Ancient Aliens: New Nin. 3DS now offers the best SNES emulation on any handheld

Hello? This is Hailun! said:
Were SNES games 60fps?
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Yes. The actual animation may not have been, but the scrolling and refresh was 60fps. Unless you were in PAL land, then it was 50fps.

There were more 60fps games back then compared to on modern consoles. Crazy, that.

Oh and another note...the Vita is gonna be blown open tomorrow with a new exploit. So yeah, New 3DS will have a contender as retroarch is on the Vita too.
 
This makes me want to buy a N3DS just to copy my old 3DS' stuff over, and then get set up for all of this.

Is it possible to run CFW on a N3DS with the right firmware, the same way you can on the OG 3DS (I have one sitting with firmware 9.2 just in case)? Either way, all I want is the ability to use the eShop and my Nintendo Network acct/all my physical and digital games, and run these homebrew apps like Retroarch.
 
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TheInternetNomad said:
Hows the GBA emulation? I wouldnt mind finishing Mother 3 on my new 3ds. Can saves be used from other emulators? (I think theyre.sav)
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Speaking of, does this comparison take into account unconventional devices? My calculator can do GBA emulation surprisingly well, I'd imagine it could do SNES stuff quite easily (and I believe there's a ported emulator too).
 
Rich! said:
Yes. The actual animation may not have been, but the scrolling and refresh was 60fps. Unless you were in PAL land, then it was 50fps.

There were more 60fps games back then compared to on modern consoles. Crazy, that.

Oh and another note...the Vita is gonna be blown open tomorrow with a new exploit. So yeah, New 3DS will have a contender as retroarch is on the Vita too.
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Awesome. That said, I still wish I could just buy the games again on the N3DS. Retroarch gets a bit too technical for me.
 
Rich! said:
Oh and another note...the Vita is gonna be blown open tomorrow with a new exploit. So yeah, New 3DS will have a contender as retroarch is on the Vita too.
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Oooh tell me more. 😱
 
Fularu said:
It has the best emulation*

*if you discard every sub150$ Android portable released in the last 3 years
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Unfortunately every Android portable has garbage buttons, if it even has buttons. Even my precious Shield feels like trash compared to any buttery Nintendo dpad.

That's the main reason I'm really interested in seeing 8/16bit emulation take off on 3DS.
 
sörine;179749706 said:
Unfortunately every Android portable has garbage buttons, if it even has buttons. Even my precious Shield feels like trash compared to any buttery Nintendo dpad.

That's the main reason I'm really interested in seeing 8/16bit emulation take off on 3DS.
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yep. SNES runs full speed on my Xperia Z2 and always has done. However, it's terrible for anything that isn't the simplest RPG due to the controls (or absolute lack of), and adding a controller to it defeats the purpose.

Playing SNES on my 3DS feels the same as using the actual console. No lag, and perfect controls.
 
So which is better? ironhax or tubehax? I see that you can use ironhax without having to change dns once you've installed it via tubehax.

Is there any downside to just using ironhax over tubehax?
 
Rich! said:
yep. SNES runs full speed on my Xperia Z2 and always has done. However, it's terrible for anything that isn't the simplest RPG due to the controls (or absolute lack of), and adding a controller to it defeats the purpose.

Playing SNES on my 3DS feels the same as using the actual console. No lag, and perfect controls.
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This is what I am going through at the moment. I love being able to play Leaf Green on my S6, but pairing it with a controller just seems really awkward
 
PotionBleue said:
I'm surprised the difference is so high for emulation, when for 3DS games the N3DS gives rather small improvements (like the slightly better textures / framerate in MH4U).
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The difference in hardware is larger than what Nintendo let on, but there's so many more OG3DSes out in the wild it's not worth the time or money to cater to the N3DS crowd
 
xlom3000 said:
So which is better? ironhax or tubehax? I see that you can use ironhax without having to change dns once you've installed it via tubehax.

Is there any downside to just using ironhax over tubehax?
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ironhax is superior as you dont need to be online

but its no longer available. if you didn't download it before it was pulled from the eshop, you cannot use it.
 
Fularu said:
It has the best emulation*

*if you discard every sub150$ Android portable released in the last 3 years
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Though I agree that 'best emulation' might lean towards hyperbole, Android devices do not have this:

controls-buttons.jpg


The New 3DS is built (and colored) like a portable SNES. It really does breath new life into SNES games. I've emulated on PSP for years but it always felt lacking. With Retroarch on 3DS I've put hours into games I've had in my backlog since the 1990s.
 
sörine;179749706 said:
Unfortunately every Android portable has garbage buttons, if it even has buttons. Even my precious Shield feels like trash compared to any buttery Nintendo dpad.

That's the main reason I'm really interested in seeing 8/16bit emulation take off on 3DS.
Click to expand...

Also, Android has so much overhead from Java and its GC and all the systems you have to go through for audio/video/input that getting consistent performance is nearly impossible. You can get random stuttering from anytime the GC decides to fire and background apps can trash you framerate at any time. RetroArch has a 64ms buffer on audio by default and that is impossible to achieve on lots of Android devices.
 
Rich! said:
ironhax is superior as you dont need to be online

but its no longer available. if you didn't download it before it was pulled from the eshop, you cannot use it.
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Luckily, I downloaded it back when it first came out since it was free to play anyway haha. Shame I never updated it. Seems even though they pulled the update, you still get it's notification on launch
 
Didn't realise Homebrew was possible on 3DS without tampering. Can't wait to try this out. Been wanting to replay Mario RPG for years.
 
Moodkip said:
So, I get that it's slower on the o3DS, but is it still playable? Had anyone tried it out on an original model?
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You really don't want to play slowed down SNES games. Anything less than 100% speed is really something you're better off experiencing elsewhere.

HOWEVER:

There's another emulator, called BlargSNES, that's coded specifically to the 3DS hardware and is thus a lot faster. However, because it's also been developed less, it's compatible with far less games. I'd recommend looking up the compatibility list and see if it runs anything you're interested in.
 
How's the aspect ratio? Is it 8:7 or 4:3?

SNES emulation always looks wrong to my eyes, but I'd bet it'd look quite a bit better on 3DS's 240p screen.
 
Okay, I just spent the last couple hours getting this to work and testing. I'm on an OG 3DS.

NES and Game Boy games are 100% awesome. Great quality - way better than even on my Galaxy S5. I don't know why, it's just awesome.

I tried Super Mario World and Mega Man X - both ran at an unplayable 26 fps in the recommended SNES emulator. In the other SNES emulator, it was 12fps. So.... yeah. It's unplayable. I haven't tried BlargSNES yet, though. Might need to do that.

I tried Pokemon Fire Red on mVBA. It ran at 11 fps. Also unplayable.

So, unless you have a N3DS, you won't be playing any SNES or VBA games any time soon. However, the GB and NES emulators are top notch.


I was reading in their forums, and it looks like the drastic difference is caused by how much CPU the software is allowed to access. On a New3DS, it can access 80% of the CPU. On an OG 3DS, it can only access 30%.

Peltz said:
How's the aspect ratio? Is it 8:7 or 4:3?
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It's 4:3, but you can force custom aspect ratios.
 
Okay, tried BlargSNES, and it's WAY better. Ran Mega Man X perfectly. Going to try a few others now.

EDIT: Gradius 3, Mario World, Super Metroid all work great. Had some issues with freezes with Chrono Trigger and Super Punch Out. BlargSNES itself is kinda buggy. It needs some work.

Like I said, this is all on OG 3DS
 
I have a New 3DS and tried both Super Mario World and Mario RPG, both had unplayable frame rates. This doesn't seem right?
 
Mistle said:
I have a New 3DS and tried both Super Mario World and Mario RPG, both had unplayable frame rates. This doesn't seem right?
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There are like 5 SNES emulators in the retroarch archive, try each of them. I can't remember which but only one would give me locked 60 with perfect sound.

I think Mario RPG is one of those games that is laggy regardless though.
 
EricB said:
Though I agree that 'best emulation' might lean towards hyperbole, Android devices do not have this:

https://mostlygaming.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/controls-buttons.jpg[/img

The New 3DS is built (and colored) like a portable SNES. It really does breath new life into SNES games. I've emulated on PSP for years but it always felt lacking. With Retroarch on 3DS I've put hours into games I've had in my backlog since the 1990s.[/QUOTE]

I don't think you've seen an Nvidia Shield.

Edit: Oh you meant the colors not the placement.
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Awesome. Didn't realize homebrew included emulation on 3DS. I hope this includes Mother 3, timing the musical mini game without perfect emulation is a nightmare.
 
I'm always sad that the DSi XL wasn't powerful enough or have a high-res enough screen (it's missing some lines of vertical resolution) to properly emulate the SNES. Between the n3DS XL and the DSi XL, I'd pick the DSi XL any day of the week because the d-pad is in the primary position. Playing 2D action games like Gunstar Heroes on my 3DS XL isn't all that comfortable. And Nintendo vs. pirates and ethical debate aside, flash carts were reliable and you didn't need to worry about firmware updates.
 
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