Prototype Impressions + Mupen64Plus With Loz: Ocarina Of Time


Adventus said:
The controls map really well to the N64, i don't think any other handheld would really cut it for this purpose. At the moment its mapped:

Pandora = N64
Dpad = Dpad
Left Analog = Analog
Right Analog = C Buttons
Right button = A
Bottom Button = B
L = Z
R = R
Start = Start

This way all the buttons are accessible from the same hand as the N64 (except L when you use the dpad).The Analogs are a bit too sensitive, but thats understandable, the N64 had what >10mm of travel? this can be helped by using a nonlinear mapping between the analogs.

Could you try these controls and let me know how they work out?

Pandora = N64
Dpad = Dpad
Left Analog = Analog
ABXY = C Buttons
O = B
P = A
L = Z
R = R
1 = L
Start = Start

-God Ginrai
 
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Thank you, Adventus!!! Keep up the great work! OoT is my most anticipated N64 game for on the go, and it's looking playable enough for me.

Zelda:MM is probably not going to run as well, considering the expansion pack it required, but I'm crossing my fingers.


@everybody: Can we just start an OT "Megabyte: Troll or just not funny?" thread where everybody can have it out? It can maybe even have a less derisive title. Frankly I think it would help his relationship with the whole board if he started that thread himself. Would at least show some deserved respect for Adventus and what he's doing for us.

Gets me down seeing him (and everybody else) bring all the negative chatter over from that stupid thread. I really don't think it has a place here.

N64, yo!! :D
 
This looks awesome- OoT is certainly one of my favorite games of all time. Thanks for all the work you have put into this.
 
That's really awesome Adventus, thanks for the video and your impressions. Looking pretty good to me!

I'm wondering about a couple of things. The sound in most of these N64 videos is not working, is it being emulated and it's just switched off or is it not being emulated yet? Do you think this would cause much extra strain?

Also it's been mentioned before with another Mupen64plus video but are we currently rendering at the game's proper resolution or are we exceeding it? If so will cutting it back help more?

It's seriously amazing work you've all done on this. I just hope we can optimise it further in time.

Thanks so much.
 
This looks amazing especially considering the first dev pandoras were just recently shipped. Cant wait to see what happens with a few months or even years of developing can truly do :)
 
I am sorry if this information is already out there but I have a few questions? I wonder if any one here know the answer to. Feel free to speculate. Also great work Adventus
1) Does the gles plug in use hardware acceleration or is it all rendered in software?
2) Has sound been tried how much of a performance hit does sound have?
3) Have other clock rates been tried and what are the effects on performance?
4) Is there any obvious or low hanging fruit in optimization that is not yet implemented?
5) Is the direction of the emulation development more towards speed or compatibility?
 
Seeing Zelda:OOT running on a Pandora is the next best thing to owning one (well, I already own one (having paid for it) but it hasn't arrived!).

Cheers to all involved :D
 
God Ginrai said:
Adventus said:
The controls map really well to the N64, i don't think any other handheld would really cut it for this purpose. At the moment its mapped:

Pandora = N64
Dpad = Dpad
Left Analog = Analog
Right Analog = C Buttons
Right button = A
Bottom Button = B
L = Z
R = R
Start = Start

This way all the buttons are accessible from the same hand as the N64 (except L when you use the dpad).The Analogs are a bit too sensitive, but thats understandable, the N64 had what >10mm of travel? this can be helped by using a nonlinear mapping between the analogs.

Could you try these controls and let me know how they work out?

Pandora = N64
Dpad = Dpad
Left Analog = Analog
ABXY = C Buttons
O = B
P = A
L = Z
R = R
1 = L
Start = Start

-God Ginrai

In the case that you are using my input plugin (http://jayfoxrox.bplaced.net/content/pandora/public/PPSP-Input/) its not possible yet because the keyboard is not a game controller (Atleast not via the hardcoded settings from map.c). However, the event code is already there so it should be easy to add support for that. But my recommendation is still to patch my pandora-input-drivers and then use one of the default plugins which work with normal joysticks (and keyboards)

//Edit:

Adventus: Can you tell wether optimized graphics would make the emulator faster? I would be working on that then. However, if the SGX is almost idle and only the CPU is responsible for the slow-downs I wouldn't waste my time as I don't have much knowledge about the N64 hardware (besides the fact that it also uses an MIPS CPU)
 
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OMG OMG OMG OMG OM GOM GOM GOMGOMGOMOGMOMGOM, Im so HAPPY!!!!!!!!! OMBGOMGOMGOMGMOG Why is the Pandora so perfect?!?!?!?!? OMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOM WHY is this going down, im having a dream its so sweet, i dont want to wake up !!!! F**K!! OMGOMGOMGOMGOM
 
Adventus said:
Well i gots me a prototype Pandora, I don't have much to add beyond what the others have said (and i've already mentioned most of these in another thread).... but here's my impressions:
  • My one has a floppy hinge, i assume its one of the ones that's been stress tested. The hinge will stay in position as long as its >45 degrees from horizontal and you don't shake it too much.


  • Actually the hinge is normal. It has 2 detents one open and one closed as that is all that is available in that size. Pretend like it is one of those slide open phones where the screen and keyboard are always parallel. The DS lite has an extra detent position but that was custom for them and the hinge MFG would not sell that version to us (Nintendo owns it). When in use you will find that it is most useable with the lid fully open anyway. You can still open 90 degrees and sit on a desk to watch movies and such but if you pick it up and flap it around like a Wii controller it will move.
 
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Get Bonus!
What's with the intermittent black screens in S&P?
Some framebuffer effect causing problems? Can it be fixed?
 
Thank you, Adventus. You've made my year.

The Legend of Zelda: OoT = No. 1

ZeldaOoTbox.jpg
 
Wow.. Thanks for the vid Adventus.. This emulator looks OH so Awesome!!! it will be installed on my Pandora from day 1. Keep up the good work. It's VERY much appreciated!

Edit: the very needed more VERY
 
JayFoxRox said:
Adventus: Can you tell wether optimized graphics would make the emulator faster? I would be working on that then. However, if the SGX is almost idle and only the CPU is responsible for the slow-downs I wouldn't waste my time as I don't have much knowledge about the N64 hardware (besides the fact that it also uses an MIPS CPU)
I hacked up a version of the emulator with profiling to measure how much time is spent in MIPS emulation, and it's about 60% on average without overclocking. Some slow downs occur when it encounters new code that it has to compile, but that usually takes less than a second. Audio uses some, but most of the rest is in the graphics plugin.
 
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Could you try these controls and let me know how they work out?
I don't think using the keyboard for A/B would be a good idea. The keyboard is more spongy than normal buttons. Maybe mapping the C buttons to the keyboard would be better, since there not used so often.

Actually the hinge is normal. It has 2 detents one open and one closed as that is all that is available in that size. Pretend like it is one of those slide open phones where the screen and keyboard are always parallel. The DS lite has an extra detent position but that was custom for them and the hinge MFG would not sell that version to us (Nintendo owns it). When in use you will find that it is most useable with the lid fully open anyway. You can still open 90 degrees and sit on a desk to watch movies and such but if you pick it up and flap it around like a Wii controller it will move.
Hmmm, thats a bit disappointing, i'm not surprised by it having two dents but i thought the hinge would be stiffer so it could rest at 45 degrees or something. I might have to mod it :) . Maybe a thin bit of rubber between the joints will increase the friction enough.

Also it's been mentioned before with another Mupen64plus video but are we currently rendering at the game's proper resolution or are we exceeding it? If so will cutting it back help more?
We are exceeding it in most cases. The n64 does support 640x480 resolution (or there abouts), but it was pretty much only used for text and HUDs.... Most games rendered 3d at 320x240.

Adventus: Can you tell wether optimized graphics would make the emulator faster? I would be working on that then. However, if the SGX is almost idle and only the CPU is responsible for the slow-downs I wouldn't waste my time as I don't have much knowledge about the N64 hardware (besides the fact that it also uses an MIPS CPU)
Basically all games seem to be CPU limited, the only game that I've tested that seems to run significantly faster at lower resolution is Banjo Kazooie. About 50% of the time is spent in the gfx plugin transforming vertices and performing draw calls. One problem is that the N64 had lower level access to its gpu hardware and hence there is very little batching occurring. Apart from shifting more work to the vertex shader (or the OGL driver magically getting faster), The other major optimisation i can think of is a reordering backend that captured all the vertices and states and at the end of the frame reordered them so there were less draw calls / state changes. This would require alot of work and might end in a net loss.

1) Does the gles plug in use hardware acceleration or is it all rendered in software?
2) Has sound been tried how much of a performance hit does sound have?
3) Have other clock rates been tried and what are the effects on performance?
4) Is there any obvious or low hanging fruit in optimization that is not yet implemented?
5) Is the direction of the emulation development more towards speed or compatibility?
1. It is hardware accelerated, NEON is used for transformations and SGX for rendering.
2. It has been tried, one of the standard mupen64 audio plugins compiles and works out of the box. This video shows super mario with sound at 600 and 800 mhz. The OS i'm working with at the moment doesn't seem to want to output any audio, i tried mplayer / xmms.
3. Yes other clocks have been tried. It seems to scale pretty much linearly with clockspeed, so 20fps at 800mhz would be 15fps at 600mhz.
4. Not that I can think of.
5. Both. The dynarec is not super compatible at the moment because it hasn't had enough time to mature, not because of optimisations (A few cpu opcodes haven't been implemented yet).

What's with the intermittent black screens in S&P?
Some framebuffer effect causing problems? Can it be fixed?
Yes, I believe its a post processing effect applied to the framebuffer. I don't think it can be fixed without totally destroying performance.
 
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Adventus said:
Could you try these controls and let me know how they work out?
I don't think using the keyboard for A/B would be a good idea. The keyboard is more spongy than normal buttons. Maybe mapping the C buttons to the keyboard would be better, since there not used so often.

Also, some games require A and B to be pressed at the same time, and if I remember correctly the qwerty keypad can only register one press at a time.



edit: I remembered wrong
 
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