Wii Virtual Console

[rock_nog]

I freakin' hate LCD. I'll admit, I have an LCD for my computer monitor, because it's convenient, but I refuse to use anything but CRT for my TV-watching. You know, I think the whole 240p thing gets to the real heart of the matter, that VC is so good, you can't tell it's emulation. I have yet to see an emulator that can run a game as smoothly as VC. Which I think is strange, because it seems to me that a PC with a 2 GHZ processor ought to be able to flawlessly emulate an 8-bit NES game, but no matter how good the computer, no matter how good the emulator, there always seems to be a little stuttering.

Plus, it really is hard to get around the whole "Who wants to drag their computer into the living room so they can hook it up to their TV to play Mario?"

[Brasel]

I prefer not to pirate games, so the VC is a very nice option, even if it costs a little bit. Also, I played games on an emulator in the past, and it just feels much better playing with a real controller and using a real TV.

Now, the computer controller that I use might not be a real console controller, but its made from the same mold as a PS2 controller, and I can play on a TV, so it isn't really much different.

Still drunk.

[Warlock]

I freakin' hate LCD. I'll admit, I have an LCD for my computer monitor, because it's convenient, but I refuse to use anything but CRT for my TV-watching. You know, I think the whole 240p thing gets to the real heart of the matter, that VC is so good, you can't tell it's emulation. I have yet to see an emulator that can run a game as smoothly as VC. Which I think is strange, because it seems to me that a PC with a 2 GHZ processor ought to be able to flawlessly emulate an 8-bit NES game, but no matter how good the computer, no matter how good the emulator, there always seems to be a little stuttering.

Plus, it really is hard to get around the whole "Who wants to drag their computer into the living room so they can hook it up to their TV to play Mario?"

Eww.. how can you like CRT over LCD? Unless you have a really horrible set with a lot of ghosting or dead pixels, LCD is superior in just about every way. Not to mention CRT doesn't support HD resolutions

I haven't tried, but would you even notice much of an improvement using component cables in a CRT? I mean, there would have to be *some*, but I can't imagine it's as big a difference as it is on an LCD.

[rock_nog]

What are you talking about? The picture on CRT is crisp, clear, vibrant, and colorful. LCD, well... For starters, you have to make sure you're at a good angle, or else you can't see anything, and I hate being able to see the individual pixels. Ugh... CRT blurs things a bit so you don't notice as much.

[MottZilla]

rock_nog, your PC sucks, we get it. But other people like myself have systems that don't. When I run emulators they are as smooth as the real thing. They are exactly like the real thing when emulation permits. And I use a real console controller on my PC, it's not expensive to do.

240p and 480i are retarded to cite really. The game is built for some resolution, lets say 320x240. But developers might be lazy or unable to or just stupid and decide to use 640x480 and use 480i. Ok, so you scale everything 2X, not a big deal. The problems certainly come in if they use filtering and such but honestly are you sitting there with a magnifying glass while you play? And if you are such a purist I can't see how you can live with yourself using emulation.

I play the original systems for classic games via the best signal they normally output. That generally means RGB, on a real RGB monitor. They look fantastic. But what games on modern consoles were ported using 480i that you play that look shitty? I've heard of a handful of games that suffer. But many are NeoGeo games which I think if you care that much you'd have an original NeoGeo anyway.

CRT is not a bad display at all. Infact it's quite nice, and there are HD CRTs. By the way, how can your CRT be crisp, clear, vibrant, but also blurs? That doesn't make sense. I have a nice CRT, it's sharp and crystal clear (depending on signal type). Anything RGB is razor sharp and excellent. Composite video is sharp but not quite so because of the signal limitations. But nothing looks bad or less than good quality.

You can't generally see pixels on LCDs unless you have a dead pixel. Viewing angles vary on the quality of each LCD display, find a good one. Also you should note that CRT's don't have pixels at all. The electron beams just have concepts of color bursts or something along those lines. They aren't a grid of units that are pixels like LCDs.

I really think you just like the VC for what it is, and that's fine. But PC's and emulation are superb. I certainly have no problems with them.

[Mak-X]

People care entirely too much about "240p". Esspecially when your Wii should be hooked up to something like an LCD that supports 480p. That and if you are such a die hard fan for image accuracy you shouldn't be emulating anyway.

We're talking about emulation, and the Wii supporting low res is very important in emulating an old game well. I pointed out Wii can produce low res and I didn't put down other emulation, so I don't see what the argument is.


CRTs handle motion well, and have better black levels than LCDs, so in some ways, CRTs are still better than LCDs. LCD has no distortion issues, doesn't weigh much, and is capable of higher HD resolutions.

I'm actually looking to get a 27" CRT Sony Wega to replace my current TV if I can find one. I don't need another HDTV yet, and don't care for LCDs at the moment, mainly because of blur and upscaling. I just need a really good CRT to play everything I have. I have Component and S-Video cables just waiting to be used.

LCDs are fine for most people. CRTs are becoming extinct because of their weight and bulkiness.



Back to the original post, emulation has always been there to play the old games that could no longer been played, and that'll never change. Maybe if Virtual Console were introduced long ago to keep old games available, roms would be less justifiable?

[MottZilla]

I'm just saying that the difference between 240p and 480i can be extremely small when done well enough, and unless you really have a fine eye and can't put up with some small image distortion, what's the big deal? I agree it's nice that it's 240p/non interlaced. But it's not as though 480i is incapable of porting those games well. Fake scanlines, or just plain 2x scaling works just fine. Mainly I've seen these debates before and always thought the arguement over 480i versus 240 non-interlaced was stupid.

ROMs didn't come about for emulation anyway. ROM files on PCs first appeared in the 90s with people trading SNES and Genesis games on BBS that often were dialed into by phone. And even during the N64 days, ROMs again were pirates trading for use on "Backup Devices". Even arcade games in MAME, ROMs first appeared for arcade owners backing up or programming a EPROM to replace a bad ROM chip to fix their games.

Downloading ROMs of games you don't own can't really be justified other than maybe for archivial purposes or more often availability issues which VC addresses. Other times you might point to cost. Some games become collectors items which become highly valued, often insanely over valued. Forinstance Castlevania Dracula X on PC-Engine, is a game you'd spend 100$ or more to buy. And there are only so many copies out there. So there's I think a fairly justifiable reason for getting a ISO of that. However when it is released on PSP it won't be, atleast not as much.

[rock_nog]

CRTs are cheap, too. I don't really care about HDTV. sure it's nice, but regular TV is just fine.

[Breaker]

After I bought my 42" 1080p plasma, I'll never go back to playing games on anything less. I'm a huge fan of roms, but playing them on the Wii is pretty fun and convenient. I've only purchased Super Mario World, Ocarina of Time, and a few RPGs on the VC, many of which I also have the same roms of on my PC (which is connected via dmi to hdmi to my TV), but like I said, they're just convenient to play on the Wii.

They're really not that expensive to argue over either... *shrugs*