I don’t have a lot of space for consoles and cartridges, or money for consoles and cartridges but I do have a decent computer hooked up to a TV. What’s the best way to get an authentic experience via emulation? Here’s what I have so far:
Retroarch Settings
- HDR enabled (cant tell if it actually helps)
- Run-ahead enabled
- Mega Bezel shaders
- Retrobit saturn controller (having trouble getting configured but has an excellent dpad)
Emulators/cores:
- NES - Mesen
- SNES - bsnes
- Jaguar - Bigpemu (need to configure shaders)
- Megadrive/CD/32X - Picodrive
- PSX - ??? Swanstation?
- Saturn - Beetle Saturn
- N64 - Mupen64plus
Thing I need to work on:
- Tweaking shader settings as the defaults are very dark
- Configuring retrobit controller to work with Steam big Picture (how I launch Retroarch) and retroarch seamlessly
- Possibly finding a Big Box theme that is focused on original artwork and not garbage
Any advice/pointers? My goal is to eventually have a “pick up and play” setup possibly with different 8bitdo/retrobit controllers for each system.
If you’re looking for authenticity then I’d recommend picking up a MiSTer.
With the addition of the recent Groovy MiSTer core, this is probably the best bet if you want to play on a CRT screen since you’ll also get access to games / systems not available on the MiSTer.
For those not in the know: Groovy MiSTer allows one to route the video and sound from an emulator on a regular PC through the MiSTer hooked up to a CRT. It is essentially replacing the need to use an old and modified GPU for analog video output.
MiSTer looks like crap though on a flat panel TV… I don’t have space for a big CRT.
It looks fine if you use the digital output rather than analog.
If the purity of the analog signal is important, you can run it through a retrotink or OSSC. Although that’s another expensive addition to the setup.