Who here is keeping up with the emulation scene?

[Alpha]

I realized I'm having a hard time keeping up with the emulation scene these days. I was wondering if anyone has been keeping track in the last year or two and can provide an update?

So far I'm aware of emulators now that are working quite well for the latest Nintendo consoles, as well as PS3, PSP, XBOX, not sure about XBOX 360, and not sure about Vita. And I'm probably missing a bunch of other stuff. It's also beautiful to see that there hasn't been any lost interest in the emulation scene at all. In fact, it seems to be only increasing with every new generation of consoles.

Anyway, if anyone can fill me in, I'm all ears.

[Robert]

Sony PS2 is pretty much covered by PCSX2. It is supposed to be able to run most games.

PS3 emulator is RPCS3. PS4 emulator is called Orbital. Vita - Vita3k, PSP - PPSSPP. I've never tried any of them, although I think PPSSPP probably works ok.

Microsoft, there isn't really much progress with XBOX emulation.

There's some new general emulators that I don't follow, these being Mister, and Retroarch.

Retroarch isn't really an emulator, more a collection of other people's emulators, used without permission and without regard for licensing. Those in charge don't care and get quite aggressive when questioned. It's popular though because of the proliferation of low-powered handheld devices that are often used these days, such as Raspberry Pi and so on. They also ask for donations (which they get) then don't reveal what the money was used for. At least these are the things I hear - there might be more to it than I know.

As you know MAME continues to exist. But, old age is setting in, and it is getting fat and slow. So, some people have been resurrecting old faster versions such as MAME2003 and other years, and adding the later games to enable them to run on today's handheld telephones. As usual, the licensing is being flouted, but the MAMEdevs just talk about it, because nobody can afford to sue.

There was a ruckus with FB Alpha when the project lead sold out to some company. So the rest of the group deposed him and set up their own version called FB Neo. It's still around and runs well enough on old computers. FB Alpha is now dead.

The number of rom sites continues to drop. This is mainly due to the actions of Nintendo America, who every so often go on a rampage targetting anyone who offers roms for their products online. Sony and Microsoft can be dangerous too, but not to the extent of Nintendo. Other companies either went bust or don't really seem to care so much.

I think that covers most of it.

More information (although I can't vouch for the accuracy) http://nonmame.retrogames.com/