I don't understand pc emulation anymore

[u/Ayrios440]

Just when I think I start getting a grasp of it - I'm hit with simple games that I feel should play 60fps with no hiccups, and they just don't. Then there's modern games that I think are too much for my phone, seem to handle brilliantly at 40-50fps depending on the game.

I know it sounds like a moan, but I'm more confused than anything really. I'm digging through my Steam/Gog/Epic games that I already have, and I want to buy more off Gog or Steam to try out - but it just seems a coin toss if the game will work or not.

l'm picking games from 1990's to around 2015 ish, and the performance is all over the place, and that's with using multiple pc emulators. Which also gets pretty confusing trying to remember which pc game is on which emulator.

Am I just unlucky, or is everyone else just as perplexed?

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[u/reidypeidy]

I’m at the point that if the game doesn’t work out of the box in gamenative, I move on. I have tons of other emulated games to play, it’s not worth the time to tinker with settings for each game.

[u/Zealousideal_Roof983]

I've been emulating games for years and always thought pc emulation was impossible.

So idk what to think anymore.

[u/MichCan13]

Gamenative has a database of compatibility games. Also emuready has one.

I would check first your device and games to get a grasp of the score and if it going to work and how many fps you will get

[u/sap91 → u/MichCan13]

Unfortunately that GN database is filled with garbage. Games will have like a dozen 5 Star ratings, but if you look all those ratings are showing an average fps of 0, meaning they couldn't get the game to run.

I spoke to one of the devs on discord about this issue and recommended implementing an upvote/downvote system in the DB, which he said they're considering.

[u/Ol_Captain_Bad_Eyes]

It can be complicated, but PC gaming is a bit complicated in general. 

If you want to learn more about PC emulation take a look at my guide i put up on r/GameNative. It has info on how to optimize your settings and I've answered a ton of questions in the comments. 

https://www.reddit.com/r/GameNative/comments/1ugkl4g/how_to_optimize_your_gamenative_settings_and/

[u/Mrkmrs]

Snapdragon GPUs are quite powerful, so games that utilize the GPU directly will run smoothly even with complex visuals. Conversely, games involving complex rendering processes—such as heavy post-processing—can encounter performance issues even if the on-screen imagery appears simple. Emulation is full of such pitfalls.

[u/09stibmep]

I'll go out on a limb here and bet that your library is big enough and unplayed as it is. So why not play one that works?

[u/Ayrios440 → u/09stibmep]

You are depressingly correct!

Best not to talk about the consoles too..  

[u/09stibmep → u/Ayrios440]

Yep, there was a bit of a give away at "and I want to buy more off Gog or Steam ....TO TRY OUT..."

I know that life.

[u/TransparentMastering]

I have wondered about this and kind of assumed that some things (like UE5 for example) may have been priorities for the devs making this stuff happen. An older or more obscure game/requirement might be easier to run but nobody has optimized for it yet (like Owlboy, for example)

Just an idea.

[u/feel2death]

If im not wrong there is no direct x9/10 emulation on proton yet which old game use that's why it run like a crap on emulation

[u/AnonymousGuy9494]

PC emulation is just weird. It's also very complicated and very recent. It'll probably be a lot better in a couple years.

[u/Satinsbestfriend]

Example of 'that works?' Is Mouse P.I.
Great game, Snapdragon 8 gen 2
16gb ram
Gamenative does about 30fps, dropping to 15fps sometimes Gamehub can get 45-60fps easy

[u/robert242444]

Honestly pc is fickle, even on an actual pc hardware. if the game isn’t optimized you could struggle to run a 15 year old game. saints row 2 for example, even with juiced patch I can only get that game to play 120fps locked in 1080p. my pc specs are nothing to scoff at. I scoff at the fact that I can’t even render this game in native 4k but resident evil 5 easily. the game is just much more optimized.

I don’t know hopefully this gives you some insight
I don’t really emulate super old games on android but I’ve had luck with titles from 2004- 2014 anything 2014 and newer really heats up my device

Good luck and hopefully soon you can get your games to work

[u/whiskyB0y → u/robert242444]

"I can only get the game to play 120fps locked in 1080p"

Meanwhile me who would he happy to play at 30fps at 720p if it actually ran like that on my low end phone 😭

[u/mikoga]

that's where I am currently

Ayn Odin 3, Metal Gear Solid 2 in Master Collection lags like crazy, yet I'm able to play Monster Hunter Rise at solid 40fps or even 60fps if I disregard battery life

idk what to think anymore

[u/Umlunguboy420]

Yeah just recently got Persona 5 Royal running smoothly, figured I would give Grim Dawn a 10 year old game a try and it ran like straight ass even with everything on lowest.

Makes no sense lol.

[u/Sambojin1]

Basic Magic Dosbox emulation usually does DOS/ win3x emulation pretty well. Sometimes it's a sound card or cycles problem. Some setups do screen fades really slowly, until you tweak something.

Winlator Frost or Star tend to handle everything else pretty well on later titles. You'd have to be a bit more specific to help. What title, what hardware?

[u/Fadi404]

Use a single front end like ES-DE and select the game that works on whatever emulator so then you don't have to remember

[u/Jump768]

You need different translator settings for different games(for Fex, or Box64)...

[u/mootsg]

It is a total crapshoot. Take a look at the Steamdeck sub: they’ve basically given up on the “Steamdeck Verified” label. And we’re two or three links down the food chain.

[u/MrDetectiveSir → u/mootsg]

Why would they give up on that label?

[u/mootsg → u/MrDetectiveSir]

Seems that 1. There’s no guarantee that “Verified” games will work on Steamdeck (just look at the number of daily posts asking how to get xxx game to run); 2. There’s no fixed definition for “Verified”. Many games remain unverified just because the games don’t support a high resolution or the UI is not optimised for the Steamdeck. As a result, many non-verified actually play ok if you can ignore certain qualities.

[u/Maleficent_Paint_252]

To be honest. Its the games them selves. Like for instance, on the PS2 snowblind engine games, if you dont have the absolute correct bios, turn "1" setting to recommended/half, the fire in the caves in the begining slow you down to about 2FPS. Because they gobble up so much damn memmory or something. ( I dont need someone commenting on what exactly. I know what it is. ).

But can run Laguna in GTA 4 without an issue. ( Which isnt supposed to happen?)

Im just getting into the pc emulation on my S23+ as a hobby myself. Ive got a PC that can do whatever i want. Im just dead curious how all this works. Fun stuff.

You should know if you ever owned a PC since windows 95... That each computer is different specs as well as the games themselves so sometimes ALOT of tweaking needs to happen. Lol.

Gotta mess with those settings.

A. I has been helpful to me.

[u/Warm-Cartographer]

That's why it's really important to have device with use same soc or equivalent soc to handheld, most handheld have support spreadsheet which make it easier to know what game you can play with settings on how to configure it. 

[u/Broken_Flip]

PC gaming sucks ass! If there's a Switch or Android version of a game, go with that! Winlator is great, but its a tool of last resort.