New Genesis Plus DC team being formed, permission pending.

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New Genesis Plus DC team being formed, permission pending.

Post by gonzo90017 »

From DCiberia.net on Sunday http://www.dciberia.net/tiki-view_forum ... &forumId=2

Image

A few days ago Fox68k rewrote and modernized parts of the emulator rewritten from scratch. He took a version he thougth was correct and implemented FAME. For now when it comes to CPU and animation there are no problems.

Image

Our Proposal:

For Genesis Plus Dc With Fox68k as supervisor we can create a plan to work on the emulator's current problems.

It's written in C KOS / PVR, audio is also written as a stream of KOS this part can be rewritten in SDL or we can take as an example the parts used in NEO4ALL which is the same sound system but converted to SDL.

We understand everyone's desire to have a 100% functioning emulator with emulation as close to the original system as posible. For that we need everyone who can help's attention so we can finish this emulator.

The screenshots you are looking at have been taken just a few minutes ago with the latest version rewritten and adapted by Fox68k. The problem right now is in a small skip or delay in audio.

Now all we need is to contact Black Aura to ask him for permission. If someone knows Black Aura let us know so we can contact him. Thanks

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Last edited by gonzo90017 on Mon Jan 09, 2006 10:52 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by DcSteve »

As long credit is given, im sure he wouldnt mind. Otherwise, he wouldnt have made most of this open source.
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Post by Quzar »

You do realize that BA is working to make GenesisPlus/DC an emulator similar to the recently released NesterDC SE right? If whatever this is were released, from the description, it would be no better than a slightly faster Gencast, and could similarly jeopardize the release of the final emulator. You don't need permission from BA to release anything. Also, the spu-dma streaming multi-channel sound is the fastest possible way to do a sound system on the DC. The reason it is skipping is because the emulator is not fullspeed, and because the sound system in pvr5 doesn't work properly.
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Post by BlackAura »

Most of the problems with GP/DC are things that are entirely missing (much of the video emulation, peripheral support, and stuff), or otherwise broken (parts of the video emulation, and the sound output). Speed isn't really an issue - the emulator has been full speed (with sound) for quite a while now, although with sound sound lag and skipping, both caused by the lack of any kind of sound synchronisation code.

The fix for the sound system is fairly simple. It involves using a triple-buffered approach (which matches the Dreamcast's video hardware quite nicely), and synchronising the emulation to the sound output instead of attempting to synchronise the sound output to the emulation. Stef.D has already done this, in fact. The result was absolutely no sound skipping (at the expense of an occasional dropped frame), although we still had a lag of almost half a second, and the sound output code is horribly inefficient.

What it needs is taking PVR5's sound code (or something very similar), and modifying it to treat the output buffer as three separate buffers, rather than one single looping buffer. Then it just needs the appropriate frame skipping code rigged up to the sound output. That's pretty much the simplest way to get it working, and it's also the fastest way to get the sound data across to the sound hardware.

By the way - Fox68k seems to have duplicated some work that's already been done. I've already had GP/DC running at full speed with sound (with the exception of that annoying sound skipping thing) using FAME, with some of the major video glitches fixed, and I've got quite a lot of experimental code laying around implementing various bits, like some peripheral support, different approaches to the video code, and so on. Granted, most of the experimental version no longer work (I played around with things untill they permenantly broke), but they still have some useful ideas in them. Had Fox asked me first, I'd have happily shared as much of that as I could lay my hands on (a lot of it is buried on one or more backup discs somewhere).

Anyway, I just emailed Fox and Ron about it.
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Post by Nico0020 »

interesting
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Post by Vik Abominae X »

BlackAura wrote:Most of the problems with GP/DC are things that are entirely missing (much of the video emulation, peripheral support, and stuff), or otherwise broken (parts of the video emulation, and the sound output). Speed isn't really an issue - the emulator has been full speed (with sound) for quite a while now, although with sound sound lag and skipping, both caused by the lack of any kind of sound synchronisation code.

The fix for the sound system is fairly simple. It involves using a triple-buffered approach (which matches the Dreamcast's video hardware quite nicely), and synchronising the emulation to the sound output instead of attempting to synchronise the sound output to the emulation. Stef.D has already done this, in fact. The result was absolutely no sound skipping (at the expense of an occasional dropped frame), although we still had a lag of almost half a second, and the sound output code is horribly inefficient.

What it needs is taking PVR5's sound code (or something very similar), and modifying it to treat the output buffer as three separate buffers, rather than one single looping buffer. Then it just needs the appropriate frame skipping code rigged up to the sound output. That's pretty much the simplest way to get it working, and it's also the fastest way to get the sound data across to the sound hardware.

By the way - Fox68k seems to have duplicated some work that's already been done. I've already had GP/DC running at full speed with sound (with the exception of that annoying sound skipping thing) using FAME, with some of the major video glitches fixed, and I've got quite a lot of experimental code laying around implementing various bits, like some peripheral support, different approaches to the video code, and so on. Granted, most of the experimental version no longer work (I played around with things untill they permenantly broke), but they still have some useful ideas in them. Had Fox asked me first, I'd have happily shared as much of that as I could lay my hands on (a lot of it is buried on one or more backup discs somewhere).

Anyway, I just emailed Fox and Ron about it.
Just curious, BlackAura...will it EVER be possible to run Sega Cd games in a Sega DreamCast? Or is that too much to ask? Just wondering if an emulator would be possible that allowed disk swapping for the real Sega Cd disks...I have a bunch of cool Sega CD games and would LOVE to be able to play them on the DC...don't flame me, I just want to know if such a thing is within the realm of possibility...
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Post by rondc »

Hi BlackAura, this is Ron .

I have emailed you as soon as i received your e-mail. Please read my answer. :D

Thanks a lot. See you. Ron
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Post by BlackAura »

Vik Abominae X wrote:Just curious, BlackAura...will it EVER be possible to run Sega Cd games in a Sega DreamCast? Or is that too much to ask? Just wondering if an emulator would be possible that allowed disk swapping for the real Sega Cd disks...I have a bunch of cool Sega CD games and would LOVE to be able to play them on the DC...don't flame me, I just want to know if such a thing is within the realm of possibility...
It might be possible. We do need good (and fast) MegaDrive emulation first, and the CD addon does add a lot of additional load. It's also pretty difficult to emulate, and needs very accurate emulation for everything to work properly. I'd love to give it a go, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

Of course, the less accurate the emulation, the faster it'll go. It may not be that difficult to run some CD games that don't really make much use of the CD hardware at full speed. You'd have to ask someone who's written a SegaCD emulator about that.

Anyway, I just got some emails back, and I'm just going to have a look at what they've done. I'll have a go at merging that with what I've got it a bit.
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Post by Vik Abominae X »

BlackAura wrote:
Vik Abominae X wrote:Just curious, BlackAura...will it EVER be possible to run Sega Cd games in a Sega DreamCast? Or is that too much to ask? Just wondering if an emulator would be possible that allowed disk swapping for the real Sega Cd disks...I have a bunch of cool Sega CD games and would LOVE to be able to play them on the DC...don't flame me, I just want to know if such a thing is within the realm of possibility...
It might be possible. We do need good (and fast) MegaDrive emulation first, and the CD addon does add a lot of additional load. It's also pretty difficult to emulate, and needs very accurate emulation for everything to work properly. I'd love to give it a go, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

Of course, the less accurate the emulation, the faster it'll go. It may not be that difficult to run some CD games that don't really make much use of the CD hardware at full speed. You'd have to ask someone who's written a SegaCD emulator about that.

Anyway, I just got some emails back, and I'm just going to have a look at what they've done. I'll have a go at merging that with what I've got it a bit.
Thanks a ton for the quick response, and I look forward to burning and making use of whatever you can throw together...if it is anywhere NEAR as good as NesterDC SE, it will be WELL worth the wait...

By the way, the main Sega CD games that I would be looking to play on DreamCast would be NBA Jam, Eternal Champions CD, Final Fight CD, Lunar: The Silver Star, Silpheed and Snatcher...if that helps at all...those are the games I have...not sure what games make use of the drive at full speed...
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Post by Vik Abominae X »

milfzor wrote:wow....snatcher and lunar the silver star...you are aware that those two games, if in pretty good condition could sell for a total of over a hundred dollars on ebay fairly easily? NBA Jam is pure garbage, imo (im not a fan of sports games personally) some other stuff that would be awesome to see running on a dreamcast would be popful mail, vay, sonic cd.....i could probably keep going with this list for a while...however i think its probably gonna be a while before the genesis core emulation is solid enough that it can be built on top of.......cuz from how i understand it at least, unlike neo geo cd where all the games run straight from the disc, the sega cd games (at least some of them) load chunks of the game into the system and use the genesis hardware to interpert them... mind you, ive never actually written an emulator......especially a sega cd one, but that being said, its gonna be quite a while before that can actually be done.....and btw, the neo geo cd emulator...at least from where it originated from, took somewhere in the area of around a year and a half or so to go from scratch to complete......and this is literally going from LESS than zero..since the genesis emulation has to be completed first, to complete....and on that note, there's still some flaws with the neo geo cd emulators that are out..dont get me wrong, i would definately like to see it happen as well, but just a forewarning that it could potentially be a solid 2 years before you see it........not that i dont have faith, but just kinda a warning.
I can be patient...remember, I waited from around the time of NesterDC 6.0's release, until NesterDC SE to come out...I have patience...and, besides, I can always play the SCD games on PC...my laptop can be hooked up to a TV and I can play the SCD games through that...oh, and I have a USB-to-PS2 controller converter, so I can use a PS2 controller to play them, too...so I have all the paitence in the world...I just would prefer to play the games on a console is all...

Oh, and while Snatcher is complete and in pretty good shape, I bought Lunar used and just the disc, so resale-wise, it is absolutely worthless...I still love it and even like it more than the PS1 remake...PS1 remake is too DAMN HARD...so, I'll keep both games, thank-you-very-much...oh, and NBA Jam is about the only Basketball game I have ever liked...so NBA Jam still rules...
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Post by DcSteve »

according to news at dciberia.net. The current development version of genesis plus DC has the sound fixed and they are hoping to release it for madricDC.
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Post by Nico0020 »

w00t. im for anything genesis :)
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Post by BlackAura »

DcSteve wrote:according to news at dciberia.net. The current development version of genesis plus DC has the sound fixed
That it does. I was up half the night getting it running properly. Sample rate's a bit low, and the emulator still has a lot of bugs that need squashing, but it's pretty good thus far.
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Post by Juan »

Sweet! )()(
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Post by Nico0020 »

i cant wait!i may have perfect Genesis emulation on xbox, but for some reason it feels so much better seeing it run on a DC and putting a Disk into the DC rather than loading from the xbox harddrive. maybe im weird! lol. congrats keep up the good work!
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Post by Sweater Fish »

Concerning Sega CD emulation.

I haven't followed all the Genesis Plus/DC stuff really closely, but I thought somewhere that BlackAura said that the speed was not a problem at all when you turn off the sound emulation. So, this makes me wonder if it would be more possible to do Sega CD emulation with no sound emulation. Redbook audio could still be played, so there would be background music in most games, but no sound effects.

I don't know how likely even that tactic would be to produce good speed Sega CD emulation, but it seems like a good way to start out at least.

Just a thought.


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Post by LyingWake »

Sega Genesis... mmm... how fun.
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