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MNESX video on Youtube

by syn on 14-12-2020, 21:25
Topic: Emulation
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Spacemoai has uploaded a video about an older project of his: MNESX

It shows an early version of his NES emulator for MSX and up, demoing the following games

  • Yie Ar KUNG-FU
  • Popeye
  • Roadfighter
  • Milliped

The video was recorded with an overclocked (emulated) R800, but MNESX should run roughly as fast on a regular clocked R800 once the dynamic recompiler is implemented. Furthermore, this video lacks sound.

As seen in the footage, this was worked on between 2004 and 2010, and may be continued if there is enough interest.

Relevant links:
MNESX - NES emulator for MSX by TNI
tni.nl

Comments (8)

By syn

Prophet (2117)

syn's picture

14-12-2020, 21:34

I spoke with the developer and the specs are the same as GEM http://www.tni.nl/products/gem.html the Gameboy emulator, so it should work on an MSX 2 and up, though R800 is recommended with GFX9000. I expect just like GEM, optional SCC and 4MB mapper.

Apparently, Super Mario Bros runs with partial scrolling support!

By tfh

Prophet (3321)

tfh's picture

14-12-2020, 21:49

Spacemoai in his Youtube Channel:

Quote:

The R800 is overclocked to about the speed which is expected from an optimizing dynamic recompiler, such as the one that GEM has. That means several times the original speed. The expected gain from a dynarec is much higher here than in GEM as well.

As you can see it emulates a basic NES system with iNES mapper 0. Compatibility is not 100% yet, although Super Mario Bros runs!! It's not in the video because there is only partial scrolling support. Other things missing are raster effects and more NES mappers.

If (and only if) there is enough support from the public, all of that will be emulated.

By Grauw

Ascended (10721)

Grauw's picture

14-12-2020, 22:23

It’s very cool!

In the video comment tfh quoted above, it says the performance gain from dynamic recompilation is expected to be higher than in GEM. I wonder if this is due to insights gained from the past decades, or due to the instruction set of the 6502. To get an idea of the performance dynamic recompilation could gain, I’m curious what speed was the emulated R800 was set to.

Also I wonder what is the status? It says that the project is from ’04-’10, has it been picked up again or is it so far only a showcase of the old project to poll interest? Since the newspost says “may be continued if [paypal link]”, if it’s already actively being worked on again it might motivate more people to donate. Although measuring interest by Paypal, I’m personally a bit sceptical if that will work well… I think platforms like Kickstarter, Indiegogo and Patreon exist because they attach promotion, targets and a commitment, which better incentivises people to show their interest with their money.

By Pippo

Hero (521)

Pippo's picture

15-12-2020, 07:47

Excellent emulator, really! Big smile
I'm pretty sure the Msx Users will be very happy if this project continued. Smile

By gdx

Enlighted (6125)

gdx's picture

16-12-2020, 14:19

Nice feat, but I don't think that's interesting since this works properly on an boosted emulator only.

By Grauw

Ascended (10721)

Grauw's picture

16-12-2020, 15:15

@gdx The idea is that if dynamic recompilation is implemented, it will run on the regular R800 speed.

By janghang

Master (129)

janghang's picture

17-12-2020, 01:02

Of course, I don't think this would work for MSX2, but it will be very interesting if it can run (what if a horizontal smooth scrolling is possible with this emulator?)

By Randam

Paragon (1431)

Randam's picture

19-12-2020, 09:12

I would love this to come to fruition. Ever since I once saw a korean cart that you could put in an msx and get nes carts to run on your msx, i have wanted something like this. This is a far more elegant and impressive way to play the games on msx hardware! I hope this gets developed further.