Try Retropie on a PC!
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N64 is not the most important one to me, but I do consider it to be necessary.
I never actually had one as a kid, but my wife did, so it's important to her.
The systems I had were the BBC Model B, ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC464, C64, Atari ST, SNES and PlayStation, all of which would probably be fine on the Pi 3. -
@backstander said in Try Retropie on a PC!:
The RetroPie N64 Compatibility Sheet
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Wjzbu90l6eCEW1w6ar9NtfyDBQrSPILQL5MbRSpYSzwI haven't tried Perfect Dark but on my Raspberry Pi 3 not overclocked, Goldeneye runs in slow motion.
It was that list that led me to make what turned out to be the wrong decision to buy a Pi 3.
My definition of 'playable' does not include the game turning into a slideshow or sounding like a machine gun :D -
Goldeneye is playable on rpi3 with recent n64 changes (with mupen64plus-GLideN64)
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@jamesbeat
so you've found out the $30 pi3 is the slowest computer in the past 20+ years? welcome! :) don't come to these devices expecting power.that said, i wouldn't be so eager to write the pi off. n64 emulation is progressing rapidly at the moment. it isn't so much of a power issue that you might believe. i expect big things in the coming months, and that's purely coming from progress in the emulators/plugins.
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@BuZz said in Try Retropie on a PC!:
Goldeneye is playable on rpi3 with recent n64 changes (with mupen64plus-GLideN64)
When you say 'playable', do you mean that there is no stuttering?
Are you able to use higher graphics settings?
I still have this Pi 3, and if I could get N64 performance like I'm experiencing on my PC, obviously I would prefer to go with my original plan and use the Pi.
Thing is, I can't return the Pi if I break the seal, so I can't just try it myself. -
@dankcushions said in Try Retropie on a PC!:
@jamesbeat
so you've found out the $30 pi3 is the slowest computer in the past 20+ years? welcome! :) don't come to these devices expecting power.that said, i wouldn't be so eager to write the pi off. n64 emulation is progressing rapidly at the moment. it isn't so much of a power issue that you might believe. i expect big things in the coming months, and that's purely coming from progress in the emulators/plugins.
I know the Pi is not a fast machine by PC standards, as I mentioned above, I already own several of the older models.
I simply had no reason to doubt everyone who said that it was capable of running N64 games at an acceptable frame rate.
Unfortunately, those people appear to have been somewhat optimistic in their assessment.
Only one person was actually realistic about it, and it was his advice that prompted me to look deeper into the issue and watch a load of videos, which is how I discovered that 'playable' is definitely a subjective term. -
I simply had no reason to doubt everyone who said that it was capable of running N64 games at an acceptable frame rate.
Unfortunately, those people appear to have been somewhat optimistic in their assessmentwell, they were right. for example it's possible to get the pi running Mario 64, f-zero 64, Mario kart and a bunch of other games with HLE hacks going back decades. Mario 64 runs at full speed at 1080p on the gles2n64 plugin, and I've played 4 player with the other 2 using the same plugin at 1080p (kart has horrible sound on some levels).
goldeneye and perfect dark are different stories. I've seen people get them working ok but there's areas of chop (especially the opening level of goldeneye). but as I say, this is changing by the day. no-one can say the hardware isn't up to the task until work stops on the software.
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an example: pi2 running Mario 64 and kart at HD. By who's standard is this not playable?
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@dankcushions said in Try Retropie on a PC!:
an example: pi2 running Mario 64 and kart at HD. By who's standard is this not playable?
That does look ok, but those games aren't really a good yardstick - I have a five year old cellphone that can play those games.
The problem is games like Perfect Dark and Goldeneye.
If you can show me those running well with no stuttering or slowdown and at a high resolution, then I will break the seal on my Pi.
As it stands, moving from my PC setup to the Pi would be a step down. -
Why does it have to be at a high resolution ? Surely if it runs fast enough at the original n64 resolution that should suffice. But of course, if you want to run things in 4x the original resolution, a rpi3 may well not be enough.
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@BuZz
Because the original resolution just doesn't seem to be enough for a modern TV.
My TV is not particularly big by today's standards (42") but 3D games just don't look right at the original resolution.
Also, I can use high graphics accuracy settings too, which is better at any resolution.I agree that this is personal preference though, and not really authentic.
Having said all that, I haven't seen Perfect Dark or Goldeneye running well on the Pi 3 even at native resolution.
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A pi3 will never be fast enough for all N64 games. Games which need LLE plugins like Rogue Squadron or Stunt Racer FX will never be playable on a pi3. If you need good performance all over the board, high resolutions, texture packs and filters use a pc. If you need accurate emulation you need a high end machine and an emulator like paraLLEI.
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@jamesbeat said in Try Retropie on a PC!:
That does look ok, but those games aren't really a good yardstick - I have a five year old cellphone that can play those games
The problem is games like Perfect Dark and Goldeneye.
but you've been talking in general terms about n64 emulation. if what you actually mean is "i don't think the raspberry pi is good enough to run two games" (and hard to emulate ones at that), then that's a separate conversation.
If you can show me those running well with no stuttering or slowdown and at a high resolution, then I will break the seal on my Pi.
As it stands, moving from my PC setup to the Pi would be a step down.of course! it will always be a step down! the pi3 is equivalent to, what, a pentium 2 or 3? the gpu is approximately the worst gpu you can buy. what the pi is is a very cheap, small device, and n64 on the pi is yet to mature.
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@gizmo98
Very true, in fact I was reading an article just last night which explained why you need at least a 3Ghz processor to perform cycle-accurate emulation of the SNES.I'm still half tempted to break the seal on my Pi 3 just because I wanted so badly to house it in a PlayStation, but my head is telling me to bide my time and use the PC until the Pi 4 comes out.
The PC is just so beautifully smooth, it's difficult to justify going to the Pi 3 for something as frivolous as the case I want to use. -
@dankcushions said in Try Retropie on a PC!:
@jamesbeat said in Try Retropie on a PC!:
That does look ok, but those games aren't really a good yardstick - I have a five year old cellphone that can play those games
The problem is games like Perfect Dark and Goldeneye.
but you've been talking in general terms about n64 emulation. if what you actually mean is "i don't think the raspberry pi is good enough to run two games" (and hard to emulate ones at that), then that's a separate conversation.
If you can show me those running well with no stuttering or slowdown and at a high resolution, then I will break the seal on my Pi.
As it stands, moving from my PC setup to the Pi would be a step down.of course! it will always be a step down! the pi3 is equivalent to, what, a pentium 2 or 3? the gpu is approximately the worst gpu you can buy. what the pi is is a very cheap, small device, and n64 on the pi is yet to mature.
I don't think it's fair to say that the Pi will always be a step down.
If your goal is to emulate up to the N64, then once there is a powerful enough Pi to do the job, there would be no point using a more powerful machine.Of course, if your goal is always going to be to add more and more power hungry emulators, there can be no end to how much power you will need, and the Pi will always be a step behind a PC.
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@dankcushions said in Try Retropie on a PC!:
@jamesbeat said in Try Retropie on a PC!:
That does look ok, but those games aren't really a good yardstick - I have a five year old cellphone that can play those games
The problem is games like Perfect Dark and Goldeneye.
but you've been talking in general terms about n64 emulation. if what you actually mean is "i don't think the raspberry pi is good enough to run two games" (and hard to emulate ones at that), then that's a separate conversation.
If you can show me those running well with no stuttering or slowdown and at a high resolution, then I will break the seal on my Pi.
As it stands, moving from my PC setup to the Pi would be a step down.of course! it will always be a step down! the pi3 is equivalent to, what, a pentium 2 or 3? the gpu is approximately the worst gpu you can buy. what the pi is is a very cheap, small device, and n64 on the pi is yet to mature.
Talking of which, check out my new paperweights that I salvaged out of some old PC's at work:
https://s10.postimg.org/mc3efgwyh/IMAG0123.jpgThat's a Pentium II and Pentium III - the pcb's that they are mounted on are larger than a Raspberry Pi.
Just shows how far we have come... -
@jamesbeat said in Try Retropie on a PC!:
I'm still half tempted to break the seal on my Pi 3 just because I wanted so badly to house it in a PlayStation, but my head is telling me to bide my time and use the PC until the Pi 4 comes out.
I don't know why this is such a hard decision for such a cheap device - surely just use the rpi3 now, and then upgrade it later ? The RPI3 is still excellent for emulation.
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It's not really the cost, it's just that there's really no point having two Retropie machines in my house.
I don't have a TV in my bedroom or anywhere else I would use it, so that would mean having both consoles hooked up to one TV.
I need the PC for N64, so why not just use it for everything?I did have a Pi in my arcade cabinet, but I also upgraded that to a PC, so there's really nowhere for the Pi to go.
It may be cheap, but it would still be a waste of money to open it if I don't have a use for it. -
@jamesbeat said in Try Retropie on a PC!:
I don't think it's fair to say that the Pi will always be a step down.
If your goal is to emulate up to the N64, then once there is a powerful enough Pi to do the job, there would be no point using a more powerful machine.so you don't believe in software improvements? just throw better hardware at the problem? boo!
of course I meant the current pi models. however right now it's using the best GPU that arm CPUs have so there doesn't seem to be an obvious hardware upgrade coming. a better CPU is meaningless for n64.
besides, at that point either everyone will be wanting the parallel n64 plugin (which needs a MONSTER GPU and system), and/or something that runs at 4K resolutions on their new TVs :)
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Of course I believe in software improvements, and I'm sure that the N64 emulators will improve on the Pi 3 to the point that it could run the games I want at an acceptable clip.
However, why set up the Pi and wait for improvements when the PC I already have runs them really well?Of course more optimized code is a better solution, but if throwing more powerful hardware at the problem works today, why not use it as a stopgap?
Also, something we haven't touched on yet, what about other emulators for more recent systems?
I haven't tried any emulators past N64 and PSX, but what about the Saturn, Dreamcast, PSP etc? Retropie supports them, but I bet they don't run on the Pi 3.
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