About Emulation

First, I'd like to thank you to waste your time for reading some simple words from someone so unimportant on this "scene", I mean, I've been an user since it was born, I touched my first emulator on the MSX, it was a Spectrum emulator for MSX, but i've made almost nothing important ( tried to translate a game, Tsubasa 1 for NES, with the help of Coldheart, (where are you, man ?) dumped a game ( the partially translated Tsubasa 5 for SNES, sent Zoop an unrealesed SMS to dump, made a Xmas svi for Fox of emuunlim ( you're welcome Fox), nothing major. Hey! emulation has two sides the big guys ( programmers, Site ops, Rom Dumpers), and the small ones, the users, after all programs are made for users.

I wanted to post the text at a msgboard ( dave's or Retrogames), but the only thing on these boards now is UltraHLE this, UltraHLE that...so I decided to write a text using Frontpage Express.

Now, I'll talk for myself, but I belive that some of you will identify yourselves...

when I ws I kid, I always loved to do something that nobody does.. The first wave was Video Games, back on the 2600 supremacy, I had an Intellivision ( BTW I ordered the Intellivison Lives! cd-rom, but it hasn't arrived yet...), so while everyone was playing their crappy Missile Command, I was playing Bomb Squad ( yea! voices on the 80's!)... then the big crash occured, no video games anymore. Then I found something called RPGs...I can still remember the faces of "normal" people looking for me and my friends while we were screaming - I hit the dragon!! I killed it! where are my XP points ? - back then nobody lknew what the hell was RPG! but as everything, it got a wide press coverage, got known for the big audince, and now they are using it on schools to help the learning process... with this and the lack of friends ( no, I'm not out of friends, but as we grew up, we slipt, each one is working on different jobs, have to spend some time w/ it's girlfriend/wife) so I moved to computers ( I've played w/ computers before, after the big Video Game crash, but I always hated the PC, it was green or orange and even black or white on those crappy monitors). So I got my first 386, with it's amazing 8 mb of RAM! I've learned how to use the DOS by reading the help ( I spent several hours reading it!) and as magic I read on a newspaper - Play your MSX on your PC! - I got mad!!! MSX games were colorful, fun, while PC ones were boring. So like an RPG I set a quest to find this program ( I didn't call it "emulator" yet). The first modem I bought was to acess the old BBS ( do u still remember what is a BBS ? you Internet Freaks! :) ). Yes, BBS, there was no Internet here yet ( for here I mean Brazil, I'm Brazilian, that's why my english is so bad, I hope that you english speakers can at least understand my toughts). Wow! it's was so hard to find the things... both program and games... there were mo words such as emu and ROMS...I found some games for the MSX2 ( this computer never got far, but it was much better the PC of that time).

Then the Internet! as I soon as I connect to the net I visited some site, got amazed by the nice look of it ( I used BBS, no graphics and stuff)... and I remebered that that MSX program had a TXT file, w/ an internet adress... hmm, tht's right! It was Marat's HomePage! It was cool, back then! no charges... no fees... all free! and so a learned the words, emulator and ROMs the way I use then now...

now that I reached the Internet and the emu and ROMs word I'll twist the topic a bit...

Back on that time when I found Marat's HomePage, there were no EMU only sites... as NES and SNES emulators began to show up, there were some much hype on emulators... a few good sites like Node99, and AR... But here's something odd... those sites were related w/ DC ( Damaged Cybernetics)... DC was not a emulator site, but a console copying, programming one. Got it ? there were not emulators... Ines and VSMC ( ???) used the console copying and programming to grow...

Soon we got arcade emulators the might Shinobi.exe ( now known as System16.exe), mame, and the once popular single arcade games emulators. Again those emulators used another "scene" to grow up... there were sites w/ dumped arcade roms long before they were emulated... I don't think that those people ( as well s the console copying people) ever imagined playing those dumped games on their PCs.

Now, the "emu scene" is woried... With the UltraHLE and bleem, the scene is being "warezed" lots of people looking for the last N64 or PSX games to play on the PC...

Hmm, I didn't seen so much trouble when neocharity released KOF98 ( on my version the copyright says 98, what does it shows on yours ? ) and 98 is only a few days ago... I feel the the word "retro" doesn't fit here as well it doesn't on bleem and UltraHLE.

I've read so much cynical "editorials" saying - PSX emulation and n64 emulation hurts the "emu scene" they are new consoles.. yadda yadda...- But not a single word on MAME and it's Neo Geo support... Hmm maybe neo geo games are retro and N64 games w/ the same date aren't. or the real problem is - SNK doesn't complain about emulation ( until now...) and Nintendo and Sony do ?

My final words...

When I upgrade my computer, m\y main tought is " Now I'll play Rastan Saga, and zsnes at full speed". I mean I only upgrade my system to play emulators, and like before I look to people's faces as the see me playing NES Castlevania on my powerfull machine, instead of these doom clones games, I say - these are emulators!- Now w/ UltraHLE and bleem their faces and words will change and even that quake fanatic will stop for a second to play Mario or Metal Gear Solid ( to name a few) or their machines. So if anyone care, like I wrote before new words have to be made to save those OLD games! Let emulation dies, long live to Retrolation! I mean it, if those cynical who wrote about new games hurting the "emu scene" stop from supporting emuls w/ games from 90's ( I think that 10 years is right for retrogamming)... so let's split it... Emulation and Retrolation... and doing so maybe IDSA, Nintendo and Sony ( among others) will let retroplayers aside and hunt the emupirates!

EOF.

Plz send you comments to lhope@iname.com