Core list selection suggestions

Libretro Cores
#1

So I’ve been playing around with the various cores and I think I’ve got most of my lineup figured out but there’s a few systems I’m not sure if I would be better off with another core. My system is an i7-4970k with 32gb ram and will have a 1080ti in it anyday now, so it’s pretty beefy. The only cores I’m still uncertain of are;

Arcade - FB Alpha (seemed simpler than mame, arcade’s pretty low on my priority list though). Unless there’s a reason to use a year’d version.

Gamboy Advance - I’m not quite sure if there’s an advantage for VGA Next vs VBA-M. I’m not using the beetle core as it doesn’t seem to work with the translated oriental blue.

NES - FCEUmm, I used to use higan as a standalone so I could switch to bNes, but I’m guessing the NES is simple enough that there’s no pressing reason to switch to bnes? Or does it have advantages over accuracy I’m unaware of (I like accuracy, just as long as it’s perceptible, if I can’t tell it’s inaccurate, it’s not as big a deal).

Playstation - Using Beetle PSX, but I’m not sure if I should use the Beetle HW version instead. I’d like to be able to upscale the internal resolution so games like Chrono Cross don’t look as twitchy and jagged. Otherwise it’ll mostly be 2D or 3D rpgs.

Sega Saturn- Beetle Saturn. My understanding is Yabause hasn’t been updated in forever and beetle is functionally as good, or at least is getting there?

Super Nintendo - This is the tougher one. I assumed Bsnes accuracy or balanced since I didn’t have any real issues with Higan. I won’t be playing Air Strike Patrol which is the only one balanced seems to have issues with. What I’m not sure of is if there’s any real reason to opt for the bsnes-mercury cores instead. I don’t seem to have much performance issues, but wasn’t sure if there was any real advantage to mercury other than working well on less powerful systesm.

Thanks for any advice/input you’ve got!

1 Like
#2

For GBA i recommend mGBA. It is both faster and more accurate then VGA/VBA-M.

#3

For NES, don’t use our bnes core. The one in higan is significantly improved compared with our old fork, though even the one in higan doesn’t really have any compelling reason to use it over Nestopia or FCEUmm.

For SNES, the mercury cores are a little faster and have byuu’s old special chip HLE code added back in (which he hates and refers to as “vile speedhacks” but whatever).

Beetle Saturn is likely to provide a better experience than our Yabause core, yes.

The HW flavor of Beetle PSX has more bugs than the SW version, so it’s up to whether those bugs are worth the upscaling.

FBA is better integrated with libretro (for example, vertical games rotate the shader along with the screen, unlike the MAMEs) but it supports fewer games than MAME. The ones it does run are typically faster, but that’s probably not going to be an issue on your machine.

And yes, as Arviel mentioned, mGBA is fast and accurate, making it a good choice for GBA in pretty much any instance.

#4

Thanks again for the input all. I didn’t realize mGBA was that far along.

How is reicast compared to standalone Demul? I know Dreamcast doesn’t get the attention that say nintendo systems do with dolphin/higan, or even PS systems. But if it functions better than Demul I might give it a shot

#5

I think Demul is currently better.