat for so long.

MaximusPrime_3d ago

Really good video.

I remember the days with RRoD was big news on here, N4G.

Microsoft had it turbulence number of years.

Looking at the success of Sea of Thieves despite being 6 years old, time to release Halo, Forza horizon 4 & 5 on PS5. It'll help their revenue

shinoff21833d ago (Edited 3d ago )

2 of the 4 games they did already sold really well. So it's definitely going down. Idk about halo or forza but I feel those studios they've bought in the last 5 years, their coming

ChasterMies2d ago

I found this video painful to watch. Can someone list them out?

Top 10 for me from are:
1. 2013 reveal presentation
2. Bundling Kinect 2 with Xbox One
3. RRoD or why rushing to market with hardware is always a bad idea.
4. Buying studios only to close them.
5. Ads on the Home Screen
6. Letting Halo die.
7. Letting Geard of War die.
8. Every console name
9. Charging for Xbox Live on Xbox 360 when Sony let PS3 players play online for free.
10. Cancelling release of OG Xbox games after the Xbox 360 launched.

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60°

CRKD and Limited Run Games Team Up for Special Edition Tomb Raider Controllers

CRKD, and Limited Run Games announced a special Tomb Raider edition of CRKD's popular NEO S, and Nitro Deck+ controller. - IS

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infinitestart.com
80°

The MSI Claw Gaming Handheld Sees Another Game Performance Boost Through New BIOS and MSI Center M

MSI is proud to announce that its gaming handheld, Claw, has achieved a significant performance increase of up to 30% through a new BIOS and MSI Center M update. Furthermore, the new BIOS and MSI Center M enable Claw to smoothly play all of the top 100 po

purple1014d ago (Edited 4d ago )

is this the one with the switch2 chip inside.?

this is Intels first try at the format

probs not though, as it's $799. so not good for switch actually

Huey_My_D_Long3d ago

Well thats nice considering Ive heard it consistently performs worse when it really shouldn't.

Now if only Lenovo would do the same for the legion go