How good are console ports vs PCB and MAME?

[trap15]

There are tons of very noticeable instances where the behavior of MAME is incorrect compared to PCB. On just about every CAVE game, even. For more obscure games? Don't even joke with me.

[Muchi Muchi Spork]

Don't know why I'd re-enter this thread but, Esprade is not emulated correctly. It slows down more on the pcb (when you are actually playing the game) and the sprite limitation isn't emulated and it makes some cool effect on the pcb that thus aren't in mame.

[Xyga]

There are tons of very noticeable instances where the behavior of MAME is incorrect compared to PCB. On just about every CAVE game, even. For more obscure games? Don't even joke with me.

Well the harware slowdowns of the first genaration are there, but are you saying most are wrong or missing ?
When I play with no forced vsync and buffering instead the game's speed isn't forced and the slowdowns are present.
I admit I haven't look extremely closely at each an every with a chronometer in hand but if there are really tons that are very noticeable then one must have an eagle eye to notice.
Ho do you use Mame by the way ? Forced v-sync or without ? Standard windows use or custom 15khz ?

Don't know why I'd re-enter this thread but, Esprade is not emulated correctly. It slows down more on the pcb (when you are actually playing the game) and the sprite limitation isn't emulated and it makes some cool effect on the pcb that thus aren't in mame.

Missed that completely but I only rarely play this game now (and when I do it's on PS2 anyway so I could'nt do a live comparison) which means the PGM emulation is still not just mainlay about the sound and a few graphic glitches.

[Muchi Muchi Spork]

I'm talking Rade not Galuda.

[Xyga]

Yep sry typed the wrong name.

[trap15]

Slowdown is still a bit wrong on the Banpresto board-based CAVE games (hint: that's not going to change any time soon), and there are a fair few sprite things not emulated (if you've played pretty much any of them on PCB, you'll notice them; DDP doesn't exhibit it too much, but it's quite noticeable in Guwange and ESP Ra.De.). PGM emulation misses a lot of the weird edge cases on the graphics, and has sound issues still.

It doesn't matter how I have my MAME setup, these are issues that exist regardless of your settings. I know because I'm fairly familiar with the drivers' code for these in MAME. Code doesn't lie.

[Xyga]

That's good to know but honestly I have never noticed the missing graphics and off-slowdowns while playing, the only occurences where I stopped to watch were during the couple of times I did direct comparisons during shmupmeets.
(I personally own/have owned only CV1000 boards which I didn't even try to compare with emulation because my computer's a bit too slow for those and everyone's saying they're really no good yet so...)

Would you say the ones labelled as 'working' like ESPrade and Guwange are way off like compared to the real hardware ? (As bad as some console ports can be ?)
If you could point at a few in-game examples/moments I would be grateful because I will have other opportunities to compare directly and I would like to see the differences in action.

I don't know how the slowdowns in games are working and how Mame handles those (IIRC the early games those were not intentional) but still I wouldn't say the way Mame is set up doesn't make a difference because that's at least one thing anyone can notice while playing; the game's speed and expected slowdowns are affected by the chosen syncing method, whether it's synced to monitor refresh, 'wait' or triple-buffered.
The 'wait' method is also kind of broken, forcing v-sync in D3D mode while enabling none in Mame works much better, which is why I chose either to always use triple buffering (which works with both Ddraw and d3d) or GC v-sync in d3d mode only.
That at least is very noticeable even to me, depending on one's choices of sync method we get either an overall speed-up, stuttering, tearing or smooth correct speed with expected slowdowns.
I remember Prometheus was doing his DDP training in the beginning using a forced sync method and he noticed the game was too fast, which was fixed by using buffering instead.

[dunpeal2064]

How accurate are the ps2 ports of Galuda and DOJ in comparison to Mame? I know both are considered fairly accurate, but I've always wondered which one is closest.

[Xyga]

There's that resurrected cave-stg post if it helps;

2.) Espgaluda (Japanese PS2) – ~95-98% slowdown accuracy. Sprite overload graphic glitch was fixed, slowdown is nearly perfect. One of only two Cave PS2/X360 ports with true 15khz 240p graphic output.

3.) Dodonpachi Daioujou (Japanese PS2) – ~90-95% slowdown accuracy. One of only two Cave PS2/X360 ports with true 15khz 240p graphic output.

[dunpeal2064]

Thanks! That exact post is what made me wonder if those ports are even more accurate than Mame, since they seem to be some of the most accurate Cave ports.

I've never seen any Mame slowdown percentages to compare, though.

[emphatic]

The reason some PCBs are so expensive is because the games have deep scoring systems and therefore are fun to play over and over again. There are however less expensive games that have other merits, like the early Toaplan produced games put out by TAITO.

[Wonderbanana]

I buy ports. I buy pcb's. I enjoy both.

I prefer pcb's purely because you cannot beat the experience of playing the real deal in a cab and playing it how it was meant to be played. It's also convenient for reasons already noted.

I own Cave pcb's but I am far from blessed in the money dept. As someone pointed out, some people who don't buy pcb's don't understand the cost side. Yes they are expensive but you rarely lose money if you buy sensibly as they generally can be sold for what you paid.

So unless you are a collector you buy the pcb, play the hell out of it and sell it on a year later when you master it or fancy a change. It's not elitism.

Heck you could pretty much buy a basic cab and a Cave board for less than the cost of most previous and current gen consoles and just recycle the Cave board ad infinitum.

[Ed Oscuro]

I find it endlessly amusing that Cave did what it could to bring out arcade games, and so looked to the more affordable (but limited) hardware, yet the vast majority of Shmups Chat time is spent complaining about this or that result or problem stemming from the hardware platform (instead of talking about the games and their gameplay).

[srarcade]

I can't slam Cave for their imperfections on their ports, I think the darts hit the board, but I'm not a superplayer. I just remind myself of the ports we had to deal with in the NES and MS era I played countless shite games of Shinobi to get my fill at home. And THAT is why I started collecting PCBs some 18 years ago. I know this doesn't hold up as well for more current titles I guess, but I like to go for the arcade platform for better or worse by choice. Sometimes it's pricey, but after you go off and do the race car hobby thing for awhile, its a bloody bargain.

[Crafty+Mech]

I can't slam Cave for their imperfections on their ports, I think the darts hit the board, but I'm not a superplayer. I just remind myself of the ports we had to deal with in the NES and MS era I played countless shite games of Shinobi to get my fill at home. And THAT is why I started collecting PCBs some 18 years ago. I know this doesn't hold up as well for more current titles I guess, but I like to go for the arcade platform for better or worse by choice. Sometimes it's pricey, but after you go off and do the race car hobby thing for awhile, its a bloody bargain.

No kidding about the early console ports. Nothing can ever come close to the epic disappointment of playing Pac-man on the 2600 for the first time.

[tzakiel]

the 360 port are better than the emulation is, or the emulation ever will be, and considerably cheaper than buying a PC capable of running the emulation at full speed.

there's really no reason at all you'd want to run the games in MAME, that's why I don't see why some people make a big deal about them

Groovymame (along with a compatible video card and the right drivers) runs games on a crt (such as a nanao monitor in a blast or astro city) at native 15khz resolution and native refresh. It looks glorious. A 360 can't do that. That's my reason, at least.

My pc runs all the cave games at full speed and it's just a decent core i5.

Yes the slowdown issue is annoying but I'm finding the new cave driver to be good once blitter delay is turned on.

[rcoltrane]

People by PCBs cause... Elitism?

oh, come on....

It's part of the full experience. Why go to an arcade, when I can have my own at home? In fact, I don't even like going to arcades anymore. I have every game I could want right here at my house. I choose the background music. I choose how bright / dim I want the lights. No smoking in my house! I don't have to wait my turn, or push my way through the crowds. No train to go downtown.. Hell, I don't even have to wear pants!

You are missing all the fun man!!

[rancor]

nah - I wear pants everyday. No pants + Battle Garegga / Dodonpachi is way more fun.

[Chromecha]

From what I'm observing, Cave games are probably the hardest to port to consoles since slowdown is integral to the gameplay, and that means they have to hard code it in. If the games were never intended to have slowdown like that, making an arcade perfect port would be as easy as can be.

Take, for example, the Raiden Fighters series. All three were ported to the 360 as Raiden Fighters Aces, and those ports are nothing short of incredible, since the graphics, gameplay, and sound are pretty much arcade perfect (especially good with the last one, considering that whenever I look up MAME videos for Jet, the sound is way off). I can't really speak for how well the slowdown is, but since the Raiden Fighters series has focused more on aimed shots rather than filling the screen with bullets, it's a very well made compilation, and there are plenty of bonuses, like screen filters and speed adjustment (60fps or 54fps).

(Minor thing: For the American release of Aces, the gameplay is based off the Japanese PCBs, with Engrish text instead of Japanese symbols. There were PCBs released in America that have some changes, like two loops instead of one, and only requiring one slave ship to be destroyed instead of two in order to decrease the rank in Jet, but you won't find these changes in Aces. Maybe Raiden Legacy has them, but I'm not sure, since I never tried that compilation.)

[mastermx]

@Xyga

I would love to configure my mame to play arcade games perfectly. Do you have a guide on configuring mame or a website that could go through everything and explain how to do it?

Perhaps this needs it's own thread.

[arcade-stg]

IMO this discussion is like a discussion between the real Mona Lisa painting vs a cheap poster of the Mona Lisa painting. Both of them provide almost the same functionality but there is a world of difference.

[dunpeal2064]

IMO this discussion is like a discussion between the real Mona Lisa painting vs a cheap poster of the Mona Lisa painting. Both of them provide almost the same functionality but there is a world of difference.

PCBs do not provide the same functionality as Mame though, or even ports.

[arcade-stg]

That's why I said almost the same functionality

[Xyga]

@Xyga

I would love to configure my mame to play arcade games perfectly. Do you have a guide on configuring mame or a website that could go through everything and explain how to do it?

Perhaps this needs it's own thread.

A dedicated thread I don't know but I could post a number of configuration suggestions yes. Will do asap.
(But just for a basic pc use, not 15khz, which would indeed deserve a looooong thread)

Anyway I got my answer - although indirectly - in another thread; even with the right setting there are still speed inaccuracies that aren't documented and not fixable even in a 15khz scenario.
Still, wouldn't say it's crap / not worth the use, because it's quite hard to notice unless you know the game very well or are up to compete for score.

[arcade-stg]

In my case: MAME is good as a library (and I welcome all these 15khz and groovymame improvements), BUT pcbs are the real thing.

[dunpeal2064]

In my case: MAME is good as a library (and I welcome all these 15khz and groovymame improvements), BUT pcbs are the real thing.

To me, PCBs feel like museum-worthy material, where as Mame is the real thing. I have no attachment to the original, though, I just want the best, and for me Mame and ports are easily better than PCBs, and not because of cost.

Different strokes I suppose

[mastermx]

A dedicated thread I don't know but I could post a number of configuration suggestions yes. Will do asap.
(But just for a basic pc use, not 15khz, which would indeed deserve a looooong thread)

Yes any configurations will be so helpful. I can't afford any pcbs at the moment, if I ever do make enough money I will buy all the pcbs I can get my hands on, but looking at the prices, it just seems tough. I only recently configured my shmupmame with scanlines and removed bilinear filtering, thus is the extent of my config knowledge, so any additions will be greatly appreciated. I'm sure I can make the roms run generally much better. I don't think I have the resources, space nor the time for a 15khz config, but I plan to one day build a 15khz mame cab.

Anyway I got my answer - although indirectly - in another thread; even with the right setting there are still speed inaccuracies that aren't documented and not fixable even in a 15khz scenario.
Still, wouldn't say it's crap / not worth the use, because it's quite hard to notice unless you know the game very well or are up to compete for score.

Which thread was this if you dont mind me asking. And how big are these speed inaccuracies? Are they so innocuous as to go unnoticed by most people, or do they actually make a siginficant difference on one's experience with the games?

[Xyga]

Which thread was this if you dont mind me asking. And how big are these speed inaccuracies? Are they so innocuous as to go unnoticed by most people, or do they actually make a siginficant difference on one's experience with the games?

A post by trap15, can't find it anymore...

[Captain]

Rancor...I'm sorry...but it had to be done.

[kidpanda]

I can say this, I own DDP DFK on 360 and the PCB. The two feel different to me, I can play much better on the PCB than the 360 port. I guess it's more of what works for you. As far as a PCB guy gettting angry about his expensive PCBs being shut down by emulation, he needs a new hobby.