GBA on DC?

TheRage · Post by **TheRage** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 3:10 am

I was just wondering if there was going to be a GBA emulator for the Dreamcast anytime soon. THat would be the coolest ever! Thanks.

SchmuckofNI · Post by **SchmuckofNI** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 3:31 am

No and there won't ever be.

RayQuaza · Post by **RayQuaza** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 3:31 am

To put it simple..................... NO!

The roms are too big for the system to hold, even if somebody did make an emu for the gba the roms would be too big to load.

SpiderW · Post by **SpiderW** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 5:52 am

Hmm.. I wouldn't say that, anything could be done if you went through the trouble to find a way to compress the games and stuff, I mean there are emulators for Quake, I think it would be a bit bigger then the new pokemon.

jessman · Post by **jessman** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 6:52 am

Not to argue, but Quake doesn't have an emulator. It's a PORT, lol. That means that some of the system files were used from the pc version, and the actual program and system was RE-written for the dreamcast. An emulator would be if someone took every Quake pc file UNCHANGED, and tried to run it EXACTLY under a new Operating system. Sadly, the GBA is barely possible on most NEW systems. Just please n00bs, keep in mind, GBA will NEVER happen.

Post by **Quzar** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 7:34 am

see, the problem with this is that it has a similar, or maybe an identical argument to the n64 on dc issue. the games are too large. this is stated as the only reason not to do it. and i firmly belive that this along with an n64 emulator are possible on the DC. it is powerful enough. whether or not the DC can emulate both the system and function as a container for the cart at the same time is debateable. both n64 and gba emulators could be made, but they would simply be unable to play most games of either system. if the coding was made to be more and more efficient though, and compression were to be used, an emulator could be made to play many games.

I can respect it when seasoned members get outraged at the fact that these types of questions are asked, but when the three people who responded each with a resounding NO have been here under a year, it is just plain old rude and mean.

Shame on you.

The Dream Lives On.

RayQuaza · Post by **RayQuaza** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 8:09 am

Don't think cause I'm posting here and have that newbie mark that I'm new to this site, I've been coming here since late last year and I know that the GBA can't be played on the dreamcast "as is" because I know the rom size is a problem and people that I know that are programmers say the same thing, if the dreamcast had more ram then yes the gameboy advance could be played on the DC and the same thing can be said about the neogeo sega st-v and any other less advanced system that uses carts instead of cd.

If the dreamcast had more ram in it then we could see more than what we have now but since it only has 16 megs of ram in it we can only use but so much.

And yes compression would help with some games but so far nobody that I know of has tried it and until somebody tries it and tells us what happens then the answer is no to what was asked.

The dreamcast is powerful enough to emulate the N64 and GBA but until that "special programmer" stands up and takes up the challenge we will never know.

Post by **Quzar** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 8:21 am

compression has been used by crackers on commercial game warez to be able to fit everything onto a CD without losing any cutscenes. one example is Skies of Arcadia. also, saying you have been here since late last year still does not take away a newbie status, i just have to change my word choice from under a year to only a year. also, even if you arnt a newbie that is not what i said, i just said that you wernt a seasoned member, you cannot use that defense for being so plainly negative. i can understand when people who have made other things and been here for a long time tell the inquirer to simply find the info on their own because that at least helps, but to say that it cannot be done, then give a reason that nobody wants to try does not help.

This whole un-emulatable issue is starting to wear on me... i understand what the mods were telling me, i must just be in an early stage of this though...

The Dream Lives On.

RayQuaza · Post by **RayQuaza** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 8:31 am

I wasn't upset by what you said and I wasn't plainly negative I was letting people who don't know about the DC limitations what can and can't be done and from reading your post you didn't read what I said carefully, I said that the GBA and N64 can be done on the dreamcast but no one that I know of has actually tried to do it and see what happens, so far we have only seen people talk about why they can't be done but we haven't actually seen anybody say that I'm going to give it a shot, if somebody gave it a shot then what we are talking about would never have to be talked about.

Post by **Quzar** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 8:47 am

i read all posts that i reply to carefully. i was making reference to you original post, before i said anything.

To put it simple..................... NO!

The roms are too big for the system to hold, even if somebody did make an emu for the gba the roms would be too big to load.

^^That post. There you said nothing about it being possible. in fact you pretty much say that even if one were to be made, it would not be able to load roms. you also say nothing about n64 emulation.

BANG.

Hobbes T Tiger · Post by **Hobbes T Tiger** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 8:48 am

Ah just go on and lock it down

Anyway, maybe there needs to be a new sticky in here for this that people can notice?

RayQuaza · Post by **RayQuaza** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 8:51 am

Got you again

If the dreamcast had more ram in it then we could see more than what we have now but since it only has 16 megs of ram in it we can only use but so much.

And yes compression would help with some games but so far nobody that I know of has tried it and until somebody tries it and tells us what happens then the answer is no to what was asked.

The dreamcast is powerful enough to emulate the N64 and GBA but until that "special programmer" stands up and takes up the challenge we will never know.

BANG!

By the way TheRage asked about the GBA not N64

BANG AGAIN!

BlackAura · Post by **BlackAura** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 8:55 am

First off - You can not use any kind of compression.

In terms of DC games, it's possible to compress some of the data. This is because it's already compressed - stuff like movies and music are encoded using lossy compression techniques. It is possible to further compress the data at the expense of quality.

However, you can't do that for GBA or N64 games. The games are stored as a block of numbers. The game has all locations hard-coded into it, and therefore knows where all it's data is. In most cases, this data is not compressed, and the game simply would not work if you attempted to compress it. If the data is compressed (Perfect Dark, for example), you couldn't compress the data any more.

Basically, the only way you could possibly try to compress a ROM image is to break it down into small blocks, compress each block, keep a table in memory containing information about the position and size of each block in memory, and where it goes in the ROM image. Then, when the game tries to access something, you'd have to decompress the appropriate part of the image to a temporary area of memory, and then use it from there.

First problem - compressing small blocks gives less compression than compressing large blocks. However, since you can't decompress data from the middle of a compressed data stream, you have to use small blocks to avoid having to decompress huge chunks of the ROM. This means that you don't gain a lot by compression.

Second problem - if you cache the decompressed blocks for use later, you might actually use more memory, by keeping both a compressed copy of the ROM image, and a partially decompressed copy.

Third problem - the speed would drop, probably to nothing. Decompression isn't exactly a fast operation (although it's faster than compression), and the extra work done by decompression chunks of ROM would make the emulator far slower. In fact, the extra code needed just to see how a chunk should be accessed would slow things down anyway, and cause more cache misses by making the code a lot larger.

All in all, not a good idea. It would be incredibly difficult to do, and the emulator would become unusably slow.

Besides, the RAM thing is only one reason.

Post by **Quzar** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 9:04 am

quzar wrote:
Hobbes T Tiger wrote:Ah just go on and lock it down

Anyway, maybe there needs to be a new sticky in here for this that people can notice?
yes. that would be a great thing. i asked for that in an n64 thread that has surprisingly not been locked yet.

As long as this topic and the n64 topic remain intelligent conversations which do not spiral off into crap I'll leave them open, with this added comment: Everbody read the rules if you haven't! They clearly state the protocols governing emulator availability/requests.

RayQuaza · Post by **RayQuaza** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 9:07 am

I know, I was shukin and jivin ya

Post by **Quzar** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 9:24 am

Besides, the RAM thing is only one reason.

BA, could you please elaborate on others? ::pulls out pen and paper::

RayQuaza · Post by **RayQuaza** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 9:44 am

Well it was fun talking about this but it's time to go play with my wife now, have fun with the GBA emu people.

hrb2k3 · Post by **hrb2k3** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 12:06 pm

BA has some great points. and had squashed my idea which was to split the rom into small pieces then the data could rollover to the next split piece when called. similar to DC Movie Player does with movies. but that would take some clever programming. even for a single game n64 emu. like say, mario64.

besides, the GBA is more powerful than SNES. and DreamSNES has a ways to go.

Lavalord · Post by **Lavalord** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 12:24 pm

If someone made a Like Cartridge port dealy that connects into the extension port, where it could just be read. Whould that solve the problem?

Post by **Quzar** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 12:55 pm

well, i think the cart issue isnt something to be discussed until after an emu is made and people want to use bigger games. there are plenty of games for the n64 that are 8mb and under, which leaves a relatively generous amount of room for emulation of the n64's 4mb of ram and 4mb for an emulator and DC ram. pc emulators go down to under a mb for n64, and that of course dosnt count whatever graphix libraries are needed etc, but even if it goes over a few megs, there are roms under 8mb.

pretty much the same goes for GBA, but it has many more 4mb carts.

The Dream Lives On.