how do u make an emulator

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caleb

New member
i have many emulators for many systems and they are remarkable things, i am just wondering how u can make such a thing, i personally love the epsxe emulators,they run like a charm, i dont know how they can make a thing that runs ps1 games soo good.
i am looking forward to a proper development of a 128-bit system emulator that actually runs commercial games, i know some gamecube games can run on the dolphin emulator.
anyways
catcha
caleb :D
 
O

onewecallgod

New member
im sure you need to have extensive programming knowlege (i'm thinking c++). and i think you would need to know the hardware of the thing you want to emulate very well
 
J

Jet Set Willy

Guest
Yes - if you have to ask the question "How do you make an emulator?" you aren't qualified to make one. I'll explain the basic principles though.

Emulators can be made due to the fact that all computers really do is alter RAM values and send signals to output hardware. A ROM file consists of numerical instructions, for example, one instruction might be telling the processor to put the value 3434 into memory address 9384. If the programmer writes an program which can take the ROM file and make a program which interprets the values within in the same way as an actual processor would, he's got the processor portion of the emulator written. From there he just needs to write routines to show data from RAM as video, sound, and to add interrupts and other platform specific things. Some emulator programmers use pre-made emulation cores for common processors (such as the Z80) so that they can concentrate on writing the platform specific stuff.

Learn about low-level stuff and you'll soon be able to go about writing an emulator without wondering how. :)
 
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onewecallgod

New member
Originally posted by Computergeek@Jul 20 2004, 09:08 PM
Can u even make one that acutaly works?
Click to expand...
when you say "you", who is that directed to?

many emulators work
 
G

Guitar Gamer

New member
Some people suggest starting with NES if you have previous programming language in C++ but if you're relatively new I'd go back even further. Take it back to the basics. Build from the ground up such as a Chip8 emulator.

I'd recommend reading this thread over at NGEmu. It should help you out a lot.

http://www.ngemu.com/forums/showthread.php...t=make+emulator

Read up :)
 
A

animemulator

New member
Depends on what system you want to emulate. if you no very little don't try anything higher than atarti.
 
J

Jet Set Willy

Guest
Last two posts are semi-bad advice, from non-programmers.

How to make an emulator:

1) Be a programmer.
2) Be self-motivated, and intelligent enough to teach yourself advanced topics.
3) Be the sort of person whose brain works well enough in these fields to automatically have a "feel" for knowing how to do something and how to research it. Fact: Nobody who posts a question on a forum asking how to make an emulator will ever be able to make one. They just don't have the right mindset. A potential emulator programmer would have already found his answers through Google and his own initiative.
 
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Postspy

New member
So you want to Create an emulator! B)

You will make a "ATARI 2600 EMULATOR",lets begin..

Download this file first..
The ATARI 2600 Source Code
then upzip this file in its own folder.
This is a Source code for you to look at how to "emulate" meaning "To be like" an "Atari 2600" it is written in C

What you need now is to download "Microsft Visual C++" a program that allows you to READ or edit etc "The ATARI 2600 Source Code"

Do you have "Microsft Visual C++"? you can download it from "Imesh"
Imesh
install imesh then serach for "Microsft Visual C++" its about 80MB

When you have finished all this I will continue from here...

PS: There many ways to do Emulators blah blah..this is my way. goodluck
 
Jale

Jale

Active member
To make an emulator you must first know how the console works and be very skillful on C++
 
Dead Zed

Dead Zed

New member
With emphasis on the first half of what JAPPSmash said.
Get your hands on every piece of tech spec document on what you want to emulate and try to understand as much as possible of it.

As for the second half, it doesn't need to be C++, though it is a bit easier than BlitzBasic for example. Java is another good choice.
 
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dude10

New member
alright, we have a bunch of people making atari 2600 emulators now! Good, cause the ones they have out now are too old...designed for DOS. Stella is great, but the only thing it's missing is fullscreen, which makes it suck :mad:
 
ticktock

ticktock

He's a Human Tornado
nothing on atari really worth playing
except....
E.T.
143-1.jpg

or Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
705123-611096-games_cover-resized200.jpg
 
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allen_frix

New member
hey guys
im new here i need a little bit help here
can i play my ps2 cd to my pc
can you show how?
i have already epsxe,
but i dont know how to configure it to the game i want to play
like FFX-2
thanks
 
Jale

Jale

Active member
can i play my ps2 cd to my pc
can you show how?
Click to expand...
There's no playable PlayStation 2 emulator right now.

i have already epsxe,
but i dont know how to configure it to the game i want to play
like FFX-2
Click to expand...
ePSXe is a PlayStation emulator, not a PlayStation 2 emulator.
 
D

dude10

New member
ticktock said:
nothing on atari really worth playing
except....
E.T.
or Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
Click to expand...
there's always pitfall, the game the 2600 is known for, but E.T. sucks!!!!
 
ticktock

ticktock

He's a Human Tornado
dude10 said:
E.T. sucks!!!!
Click to expand...
how does it suck?
it has an awsome story line
amazing graphics
innovative controlls
if theres any game worth playing on atari its ET
 
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