The SNES Emulation War of 1997 | MVG

In 1997 a war had started to see who could develop the best Super Nintendo emulator. In this episode we take a look back at early SNES emulation and how it become what it is today.
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Sources/Credits/Links:
► Axelay Soundtrack OST #01 "Axelay Title Theme" Taro Kudo
► patpend.net/articles/ar/s9xpa...
► tcrf.net/Fight_Night_Round_2_...)
► web.archive.org/web/1997030500...
► archive.org/details/s96d072
► emulation.gametechwiki.com/in...
► mavrick1.tripod.com/emulators...
► www.zophar.net/articles/artic...
► web.archive.org/web/1999022013...
► www.zophar.net/snes/nlke.html
► emulator.games/roms/super-nin...
► www.zophar.net/articles/art_1...
► www.zophar.net/articles/artic...
► web.archive.org/web/1998120122...
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#SNES #EarlyEmulation #War

[@clivemyrie4209]

That bloody UI brings back memories.

[@dustinsteele3069]

The first Genesis emulator I remember using.

[@my3dprintedlife]

Good Ole Bloodlust Software.

[@MAGA_Patriot2024]

A ton of memories!

[@shadowfax8434]

Oh yeah, memories.

[@AceWing905]

I still remember picking up a bootleg CD promising hundreds of games, and discovering a ton of ROMs with an executable only titled "genecy32". I didn't even know what it really was until a while later. Good times.

[@nicolasrolke3538]

Zsnes was the first emulator I used on PC. Back then it was simply unbelievable to run the entire SNES catalogue of games on your computer. I would spend hours starting random games that sounded fun with a friend and discovering the unknown library of games. Simply unforgettable.

[@orlandofurioso7329]

You know what i loved about zsnes? The UI, it was so cool and retro, it felt really good to run it.

[@mariatelos]

My first experience with emulation was playing Sonic the Hedgehog with Gens back in 2001-2002. Before then, I first heard about emulation though either Game Informer or Electronic Gaming Monthly's article about UltraHLE's impact on the emulation scene.

[@soundspark]

Nesticle was my first experience. Tossed my Zelda II cartridge back into my NES when I first emulated it because I thought the little red dot on the Wosu sprite was a bad ROM.

[@playinginthepodcastroom8365]

The first time I even learned about "emulators" was sometime between 1998 and 2001 (my high school era). In a C++ (?) programming class, I had noticed my classmate Greg playing...something...on a computer lab PC that I had never seen before. It was *ZSNES,* and he was playing *Seiken Densetsu 3.* Around that same time I also stumbled upon *NESticle* (aka "the emulator with the bloody hand").

[@MasterChibi]

God I remember playing Yoshi's Island in college in the computer lab and having the *entire* computer lab eyeing me playing it. I had headphones on and then suddenly find out everyone's cheering for me to finish each level, wonderful memories.

[@tommj4365]

Sounds like heaven

[@phtevenstevin4625]

The gui for zsnes brings back the feels. It felt like magic to be able to load so many games as a little kid - my brother had set it all up and dang, it was so cool. That was my first time having save states. Good times.

[@linkthehero8431]

I still use that one now because the NTSC filter allows me to adjust pretty much everything possible. It's a lot more feature-rich than the SNES9X one that is just a shader file preinstalled to the emulator.

[@xXMasterForceXx]

Right? When I first discovered emulation and that I could play some of my all time favorite games again it felt like a dream and even though this emulator is considered outdated, innacurate and obsolete these days it still has a place in my heart for being the first one that allowed me to relive the greatness of the SNES long after mine died.

[@VexAcer]

Honestly I always liked the snowy option it had for the UI background. Very comfy feeling.

[@kosmosyche]

@@linkthehero8431 Same, I really dig the ZSNES implementation of NTSC filter with all the adjustments. Also, before "Run Ahead" option appeared in RetroArch, ZSNES was the most input lag-free SNES emulator, basically on a CRT monitor it had almost as fast input response as the real SNES (unlike super accurate bsnes, which has always been an input-lag-fest).

[@taben9jake]

@@VexAcer it does have a special feel to it doesnt? I remember sitting there running through folders with the snow in the background. Fantastic!

[@4RedDwarf3]

And now we are spoiled with emulation with all the great people behind these emulators. A big thank you from me for them all.

[@SuperPhunThyme9]

With the way these entitled people in gaming treat creators, it's no wonder it takes us so long to get good emulation sometimes. There's nothing wrong with selling your work if you aren't using copyright law, etc. to hinder other emulation projects. You're doing exactly zero harm to anyone.

[@yellowblanka6058]

@@SuperPhunThyme9 I would say if these projects are built on official technical documents etc. (like CEMU), there is definitely something wrong with selling their work.

[@International_Criminal_Court]

👏🏾

[@GamingRobioto]

ZSNES was where it started for me. I'll never forget the sheer joy I had when I finally got Final Fantasy IV, V and VI working. Being in the UK meant there was no easy way to play these games, which in a nutshell sums up why emulation is a good thing

[@crisnmaryfam7344]

I had never heard of Seiken Densetsu. But was a die hard fan... Secret Of Mana on SNES. My uncle had it and I played with my cousin on sleepovers and weekend things, eventually Zsnes came along in my life.. OF course I went for SoM and some FF"3" then I stubled across "Secret of Mana 2" like wait "whAaaaaaaaaaaaaaat? they made a second one?!" Then promptly found secret of evermore, another Seiken Densetsu title, learned that all the FF titles essentially are "SD" and what "Legend of the holy sword 2" AKA Seiken Densetsu 3 was.... Sadly it took until recently for this to make it to the states.... If it werent for emulation.... you never know...

[@milesaway1980]

Final Fantasy IV was the first one I ever booted up! I remember downloading it on my 14.4k modem and it took hours to download the ROM. I still remember seeing the Red Wings flying in on my old PC monitor.

[@modifiedlandfish]

@@milesaway1980 😳 damn u talking hours

[@milesaway1980]

@@modifiedlandfish It was 140kb and I think the download speed was about 0.5 - 1 kb / minute. It was so slow!

[@mana_beast_beats1114]

@@crisnmaryfam7344 --- Evermore isn't part of the Seiken Densetsu / Mana series. Evermore is its own separate thing.

[@titanderp]

Learning about emulation history never ceases to amaze me.

[@adam.wascholl]

I remember waking up on Christmas in those early years and they released an update that allowed for transparency effects. This meant you could play a game with smoke, mist, or rain without having to turn off that layer. This was my favorite present that year.

[@jerryg4534]

Ah yes, the Zsnes days. Loved every minute of it

[@johnspartan6352]

I still use it from time to time

[@hppvitor]

@@johnspartan6352 ZSNES not only runs worse than the competition regardless of game or hardware, it also has security issues. You should drop it ASAP in favor of bSNES if you have a modern device, or SNES9x otherwise.

[@CheddarGetter]

Vimm's emulation lair

[@neoman4426]

@@hppvitor Unless things have changed I know at least a few years ago there were some old ROM hacks that were written with ZSNES's jank in mind and wouldn't work properly on more accurate emulators, so it might still have *some* use, but yeah, for general purpose use outside of that somewhat niche scenario should likely swap to a different one and only swap back when necessary

[@TheKrazyKat89]

It's always fascinating to me hearing about software development in the 90s and how C was considered a "slow, high-level language".

[@johnsimon8457]

If you’re doing anything that needs to run 60 times a second with no hardware support, and all you have is a 486, things like structs and the heap are a hindrance.

[@cwtrain]

Relative the the machine code you'd have to bang out to run game console code cleanly? It was.

[@joesterling4299]

C was much closer to the hardware than other high-level languages of the day. But nothing beats going straight for the metal, especially on the more primitive systems of yore.

[@shinyhappyrem8728]

@@johnsimon8457: structs are fine if they're global; classes are worse

[@Meton2526]

@@johnsimon8457 Uhhhh .... the heap still exists in assembly.

[@EightPieceBox]

It's crazy that emulation has been around long enough to get nostalgic about it. I tried most of these, but I was into arcade emulation more than anything else. The early days of MAME were amazing because there would be a batch of new games every week. I learned about a lot of games I never saw before.

[@kaisersoymilk6912]

It was around even longer than that: when I passed from the C64 to the Amiga I remember of having heard about a "commodore 64 emulator" for the Amiga. I'm not sure if it actually existed or if it was just a urban legend.

[@matthewjohnson1891]

Zsnes almost utter lack of input latency was fantastic

[@jessie3268]

Yeah I remember playing a lot of RPGs on early SNES emulators and having to toggle layers off and on at certain points due to the lack of transparency. Also remember finding it nice when toggling layers also revealed all the secret passages.

[@negirno]

I also cheated in the Super Mario All Stars version of Super Mario 3. In the memory minigame you could reveal all the cards by disabling a layer :-)

[@zorochii]

In A Link to the Past, with Snes9x and I think early versions of zsnes too, it was impossible to even find the castle at the start due to the rain effect not having transparency.

[@giorgio5789]

Same! It was the golden age of jrpgs. Back when Square and Enix were not merged yet

[@RN1441]

On the original final fantasy on NES, I learned that secret passages could be exposed by turning the TV contrast all the way up.

[@jacob-spring]

yeah exactly! The smog in the robot factory in Chrono Trigger was in the way so you had to turn that layer off. Haha, it's been a hot minute since I thought about that.

[@SirVG]

I remember using ZSNES back in the late 90s when I was in college. Gave me a chance to play games I couldn't get otherwise, like Chrono Trigger. Getting the bad ending while in a giant room, by yourself, in the middle of the night was creepy as hell.

[@Kymus]

Loved ZSNES; nice UI + transparency for RPGs

[@adam1984pl]

Me too in early 2000,when i was i high school/

[@RamjetX]

I'm still using zsnes today?!?! I didn't know there were others beyond ZSNES and SNES9x

[@tl1882]

@@RamjetX i only remember bsnes, zsnes and snes9x

[@brettneale]

Same here! Us PAL-region gamers got shafted with some very high-profile games never making it to our shores, and ZSNES allowed me to play such classics back when they were part of the Zeitgeist.

[@ChiEKKUsama]

I was half expecting him to end it with: "and then I wrote the best emulator of them all"

[@Lossenhyando]

ZSNES was such a good Emulator - great video as always! Would love to see one about NO$GMB

[@arizvisa]

Wow, NO$. Now that really brings back some memories.

[@SireSquish]

ZSnes holds a lot of nostalgia for me - with each successive release, the accuracy of Chrono Trigger got better and better, and seeing that I'd never played on real hardware, each improvement was like a quality update for the game itself.

[@MAGA_Patriot2024]

Right with you there...I never knew how great it was until much, much later...actually just started playing it again the other day 🙃

[@noop9k]

Not a perfect choice for Chrono Trigger and other advanced games, but perfectly fine for many other. Also has low input lag an lots of innovative features such as filters an fastforward. Too bad opensourcing basically killed it. It literally became worse.

[@MAGA_Patriot2024]

@@noop9k at the time, I don't think too many options were available...I could be wrong with this failing memory of mine but I was just happy to have them work 🙂

[@reven_]

My first time playing Chrono Trigger was with ZSnes and I still remember it to this day

[@Valientlink]

except the dreadful cursor noise lol. I think that games cursor noise was a little annoying anyway though, idk why so many games have to have this loud beep. it just sounds terrible on zsnes but it had the best sound for everything else in the game for years

[@RAMChYLD]

I was there, Gandalf. I was there 24 years ago.

[@yopachi]

hahah

[@FamousWolfe]

I too was there back in '97 lol. Has it really been 24 years already? Damn.

[@marscaleb]

Wait, ZSnes isn't being updated anymore? That's still my go-to emulator; it's still fantastic.

[@hnorrstrom]

Yeah I always play snes rom hacks on it in Windows 10 now works like a charm never understood it was other new ones that are supposed to be better.

[@KujaNiv100]

Nope, the emulation is inaccurate, especially the audio. The newer emus do it better...

[@kaisersoymilk6912]

I especially liked the interface, not the usual boring standard window.

[@marscaleb]

@@kaisersoymilk6912 You could make the background animate whether effects and ripples and stuff. Whatever happened to people adding nice touches like that?

[@lpfan4491]

@@KujaNiv100 How accurate are we currently anyhow? There seems to be a larger effort to get perfect emulation for N64 onwards, but the Snes and NES seem to barely have any attention anymore because "Already works pretty good, lol". To the point where there doesn't seem to be any documentation on if we even crossed the finish line already or not.

[@aurorablaize]

God this brings back so many memories. Especially that NESticle UI. So simple, yet so iconic. Zophar's Domain was freaking huge when it came to finding all those old emulators. The dark days of shareware emulators tho. *shudders*

[@milhousevanhouten3796]

amen

[@pseudonym3690]

You mean like the excellent Bleem?

[@OliNorwell]

This really made me feel old, I remember reading the emulation news sites on a daily basis through those years, great times and a great video summary

[@alexojideagu]

Yeh I was emulating PS1, N64, Mame, Snes, Megadrive on my Pentium 4 PC since 2001. I also remember Bleem for the Dreamcast being controversial and sued by Sony.

[@1Terrapin1]

Lol I used to go to zophars

[@yellowblanka6058]

Those were such exciting times for emulation, I remember running MAME and NeoRAGEX on our old Pentium II-400 as a young teen. Being able to run full arcade games on the PC blew my mind at the time, though they of course didn't run perfectly. Now it's trivial to run those games on even the lowest-power devices.

[@BigSnipp]

I used to read emulation news all the time. Fave's Classics wasthe shit

[@geoffgero6081]

I was a Genesis kid so when my family got internet for the first time in 1997 the first thing I did was download ZSNES. It took like 3 hours to download 😂

[@tf2scoutpunch175]

How good was it

[@timelymirror7826]

🧐 internet in 1997 must've been slow as hell

[@StriderVM]

@@timelymirror7826 Yep. A typical internet was 28.8kbps its like 3kilobytes a second. And that's on optimal scenarios. A bad / crowded ISP or a bad power line would make it bad to unusable.

[@zerocal76]

@@StriderVM You had 28.5k in 1997 huh? I suffered with 56k up until like 2004 =O

[@StriderVM]

@@zerocal76 Yeah its 28.8k with the only literal ISP in my area. However, they have real pisspoor bandwidth, so getting any better than 2 kilobyte per second download is very unlikely. And the phonelines do not support 56k modems.

[@meatpockets]

I remember the first time I saw someone playing Final Fantasy III on the SNES in the computer lab in high school around ‘97 or ‘98 it blew my freakin’ mind. I never heard of emulation before and I have been hooked since.

[@Cri_Jackal]

Seeing SNES9X come into being from its former evolutions was interesting to see.

[@andresbravo2003]

Homebrew does what Nintendon't.

[@thehopper3782]

You mean the homebrew app nintendon't? that is used for playing gamecube games on a bc wii.

[@Enkeria]

They used the emulation and homebrews to make some of the 30th anniversary games to work as of late. Such strange double standard of Nintendo.

[@kenrickeason]

Nintendon't plays GameCube Games Well.. Give it a Try..

[@kahveciderin]

​@@thehopper3782 he is referencing to the famous ad "genesis does"

[@thehopper3782]

@@kahveciderin i don't know what you are talking about and sorry i don't know anything about sega genesis.

[@tourgasmsvt]

We need to talk about SNES emulation in 1997

[@TheRealCaptainFreedom]

No we don’t lol

[@International_Criminal_Court]

@@TheRealCaptainFreedom 😅👍🏾

[@StuartKReilly]

Man I love the look of ZSNES’ menu. I’m reminded how cool it is every time TerminalMontage makes a video

[@overlordalfredo]

I think my first real efforts to mess with emulation was in 2006 or 2007 so most of these "historical" events happend before I was aware of anything. Therefore thank you for putting this together MVG and preserving not only the tools but also their history for all of us!

[@jasonblalock4429]

I'd love to see you do a similar video talking about the 2000s N64 emulation scene, and how the good-idea-in-theory plugin approach ended up creating more problems than solutions.

[@javierortiz82]

I think he already did a video about that?, not sure though.

[@JohnDoe-xh5wp]

@@javierortiz82 He made a video about the first working n64 emulator.

[@Facusblues]

Yes! I want this, I hope he sees this comment.

[@rage12345678]

Anybody remember Corn? It was a mindblowing emulator nobody thought would be possible.

[@LoPhatKao]

@@rage12345678 still have a copy of corn in my old n64 emulators, had decent framerate mario64 on my pentium 100

[@Ballgolong]

I worked with Icer Addis at EA I remember meeting Him and thinking he was one of the smartest people I had ever met. Eccentric but very smart. Hard to believe that he was one of the pioneers of emulators and without his work (which was stolen) emulation may not be in the state it is now.

[@pleasedontwatchthese9593]

I'm not really sure about pioneers of emulators. Maybe from the perceptive of console gaming for public use. But emulators have existed as long as computers have on the professional side of things for compatibility reasons. Though even the mid 80s computers had public software could emulate early to late 70s computer at home. And when it came to video games, devs did have their own that they build for testing because dev kits where limited, though many of those where not public because of legal reasons.

[@Code7Unltd]

>man famous for stealing emulation code >Electronic Arts >EA Hires code thief I'm not surprised, honestly.

[@fungo6631]

Why doesn't he finally release SNESticle? I mean, it's only good for experimentation in DOSBox today anyways.

[@PriestessofGenbu]

@@Code7Unltd You will have to refresh me on that, I though Addis was the one whose code was stolen by Mr. Moore.

[@Code7Unltd]

@@PriestessofGenbu Electronic Arts are known to start game jams or commission games just to take the provided code at the end. The first time this happened: Bethesda Softworks (you know, the Fallout 76 house ran by Mr. "Buy my 665th Skyrim release" himself Todd Howard) was commissioned by EA to make a gridiron football game. Bethesda's football game would never come to market, but the physics code would be harvested and re-used in John Madden Football. Every Madden game used Bethesda's physics code as a base since.

[@RichHomieBodhi]

Love these classic emulator retrospectives. It’s fascinating reliving this stuff. I was obsessed with the emulation scene as a kid, especially the ps1 scene. Getting My personal copy of MGS running on VGS was one of my favorite computing memories lol. Keep em up! Would love more about the snes (rip near) and all the other systems.

[@Hondu311]

Great video. This needs to be a Series. Love hearing about the history of emulated systems and the individual projects.

[@Ziggurat1]

This was a great episode, almost felt like I was back in the 90s playing snes again

[@lopezzelo2502]

Zsnes was something back in the days...

[@LusRetroSource]

Game changer, was able to play SNES games at full speed because of it.

[@crashniels]

I still have that on my old laptop.

[@lopezzelo2502]

@@LusRetroSource it was more being able to play everything, i remember i would bring floppy disk to the schools asking some friends of mine to put, ff5 or seiken desenstu 3... Etc it was like a dream

[@kitemett]

Came here to say this.

[@superjetze]

I was all about the snes9x

[@Areala21]

Oh my gosh, this was the history video I didn't know I needed! I got into emulation in late 1996, so this is right when the scene starting making inroads for me. Thank you so much, MVG! I loved every minute of this!

[@Paulenski]

I found zsnes in '99 or '00, right after I was introduced to emulation via Pokemon Red GBC. I played more snes emulation for the next few years than any other console. The plethora of jrpgs was such a magical time.

[@SinaelDOverom]

Snes9x with ZSnes GUI mod. Maximum comfy nostalgia.

[@Metalwario64]

YES

[@plonk420]

bsnes with zsnes GUI mod

[@ohnoitschris]

plus controller support plz

[@plonk420]

@MrFoxbody89 CRT, sure. but that's only because a previous roomie left it here🤣 ...SNES is staying in storage, tho, because bsnes is *that good*

[@plonk420]

@MrFoxbody89 have you *tried* bsnes? (even with input lag reduction if you must)

[@AncientWare]

3:47 man, the developer was angry at people xD

[@GeoNeilUK]

What got me was the VSMC developer getting miffed that his code was being leaked and cracked... while being part of the organisation that leaked and cracked Nesticle.

[@PriestessofGenbu]

@@GeoNeilUK That's the ultimate irony. They were code thieves who went to war with stolen arms all while trying to push users to their website/forum/message board/irc/ect. In a way, nothing has really changed, lol.

[@adriianeut]

ZSnes and SNES9X were all the rage back then. while most people preferred 9x, I stuck to zsnes 'cause of its GUI, good performance, and also because it was the first snes emu I was introduced to. then ZSnesW came with other joystick support, and I made the switch.

[@brucewrigleysgumchewz4667]

And the ZSNES movies....and later eventually the SPC logger. Thought that was pretty damn cool (and convenient...).

[@PixelShade]

Man, I remember building my first PC in my youth (after the 80's and early 90's being dedicated to commodore 64 and Amiga), it must have been in 1997 . A Pentium 166MHz MMX + the cheapest case and components I could find. Although the machine was great the year I built it, computer performance just sky rocketed at the time. It was really hard to keep up in the computer space at the time. Thankfully nesticle and zsnes really became the saving grace for many years to come. I was never able to afford the nes or snes back in my childhood. So really it offered me a way to play through a huge back catalogue of games. :) I remember this part in life fondly and I still remember the fantastic ergonomics of the Gravis Exterminator. :) The beige 166MHz Pentium lived on until 2006. At the time, my mother used it only for internet banking. It was slow, TERRIBLY slow, surfing the web was a pain, no matter how much I tried to optimize the experience, The RAM, OS and browser wasn't really up for it anymore. :D

[@TurboShawn]

Always love seeing these "scene history" videos from MVG!

[@eFeXuy]

Good old Zsnes, the fist emulator I've ever used followed by Callus.

[@aaronreid8375]

Callus was really good in the early days of CPS-1 emulation, back when MAME CPS-1 was way slow.

[@crisnmaryfam7344]

Zsnes.... my childhood wouldnt be the same. Same with some of the gameboy emu's... Was too poor at the time, family couldn't afford a gameboy handheld "just for me" when I had two younger siblings, but the computer.. thanks to rent a center... lol It opened doorways and windows galore.. Was playing pokemon on emulator while kids at school were playing it on gameboys lol.

[@freezeframeplease]

this is one of my fav videos so far! amazing work

[@NewportBox100s]

These emulation history videos are absolutely fascinating. Thank you for them.

[@joshuabergeron9731]

Loved the video. Would be awesome if you did a whole series on all the emulated consoles. Especially the history of the Dolphin Emulator

[@ohnoitschris]

Seconding Dolphin

[@realjaytruth]

Loved snes9x and Zsnes. Took me back through memory lane.

[@feature-creature]

Terrific video on a subject I've long been curious about! Would LOVE more videos that delve into the early history of the scene like this.

[@cloud1494]

I learned about a lot of this when I was involved with SNES-Station for PS2 and this episode was a fun trip down memory lane. Thanks.

[@tourgasmsvt]

SNES9X on a softmodded Wii is my fave way to play SNES games. I also have a pocketgo S30 but you can't beat the big screen two-player experience the Wii offers.

[@ohnoitschris]

Yeah same here, it's a great way to bring life back into your Wii (viagra is too, but that's for a different kind of wii)

[@fmsyntheses]

Like a warm blanket of nostalgia.

[@djtonmai]

Amazing video. It really took me back. Keep up the good work.

[@pinkomoore]

I absolutely love these history of emulation/history of modding scene videos

[@wompastompa3692]

I love the ZSNES UI and wish more emulators were like it.

[@johnsimon8457]

MEKA is pretty cool

[@ukyoize]

Except it's shit at supporting non-ASCII chsracters

[@jmtrad1906]

Same

[@hppvitor]

Ah yes, love it when I have to guess which version of a game I'm clicking on when the filenames are longer than four words. Why do ZSNES fanboys defend the worst things about it?

[@wompastompa3692]

@@hppvitor I just like the look and feel, I don't even use ZSNES. Only SNES game I play is Super Metroid, so I use the emulator that supports widescreen (BSNES?) because wide Metroid is pretty awesome. Obviously the Z GUI would have to be modernized if included in other programs, but treating it like a war crime is pretty boneheaded.

[@MoultrieGeek]

Loved every minute of it MVG. Your retro emulator overviews are one of my favorite type of video. Well done.

[@robalarcon]

this is one of my favorite episodes, thanks!

[@shadowtheimpure]

Oh man, ZSNES brings back so many memories. I used it on DOS for quite a while.

[@Vanessaira-Retro]

You know its going to be a great episode when Axelay's OST kicks off.

[@DonWafle]

Thought the same ❤️

[@Carambal81]

I recognized it immediately as well :)

[@StewNWT]

yeah fantastic choice

[@jamescameron149]

This!

[@mustangjude]

Where ever you are arch-nacho and tortilla godzilla, shine on you crazy diamonds!

[@berserker9689]

Need more old-school emulation history videos, it deserves to be preserved. Great video man.

[@colondnb]

Love your use of the Axelay music dude 🙏 makes me smile every time, those tunes are dope

[@supernoob17]

these emulation history videos are my favorite, something so fascinating about the history of something i take for granted and use daily

[@ArpeggioPegasusMusic]

I'd like an episode on Near's work on BSNES, Higan and Ares. Their work is extremely under-appreciated and they at least deserve to be remembered for their incredible efforts to preserve SNES games. RIP Near.

[@Einar730]

No

[@HollowRick]

His*

[@Gworzor]

Byuu

[@happyarch5365]

I do have to say his possible death is unfortunate.

[@connorkiss2614]

Yes please !! Near needs an episode

[@gogreengameon2146]

Love that you used the Axelay OST!

[@YoursTrulyPeePee123]

My favorite channel on KZbin by far. Thanks for the content!

[@danielpindell1267]

Wow I remember all of this going on. Man this is great stuff right here. Let me say all the plain boring text and backgrounds of websites brings back memories. Nobody knew emulation would ever go this far being ported on almost every platform 👍👍

[@MisterCasket]

Takes me back to the time where only the library had internet access, and I looked up fan sites of bands on Geocities or Angelfire, while chatting on Alamak in the Hot Tub room😂

[@brucewrigleysgumchewz4667]

"Plain boring text and backgrounds of websites"....literally every damn website out today. Nothing but whitespace, text and a hamburger menu ...and ads ....ads...and more ads everywhere plus GOBS of garbage scripts being run in the background. Yeah..I'll take the websites of yesterday over this ugly bloated BS. At least those websites had creativity and interesting designs. And didn't devour data just trying to open them.

[@cunt5413]

Just finished watching the vid about PS2 development. This got uploaded 20 secs ago. Yay.

[@klashe1977]

Loved this episode. Thanks for making it.

[@fresnokila3]

I remember a lot of these emulators but never gave any thought to what was happening behind the scenes. Great video!

[@johnaraya3761]

You are a god with this thank you for everything you do champ I love the show.

[@PrettyBlueThings]

I love that ZSnes was written entirely in asm. That is just awesome 😊

[@pleasedontwatchthese9593]

Its funny now though back then it was less impressive. In the 90s many of the programmers learned in the 80s where asm was the only way to do things. Writing an emulator at all requires intimate computer knowing and writing asm was seen was a tedious necessary evil that broke portability. It was more impressive to get something running fast in C back then.

[@PrettyBlueThings]

@@pleasedontwatchthese9593 Absolutely spot on!

[@alejonin]

This brought back so many memories. Love the videos guy.

[@taggounet]

Amazing video, as usual. I remember using zsnes and was excited to see a new version.

[@appscanti2162]

those where the greatest times ever, thank you so much for this awesome trip to the past

[@frogz]

and i still use zsnes in 2021, especially with netplay

[@nicolaspeter1679]

Another wonderful video thank you very much, I was there in the 90s watching the emulation rise and testing these out as they became available on my BBS, I remember emulators going from 2 to 3 frames a second and then trying out zsnes and being blown away.

[@PeterHosszu007]

very accurate and down to details video as usual. thanks for sharing this information!

[@michalixgaming]

This is incredible how emulation evole

[@HeXeNOverlord]

This was super interesting. Im curious how this compared to early Genesis/Megadrive emulation.

Your videos are amazing. I love how you tell the story behind the emulation/home brew scene. Could you please make a video about how to get started on writing emulators (where to get documentation, what system to start with, etc)? I guess many of your viewers would love this.

[@MrDarkNao]

Nice content! Brings me some good old memories. This video is full of history!! Amazing.

[@thatcriticvideo]

Such great memories playing on these emulators. I just assumed it was magic.

[@seppomuppit]

I'm pretty sure I just came into emulation as soon as it hit the golden age circa 97-98. It was such good timing. Snes games ran completely flawless, as far as my 11 year old mind could ascertain.

[@MooflesThaCat]

I can’t tell you how happy this video makes me. I mentioned this to you once in one of your live-streams.

[@Lovuschka]

You had fun putting this episode together, we had fun hearing it. A win-win situation.

[@ultimateman55]

Excellent episode. I'd love to watch an episode documenting the decryption of cps2 hardware sometime in the future. I waited with baited breath for each new release, literally years before xmen vs Street fighter was released.

[@JamesWilson01]

Where did they come up with such catchy names for these emulators though?!

[@v3xman]

I hope this one is sarcastic

[@rmg4152]

A emulator called RAPE

[@shalpp]

@@rmg4152 rather (have) a Pokémon emulator?

[@csalcedof]

Excellent video!!!, brings many memories of those times, jumping from an emulator to another one, I loved the ZSNES emulator on DOS.

[@HimmelFlugzeug]

Awesome episode, thanks! I only ever used Snes9x and ZSNES back in the late 90s and early 2000s, it's interesting to hear about all the others that I didn't know so far

[@JoshHatfield]

He's wearing glasses to show that time has passed.

[@Koseiku]

classic time skip lol

[@dan_loup]

PCEM/86box is quite better at "simulating old PCs" as it emulate everything in it. You can even emulate the dreaded (but good at 2D) S3 Virge

[@Crunchifyable2]

What irony. Having a piece of crap computer with a piece of crap 1mb s3 virge. Then wanting to emulate it 20+ years on. Which I could see would be useful for old direct x / direct 3d titles.

[@dan_loup]

@@Crunchifyable2 well, it can emulate the voodoo 3 videocard as well if you want good retro performance

[@dycedargselderbrother5353]

I'm guessing the ViRGE was selected because it was a long-running platform with high compatibility.

[@dan_loup]

@@dycedargselderbrother5353 Probably due being well documented as well. It's a pretty great 2D card with good VESA compatibility etc..

[@Girichoko]

This is the video I was waiting for! Splendid work as always. Snes is my favorite system of all time and I emulate it in every device I have. I remember finishing Tactics Ogre and Secret of Mana on my MSDos machine, no sound. Those were the days.

[@andresf.cardenas2637]

i was not able to finish Tactics Ogre back in the old days in my zsnes emulator but it was a really good game

[@michaelwalker8250]

Thank you. Great video as always.

[@SRC267]

BSNES HD Beta is the best core in RetroArch. Proper wide-screen 16:9 for Mario World etc.

[@AmyNumberSeven]

RIP Near

[@freddiejohnson6137]

@Daclunator evidence? Do you want to see pictures of the body to put your mind at ease or something?

[@freddiejohnson6137]

@Daclunator not everyone who ever dies gets an obituary written about them...

[@MarceloMedeirosb]

@Daclunator can you present any evidence to back up your accusation?

[@killy9999]

@Daclunator There's an article on his death in USA Today. YT prevents me from positng a link in the comment so search for this title: "'The internet is not a game. ... This stuff really hurts.' Respected developer who was bullied online dies by suicide."

[@OLIV3R_YT]

I was always amazed by the geniuses that could implement such great emulators without proper hardware specifications. To this day it feels like magic :)

[@DouglasTitchmarsh]

A real trip down memory lane. Great video, very interesting 👍

[@seanabsher5577]

Thanks for covering this, MVG

[@kyokusagani8869]

Thank god for SNES 9x! A high accuracy, low system requirement emulator that runs on just about anything!

[@RadikAlice]

That's the beauty of coding for Linux isn't it? It's like the kernel equivalent to a Bag of Holding

[@ohnoitschris]

But perplexingly struggles to hit full speed on PSVita, even on simple games like Final Fantasy IV somehow (while running great on 3DS)

[@RadikAlice]

@@ohnoitschris Must be on the part of the one who ported it A quick job with little optimization is my educated guess

[@Jucelegario]

Is the Robert Broglia Snes 9x android one up to date with all the high accuracy stuff or is his fork based on an old release? He states most of his emus are high accuracy but some people have stated in the past (like 7 years ago or so) that his emus are not that accurate. Don't know now.

[@RadikAlice]

@@Jucelegario IDK. Maybe they're high accuracy by the time of initial release

[@alaharon1233]

Heads up, bsnes is more accurate than snes9x and doesn't take much power these days. If you're not familiar with its lineage, it started as an attempt to make most accurate emulator possible, speed be damned, then was turned into Higan, which keeps that goal, but then was spun off of Higan with the goal of being as accurate as possible without sacrificing speed. So now it's like 99.9% accurate and the best snes emulator for the average user. Could be a good topic for a video tbh

[@MetalJody1990]

I look forward to seeing 99.9% accurate SNES emulation on the Steam Deck. Hopefully the battery will last a long time.

[@ohnoitschris]

Yeah but it's not nearly as user friendly as SNES9X and I've never seen a true need for it other than developers who wanna test their game on real hardware, but don't own an Everdrive.

[@alaharon1233]

@@ohnoitschris I would agree regarding old bsnes. Current bsnes actually has a great UI though. If you haven't checked it out in the past couple years, definitely take another look

[@fungo6631]

Mesen S is also a great emulator. Easy to use, yet super accurate.

[@alaharon1233]

@@fungo6631 and unfinished. It doesn't do Yoshi's Safari properly

[@mario7832]

I’ve waited so long for a video like this

[@codyanderson5467]

this brought back some memories, i remember myself and a few buddies constantly arguing about which was better back in 6th grade. I was all about Zsnes for a while until 9x updated further and started having better compatibility