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Dec

Prophet of Truth
Member
Oct 26, 2017
3,535
Have the Snowblind engine games been ironed out in PCSX2? When I first discovered it a few years ago they had a myriad of issues and I've not messed with any of it much since.

They work well now, but they are among the more demanding games to emulate. Some specific settings need to be enabled to get good performance. The FMV videos have issues in hardware mode, but there is an option to run only the FMVs in software mode which fixes that.

The old half screen bug was fixed but make sure you get an in development build as the stable is pretty old.
 

Bane

The Fallen
Oct 27, 2017
5,905
They work well now, but they are among the more demanding games to emulate. Some specific settings need to be enabled to get good performance. The FMV videos have issues in hardware mode, but there is an option to run only the FMVs in software mode which fixes that.

The old half screen bug was fixed but make sure you get an in development build as the stable is pretty old.
Awesome, time to crack into some Champions of Norrath. Thanks for the info, I'll look into what settings are needed.
 

Elfgore

Member
Mar 2, 2020
4,580
Off topic, but I've played around with this before and I really didn't like it. It kinda ruins the pace of the game for me, it turns what's supposed to feel like a ten year old going off on an epic adventure into something that can be completed in an afternoon. Each to their own of course but it's weird to me that it's how a lot of people play older Pokemon games and retro JRPGs in general now.

Personally, I only turn on turbo if I'm grinding levels to keep a balanced Pokemon team or if I'm trying to find all Pokemon in an area. I think I'm on the fourth gen in the romhack I'm playing and I've hit about forty hours in game time. I've actually played maybe 10. I'm so used to .exp share now that I need a method of keeping a leveled team and this is the most effective way of doing so.

I normally turn off turbo if I'm actually progressing the story or walking a route for the first time.
 

arcadepc

Banned
Dec 28, 2019
1,925
What irks me is that many games compressed are few hundred mb, yet when you decompress them they take a whole 4.4 gb, wasting hdd space. Same for Wii emulation. If they only could add zip support like with 8/16bit emulators.

Awakened

thanks I'll try it out to see the difference
 
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Keym

The Fallen
Oct 26, 2017
9,197
It's all fun and games until you want to play Shadow Hearts 2/3.

nfhem200wur11.png
 
OP
OP
Shinobido Heart
Dec 23, 2017
8,125
Couldn't find a copy of Red Ninja at my local vintage store.

I was planning on ordering it online, but I'll wait.
 

Ravelle

Member
Oct 31, 2017
17,805
Man, Shinobi.

Bloody fantastic game but it sure was Sekiro before Sekiro and dark souls existed.

You feel like a ninja doom guy for quite a bit until the game introduces your vampire katana that drains your life unless you kill enemies with it, I believe I never got passed that butterfly boss that hovered over a pool of lava with levitating chunks of dirt you had to jump to and from. What a pain in the ass that boss fight was.
 

asmith906

Member
Oct 27, 2017
27,404
I've got a pc hooked up to my TV I built with playing ps2 in mind. Best way to play ps2 without it looking like a blurry mess.
 

7threst

Member
Oct 25, 2017
3,297
Netherlands
Man, I should look into this, I have lots of PS2 games I want to replay. Never copied a game to my PC to emulate it, so I'm a complete noob lol, but gonna look it up and try this the coming days since I can't leave the house anyway and I really want to play SMT: Nocturne. OP, saw it was missing in your library, how about fixing that lol? :)
 

Jon God

Member
Oct 28, 2017
2,295
The higher resolutions is what I always wanted from Sony's BC....

Some PS2 on PS4 games do it, others do not, it's pretty terrible.


I liked MS's quality on the Original Xbox games on Xbox One, stuff like BLACK looks great.
 

Awakened

Member
Oct 27, 2017
506
What irks me is that many games compressed are few hundred mb, yet when you decompress them they take a whole 4.4 gb, wasting hdd space. Same for Wii emulation. If they only could add zip support like with 8/16bit emulators.
PCSX2 has supported the compressed CSO format for a long time. Use MaxCSO to convert your ISOs.
 

Kromeo

Member
Oct 27, 2017
17,871
Man, I should look into this, I have lots of PS2 games I want to replay. Never copied a game to my PC to emulate it, so I'm a complete noob lol, but gonna look it up and try this the coming days since I can't leave the house anyway and I really want to play SMT: Nocturne. OP, saw it was missing in your library, how about fixing that lol? :)

PS2 games are extremely easy to make ISOs of as long as you have a dvd drive
 

7threst

Member
Oct 25, 2017
3,297
Netherlands
PS2 games are extremely easy to make ISOs of as long as you have a dvd drive
Oh that is no problem, have one in my PC. I'm just not used to this at all. Would it be possible to convert my Gamecube games to maybe? I see people playing these games through Dolphin and always wonder how they do it. Sorry, I probably sound like a complete idiot now haha! It's just a drag to constantly connect my old consoles, especially if I can convert my games to digital files that I can emulate.
 

Bluelote

Member
Oct 27, 2017
2,024
I've been having some very good results with PCSX2 recently, some games running better on it than Dolphin.
 

Odeko

One Winged Slayer
The Fallen
Mar 22, 2018
15,180
West Blue
my dream is having someday a small device (Like Nvidia Shield) where i could emulate ps2 games full speed. Wii and gamecube as well. Maybe someday in this decade
I'm counting down the days until Alienware's Concept UFO device launches. A PCSX2/Dolphin handheld like that has been the dream forever and it looks like it's finally on the horizon.
 

Dogui

Member
Oct 28, 2017
8,813
Brazil
It's pretty bizarre how some games simply doesn't run or needs a high end pc to run, though. Like fucking Xenosaga, that was too much to emulate on my rig even though Xenoblade X runs almost perfectly on the Cemu.
 

Mr. Genuine

Member
Mar 23, 2018
1,618
PS2 emulation is a godsend. And necessary since Sony appears to not give an F about an "official" solution
 

dom

▲ Legend ▲
Avenger
Oct 25, 2017
10,453
The higher resolutions is what I always wanted from Sony's BC....

Some PS2 on PS4 games do it, others do not, it's pretty terrible.


I liked MS's quality on the Original Xbox games on Xbox One, stuff like BLACK looks great.
I thought all PS2 games on PS4 increased the res.
 

Jon God

Member
Oct 28, 2017
2,295
They also have increased res. Their PS2 res was just so low to begin with.

I mean, I ran the PS2 version, the PS3 HD version and the PS4 version all side by side. the PS2 version running in progressive scan looks basically on par aside from the TV's internal scaler not looking as good as the one on the PS4 port. It doesn't _look_ like the base resolution is any higher though?
 

dom

▲ Legend ▲
Avenger
Oct 25, 2017
10,453
I mean, I ran the PS2 version, the PS3 HD version and the PS4 version all side by side. the PS2 version running in progressive scan looks basically on par aside from the TV's internal scaler not looking as good as the one on the PS4 port. It doesn't _look_ like the base resolution is any higher though?
Jak 1 rendered at 512×224. On PS4, it renders at 1024×448. All PS2 games see a 2x resolution bump or 4x the pixels.
 

jay

Member
Oct 25, 2017
2,275
I recently went the other direction, adding a HDD to my real PS2 and figuring out how to load games off that, playing on my CRT. Been loving it.

I've gotten away from wanting to emulate 3D games in high-res. That's OK but CRTs at the games' standard res is my strong preference.

Anyway, it's nice to have enough options to suit everyone.

I make half steps in both directions now and then but have settled on real hardware as well. How was adding the hard drive? Did you change the format it can accept (don't remember the to to from formats off the top of my head)? I've been thinking about doing this so I can pack my games away.
 

lake

Member
Oct 27, 2017
1,289
I make half steps in both directions now and then but have settled on real hardware as well. How was adding the hard drive? Did you change the format it can accept (don't remember the to to from formats off the top of my head)?
It went mostly smoothly despite the overall quality of PS2 homebrew being lower than that of, say, PSP or 3DS. Documentation is... spotty and the tutorials (oh my god, the endless tutorials) are confusing.

The best phat models are 390xx (great except for loud fan) or 500xx (laser said to be less reliable). Slims mostly cannot use HDDs (earliest ones can be modded for HDD, requires soldering).

Open PS2 Loader (OPL) can run PS2 games off an internal HDD, a network share, or a USB drive, in descending order of quality. OPL HDD is compatible with almost every game at this point, while network introduces slower loads and more compat issues, and the PS2's USB 1.1 is just painfully slow.

Standard PS2 network adapters only support outdated IDE drives so I highly recommend buying a SATA-modded official Sony OEM network adapter, they're available on eBay for $30-40. That way you can use a modern SATA drive of up to 2TB. (Some hobbyists have also rigged microSD readers to their network adapters, but 2TB microSDs aren't really a thing yet.)

I got a $50 WD Blue (for PS2 choose 5400rpm over 7200, less heat, same performance). Though I have an Matrix Infinity modchip from back in the day, I also got a FreeMcBoot memcard from the seller for $10 extra. This is very handy to have for easy access to homebrew. (Now I kind of wish I didn't have the modchip because it interferes with FMCB, so I have to disable it each boot.)

Beware the cheaper Chinese-clone HDD adapters on eBay that omit the network port. For one, you want the network port. Two, they're waaay less reliable.

Formatted the hard drive in uLaunchELF (aka wLaunchELF).

Then used a SATA to USB3 adapter to connect it to my W10 PC whenever I wanted to install ISOs to it.

For PC->HDD installations I found the batch file HDLBatch was an absolute godsend. I edit the database file that comes with it to make sure all games have correct/optimal titles. If you can get your PC and PS2 talking over Ethernet (I could not) you can also install games over the network, but it'll take ~10x longer. Or if you're doing the network share method just copy the games to the network share (I think, I've not tried this).

Once games are installed you can run them via Open PS2 Loader and manage certain aspects of them (screenshots, metadata, etc.) via OPL Manager (Windows app).

Almost every app I listed has, uh, quirks and major learning curves, it's a little brutal (I'm not sure how I'd have installed games without HDLBatch, every purpose-built GUI app I ran into failed me). But everything does work in the end. And then you have a lovely PS2 full of all your favorite classics. Well worth it.

Side note: Because homebrewers haven't been able to gain access to PS2's internal PS1 emulation, OPL relies on outdated, quite lacking software emulation for its nominal PS1 ISO support. I recommend not bothering; play PS1 via disc only (though honestly, I'd rather spare the wear on the PS2 laser).
 
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Daeoc

Member
Oct 27, 2017
184
MA
It's all fun and games until you want to play Shadow Hearts 2/3.

nfhem200wur11.png
I've been checking every few months to see if this has been fixed for a couple years now. (I know it works in software mode, but the reason I prefer emulators over actual hardware is because of the enhancements)
 

jay

Member
Oct 25, 2017
2,275
It went mostly smoothly despite the overall quality of PS2 homebrew being lower than that of, say, PSP or 3DS. Documentation is... spotty and the tutorials (oh my god, the endless tutorials) are confusing.

The best phat models are 390xx (great except for loud fan) or 500xx (laser said to be less reliable). Slims mostly cannot use HDDs (earliest ones can be modded for HDD, requires soldering).

Open PS2 Loader (OPL) can run PS2 games off an internal HDD, a network share, or a USB drive, in descending order of quality. OPL HDD is compatible with almost every game at this point, while network introduces slower loads and more compat issues, and the PS2's USB 1.1 is just painfully slow.

Standard PS2 network adapters only support outdated IDE drives so I highly recommend buying a SATA-modded official Sony OEM network adapter, they're available on eBay for $30-40. That way you can use a modern SATA drive of up to 2TB. (Some hobbyists have also rigged microSD readers to their network adapters, but 2TB microSDs aren't really a thing yet.)

I got a $50 WD Blue (for PS2 choose 5400rpm over 7200, less heat, same performance). Though I have an Matrix Infinity modchip from back in the day, I also got a FreeMcBoot memcard from the seller for $10 extra. This is very handy to have for easy access to homebrew. (Now I kind of wish I didn't have the modchip because it interferes with FMCB, so I have to disable it each boot.)

Beware the cheaper Chinese-clone HDD adapters on eBay that omit the network port. For one, you want the network port. Two, they're waaay less reliable.

Formatted the hard drive in uLaunchELF (aka wLaunchELF).

Then used a SATA to USB3 adapter to connect it to my W10 PC whenever I wanted to install ISOs to it.

For PC->HDD installations I found the batch file HDLBatch was an absolute godsend. I edit the database file that comes with it to make sure all games have correct/optimal titles. If you can get your PC and PS2 talking over Ethernet (I could not) you can also install games over the network, but it'll take ~10x longer. Or if you're doing the network share method just copy the games to the network share (I think, I've not tried this).

Once games are installed you can run them via Open PS2 Loader and manage certain aspects of them (screenshots, metadata, etc.) via OPL Manager (Windows app).

Almost every app I listed has, uh, quirks and major learning curves, it's a little brutal (I'm not sure how I'd have installed games without HDLBatch, every purpose-built GUI app I ran into failed me). But everything does work in the end. And then you have a lovely PS2 full of all your favorite classics. Well worth it.

Side note: Because homebrewers haven't been able to gain access to PS2's internal PS1 emulation, OPL relies on outdated, quite lacking software emulation for its nominal PS1 ISO support. I recommend not bothering; play PS1 via disc only (though honestly, I'd rather spare the wear on the PS2 laser).

Really appreciate the detailed response. I will bookmark this for later. And it's about as complicated as I thought :P

I had read PS1 via PS2 hacking was not great and it's a real shame. That will have to be its own project, maybe I'll get the PSIO or something. I've got some European and Japanese PS1 and PS2 games and it would be a real treat to hack one console and have access to all regions of PS1/2.
 
OP
OP
Shinobido Heart
Dec 23, 2017
8,125
So I was messing around with PCSX2 some more and realized I could render my PS2 games in 4K Internal Resolution (Custom Resolution 3840 x 2160). I have my GS Window set to 1920 x 1080, it's how I play my PS2 games. Here are some Skygunner pics!

gsdx_20200322212411.png

gsdx_20200322212514.png

gsdx_20200322213140.png

gsdx_20200322213231.png


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