Emulators running on PS3? News
PlayStation 3 News by Rob Fahey
Early adopters of the PlayStation 3 have reportedly managed to get a variety of emulators up and running on the system - including hugely popular arcade machine emulator MAME, and a NES emulator, with videos of games such as Super Mario Bros and Pac-Man being posted to YouTube over the weekend.
The emulators are allegedly up and running on Fedora Linux, the Linux operating system which was released for the PlayStation 3 this month, and which is generating plenty of interest from those interested in expanding the multimedia functions of the console.
Admittedly, the videos are dodgy quality, and the Mario video is particularly suspect, since it cuts away at the point when the system reboots. However, we'll give it the benefit of the doubt for now - this seems to be down to bad camerawork more than any kind of subterfuge, since the video is correct in all other respects, right down to the Fedora desktop and the "boot-game-os" command line switch used to boot back into the standard PS3 operating system.
All of which is... Well, a bit obvious really. PS3 runs Linux, emulators are freely available on Linux, therefore it stands to reason that PS3 can run emulators - but there had been some doubt over whether Sony was really about to allow such nefarious activities on its device. Noses are likely to be particularly out of joint at Nintendo and Microsoft over this move, since it effectively means that PS3 owners with a modicum of technical know-how will be able to play (illegal, lest we forget) ROM versions of games which they'd rather sell you, for money, on the Virtual Console and Xbox Live Arcade services.
Sony, for its part, has indicated that its own PlayStation Store download service is going to focus on new, original content and on distributing PSone and PS2 games digitally - so it doesn't really have much to fear from the ROM piracy scene at present, especialy since early mutterings from the beard 'n sandals brigade suggest that one of the technical restrictions on PS3 Linux is that it's not capable of tapping the system's 3D graphics power, without which emulating 3D games would be extremely difficult.
As to why people might choose to play 20 year old games on their PS3 rather than settling down with one of the console's launch titles... Well, the comments thread is right there. Off you go. Play nicely!
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Pity about the no-3D thing, otherwise this would have been a pretty amazing thing, and a HUGE departure from the way that the PSP was strictly controlled.
I wonder if the extremely clever 'beard and sandals' brigade can find some way of over-coming the no-3D limitation, and whether Sony will change it's tune once they do... |
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I should add that I have no idea whether this is actually a restriction, as such, or if the Linux distribution just hasn't built support for PS3's 3D hardware yet. I was a developer in the distant past, but the closest I get to wearing sandals these days is tweaking some PHP and then feeling clever for about a week. :)
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I'm guessing any Linux emulator which can use software rendering rather than relying on the graphics card is viable. I'm wondering how Cell would handle the more CPU intensive stuff in MAME though.
I'm hoping Sony leaves this particular door open, the PS3 would then have far better emulator support than my poor old Mac. *edit* Its not 'no 3D' its just software rendering only. Tempest and I, Robot will work in MAME just fine as should later titles like Starblade Alpha.
Edited 1 times,
most recently on 20/11/06 @ 12:06
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stuarty_2003
20/11/06 @ 12:04
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Surely it won't be long until there is a software solution to allow pirated games to run?
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Well, whilst one cannot condone piracy, if it makes MS re-think they're pricing strategy for 25 year old games via Arcade Live! it can be no bad thing.
The pricing started to look bad when MS started charging £3.40 or thereabouts for each of these games when typically they were bundled from about £1 each on retro collections. |
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bunglebonce
20/11/06 @ 12:11
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As to why people might choose to play 20 year old games on their PS3 rather than settling down with one of the console's launch titles...
The same which could be said of the Other Two. |
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mingster: There is a big difference here though. The PSP was hacked to run unsigned code and the programs you run on it are compiled using a GCC compiler but with PSP-OS-specific libraries that have full access to the graphics chip. They do not have access to secondary CPU on the PSP that handles the media decompression.
The PS3 has Linux running on it, a Linux that lacks proper drivers for the RSX (Graphics chipset). At the moment it is not know if there is any access available to the RSX at all. Homebrew developers have full access to IBM libraries for developing Cell applications but they do not have access to libraries for the RSX and as such. Don't really know how you should call it. Developing for the Cell is probably very interesting, you could use them as a bunch of Vertex/Pixel shader machines even though they can handle proper C/C++ programs which is a bit more than a GPU wants their shader units to do. |
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kangarootoo
20/11/06 @ 12:21
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@stuarty_2003
"Surely it won't be long until there is a software solution to allow pirated games to run? " Emulated in Linux? There would be no point, you might as well emulate the PS3 on a PC (with all the performance woes that would bring you). |
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chupachups
20/11/06 @ 12:22
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If Sony is losing $300 on every PlayStation 3, they clearly wouldn't want people buying it for software other than their games.
I suppose the emulator market is very small, but that makes it even more bizarre that they're allowing people to do this. |
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kangarootoo
20/11/06 @ 12:23
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@Adam_T
"hehe, here come Sony then with their lame firmare updates in exchange for some nonsense feature" What? Have you posted on the wrong thread by accident? |
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kangarootoo
20/11/06 @ 12:27
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@chupachups
"I suppose the emulator market is very small, but that makes it even more bizarre that they're allowing people to do this." One thought just occurred, a question for the Linux heads really? I understand that releasing a build of Linux means you fall under certain license agreements. Does that mean that you can't chop it up too much (similar to building a JVM, hence MS getting sued for building a non-compliant one)? Perhaps its not a matter of Sony "allowing" this. Maybe it is more a matter of Linux being able to do this and Sony not being allowed to switch things off. For that matter, what would you even switch off? How could you turn off parts of Linux used for emulators, whehn that would break loads of other apps too? Emulators are after all, just applications with a certain objective in mind. Coders, harken to me and say clever explanatory things, as clearly I don't really know what I am on about :) |
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kangarootoo: The PS3 has an operating system running 'underneath' Linux and the Game OS. That OS can limit hardware access and also stop unsigned code from running.
Limiting what the Linux Os run is not a simple matter. Limiting what the Linux OS has access to in hardware resources is something else though. They can stop Linux from reading PS1/PS2/PS3 format discs, they can stop Linux from accessing the PS3 Game OS partition and they can stop Linux from having full access to memory and the RSX etc. |
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chupachups: It's a bit like Apple allowing people to run Windows on their computers.
Why not allow people the possibility to do that when you have the hardware and it is capable of it? Nintendo wouldn't but that's because they have a different philosophy, they don't want the 'negative' impression that computers have. They want their Wii to be seen as a Toy and that's it. Microsoft could very well be doing exactly this on their Xbox 360, heck their machine would probably run Linux even better since they have 3 PPC cores. I don't imagine Microsoft ever doing something like this though :) |
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I think it's a good idea. Provided Sony are stopping new games running as pirated copies then great. I have a 360 and keep buying stuff from the marketplace (sucker) and paying too much for what it really is. The only exception is Texas Hold 'Em (which was free) and Geometry Wars. None of the other games are worth the price M$ are asking (I have bought them though) and it's good that they will be forced to rethink and start offering them at sensible prices.
Also with all the talent that modded the original xbox, in many cases able to do more than the 360 can now, this could herald great things for a linux based PS3. @EG Where the hell are my Jaffacakes - you said :( |
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bunglebonce
20/11/06 @ 13:15
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it's legal to have ROM's and Emulator as long as you have the physical game.
ROM's are deemed as backups. Lets not get confused here. In the US, this could arguably be the case because of the 'fair use' defence to copyright infringement. In the UK, there is no such defence. Copying anything for a back-up is copyright infringement, although it's extremely unlikely any copyright holder is going to take an action against an individual. |
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@ disc
The story was about the running of Mame and the likes. Tbh Im not interested in any retrogaming on any homeconsole (handheld is a tad different). My xbox ran several unused nintendo emulators. I just don't get what's so special about running oldschool stuff on such expensive hardware. edit: let me rephrase. the fact that its possible and people have achieved it IS interesting, the fact people actually would use it is beyond me however.
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most recently on 20/11/06 @ 13:55
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SeesThroughAll
20/11/06 @ 13:57
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i thinks it's great that sony are allowing alterate OS installs, it shows at least that they're listening to what homebrewers (not pirates) want.
Well, access to hardware under alternate OS is limited, so it's not exactly a dream coming true for homebrewers either.
Edited 1 times,
most recently on 20/11/06 @ 13:57
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gamesb*tch
20/11/06 @ 14:03
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"Noses are likely to be particularly out of joint at Nintendo and Microsoft over this move..."
Yeah, cos Sony were never planning to sell us rancid old tat via their online services, were they? Actually, looking at some of the PS2 compilations they normally save it up and sell it on a disc! /runs away a la Zoidberg /whoob whoob whoob |
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sanctusmortis
20/11/06 @ 14:06
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I would hardly say they're supporting the idea of multiple OS support, but merely having a swipe at MS by trying to steal some of the lucrative PC market... It'll never work, obviously.
As for allowing such stuff to run on their machines, I doubt their publisher associates are happy with such ideas. It's only a matter of time to someone doing an RSX driver and making Sony very red in the face. On the bright side, no need to "chip" your machine... |
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