3DO: The Pi4 Emulation Nobody Loves?
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Don't overclock the 3DO's CPU. That will make things worse.
The VDLP pixel format and VDLP bypass clut settings can be changed which may improve performance a bit. Make sure HiRes CEL rendering is disabled. I doubt OperaOS SWI HLE would make a difference on a non 3D game. WRT to core settings that's about it.
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@trapexit I just reached out to a few. There's some who would definitely have material, I'll just see what they're willing to share. :-)
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@sirhenrythe5th The 3DO version's soundtrack was from Soundgarden. Rusty Cage and Outshined, and a fair bit of other great music.
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@trapexit Yep! That has definitely helped. It's a hard game now I'm giving it a play....
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@AdamBeGood said in 3DO: The Pi4 Emulation Nobody Loves?:
I've just got 3DO working - has anyone got any performance tips aside from Overclocking the CPU in the settings?
enable runcommand from the Retropie Setup screen and hit a button before the game launches and select a lower resolution eg. 640x480 @ 60Hz (which is the 3DO's native resolution) you won't see a big difference in resolution if you run higher than that, but you should see a better performance by using a lower resolution.
also in the lr-opera 'options' screen select Threaded DSP = On ... which is supposed to improve performance on multi core processors.
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@trapexit said in 3DO: The Pi4 Emulation Nobody Loves?:
As for your offer... that would be amazing. Any info could help out. Any official documentation would be great even if only for archival reasons. I'd really love to get access to the OS source code. I've seen evidence that it exists in someone's hands but it's never been released generally probably due to copyright concerns. TBH I really really doubt anyone cares about all that much which is why I've been pretty cavalier with uploading things to my website. Not that I'd not take things down if asked but the IP has been spread out so far and wide seems all abandonware now. If you think it wouldn't be uncouth to blanket ask if your acquaintances have and would be willing to share anything they might have that might be the easiest. Otherwise I'll reach out if I run into something specific.
I just sent you an email.. Got something which should be of help.
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@ReadyPlayaWon Threaded DSP is not stable. It's likely to crash. It was more of an experiment and would need a lot more attention to ensure proper synchronization.
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@ReadyPlayaWon Cheers for the Resolution shout, I should have tried that. Think it has improved things slightly.
Trying out "Killing Time". I quite like it so far, but it is a bit juddery. Playable, just about.
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@AdamBeGood said in 3DO: The Pi4 Emulation Nobody Loves?:
Trying out "Killing Time". I quite like it so far, but it is a bit juddery. Playable, just about.
Killing Time on my RPi4 is pretty smooth for the most part.
RPI4 is overclocked and the lr-opera overclock settings do sometimes help .. i'm at 1.5x (18.75Mhz) and it's pretty smooth for an old game (not 60fps butter smooth, but better than what the real game on the real console could do)
Still have my original copy of Killing Time and a Panasonic FZ-1 for comparison :)
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@trapexit said in 3DO: The Pi4 Emulation Nobody Loves?:
Threaded DSP is not stable. It's likely to crash
Haven't had a single crash with it ON with the many 3DO games i have tried ... i guess i've been lucky ;)
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@ReadyPlayaWon Interesting - my RPi4 is overclocked, and I'll try out 1.5x to see if that makes it any better. What do you have set for VDLP pixel format and VDLP bypass clut, and OperaOS SWI HLE? (Or anything else you might think is different to the default).
Actually framerate wise it is fine, it's the audio that is choppy rather than the graphical side of things.
I've never played the original console, think I only ever saw one demo model in a shop.
I have had crashes that I think are linked to Threaded DSP, on Snow Job and Killing Time.
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SWI HLE will help a bit with Killing Time (and any game listed as having matrix multiplication usage https://3dodev.com/documentation/games/game_technical_information).
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Regarding VDLP options. Assuming 16bit mode is supported on the Pi4 then setting it to that will likely improve performance as Opera is mostly a low level emulator and the pixel translation is all done in a simple, brute force way on a single thread. You'll have half the work to render the frame buffer with 16bpp vs 32bpp. The CLUT option similarly bypasses extra work that on most games makes no difference. It's just on the rendering pipeline though and that isn't the bulk of the cpu requirements (that's mostly CPU and DSP emulation). But every little bit should help.
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@trapexit This is all interesting stuff - and that list you attached will be useful so far as trying out other games is concerned, so thanks for that. It's all about marginal gains, most games seem to run fairly well but could be a bit better.
I can't see a 16bit mode as an option within the Emulator, but I might not be looking in the right place!
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When I'm referring to 16 vs 32bpp I'm talking about "VDLP Pixel Format" option.
RGB565 and 0RGB1555 vs XRGB8888
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@trapexit Ahhh right, I've been having a playaround with those already. Seems to be some improvement. What's the difference between the two 16-bit options?
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Also has anyone played Dragon's Lair on 3DO and is it almost unplayably hard for everyone else?
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@AdamBeGood Why not just play the arcade version through Daphne? While I agree it's awesome that these emulators can run so many games well, it's often better to focus each emulator on the things it did uniquely well.
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@neek I mostly agree but sometimes the conversion holds affection too.
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@AdamBeGood As the option name implies the actual pixel data layout. RetroArch/libretro has those three as different output targets. Most cores just choose one and ensure to fill the framebuffer with compatible pixel data but I figured it'd be easy to optimize the situation for each case. The 3DO uses a 16bit framebuffer which doesn't really match the RA output but it does mean less data to move around or whatnot.
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