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PS2 Emulation with PCSX2 - share your game configs!

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
EatChildren said:
Two things;

1. God of War wont boot properly. Im pretty sure it is not scaling the resolution any higher, and just running in native. I also get hideous green artefacts all over the screen.

2. This MotionJoy program is a trainwreck, and I cant get my PS3 pad to work with PCSX2.

Halp on either?

EDIT: 3. GS plugin fails to load and crashes continuously. What the fuck?
Which version you running? Try .97, .98 or an SVN release.

Motionjoy, I use that to emulate a 360 pad. What I would do is install the driver through the tab in the program which says load driver. DO NOT FULLY INSTALL IT as it's known to mess up your USB keyboard/mouse setup. Test it by doing a rumble test on the main tab. Then go to 360 pad option and enable it in there. I honestly don't use motionjoy to emulate a DS3 more than to emulate a 360 pad. I even have it working with a BT dongle flawlessly. And make sure it's plugged in via USB when loading the driver.

And what GS plugin are you using? You try reconfiguring the paths?
 

Iadien

Guarantee I'm going to screw up this post? Yeah.
LiquidMetal14 said:
The game looks so good at 3x native and up that you really forget the small things like that fast. You try the new release by chance? I haven't tested every game yet but I do have it installed. See if that fixes that issue.

yes, I am using the newest release. The issue seems to be that at native resolution, texture filtering is greyed out.

It is a minor issue, I was just wondering if there was a fix.
 

EatChildren

Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
I'm running .98.

GS plug-in was SSE41, which im 99% sure is compatible with my CPU, but randomly crashes. I've gone to SSE2 because I really dont seem to have any other option.

As for the DS3, I got MotionJoy to boot it fine, but its clumsy to get working in PCSX2. Im sure I can get it if I keep trying.
 

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
EatChildren said:
I'm running .98.

GS plug-in was SSE41, which im 99% sure is compatible with my CPU, but randomly crashes. I've gone to SSE2 because I really dont seem to have any other option.

As for the DS3, I got MotionJoy to boot it fine, but its clumsy to get working in PCSX2. Im sure I can get it if I keep trying.
Weird, did you enable the pad through the config in the emu? I use the lily plugin. I also use SSE2 most of the time. I don't know what difference it makes but I can't tell. I also went back and forth to DX9 and 11 so you can try that. Trying to think of more stuff other that trying another version.
 

EatChildren

Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
Got the pad working. Fucking finally.

I think I was wrong about God of War running in native. It is scaling, it's not just the biggest looker. I had to change from DX11 to DX9 to get it working without visual artefacts.

One thing that really annoys me is changing the window size. Is there any way I can force the window to display at the exact resolution the game is at? I've got it at x3, but I want the window to automatically size to that resolution. Is there any way to do this?
 

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
You go into GS window and hit 16x9? Maybe set the custom window size to a res that covers most of your desktop. Or choose "fit to window/stretch".
 

EatChildren

Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
What I mean is, if I set the game to x3 scaling of native, is there a way I can get the window to automatically shape to that exact pixel resolution? Or is that not how this is works?

For example, God of War is displaying 512x448 in the window, but I've got it on x3 scaling. Obviously the picture is sharper, but I can still shape the size of the window to whatever I want. What I want to do is set the x3 resolution, and have the window automatically shape to that exact pixel resolution, so there's no stretching or scaling.

Essentially I dont want to be stretching the window to fit my screen when the game is running in a resolution that's lower. I'd rather the window fit the resolution perfectly.

Is this possible or am I entirely missing the point of what I should be doing?
 

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
I'm almost out of suggestions but does clicking the blank space on top make it the right res or at least stretch it properly? I know what you're saying but other than making the custom window res I have less experience with that kind of display method. I usually go full screen. Good luck.
 
Can anyone check to see if this new version can finally run the Jak Trilogy without all the weird graphical glitches and slowdown? I have an i5 2500k processor overclocked to 4.5GHz so I shouldn't be getting any damn slowdown!
 

Zimbardo

Member
any of you guys know if its possible to get rid of the double image that occurs when i play God of War 2 and Shadow of the Colossus?

example is Kratos would have like a halo effect around him where you kinda see another faint image of himself but offset to the side.
 

Tain

Member
Is there a processor out there that can play all of the currently working PS2 games at full speed?

I can't really care about emulation if it's not hitting 100% speed, and I'm looking to build a PC soon. PS2 emulation would be cool.
 

Durante

Member
Tain said:
Is there a processor out there that can play all of the currently working PS2 games at full speed?
With any Sandy Bridge i7 that shouldn't be a problem for the games that actually fully work. The remaining issue with PS2 emulation is compatibility, not speed.

Zimbardo said:
any of you guys know if its possible to get rid of the double image that occurs when i play God of War 2 and Shadow of the Colossus?
Are you using a non-native resolution? Integral scaling?
 

Zimbardo

Member
Durante said:
Are you using a non-native resolution? Integral scaling?


using the newest pcsx2, i used its default 2048x2048.

also tried 3x upscaling.

not really sure what internal resolution to use, etc.
 

Durante

Member
You shouldn't use anything other than the native and 2x/3x/4x etc. modes. That can lead to all kinds of graphical problems.

If you have a graphical problem you should always try to run the game in native for a short time to see if it is related to rendering at a higher resolution.
 

isamu

OMFG HOLY MOTHER OF MARY IN HEAVEN I CANT BELIEVE IT WTF WHERE ARE MY SEDATIVES AAAAHHH
Has anyone tried Ridge Racer V yet? What fps are you getting and what are your specs?
 

Zimbardo

Member
so i tried out my copy of God of War 1 ...4x native scaling, and EE cyclerate at 2 and the other speed hacks at default settings.

game runs pretty darn good @ 4x scaling. close to perfect. runs even better with 3x native scaling.

a few pics @ 4x native scaling ...

http://img855.imageshack.us/img855/1074/pcsx2r46002011050304144.jpg

http://img801.imageshack.us/img801/7567/pcsx2r46002011050304135.jpg

http://img856.imageshack.us/img856/6754/pcsx2r46002011050303470.jpg

i don't really know the perfect settings for any of the games, but this seems pretty good.

me like!

running i5 760 @ 3.8ghz and 2x GTX460 1gig cards. 8gig ram.
 

ExMachina

Unconfirmed Member
I'll see if I need to update the OP in light of 0.9.8's release, but I have exams to study for and internet is down in my building so I can only post at the library atm... ^^; So I'll probably get around to it this weekend.

Zimbardo said:
any of you guys know if its possible to get rid of the double image that occurs when i play God of War 2 and Shadow of the Colossus?

example is Kratos would have like a halo effect around him where you kinda see another faint image of himself but offset to the side.

Don't have any of the GoW games to run, but I have a config for SotC. You need to enable offset hack to get rid of some graphical issues (black bars and misaligned effects), and as already mentioned be sure to use a multiplier (x2, x3, etc.) instead of setting a custom resolution. Just go as high as your system can handle without performance loss.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=27185238&postcount=117

EatChildren said:
What I mean is, if I set the game to x3 scaling of native, is there a way I can get the window to automatically shape to that exact pixel resolution? Or is that not how this is works?

For example, God of War is displaying 512x448 in the window, but I've got it on x3 scaling. Obviously the picture is sharper, but I can still shape the size of the window to whatever I want. What I want to do is set the x3 resolution, and have the window automatically shape to that exact pixel resolution, so there's no stretching or scaling.

Essentially I dont want to be stretching the window to fit my screen when the game is running in a resolution that's lower. I'd rather the window fit the resolution perfectly.

Is this possible or am I entirely missing the point of what I should be doing?
You're better off forcing 4:3 rather than retaining the exact AR of the native res. 512x448 is more square than 4:3, and your picture will be slightly squashed horizontally if you set a custom window size exactly 3x that. I'm pretty sure the PS2 wasn't designed to output square pixels ultimately, so you'll need to do some sort of scaling to get it to proper proportions regardless.
 
Durante said:
With any Sandy Bridge i7 that shouldn't be a problem for the games that actually fully work. The remaining issue with PS2 emulation is compatibility, not speed.

Are you using a non-native resolution? Integral scaling?
I have a Sandy Bridge i7 and some of the games I've tried work but don't run at full speed, like the Jak series and Ridge Racer V. It depends on whether the games are doing things the way the emulator expects them to.
 

Zimbardo

Member
ExMachina said:
I'll see if I need to update the OP in light of 0.9.8's release, but I have exams to study for and internet is down in my building so I can only post at the library atm... ^^; So I'll probably get around to it this weekend.



Don't have any of the GoW games to run, but I have a config for SotC. You need to enable offset hack to get rid of some graphical issues (black bars and misaligned effects), and as already mentioned be sure to use a multiplier (x2, x3, etc.) instead of setting a custom resolution. Just go as high as your system can handle without performance loss.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=27185238&postcount=117

yeah i noticed mention of that offset hack before, but i don't see any way where i can enable it.

here's a pic of mine ...in the hacks section there is nothing to enable, etc.

http://img585.imageshack.us/img585/8880/unledzg.jpg


i'll read a bit more and see what i can find. so far i've just been quickly glossing over things.
 

EatChildren

Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
ExMachina said:
You're better off forcing 4:3 rather than retaining the exact AR of the native res. 512x448 is more square than 4:3, and your picture will be slightly squashed horizontally if you set a custom window size exactly 3x that. I'm pretty sure the PS2 wasn't designed to output square pixels ultimately, so you'll need to do some sort of scaling to get it to proper proportions regardless.

Yeah, I finally got some decent sizing of the window so everything looked in proportion. Blitzed through all of God of War yesterday, and didn't really have any performance issues, though did have quite a few sound issues, particularly with music stopping and restarting. Was nothing game breaking though.

Trying God of War 2 now and I'm not having much luck. On standard settings there's a clear performance issue. Increasing the VU cycle stealing to 3/4 fixes that, though Kratos and some others flicker now and then. I also have this weird problem with ghosting, where there's a faint glowy image of everything a little to the left of the actual models, so Kratos essentially has a glowy ghost follow him everywhere. I also get some visual artefacts when under water, mostly green lines streaking down the screen, which were not present in GoW.

Considering how hard GoW2 was pushing the PS2 I'm not surprised that it has more problems than the original, but does anyone have any tips or tweaks that might help me improve performance or fix any of the issues I mentioned?
 

Luigi87

Member
I'm very much enjoying being able to setup the shortcuts easily with Steam by adding the game to the command line.

IE:
Target: "C:\Program Files (x86)\PCSX2 0.9.8\pcsx2-r4600.exe" "C:\Users\USER\Documents\PCSX2\Games\GameImage.iso"
or
Target: "C:\Program Files (x86)\PCSX2 1.0.0\pcsx2-r5350.exe" "C:\Users\USER\Documents\PCSX2\Games\GameImage.iso"
something like that, depending your folder setup.

I also made copies of the emulator's EXE so I could have custom icons for each. (I used the program Resource Hacker to edit the icon files.)

L87_FF12.jpg


L87_KH2FM.jpg



Both running at 60FPS avg. on i7 920, and GTX 470 card, btw.


So each game loads their own individual DLLs (thus not needing to constantly changing settings when loading different games), do the following:

A relatively easy way to make individual config settings for each game is to make multiple copies of the main emulator folder (likely in the Program Files folder), and add a blank file called "portable.ini" in its main directory.

This will place it into portable mode, which will then create an ini folder within that same directory (rather than in your My Documents) when you start the emulator, which will be what the EXE file in that folder will be linked to. So in practice one could do that for every game, then just load the proper EXE using a frontend (like Steam) with the game attached to the command line (if using ISOs).

Naturally at that point you could still point your memcard and save state directories in Portable version back to your main one in your Documents, and then just copy the portable version from then on, and make the necessary adjustments (which won't be as much work as the first time). That way all the games save onto the same memcard.
 

gotee12

Member
Luigi87 said:
Unfortunately since the DLLs point to the inis in the Documents folder, and I can't figure out how to change that, I can't save settings for each game, since for FF12, I have Native x3 with 4xMSAA, and 16:9 res, but KH2FM, Native x5 with 1xMSAA (as anything higher than 1xMSAA will cause shadow or texture errors) and 4:3 res.
A config manager, a config manager, my kingdom for a PCSX2 config manager...
 
gotee12 said:
A config manager, a config manager, my kingdom for a PCSX2 config manager...
when dolphin got this feature this year it made my Dolphin usage skyrocket at least 500%!
Luigi87 said:
I also made copies of the emulator's EXE so I could have custom icons for each.
Final Mix came out in the US? And where can i get a KH1 custom icon. or any PS2 custom icons?
 

Luigi87

Member
Cuban Legend said:
when dolphin got this feature this year it made my Dolphin usage skyrocket at least 500%!

Final Mix came out in the US? And where can i get a KH1 custom icon. or any PS2 custom icons?

No, it's my import copy I got when the game came out (and thanks to it I learned to read katakana), but there is an ongoing beta of an English translation a person is doing. Has all the menus translated to English.


As for custom icons, I made them myself.
Saved a 32x32 image as an ICO file (used a Photoshop plugin), then used the program Resource Hacker (followed this tutorial). Then a reboot of the system makes the system fully recognize the new icon (a reboot has to occur, otherwise while you can see the icon, the system still keeps the original one in memory... At least on Windows 7 64-bit).



equap said:
how hard is it to get the bios from my ps2??

It's between very simple and very tedious.

Following instructions it is a relatively easy enough process, however I had to literally exhaust every method in order to get mine (in the end I went with the mem. card exploit and over LAN, since none of my USB sticks were compatible for USB dump...)
 

Luigi87

Member
Well a relatively easy (though kind of inconvenient, yet perfect if using Steam as a frontend) way to make individual config settings for each game is to make a multiple copies of the main emulator folder (likely in the Program Files folder), and add a blank file called "portable.ini"

This will place it into portable mode, which will then create an ini folder within that same directory (rather than in your My Documents) when you start the emulator, which will be what that one reads from. So in theory one could do that for every game, then just load the proper one using a frontend with the game attached to the command line (if using ISOs).

Naturally at the point you could still point your memcard and save state directories in Portable version back to your main one in your Documents, and then just copy the portable version from then on, and make the necessary adjustments (which won't be as much work as the first time).
 

Cdammen

Member
I want to get close to the PS2's original audio output. I can't stand music or sound effects being off.

I'm using these SPU2-X settings...
Mixing Settings
Interpolation: 2 - Cubic (slower/good highs)
Disable Effect Processing: [unticked]
Reverb Boost Factor: 2X - Reverb Volume * 2

Enable Debug Options: [unticked]

Output Settings
Module: X-Audio 2 (Recommended) [haven't touched configure)
Latency: 150 ms (avg)
Synchronising Mode: TimeStretch (Recommended) [haven't touched advanced]
Audio Expansion Mode: Stereo (none, default)

Use a Winamp DSP plugin: [unticked]
Increasing the Reverb Boost Factor made the music waaay nicer in FF12, it doesn't sound as flat as with the default settings. Are there any other tweaks that I should know of to get FF12 sounding great?
 

ChryZ

Member
I just upgraded to 0.9.8 R4600 and checked a few of my "problem" games.

Bombastic is still not working with GSdx, Magic Pengel is still having audio issues

... BUT OMG, Rez is working flawless now, its weird rendering problems are gone and emulation is perfect!
 

ChryZ

Member
Dascu said:
Oh, really? What are your settings?
Nothing fancy:

-Preset 3 Balanced
-GSdx 4600 SSE41: D3D11, Bob tff, 4x, Texture filtering, Allow 8-bit textures, rest default
-SPU2-X all default

I monitored my CPU/GPU and there was still head room. I'd guess 6x would fly too.

EDIT: 6x + Hacks: HW Anti Aliasing 1 = no problem
 

Anony

Member
how do u set MSAA in the emulator (GSdx)?
is the GSdx vid plugin the only supported plugin now, i remember there was another vid plugin

nvmd, just gonna stick to MLAA, it looks pretty good using it on upscale+emu
 

Stallion Free

Cock Encumbered
Messed around with Red Dead for a bit:

pcsx2-r46002011-05-080qu97.jpg


pcsx2-r46002011-05-080eut6.jpg


Anyone know what setting would get rid of that motion blur-ish effect? I was running at 6x the resolution on DX9. I also got shadows all fucked up in later levels (banding).
 

gotee12

Member
BudokaiMR2 said:
I tried to play ZoE2 like this but my comp just couldn't handle it. What specs do you need to get it to run well?
It's all about the CPU.

I'm running an Athlon X4 3Ghz and ZoE2 runs great at native res with no AA. But what's the point of pcsx2 without making those old ps2 games look incredible!?! Lol

Keep in mind that pcsx2 runs better on intel procs and the more CPU giggerhurts you can throw at it, the better the end results. Also pcsx2 can't make use of more than one or two cores (can't remember exactly) so a quad core or better won't help the situation any.
 

Gvaz

Banned
gotee12 said:
It's all about the CPU.

I'm running an Athlon X4 3Ghz and ZoE2 runs great at native res with no AA. But what's the point of pcsx2 without making those old ps2 games look incredible!?! Lol

Keep in mind that pcsx2 runs better on intel procs and the more CPU giggerhurts you can throw at it, the better the end results. Also pcsx2 can't make use of more than one or two cores (can't remember exactly) so a quad core or better won't help the situation any.
Two cores tops.
 

Clevinger

Member
gotee12 said:
Also pcsx2 can't make use of more than one or two cores (can't remember exactly) so a quad core or better won't help the situation any.

It can, actually. It just has to be in Software Mode. Say you have a quad core; you set the rendering threads to '3', then it uses one core for the emulator, and the other three for rendering.
 

RPGCrazied

Member
I cant wait for this EMU to be on the level of espxe. Alot of the games I like are broken or glitchy.

Xenosaga Episode 1:

Seems to work fine until I'm in a battle and summon the A.W.G.S, then the game comes to a complete crawl almost! Some scenes that aren't prerecorded sometimes become out of sync with the spoken dialogue with the scene that's taken place.

.Hack G.U. - Rebirth:

Seems to work fine except I have these wierd black lines show up when I'm near an NPC or another character. Small ghosting issues as well. Weird.

Dragon Quest VIII:

Plays fine for the most part, but the lines and garbbled junk in the text boxes, but I read its a scaling issue. I won't do native though, I'd rather just go play these on my PS2 right now. I just want to try and run my games higher res on my 1080p monitor, or I see no point.

Shadow Hearts: From the New World:

Seems to work fine, sometimes I get a black screen when trying to boot the game, but when in battles, the map by pressing R1 is merged within the battle screen.

I had a problem with Kingdom Hearts II too, but I fixed it by using no antialasing. I don't think many games like using that.

Final Fantasy X - Other than the text, menu bugs it runs and looks great.

Thats it for now! Thanks!

Oh my PC is:

Windows® 7 Home Premium, 64Bit, English
Processor and Graphics AMD Phenom™ II X6 1090T + ATI Radeon™ HD 5770 1GB
Memory 6GB Dual Channel DDR3 SDRAM at 1333MHz - 4 DIMMS
Hard Drive 1TB - 7200RPM, SATA 3.0Gb/s, 16MB Cache

I just noticed the new 0.9.8 version. I have yet to try it out, is it a good performance increase?
 

gotee12

Member
Clevinger said:
It can, actually. It just has to be in Software Mode. Say you have a quad core; you set the rendering threads to '3', then it uses one core for the emulator, and the other three for rendering.
Didn't know that. I'll have to try that tonight...
 
Clevinger said:
It can, actually. It just has to be in Software Mode. Say you have a quad core; you set the rendering threads to '3', then it uses one core for the emulator, and the other three for rendering.
But does it run smoother than in hardware mode? That's the question.
 

Yasae

Banned
RPGCrazied said:
I cant wait for this EMU to be on the level of espxe. Alot of the games I like are broken or glitchy.

Xenosaga Episode 1:

Seems to work fine until I'm in a battle and summon the A.W.G.S, then the game comes to a complete crawl almost! Some scenes that aren't prerecorded sometimes become out of sync with the spoken dialogue with the scene that's taken place.
It took a long time for this game to get up to speed. Only within the last year and a half have revisions given it full playability.

That said, it chugs regularly in battle scenes with multiple enemies and drops even more in AGWS conflicts. Specular highlights also slow things down in cutscenes. I don't think I've seen anything go out of sync.
 

mrklaw

MrArseFace
looks like I might need to go into the loft for some PS2 games. Although I still have my SotC Asian copy downstairs - can I somehow transfer saves from a PS2 'memory card' on PS3, onto PC?

Also, will it work ok with a wireless 360 controller, or do I need a PS2/PS3 one?

oh - any guides on making ISOs from PS2 discs - hopefully I don't need the PS2 hooked up anymore


edit: on the positive side, the games I most want to play are SotC and Earth Defense Force 2, which aren't smooth even on the PS2
 

ExMachina

Unconfirmed Member
mrklaw said:
looks like I might need to go into the loft for some PS2 games. Although I still have my SotC Asian copy downstairs - can I somehow transfer saves from a PS2 'memory card' on PS3, onto PC?

Also, will it work ok with a wireless 360 controller, or do I need a PS2/PS3 one?

oh - any guides on making ISOs from PS2 discs - hopefully I don't need the PS2 hooked up anymore
From the OP:
What's a good program for making images of my PS2 discs to run in PCSX2?

>> ImgBurn is a free, lightweight disc burning/imaging application.

How do I transfer saves from my PS2 to use on my PC in PCSX2?

>> If you have a PS3 and a Memory Card Adapter, you can copy saves from a PS2 memory card to a USB drive.
>> If you have a PS2 and a method to boot a file manager such as uLaunchElf, you can copy saves from your memory card to a USB drive.
Then use MyMC to add the save files to your existing PCSX2 memory card images.

EDIT: Misread your mem card question... yeah, you can backup your virtual PS2 memcard saves from a PS3 to a USB drive, put them on PC, then use MyMC to add it to a PCSX2 mem card.

http://www.csclub.uwaterloo.ca:11068/mymc/index.html

You can use any PC optical drive to rip PS2 games with a program like ImgBurn. Just pop your PS2 disc into your drive and then hit "Create image file from disc."

http://www.imgburn.com/

Wireless 360 controller should work fine, Lilypad plugin will recognize any controller that shows up in Windows.
 
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