[scottlc]

Some people don't agree with the commercial sale of emulators. Personally, I don't feel that there is anything wrong with it, considering that I bought Bleemcast. Yet, some describe it as "almost as bad as selling roms".

What is your opinion. Vote in the poll and post a reason either way.

Just to clarify, this isn't about whether emulators should be commercial. It is about whether it is morally wrong to sell an emulator.

 

[Mako Eyes]

well, if you can use your own BIOS dumps then I guess it's alright . . . but if the BIOSes are sold along with the emulators, then that's another story.

 

[Boltzmann]

I don't think it's morally wrong or anything. The emu coders are entitled to charge for their work, if they want to. It’s their work, after all.

But on the practical side, commercial emulators run into many problems. Just to name two:

a) legal problems with the company who owns the emulated console;
b) commercial emus don’t sell that much, and coders would have to dedicate themselves to other projects. The perceived lack of attention and updates to the emu will piss off customers (who, since they’re paying, have the right to complain). With free emus, authors are able to work as much as they like (or can), since everyone is just benefiting from their work.

And of course, I think that for the community as a whole, free emulators are the way to go.

well, if you can use your own BIOS dumps then I guess it's alright . . . but if the BIOSes are sold along with the emulators, then that's another story.

They can also use an HLE bios, as PCSX does.
(But to be truthful, I'm not sure on the feasibility of this for every system out there.)

 

[FLaRe85]

I don't see a problem with it. As long as it's coded using legitimate reverse-engineering tactics and is perfectly legal, I don't see why not. Programming an emulator takes just as much if not more work than programming a typical commercial application these days. If they ask for it, I believe the authors deserve to be compensated for that work.

With all the free emulators floating around, we're really luckier than we realize.

 

[Mr. Killjoy]

It's right when the emulator is good, Bleem sucked so much compared to all the other free emus that I wonder how you dared buying it

For the BIOS part, well, if the emu doesn't need any, it's right as long as its not a built-in
dumped BIOS :I

 

[industrian]

Ahhh, the magic of free enterprise: the ability to create income through private means. As a socialist I'm fundamentally opposed to free enterprise (don't get me started) but as "we're all living in Amerika" I guess i just have to lie back and accept it.

Morals have **** all to do with it. Do you really think we should cry for Sony/ Nintendo/ Sega/ Microsoft for lost profits even though they are dedicated to ripping us off with hyper-inflated priced games?

At the end of the day people will pay for something that does it's job properly.

The question of this thread should be: Commercial emulators - worth it? Because at the end of the day why pay for something that can be obtained legitimatly for free?

And the other one: Why pay for a Dreamcast emulator when you can pick up a second hand one quite cheaply?

 

[Razor Blade]

When the emulators are good (like morphgear) I think it's great. I rather pay for a great emulator than a half ass one for free ... But I am also ecstatic that authors from PCSX1/2 and epsxe etc. are making there's free for the public ... Bravo!

 

[Cid Highwind]

I don't have a problem with it when it is real good and better than the competition. Like the Bleemcast discs for MGS, tekken 3 and GT2. I already have 2 of them

 

[Typhoon 01]

I think commercial emulators are right if they are well done and are regularly updated, Sega made a nice step in that direction however it was only for Japan and was soon discontinued.

 

[KanedA]

I don't have a problem with it when it is real good and better than the competition. Like the Bleemcast discs for MGS, tekken 3 and GT2. I already have 2 of them

and how does it perform??

as for this topic... it's only authors choice... remamber if it would be commertial, there will always be people which will get it in illegal way...

 

[Kaiser Sigma]

It's right when the emulator is good, Bleem sucked so much compared to all the other free emus that I wonder how you dared buying it

Is that so...? Bleem was perfect for its time... it featured emulation of PSX games plus enhancements by using 3D acceleration. The GUI was superb, not everyone is a fan of settings... I don't like having to configure like 20 options to play a game for 20 minutes or having to store mutliple configurations for different games. Bleem could have used updates but for its initial release and the updates that took place on the 2 months after it was released the emulator was great... in my opinion at least.

No regrets on buying it here...

As for the question... my views are similar to Flare's. Other than that I'd say that a comercial emulator should do as much as it can to prevent the use of piracy... ie: I'd hate to see a comercial emulator like Chankast which run games based on backups only.

 

[Keith]

It's right when the emulator is good, Bleem sucked so much compared to all the other free emus that I wonder how you dared buying it

For the BIOS part, well, if the emu doesn't need any, it's right as long as its not a built-in
dumped BIOS :I

Compared to what at the time .. remember this was 98/99 and the only practical emulator at the time was PSemu which Bleem at the time blew it away. I payed for it and got my use out of it.

It was only once ePSXe become a reality did other commercial options become obsolete such as bleem and CVGS because we could get better emulation for free, but before that these two products were well worth the money if you wanted to experience PS1 emulation and be playable.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Morals have **** all to do with it. Do you really think we should cry for Sony/ Nintendo/ Sega/ Microsoft for lost profits even though they are dedicated to ripping us off with hyper-inflated priced games?

Are you serious? .. If anything we should be happy that game prices have not risen, but actually fallen over the generations of systems. When I was a kid back in the 80's to buy a new NES game it cost around $70 and the system even ran as high as $200 .. now include inflation over the years and rise of cost of living and games are cheaper now then they have ever been. They even do specials for best sellers at 19.95 .. who can't afford that? Hell it cost me more to eat at McDonalds with my whole family (wife and 3 kids) then to buy a Best Seller game. There is always the option of buying used games as well .. but this really doesn't have much to do with the topic, but wanted to comment on it.

 

[Cid Highwind]

and how does it perform??

as for this topic... it's only authors choice... remamber if it would be commertial, there will always be people which will get it in illegal way...

Better than the real thing I only had some slowdown in MGS at the elevator scene in the end, but I heard that there's also slowdown on the real PS, but I can't confirm that. I do have the feeling the quality of some of the sounds could've been better, but overall, I'd say they did a pretty good job! If you like the games, and own a DC, get the bleemcast discs

 

[industrian]

Are you serious? .. If anything we should be happy that game prices have not risen, but actually fallen over the generations of systems. When I was a kid back in the 80's to buy a new NES game it cost around $70 and the system even ran as high as $200 .. now include inflation over the years and rise of cost of living and games are cheaper now then they have ever been. They even do specials for best sellers at 19.95 .. who can't afford that? Hell it cost me more to eat at McDonalds with my whole family (wife and 3 kids) then to buy a Best Seller game. There is always the option of buying used games as well .. but this really doesn't have much to do with the topic, but wanted to comment on it.

As I live in the UK I get ripped off all the time. Technically it would be correct to "adjust" currencies. As the UK Pound Sterling is currently worth more than anything else, we get ripped off more. With some products I can understand, but when it comes to a video game, identical to the ones sold cheaper in other shores, I get pissed off. It stems to my red roots I'm afraid.

It doesn't mean I'm all for piracy or whatever, I still buy new games and am fundamentally opposed to piracy (check my 80+ PC Games, 120+ PSX game collection and 500+ CD music collection for more information ) but I don't like being forced to buy something that is more expensive just due to corporate greed.

To get back ontopic though, I used the Bleem demo and I was impressed. It had good results with my P3 500mhz, 128mb, built-in ATI gpu wonder-machine. If I had the means and the money back then I might have considered purchasing it.

 

[Grv]

The only gripe I have with commercial emulators is that they run a chance of persecution, which, even if everything turns out to be completely legit, can be very damaging to the author(s) resources, time, and motivation.

In essence, my gripe is that commercial emulators have a bigger chance of getting "closed down", discontinued or the team behind it getting disbanded. Such is often a waste of time, effort, and research.

Other than that, I have no problems with it.

 

[ready2rumbelX]

I always prefer freeware, cause firstly...I don't have cash. But more importantly, this way the authors have less chance of getting fcuked by big companies (look what happened with Connectix VGS ).

But, ever company is entitled to make a living...even in the form of emulators, but make sure they work as good, or better than the free versions.

r2rX

 

[Coolsvilleman]

IF you mean commercial as in nintendo makes emulators for there own games and then sells them on cds with encrypted roms. I think its perfectly good idea. Whats wrong about it? Now if your not ninetendo and your selling a nintendo emulator, thats wrong cause you don't own the right to make money off of nintendos games/systems/name whatever. If you do it for free. Then you defnitely deserve credit for such hard work and if you want money try selling to the company.

 

[bcrew1375]

It seems video game console companies are too proud to give us emulators. I'm sure they could easily come up with a way to keep the games from being shared. If a video game company would make a well-working emulator for their system on the PC, I would buy it in a heartbeat. Unfortunately, it seems the game companies are too ignorant to give people what they want. They could just charge less for the emulator, but warn people it may not be as compatible as the original system. So, yes, if the emulator was legit and worked well, I would buy it.

 

[hellmasterx]

you can buy here a nes for 10 bucks.

 

[Aided Onslaught]

I would buy an emulator if it was from the company, and they were able to provide a good bit of "rom packs." I mean after a system gets old and the consol isn't selling anymore, they can relase that and bam sells are huge again....and people before that never had the system would get it too(sell it kinda cheap though). I think that would rock.