written by child me
There are many many many sites already on emulation, but most don’t concentrate on the positive side of emulation, rather, they are based on the aspect of getting free games. I support what sites like SitC are doing, by going by the basis of preserving the videogame culture, so many whose machines broke down or even others that never got the chance to play a classic, get a(nother) chance to play that game they loved so much/heard so much about. Also SitC is somewhat serious about this approach and not just using it as a cover to supply games. Two things I can’t quite agree with though are SNES emulation and NESticle-bashing. First, roughly, the SNES is a dead machine by being surpassed by 32-bit and 64-bit systems, it just sits on the shelf at stores. It does still sit on the shelf however. The fact that it is still commercially available cannot possibly help to prove the legitimacy of emulation to NOA when ROMs are all over the place. It just isn’t the right time for full SNES emulation, give the SNES another year or so and it’s sure to vanish completely. Also I can’t quite understand the hatred of NESticle, it is a great emulator, it shouldn’t be blamed for giving emulation a bad reputation. People ruin a good thing. Well, blah blah ..I just wanted to add my thoughts on emulation for the time being. I’m not affiliated with SitC and I hope they don’t mind me mentioning their site, it’s just the one that came to mind.

2003 commentary
Development of NESticle was abandoned long ago, but it’s still one of the best NES emulators out there. However, the name “NESticle” is pretty much unknown to the new generation of console emulation fans. This is mostly due to the plethora of emulators available that run natively in a Windows environment.

The SNES is of course no longer commercially available. SNES emulation has become perfect (or near) with the emulator ZSNES and in 2nd place – Snes9x. NOA is still as protective as ever of its ROMs. Interestingly enough is that classic game compilations keep appearing on other consoles, the PC, or as a standalone device.

A site called SitC still exists but I’m not sure if it is by its original creators or not. It resembles none of its former glory, which basically was a historical archive of NES ROMs.

And finally my thank you to all the developers of good emulators out there. What I wrote so many years ago has held true as far as someone being able to play a classic game once again for the memories. When I originally owned an NES I had about 30 games or so, the Max and Advantage controllers, the lightgun, and had actually bought the system twice. Nowadays every NES game probably ever made is available to me, but the only ones that really interest me are the ones I actually owned. That is what emulation is all about – nostalgia.

adult me commentary: 2009
ok, first im embarrassed by my little righteous moment there and plus that bit of sycophant behavior towards SitC . but i do remember that being a good site and the point of what i wrote was true. console emulation is all about nostalgia. nesticle was a good emulator i loved it. i use fceu(x) nowadays. also emulator development has to start out at some point. whether the original console is still on the shelf or not. and it’s definitely nice to have non-alpha/beta versions released by the time the console is no longer for sale

more child me
Due to some fine points by BigBrother in ABEN, I’ve altered a little of this. First off, N64 and PSX emulation are not in the near future. Projects have begun on both systems already, but probably won’t be completed in the next 3-5. I, myself, could care less about the emulation of these 2 systems. Why? Of the two computers I have access to, neither have a 3D acceleration card or even come close to the capability of running one of these ROMs. Besides, I plan to purchase a PSX in a year or so (mainly for FF7). The other point brought up was about the SNES, I fully support all the translation and rare game ROMs, since Nintendo has no interest in bringing over games like Secret of Mana 2 and others never released here in the U.S. like FF5. I just wanted to clarify the fact that I’m not against all SNES emulation, just against the ROMs of commercially available games. Mainly because I’d love to possess Chrono Trigger or Illusion of Gaia, but those games are hard to find, I doubt they’re even manufactured anymore (true?). This portion is largely inspired by BigBrother, thanks for filling me in on N64 & PSX statuses.

2003 commentary
My 2 main computers nowadays both have excellent videocards and can play both PSX and N64 games. However, both of those emulators never progressed very far in development. There was a commercial PSX emulator called bleem! for a while but that also died out. Most of the N64 emulators out there can only play a handful of games.

I did end up buying a PSX exactly for the reason I mentioned back then. FF7 was pretty good, but didn’t draw me in nearly as much as the older FF’s. Final Fantasy Tactics on PSX was excellent. Those are the only two games I really played on it. After a while I gave my PSX away to my friend Ram.

After trying the PSX I lost interest in consoles totally and moved on to PC games. RTS games were my biggest interest back then. A couple of months ago I reentered the console world with the purchase of a MS X-Box.

adult me commentary: 2009
ahh more sucking-up, and i’m repulsed by my know-it-all-ism back then. ABEN was of course alt.binaries.emulators.nintendo. as far as i know N64 emulation has to this day not gotten any closer to full featured. ePSXe is a pretty decent PSX emulator.