| Welcome to NonMESS ! |
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It's quite simple, really. This site endeavors to capture the best emulator for any given system including MESS itself. Lots of research with developers, discussions with the user community, and countless hours of testing have gone into making this site what it is, so you don't have to. Another nice benefit to this site is to aid MESS developers in understanding what resources currently exist, that they may be tapped for assistance. My evaulation criteria for the best emulator is as follows (in order of importance):
Additionally, "MESS driver status" has been provided for each system, which matches actual MESS nomenclature and driver status. Categorization is as follows:
I've always believed that the best information comes from you folks out there. So if you have any comments, by all means I want to hear them! I can be reached via email here. Keep in mind that I'm only providing information on *one* emulator per system. If you'd like to suggest a better emulator, by all means do so - just provide me with a link to the emulator, and a reason why you think yours is better, and I'll consider it. One more thing, I've decided to do this partly due to the success and popularity of NonMAME, so this is my thanks to everyone out there for the years of support you've given me! ;-)
Enjoy! Baseline reference system specs:
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| What's New |
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| MESSy Systems |
The following are systems which MESS emulates as good as, if not better than, any other emulator. This only includes systems that have known "competition" to MESS - there are hundreds of systems in MESS, with potentially hundreds of thousands to come, and I'm simply not going to include all of them here. This is an experimental section and may be removed if people misunderstand its intent. Please note this does not mean any of these systems are "perfectly emulated" either - remember, emulation is never truly perfect! Please join me in extending thanks to the MESS team for their hard work and dedication to this effort, without which such accurate emulation would not be possible. |
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| 32X (Console) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| Kega Fusion: http://www.eidolons-inn.net/tiki-index.php?page=Kega |
With the release of this emulator, it can now be said that Steve Snake, the sole Kega Fusion author, has finally made Sega his bitch. Kega Fusion not only emulates the 32X more accurately than any other emulator, but also supports the Game Gear, Genesis, Master System and Sega CD. |
| 3DO (Console) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| 4DO: http://www.fourdo.com/ |
This emulator builds upon the elder FreeDO's codebase, though with many new features, improved accuracy, etc. Many 3DO games apparently run just fine under 4DO - check here. This should give the 3DO emulation scene some much-needed competition until a decent MESS driver is written. |
| ADAM (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| Virtual ADAM: http://www.sacnews.net/adamcomputer/downloads.html |
Virtual ADAM is a bitter pill to swallow since ADAMEm, which provides its core, was last updated over 10 years ago and is MS-DOS only. That said, it's still your only bet to emulate this curiosity from Coleco with any reasonable level of accuracy. With that said, apparently ColEm will support the ADAM soon too - though hopefully MESS will beat that one to it. |
| Altair 8800 (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| Altair32: http://www.altair32.com/ |
The Altair 8800 was the first "home computer" introduced in January of 1975. Altair32 simulates this historically significant system fairly accurately, and includes the source code for future improvements by outside contributers. Curiously, Altair32 is actually an improvement of Altair 8800b Simulator, the latter having been written by Microsoft employee Claus Giloi and abandoned some time in the late 90s. |
| Amiga Series (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary/Imperfect |
| WinUAE: http://www.winuae.net/ |
There's really no need for anyone to consider any other Amiga emulator - this one rocks. It's been in development for many years and has a huge user/fan base worldwide, due in part to the fact that the Amiga computer itself was quite an incredible system. While the MESS driver has seen dramatic improvements lately thanks to some excellent work by Aaron Giles and Ernesto Corvi, I believe there's still more work to do in order to match WinUAE's versatility. |
| Apple II (Non-GS) (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Good |
| AppleWin: http://applewin.berlios.de/ |
This emulator is fantastic, I believe compatible with the entire Apple II software catalog, and the latest versions even include Mockingboard support (Apple II sound card!). The MESS driver also supposedly supports Mockingboard, though I have not been able to get it to work. |
| Arcadia 2001 (Console) |
| MESS Status: Imperfect |
| WinArcadia: http://amigan.1emu.net/ |
WinArcadia author James Jacobs pointed out several deficiencies in the current MESS driver that are not present in his emulator. He indicated he may help the MESS team with their driver however. Update: James is most definitely not going to be helping the MESS team. Fortunately, the MESS driver for Arcadia 2001 (and other related systems) is nearing completion with many games already perfectly emulated, so look forward to that soon! |
| Archimedes (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| Red Squirrel: http://www.red-squirrel.org/ |
Red Squirrel is the best Acorn Archimedes emulator to date. |
| Atari ST (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| Steem Engine: http://steem.atari.st/ |
There are many mature Atari ST emulators in existence, but this one seems to be still in development and is compatible with newer versions of Windows. |
| CD-i (Console) |
| MESS Status: Imperfect |
| CD-i Emulator: http://www.cdiemu.org/ |
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Due to licensing issues, MESS does not yet support CD-i games with MPEG-compressed video, and is not quite as accurate as CD-i Emulator, so CD-i Emulator remains on NonMESS. With that said, this is the best known standalone CD-i emulator, and a fairly mature one at that (although it is not freeware). There are very few other emulators known for the CD-i, and small wonder: the system was terrible as a gaming platform. |
| Central Data 2650 (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| WinArcadia: http://amigan.1emu.net/ |
This system uses the Signetics 2650 CPU. |
| Commodore 64/128/PET/VIC-20 (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Good |
| VICE: http://www.viceteam.org/ |
The open-source VersatIle Commodor Emulator (VICE) is the best Commodore 64 emulator to date. While "CCS64" is equally accurate, it isn't free, and it doesn't emulate the PET, VIC 20 or 128 as VICE does. Moreover, the MESS 64/128 driver currently crashes on loading software; the PET driver has no sound; and the VIC-20 driver has preliminary sound only, along with graphics issues (see Amidar offset). |
| Dreamcast (Console) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| nullDC: http://code.google.com/p/nulldc/ |
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To quote the late Doug Henning, "Anything's possible in the world of magic!". Well folks, if you believe in magic, believe this: nullDC is one heck of a Dreamcast emulator, and has been from its first release. As an update to this original entry made several years ago, nullDC has gone open-source; great news for the long-term potential of the project and Dreamcast preservation in general. It's a timely maneuver too, because its successors are slowly filling the gaps of it's glaring limitations. Here's hoping this will bring new features, such as proper CHD, WinCE and DSP support. |
| Dreamcast Visual Memory System (Handheld) |
| MESS Status: Non-existent |
| DirectVMS: No Website |
The Dreamcast Visual Memory System (VMS) was a gaming platform in its own right. This emulator is actually a DirectX port of SoftVMS but is the better of the two. Development on both emulators has ceased. |
| Game Boy / Game Boy Color (Handheld) |
| MESS Status: Imperfect/Good |
| Gambatte: http://sourceforge.net/projects/gambatte/ |
There are so many Game Boy emulators out there to choose from, yet this the most accurate (with runner-up KiGB a close second). Interestingly, Mednafen has also become a nice alternative to Gambatte, though falls short on rare edge cases such as Shantae. Indeed, this project definitely belongs in the same league as other emulators with a focus on clock-cycle accuracy, such as pSX and bsnes. Additionally, this is an open-source project, and there appears to be some collaboration between the MESS development team and Gambatte's author! At this point, MESS matches Gambatte's accuracy as far as I can tell, barring some very limited, small-scale issues. MESS has problems with Rayman in particular - note the graphical effects during the intro, the music in the game, and the garbage at the bottom of the screen during gameplay - none of which are problems for Gambatte. |
| Game Boy Advance (Handheld) |
| MESS Status: Imperfect |
| Mednafen: http://mednafen.sourceforge.net/ |
Some of you may be surprised to see the Game Boy Advance (GBA) section re-surface after recent MESS driver improvements. It appears I had made a mistake: I've discovered the MESS driver has difficulties with certain edge cases, such as Drill Dozer, Racing Gears Advance and Iridion II (all great games, by the way). Furthermore, Mednafen runs these games just fine. Since I cannot find any games that MESS runs better than Mednafen, I've declared Mednafen the better of the two. To be fair, VisualBoy Advance is also a fine GBA emulator on par with Mednafen, though given the diversity of Mednafen with other systems, and its status as an actively developed emulator, the latter is a better choice overall. With that said, be forewarned: Mednafen is famously difficult to use. For one, there is no GUI, and the third-party GUIs that exist are generally terrible. I've tried many and have found that only one, MedGUI, even works correctly. Additionally, there are some very counter-intuitive configuration issues. For example, setting controls requires pressing SHIFT-ALT-1 while Mednafen is running! Worse: there's no way to configure controls in MedGUI, though just about every other configuration option exists within the frontend. |
| GameCube (Console) |
| MESS Status: Non-existent |
| Dolphin: http://www.dolphin-emulator.com/ |
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Oh my! In just a few short months the Dolphin team led by F|RES and ector have improved this emulator by orders of magnitude, and it now supports an impressive array of games that grows on a daily basis. Get the full skinny on Dolphin in the Wii section below. |
| Game Park 32 (Handheld) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| GeePee32: http://users.skynet.be/firefly/gp32/ |
The GamePark 32 is a Korean handheld gaming system, and is several times more powerful than the Game Boy Advance. GeePee32 does a great job emulating the system - check it out! |
| IBM Mainframes (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Non-existent |
| Hercules: http://www.hercules-390.org/ |
Hercules emulates several IBM Mainframes; namely, System/370, ESA/390, and z/Architecture systems. Hercules has a huge (3000+) user community, as these systems were quite special to many people. Note: A GUI is available for Windows users. |
| IMSAI 8800 (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Non-existent |
| Altair32: http://www.altair32.com/ |
This system is a clone of the Altair 8800 computer, the latter being the first "home computer" introduced in January of 1975. See the Altair 8800 section for further information. |
| Instructor 50 (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| WinArcadia: http://amigan.1emu.net/ |
This system uses the Signetics 2650 CPU. |
| Jaguar (Console) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| Project Tempest: http://pt.emuunlim.com/ |
In actuality, MESS Jaguar emulation is the most accurate of all, thanks in part to Aaron Giles' CoJag MAME driver. However, playing Jaguar games in MESS on today's computing hardware is like swimming in a pool of molasses - try it, you'll see! Project Tempest currently has many accuracy and compatibility issues, and hasn't seen a release in many years, but it's the best available. Curiously, Virtual Jaguar has seen recent development activity, and is fully open-source; however, it has several speed, sound and graphics issues that aren't evident with Project Tempest. |
| JR-200U (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| Virtual Panasonic JR-200U: http://www.reocities.com/emucompboy/ |
This is the only known emulator outside of MESS for the JR-200U. |
| Macintosh (Non-PowerPC) (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary/Good |
| Basilisk II: http://www.emaculation.com/doku.php/basilisk_ii |
This is the best Macintosh emulator out there, made better by the fact that it seems to have risen from its moribund status to active development. One small issues remains with this emulator, however: the original Mac 128/Plus computer is not supported (your best bet for this is Mini vMac). Regarding this issue, RBelmont has this to say, "MESS is the only Mac emulator on the planet to emulate the SCSI port at the hardware level instead of sticking HLE shims into the Mac OS.". I should also note that users of x64 machines may not be able to get this running with features such as CD-ROM support, due to the emulator relying on system-specific drivers and only providing x86 versions. |
| Macintosh (PowerPC) (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| PearPC: http://pearpc.sourceforge.net/index.html |
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PearPC is the first Macintosh PowerPC emulator available for Wintel machines. The emulator is in very early stages and is relatively difficult to install and use; however, it is worth the undertaking if you happen to be a PowerPC enthusiast. |
| MSX Series (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Good |
| blueMSX: http://www.bluemsx.com/ |
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Would I steer you wrong? Hell no. This is hands down the best MSX emulator out there, and it's relatively new. Don't just take my word for it though, MSX.org even ran an MSX emulator bake-off and came up with the same results. Try it and see what all the fuss is about! The MESS driver is coming along too; however there are known problems with the floppy support, and I've noticed problems with music tempo in MSX2 games like "Vampire Hunter" and "Metal Gear". |
| MZ Series (Below 2000) (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary/Good |
| MZxEmu: http://www.sharpmz.org/ |
Michael Franzen's MZxEmu is the only emulator you need for Sharp MZ systems below the 2000 model. Curiously, there is no "readme" file, though the emulator is very straightforward and well-written. Interestingly enough, MZxEmu also emulates Z80-based arcade games such as Phoenix and Carnival! As a side note, the link provided here is not specific to this emulator; rather, it is an excellent resource for information on the Sharp MZ-based systems, in addition to providing a de facto home for MZxEmu. Check it out! MESS has recently added support for these models; however the "MZ-80B" and "MZ-1500" which MZxEmu emulates well, are not currently working. |
| MZ-2000 (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary/Good |
| EmuZ-2000: http://www5d.biglobe.ne.jp/%7Eobject/ |
This Sharp multi-MZ emulator is the only one of its kind. Surprisingly enough, this emulator features an English GUI. |
| Neo-Geo CD (Console) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| NeoRAINE: http://rainemu.swishparty.co.uk/ |
This emulator recently introduced support for the Neo-Geo CD's raster effects, making it the best of the bunch. |
| Nintendo DS (Handheld) |
| MESS Status: Non-existent |
| DeSmuME: http://desmume.org/ |
DeSmuME is back! This is clearly the best DS emulator out there, now beating out its closest competitor, No$GBA, by a sound margin. With tons of great features, excellent compatibility and speed, and an open-source platform, what more could you want? |
| Nintendo Entertainment System (Console) |
| MESS Status: Imperfect |
| Nestopia: http://sourceforge.net/projects/nestopia/ |
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Surprised? Man, is competition fierce in the Nintendo department. With so many great emulators to choose from (Mednafen, FCE Ultra, Nestopia, VirtuaNES, RockNES X and NNNesterJ to name a few) it can make your head spin. What's worse - the NES supports over 100 "mappers" within their cartridges and none of these programs emulate them all. What's a mapper? Chris Covell's NES Tech FAQ describes it well:
Incidentally an excellent place to find information on mappers and the games they support is here. Fortunately there are games such as "CastleVania III", "Skull & Crossbones" and "Mr. Gimmick" that provide good benchmarks for testing, as their mappers are notoriously difficult to emulate. I spent quite a long time testing each of the best emulators, aggregating findings from other emulation sites, reading their documentation, etc. My conclusion: Nestopia is the best NES emulator to date - with support for far more mappers than any other emulator, its open-source status, constant updates, great features like Kaillera netplay and rewind support, and a very simple and intuitive yet powerful interface - nothing really comes close. Honorable mention goes to VirtuaNES, which provides four mappers non-existent in Nestopia - specifically, mapper #s 20, 109, 110 and 190. Additionally, fwNES (discontinued with no website available) supports mapper 81. None of these mappers are currently supported by any other emulator that I am aware of. If you are a completist, it may be worth your while to download and use these emulators as well. Finally, I understand Mednafen is probably the best overall alternative to Nestopia, though without support for the MESS (proper) split NES ROM format, it's difficult to recommend at this time. Oh, and it's definitely worth noting that the MESS driver is probably going to steamroller all of this pretty soon - it's very close to Nestopia in terms of accuracy and compatibility (now even running one of my favorite NES games, "CastleVania III"). Still, it chokes a bit at times - for example Skull & Crossbones shows no video; many Tengen games (Klax, Alien Syndrome) are unplayable; a few mapper 1 games (Back to the Future) are glitchy or freeze; and many Chinese mappers are only preliminarily emulated. I don't know when it'll get there exactly, but hopefully soon! |
| Nintendo 64 (Console) |
| MESS Status: Imperfect |
| Project64: http://www.pj64-emu.com/ |
It's been a long and winding road towards perfect Nintendo 64 emulation. No emulator outside of the MESS driver is terribly accurate, though a few can at least run a wide variety of N64 titles (ignoring for a moment that they use High Level Emulation as smoke and mirrors to do so). The best of these are Project64 and Mupen64Plus. While the former is the more compatible of the two, running a wider variety of games, Mupen64Plus is rapidly closing the gap. Also, the latter's open-source and cross-platform status (it runs on Linux, MacOS etc.) means it has far greater future potential than Project64. Finally, both Project64 and Mupen64Plus take advantage of a very effective plug-in system that allows independent developers to write their own interchangeable video, audio, controller, and Reality Signal Processor (RSP) modules, separate from the emulators' cores. To date, the best Project64 plug-ins are as follows:
Video: Jabo's Direct3D8 (Included with the emulator) Most people don't realize how easy it is to configure these plug-ins, but it's really quite simple: download any plug-ins that are not included with the emulator, unzip them, and place them in the emulator's "Plugin" directory. Launch the emulator and select the downloaded plug-ins for each module, optionally configure them and you're done! Now you're playing with power. ;) Another thing, check out the work Smiff has done with the replacement RDB file, here. The RDB file is essentially a database of settings for individual games that further tweak the emulator and maximize performance. Simply replace the stock RDB file with this one for even better performance. One important note about the MESS driver - it's had some major improvements recently thanks to MooglyGuy and Ville Linde. In fact, the MESS driver is probably several orders of magnitude more accurate than Project64; however given this fact it is unplayably slow. Given time the MESS driver will, of course, be a far better alternative. |
| NUON (Console) |
| MESS Status: Non-existent |
| Nuance: No Website |
Nuance is the only known emulator for this system. Sadly, its original author passed away in 2007. |
| Odyssey (Console) |
| MESS Status: Non-existent |
| ODYEMU: http://www.pong-story.com/odyemu.htm |
ODYEMU is the only known emulator for this, the very first console game system ever made. |
| PC (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| DOSBox: http://dosbox.sourceforge.net/ |
If you want to play old PC games, you need this software. It's really that simple. Nothing comes close, excepting the MESS driver which has made rapid progress lately, especially with respect to 486 and 586 (Pentium) processor-based systems. |
| PC98 (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| Neko Project II fmgen: No Website |
The NEC PC98XX series of computers was introduced at a time when the IBM PC was first taking off, and it was marketed in a similar fashion for the same purposes, yet it had its own architecture. Neko Project II fmgen emulates this system very well, and unlike so many other PC98 emulators, it sports an English GUI that won't drive you non Japanese-speaking folk bananas using it. Note that this emulator is an anonymous programmer's fork of the original Neko Project II effort that is now defunct. While this emulator has no official website, there are some interesting discussions with links posted on this forum thread. |
| PC-FX (Console) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| Mednafen: http://mednafen.sourceforge.net/ |
Mednafen supports this system well, and considering the emulator also supports other NonMESS systems, I wouldn't even consider any alterative at this point. With that said, be forewarned: Mednafen is famously difficult to use. For one, there is no GUI, and the third-party GUIs that exist are generally terrible. I've tried many and have found that only one, MedGUI, even works correctly. Additionally, there are some very counter-intuitive configuration issues. For example, setting controls requires pressing SHIFT-ALT-1 while Mednafen is running! Worse: there's no way to configure controls in MedGUI, though just about every other configuration option exists within the frontend. Despite these issues, Mednafen is a solid emulator and worth checking out - at least until the MESS driver is cleaned up. This will hopefully be soon, by the way - the MESS PC Engine and PC Engine CD driver has seen substantial improvements recently, so PC-FX can't be far behind. |
| PCW (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| JOYCE: http://www.seasip.demon.co.uk/Unix/Joyce/ |
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JOYCE is the only Amstrad PCW emulator available outside of MESS (which currently doesn't work at all). |
| PIPBUG-based Systems (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| WinArcadia: http://amigan.1emu.net/ |
These systems (example: Adaptable Board Computer) all use the Signetics 2650 CPU. PIPBUG itself is actually a BIOS rather than a computer. |
| PlayStation (Console) |
| Mess Status: Preliminary |
| pSX: http://psxemulator.gazaxian.com/ |
PlayStation emulation has been fraught with controversy, from the commercial fiasco/disaster "Bleem" to the unapproved hack/project "PSXeven". Thankfully, we have pSX - an absolute gem of an emulator that's so far above the rest of the competition it isn't funny - though honorable mention goes to ePSXe for fully supporting sound in Spyro 2, which pSX does not (hopefully that will come soon). It's worth noting that unlike many of its competitors, ePSXe included, pSX doesn't use plug-ins. Eschewing this system in favor of a more traditional and simpler approach, the emulator is far easier to configure and use than its plug-in wielding competitors as a result. It's also worth noting that Mednafen has made significant progress with the PlayStation recently, and would replace these other emulators except I could not get it to boot into the BIOS (for memcard support); I couldn't get native resolution to work properly; and there's no dualshock support. However, this one's definitely worth watching out! |
| PlayStation 2 (Console) |
| MESS Status: Non-existent |
| PCSX2: http://www.pcsx2.net/ |
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There's really no other viable option for this platform. While it's fully open-source with Windows and Linux versions, unfortunately there isn't a 64-bit version; this limits future compatibility and creates problems for Linux users since they will need to create a chroot environment to get it to work (see here for further details).
For assistance getting PCSX2 to work in general, see bostman's PCSX2 Configuration Page. |
| PlayStation Portable (Handheld) |
| MESS Status: Non-existent |
| JPCSP: http://www.jpcsp.org/index.php?p=Downloads |
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What's this? A PSP emulator in Java? Great to see the language get a real workout with this, the best PSP emulator currently available. |
| Pong (Console) |
| MESS Status: Non-existent |
| WinArcadia: http://amigan.1emu.net/ |
WinArcadia simulates (i.e. doesn't emulate) the old AY-3-8500 based "Ball & Paddle" integrated circuit from General Instrument that was used in several home Pong systems. WinArcadia author James Jacobs has this to say about supporting these systems: The Pong coin-op and the earliest home versions use discrete circuitry. The AY-3-8500 was designed as a "Pong-on-a-chip" system to eliminate the need for such discrete circuitry. The chip is presumably running some kind of microcode to achieve the resultant game behaviour, but it's impossible to know exactly what is going on inside it. The simulation is based on the official datasheet for the AY-3-8500, which goes into considerable detail about the exact behaviours of the game but not about its internal operation. I don't think this chip could be actually emulated unless someone decaps and scans one with a microscope, which has never been done for this chip to my knowledge." While Pong may not exactly spell excitement these days, it makes for a great nostalgia trip for those of you who are old enough to remember. |
| Saturn (Console) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| SSF: http://www7a.biglobe.ne.jp/~phantasy/ssf/index.html |
While development of this emulator has been notably slow over the many years that it's been around, nothing has been able to top it - including the controvertial GiriGiri/Cassini. SSF isn't the fastest Saturn emulator out there, but it runs at a playable speed on my reference system and it's the most compatible there is. Keep in mind that while the emulator's website may be in Japanese, the software itself, including the GUI, is in English. The MESS Saturn driver has come along quite nicely recently, and apparently some games are now fully playable. However, the CD block is still missing so a majority of games will not be playable until then. That may change soon, though... |
| Sega CD (Console) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| Kega Fusion: http://www.eidolons-inn.net/tiki-index.php?page=Kega |
Steve Snake strikes again! This is the best Sega CD emulator out there. |
| Super Nintendo Entertainment System (Console) |
| MESS Status: Imperfect |
| bsnes: http://byuu.org/bsnes/ |
I really need to be careful with hyperbole when I'm writing about brilliant emulators - there's so much good stuff out there I imagine it would be easy for you, my readers, to feel jaded by review after glowing review. Having said that, it's impossible for me NOT to rave about bsnes. Please indulge me. With so many decent SNES emulators that have been developed over the years there's a lot of competition for sure, yet bsnes beats them all. Rising like a phoenix from the ashes of inaccurate, buggy and hack-plagued emulators that will go unnamed, this tiny and efficient piece of software demonstrates that system emulation can improve dramatically, even after the target system has received years of attention and scrutiny. bsnes accuracy is VERY close to 100%, with a 65816 CPU core that is - are you sitting down? - accurate to the clock cycle. I'm not kidding. This emulator basically IS a SNES in software. Show me any other SNES emulator - heck, show me any other emulator period, that can lay that sort of claim (of course there is a speed cost, but it's really not that noticeable if you are running bsnes on anything made within the last several years). As if that weren't enough, bsnes features an uncommonly simple and clean interface as well as BS Satellaview and SuperFX support, and is actively updated unlike some of its competition. About the only thing missing from bsnes that others have is netplay. The only true runner-up to bsnes is SNESGT. While not quite as accurate, this emulator is also highly compatible, and according to the bsnes author byuu himself, SNESGT actually supports some BS Satellaview games that bsnes doesn't. byuu writes, "[SNESGT] uses various game-specific workarounds that bsnes cannot to achieve even greater BS-X compatibility [than bsnes]." In any event, you really can't go wrong with bsnes - it's simply astonishing. If there can exist such a thing as a work of art in emulation, this would be it. Future authors would do well to study and learn from byuu, and hopefully reflect half the talent he obviously has. On a side note, MESS development has been progressing rapidly as well these days, though without support for features such as BS Satellaview and decent SuperFX support. Further, don't hold your breath waiting for cycle-accuracy - it may come in time, but not on the immediate horizon for sure. There will need to be major changes to the MESS (and actually, MAME) core before such a thing is even possible. |
| Trek (AKA NEC PC-6000/PC-6001)(Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| Virtual NEC Trek:http://www.reocities.com/emucompboy/ |
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This is the only working NEC Trek emulator available. |
| TV Games Computer (Computer) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| WinArcadia: http://amigan.1emu.net/ |
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WinArcadia supports this computer by Elektor, which is not too surprising considering it uses the Signetics 2650A CPU as does the Arcadia 2001 and others listed on NonMESS. |
| VC 4000 (Console) |
| MESS Status: Imperfect |
| WinArcadia: http://amigan.1emu.net/ |
Interton's ancient game console, utilizing the Signetics 2650 CPU. WinArcadia author James Jacobs pointed out several deficiencies in the current MESS driver that are not present in his emulator. He indicated he may help the MESS team with their driver however. Either way, the MESS driver is nearing completion and many VC 4000 games are already perfectly emulated, so look forward to that soon! |
| Virtual Boy (Handheld) |
| MESS Status: Preliminary |
| Mednafen: http://mednafen.sourceforge.net/ |
Mednafen supports this system well, and considering the emulator also supports other NonMESS systems, I wouldn't even consider any alterative at this point (though Reality Boy is a decent standalone VB emulator). With that said, be forewarned: Mednafen is famously difficult to use. For one, there is no GUI, and the third-party GUIs that exist are generally terrible. I've tried many and have found that only one, MedGUI, even works correctly. Additionally, there are some very counter-intuitive configuration issues. For example, setting controls requires pressing SHIFT-ALT-1 while Mednafen is running! Worse: there's no way to configure controls in MedGUI, though just about every other configuration option exists within the frontend. Despite these issues, Mednafen is a solid emulator and worth checking out - at least until the MESS driver is cleaned up. |
| Wii (Console) |
| MESS Status: Non-existent |
| Dolphin: http://www.dolphin-emulator.com/ |
While not exactly coming out of the blue, Dolphin's advanced support for the Wii took everyone by surprise. It'll require a little work to dump the BIOS from your Wii, and your computer will need bluetooth capability to support the Wiimote, but Dolphin makes it possible to play your Wii games at full speed on modern computers (well, some of the anyway, though that's changing). Perhaps the most exciting thing about Dolphin are the constant improvements that you can compile and see for yourself on a daily basis. I attribute this rapacious progress to it's vast open-source development community, comprised of many talented programmers and reverse engineers (led by F|RES and ector) as well as the accessibility of the code and the loose yet coordinated development model that seems more prevalent than that of any other emulation project I know, with the exception of MAME and MESS. This is the way emulation projects should be run, especially those involving such modern systems as the GameCube and Wii. As time passes, projects established with the lofty goal of emulating a complex next-generation system will need to employ Dolphin's successful and proven model if any success is to be made. So take it in, folks. This is far too important (and cool) for any emulation fan to ignore. |
| WonderSwan (Handheld) |
| MESS Status: Imperfect |
| WSCamp: No Website |
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This is the best WonderSwan emulator available today. The MESS driver has been improved recently; however there are still significant problems with sound (try the monochrome "Crazy Climber" game and you'll see what I mean). |
| Xbox (Console) |
| MESS Status: Non-existent |
| Cxbx: http://www.caustik.com/cxbx/ |
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Xbox emulation is a sad state of affairs indeed, thanks in large part to a lack of documentation. But you ask, shouldn't there be an abundance of documentation for the PC platform, on which the Xbox is based? Well, sort of. To begin with, the Xbox uses custom Nvidia graphics hardware - and Nvidia is known to be very cloak-and-dagger about their hardware. Until recently I had reported that Dxbx was the best Xbox emulator available. However, a few things have made me change that: first, being a Delphi port of Cxbx, Dxbx will always be one step behind; and second, while Cxbx hasn't seen a public release in many years, its SVN is on fire. Keep in mind: very few games actually run on this emulator, and the future doesn't look promising unless/until more documentation avails itself to the developers. Also, neither of the above emulators support x64-based operating systems yet. Let's hope they do at some point soon. |