Working on a NDS emu

[Roor]

Hello,

My name is Roor. I worked coding some emulators and stuff in the past, and as a hobby I've begun working on a NintendoDS emulator, something like 4 or 5 months ago.

It is actually quite slow, has no sound, almost no settings to play around, and it is still lacking in lots of aspects.
Although I've always tried to focus on compatibility, before getting on nice features or hight performance.
I begun with it after I noticed that No$GBA haven't been updated for a while, nor anything close to an iPhone/Android NDS emu in sight; which would be my ultimate and long term goal.

So far, it is named DuoS, and although slow, it is able to play several games so far, under Windows.
I'll upload some screenshots later, if someone is interested.

I'm about to open a tiny blog, were to publish about progress and stuff.
The emu is reaching a stage where it might be very helpful to have feedback regarding compatibility, as well as debug/log information.
If someone is interested in helping on this aspect, please contact me.
Remember that it actually not very useful for actual "gameplay", and still far from finished...

Thanks in advance for you attention,

Roor

[VintageTorrie]

I'll definitely be interested in seeing screenshots, good luck! :D

[Roor]

I just took these shots from games that are actually playable, with a huge frameskip value; I've been incorporating new stuff to the renderer from the old AdriPSX, so it is showing better results, as you can see in the last shot; working with layers is a real pain... but it's improving well so far.

Labyrinth
http://www.torum.com.ar/shots/001.jpg

The Logic Machine
http://www.torum.com.ar/shots/002.jpg

Super Mario 64 DS
http://www.torum.com.ar/shots/003.jpg

Some graphics during play in Mario show some corruption because of bugs with matrix operations, I'll try to improve that during this weekend.

BTW, the "white box" in the upper corner of the window... is the actual (and non-existant) icon for the emu...

[Roor]

I'll definitely be interested in seeing screenshots, good luck! :D

Just posted a few shots here, but it seems that they'll have to wait for approval from a moderator before being shown.

[testmachine]

Can't wait to the emu to get finished!

[Mupen64 Man]

This looks okay. When do you think you'll release a beta?

[Roor]

This looks okay. When do you think you'll release a beta?

I really don't want to make any public release until getting some performance/playability improvements done.
The emu is fairly compatible with several commercial games so far, and I'm about to get the ARM Dynamic Recompiler done along this week... so...

I'll make a try with a private release for "willing testers" in something like two weeks.

I'm just abou to set a tiny blog for that purpose as well as to use it as homepage.

BTW, I posted some shots on this thread, but seems that they are just "frozen in the moderation queue"...

[Roor]

I'm just abou to set a tiny blog for that purpose as well as to use it as homepage.

I just started the blog at http://ds-duos.blogspot.com.ar/.

I'll post some shots and more stuff later tomorrow.

[Mupen64 Man]

Alright, I'll keep a lookout.

[VintageTorrie]

Looking good so far ;)

[ScissorsForDays]

I'm willing to be a 'willing tester' if you need one.

[testmachine]

Looks Awesome.I will make a icon for you!I noticed that you don't have one.I am very talented at photoshop.when i'm done i will post the link!

[testmachine]

I am also willing to be a tester.If you need any!just post a link to the emu and i'll check it out!

[Roor]

I am also willing to be a tester.If you need any!just post a link to the emu and i'll check it out!

Thanks a lot.

Just send me a PM with an email address so we can begin sort it out.

[testmachine]

Here is the icon:
http://img820.imageshack.us/img820/1224/duosicon.jpg
And i will send you a P.M with my email so you can send me a link to the emu!
http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/7/duosicon001.jpg
Here is a cut icon.To fit the icon screen.Only convertion to .ico needed!

[Roor]

Here is the icon:
http://img820.imageshack.us/img820/1224/duosicon.jpg
And i will send you a P.M with my email so you can send me a link to the emu!


I just sent you the build by email.
Expect compatibility to be high, speed to be low... an stability... who knows... (with every line of code I add, the risk of potential crashing bug increases :P ).
Till this weekend I'll be working on speeding it up (there's lots of room for improvement in CPU and Renderer performance).

Please confirm when you receive it, and tell me your thoughts.
There's no need for you to test it on too many games, as compatibility and performance will surely be quite different for next "stable" build.

Talk to you soon.

[testmachine]

DuoS testing results:
Note:All roms are self dumped and they are all EU-Europe.
Cvania-Portrait of Ruin (working)
Cvania-Order Of Ecclesia (working)
Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles-Ring Of fates (working,Even the 3d gameplay and 3D cutscenes work!)
Final Fantasy Tactics Advance 2-grimoire of the rift (working)
Mario and Luigi - Partners in time (working)
New super mario bros. (working)
Tetris DS (working)
Tetris Party (working)
Pokemon Black (working!!!No black screens)
Pokemon White (Also working!!!No black screens!)
Naruto Ninja destiny (working)
Naruto Ninja Destiny 2 (working)
Naruto Ninja Council 3 (working)
Naruto Shippuden-Naruto VS. sasuke (working)
Naruto rpg2 (working)
Kirby canvas curse (working)
Kirby Super star Ultra (working)
Notable Bugs:
Note:This is a test build done By:RooR so download links are not available
The sound is not working(presuming you didn't code it yet @RooR)
Un-Configurable controls - Only set by default
Kind of laggy (My computer runs a Core2Duo and a Nvidia GT240 with 4 GB of ram,Presuming performance will be fixed in the future)
Graphics Options not configurable (presuming this will be added in the future)
saving does not work (tested with multiple roms)
Advantages:
very good compatibility
2D,3D,Arm 9 and Arm 11 is very well coded
Excellent Touch screen emulation (It's precise on Pixel!)
Very nice Full-Screen feature (Alt+Enter improves performance)
Pokemon Black and White do not hang (do not have a black screen while ingame)
I'll test some more games then i'll post them here!
excellent work RooR!

[Roor]

Testmachine, I just emailed you version 0.770 of the emu, it has more than two months worth of work, compared to the version you tested before (0.220).

Most noticeable changes:

- Uses Dynamic Recompiler CPU.
- Uses GPU-Skip functions, so it skips "a lot of GPU work" for non rendered frames; that makes the emu "less CPU hungry", but introduces GPU artifacts. I already corrected lots of those.
- Registers NDS files, so you just run NDS files from your browser.
- Uses OpenGL surface, instead of a software WinDIB surface.

Please email me about compatibility changes!

[testmachine]

I just replied to your E-Mail check it out RooR!

[CalinCool]

just cant wait!

[Roor]

The emu has a working and "acceptable" SPU since last wekend. It sounds good enough on my PC, but now I need to test it on lower end PCs.
The emu is presumed to be "light enough" to run on smaller and single-core PC without much performance lose; but it needs to be more throughfully tested.
I'll be mailing latest beta to testmachine (as soon as I get an answer from him, knowing that he's still alive);

If lucky enough, we might get DuoS DSEMU first release in a week or two.

[testmachine]

I'm alive!Send it to me.

[Roor]

I'm alive!Send it to me.

Among the features I commented you in the email, I forgot to mention that you have TURBO now, when pressing the "left shift" key.

[VintageTorrie]

Sounds like you're making good progress, good luck with it, and I'll be eagerly awaiting release :happy:

[testmachine]

i posted the test results on your e-mail.

[Roor]

I'm almost finished building the "last" beta for the emu, before release tomorrow.
If anyone wants to do some "testing" on it, in order to find "last minute bugs", please PM me ASAP.

I'll publish the build tomorrow late night on its blog ( http://ds-duos.blogspot.com )

[testmachine]

Well Roor the latest build is not stable at all.Check out my results on your E-Mail.

[Roor]

Well Roor the latest build is not stable at all.Check out my results on your E-Mail.

Yes, I noticed the crash last night, a few hours after I sent it to you, and already fixed it.
It was a bug in the SPU sound interpolation. After some tests, I just removed it all (interpolation)... now SPU sounds a lot worse, but emulation is around 10% faster; I guess I ll release it without interpolation until next version.

I ll try to build it before leaving for work this morning, so you can do further testing before release time.

Please send me any other comment you think might be important, apart from the crash and missing keys.

[crystalis]

I cant wait im always excited to try a new emulator keep us posted dude

[testmachine]

I cant wait im always excited to try a new emulator keep us posted dude

It is already done.The public beta has been released.
download it from his blog:
http://ds-duos.blogspot.com