OmegaFlareX wrote:
. It doesn't make it better than original hardware. If you set the RA frames too high, you'll start seeing weird shit with sprite movement.
The problem is the point at which you start seeing movement isn't the point at which you've exceeded the original limit.
A lot of original hardware has 2, sometimes 3 frames of buffering for all video, some 2 or 3 from IO MCUs or the like. You can end up killing that off with the runahead without even realising it, without seeing any glitches. At least with shmupMAME you got ugly glitches due to the way it hacked code, so you could tell people were using it in most cases.
Then a whole bunch of people will swear blind the original hardware doesn't have that buffering, even if it does, even if we can show them the RAM on the PCB that is adding those buffers, or in some (none-automatic cases) the triggers in the program code that is doing a DMA that they're now using time travel save states to bypass. Insisting they have the right to get rid of that delay and still compete, the delay that really is there on a PCB.
RA, as a result, has utterly destroyed any concept of high score runs on emulators, because people will use it, maybe even unknowingly, and be getting less than PCB lag times, and games that no longer play as they were originally balanced. We've already seen enough people claiming otherwise and defending the feature to know this is a legitimate problem.
That's the problem, it's an irresponsible feature that now sets completely unrealistic expectations for people doing it correctly. As I said, I got what were messages that basically read as ill concealed death threats for simply adding a single frame buffer people didn't think should be there in MAME drivers. Putting people back on the right track, even once proper solutions are available (if anybody bothers to develop them now) is going to be a horror show now that this is the 'norm'
I'm sorry, but if a feature has the potential for such consequences then it shouldn't be implemented, but the RA devs are all about implementing things they know will have deeper negative side-effects on communities and really not caring, because they know they can create enough hype, and enough people saying those features are amazing that it will boost their popularity due to the features, on the surface, looking good. I've said before, and I'll say it again, LR / RA is parasitic.
Again you can say MAME is user hostile for not wanting this, but I'd argue that MAME instead has just acted in a much more responsible manner, it would have been selfish of us in the long run to add such a feature due to the damage it causes. At least right now if somebody is running a proper version of MAME you know for sure they're not using that kind of cheat. I'll admit, yes, with the inherent lag you get from emulation you are at a slight disadvantage instead, but better that, while working on a proper solution (which would have arrived in time) than the mess that has now irreversibly been created.