Geod went in to a little more detail on the algorithm in an NESDev thread, saying, "The rendering mechanism is not just based on 8x8 tile, but based on "shape"- meaningful collection of consecutive tiles. AdvertisementĪ demo reel showing how various games look through the 3DNES emulator. Nothing is done manually," he wrote on emutalk. "Everything is calculated automatically in runtime. But in online postings, geod insists that his algorithm, while "still far from perfect and there are still many things to improve," is generalized enough to work on any NES game.
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Your first assumption might be that geod has hard-coded specific algorithms for each supported game, training the emulator in how to detect specific objects and create good-looking 3D models for them. How exactly does an emulator take the flat 2D images produced by the NES and intelligently convert them into a 3D model? The beta is still quite rough (and it only works in Firefox for the time being), but the fact that it works at all is pretty impressive. This week, he finally took his work public, posting a playable beta version that runs through the Unity Web player and can load arbitrary (and definitely legally obtained) ROMs from the cloud. The emulator's developer, who goes by the handle "geod" online, has been posting videos of the work-in-progress emulator for months. In Mega Man, ladders remain in the background while wall-hugging enemies are accurately placed on the sides of thick blocks. In a game like Super Mario Bros., for instance, 3DNES converts pipes to into cylindrical 3D models, with bulging piranha plants embedded in the center. This isn't just a conversion of every pixel into a uniform voxel, either. The 3DNES project, as the name implies, extends the 2D sprites of the NES into the Z axis, letting players rotate the camera around to see the sides and back of the formerly flat sprites. So it was a bit of a surprise this week to stumble across a new NES emulator that provides a genuinely new perspective on decades-old games by rendering them in three dimensions. And if he finds the time, he might answer some of the most pertinent questions.Further Reading Accuracy takes power: one man’s 3GHz quest to build a perfect SNES emulatorThe world of NES emulation hasn't been all that exciting since the late '90s, when NESticle provided "good enough" emulation accuracy and stability for any NES game out there (though there has been a lot of subsequent work to get that final bit of true emulation accuracy). Turns out that the man behind the project is now a Temper under the username and made a thread about it earlier.
Until then, we can rejoice over the videos at the very least. I'm sure most of us can't wait to see more games running on the emulator and possibly having it running on other platforms. Furthermore, he adds that "if the emu can render decently 1/4, 1/5 or even 1/10 nes game collection, it's already a big success for me".Īlthough in beta state, the whole concept is worth praising.
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He also hints about allowing manual adjustments for certain games in the future but is focusing on having a "strong emulation engine as the backbone" for now. I call it - 3D PPU which will render the game on 3D buffer". Geod Studio's Trần Vũ Trúc even quit his job to go all out for his passion! The developer wrote the emulator himself, further adding that "the essential difference between it and any normal emulator is the PPU. It might be in its early days but this project is worth checking out. Check out the developer's Youtube Channel for more such videos.