Commercial version of Project64

[nanobyte]

Hello,

I have just discovered Project 64. I converted to a PC gamer a long time ago - after I sold my Dreamcast. But today I read Gamespot.com's Goldeneye 64 review and suddenly remembered the incredibly fun, good old days!

I've just played for several hours and am totally addicted - I use a PS2 gamepad connected using a USB adapter.

I would like to thank the programmers of Project 64. I totally appreciate all the effort that went into it. You've must have spent thousands of hours developing it.

I read that you lack motivation to develop (i.e. track down bugs) the emulator any further and encourage everyone to donate.

Donations usually do not work very well :-/ What about making it a commercial emulator instead?

I bet virtually everyone in the forum (after all, most here are probably die hard fans) would totally be willing to spend EUR 14.95 - 19.99 for the emulator - if it was stable and the missing features (e.g. net play) were implemented.

After all, so much crap these days costs much more and does much less. I don't know how many hours you usually play, but if you divide the cost for the emulator by the hours of fun you have every day, every week, every month and year, it would be extremely cheap.

Would there be any legal issues? What about the BIOS that seems to be embedded in PJ64? Has that been totally reverse-engineered as well?

I know Nintendo plans to release many successful old games - hopefully among them Goldeneye - for download for the Revolution, so maybe they could make legal troube :/

After all, you don't want people downloading N64 roms of the web and playing them for free if you offer them for a download fee ...

Still, I think many people spending small amounts of money is much better than only a handful spending larger sums.

 

[Agozer]

All commercial emulators have failed and/or got sued. You don't want Project64 to go under, do you?

Now if I understood this the wrong way and you meant that Project64 should be made "shareware" with a fee that a user must pay to get the full featured emulator, I am also against that.

You pay money to get a full-featured emulator, and if you don't pay you get a crippled version.... yet you pay nothing to get the games, since most people get their roms illegally anyway.

 

[squall_leonhart]

the creators of project 64 are not allowed to make a financial gain out of emulating 64 cartridges... something about intellectual propertie laws or something...

 

[axcc123]

Hello,

I have just discovered Project 64. I converted to a PC gamer a long time ago - after I sold my Dreamcast. But today I read Gamespot.com's Goldeneye 64 review and suddenly remembered the incredibly fun, good old days!

I've just played for several hours and am totally addicted - I use a PS2 gamepad connected using a USB adapter.

I would like to thank the programmers of Project 64. I totally appreciate all the effort that went into it. You've must have spent thousands of hours developing it.

I read that you lack motivation to develop (i.e. track down bugs) the emulator any further and encourage everyone to donate.

Donations usually do not work very well :-/ What about making it a commercial emulator instead?

I bet virtually everyone in the forum (after all, most here are probably die hard fans) would totally be willing to spend EUR 14.95 - 19.99 for the emulator - if it was stable and the missing features (e.g. net play) were implemented.

After all, so much crap these days costs much more and does much less. I don't know how many hours you usually play, but if you divide the cost for the emulator by the hours of fun you have every day, every week, every month and year, it would be extremely cheap.

Would there be any legal issues? What about the BIOS that seems to be embedded in PJ64? Has that been totally reverse-engineered as well?

I know Nintendo plans to release many successful old games - hopefully among them Goldeneye - for download for the Revolution, so maybe they could make legal troube :/

After all, you don't want people downloading N64 roms of the web and playing them for free if you offer them for a download fee ...

Still, I think many people spending small amounts of money is much better than only a handful spending larger sums.

are you nuts the legal issues alone would kill the emulator:bouncy:

 

[Smiff]

i think it's the motivation we want, and encouragement for development (especially for zilmar)... no one is trying to really make money on it. it would just get warezed anyway and be a sad end to the project. imho.
the finished 1.7 if/when that happens (i say "if" only because it's a long and difficult road) will be completely free and uncrippled just like 1.6. (don't know yet if the source will be released). so thanks for saying you think it's worth buying but that's never been a possibility, partly for the reasons above.

so far, the people who have donated have been great at giving feedback and everything, but honestly, do only ~200 people want another major release? if i was zilmar looking at the numbers so far... comparing how many users we have vs how many have donated.. well he has, and it's disappointing. not disappointing enough to give up, but disappointing nonetheless. it's really about our time not the product.. remember all this is hard work and often tedious, even little things take so much longer to get right than you'd believe. to everyone reading: if you do want a next version, please do show it. you will make a difference.


technical stuff:
there is no bios with the n64, boot code is in the rom, nintendo have patents on that maybe they could have some case, the biggest issue is fair use, the media problem. zilmar and jabo have never had access to n64 documentation so the reverse enginerring is probably safe. it's occured to me that Revolution could make them see us as competition. but we've never been contacted by nintendo. and not selling the product is part of staying safe. hopefully, i'm not a lawyer..


the donation amount we ask is less than the amount you suggest selling it for, btw. but some people are very generous and give more, that's really nice.

 

[elektrixxx]

I hear that Goldeneye & some other Rare(ware) titles won't be downloadable for the Revolution because it is property of Microsoft now.

 

[synch]

I'll just (and maybe will be a bit off-topic) comment about the "show interest" question Smiff mentioned:

Being a developer myself (coded an emulator, lots of graphics oriented apps, and working as a coder professionally), and understanding how much effort and time usually a coder puts in a hobby project, I understand how dissapointed they could be from the "little" response they got from the donations... But, presuming they still enjoy pj64 as their main hobby in their (surely little) spare time, that won't be that much influenced by the donations (as good as donations are, to get better equipment to develop, or to get some random hardware to achieve better emulation), but being on emulating the real thing as perfect as they can.

The whole point is: I love their work, I find it impressive (knowing how an emulator works internally, and how much effort is in the app), but I understand that, even if receiving lots of donations they just stopped development, or if, the other way, not receiving lots of them, they would keep developing the app. It's all about investing your free time in something you like.

If I could donate, I would, but my economy is too fragile right now to do such a thing. All I could donate, is my coding time (meaning a proper opengl graphic plugin or whatever). I know this sounds like an excuse, but it's all I can offer.

Kudos

(if improper, or too much off-topic, just delete it )

 

[axcc123]

I'll just (and maybe will be a bit off-topic) comment about the "show interest" question Smiff mentioned:

Being a developer myself (coded an emulator, lots of graphics oriented apps, and working as a coder professionally), and understanding how much effort and time usually a coder puts in a hobby project, I understand how dissapointed they could be from the "little" response they got from the donations... But, presuming they still enjoy pj64 as their main hobby in their (surely little) spare time, that won't be that much influenced by the donations (as good as donations are, to get better equipment to develop, or to get some random hardware to achieve better emulation), but being on emulating the real thing as perfect as they can.

The whole point is: I love their work, I find it impressive (knowing how an emulator works internally, and how much effort is in the app), but I understand that, even if receiving lots of donations they just stopped development, or if, the other way, not receiving lots of them, they would keep developing the app. It's all about investing your free time in something you like.

If I could donate, I would, but my economy is too fragile right now to do such a thing. All I could donate, is my coding time (meaning a proper opengl graphic plugin or whatever). I know this sounds like an excuse, but it's all I can offer.

Kudos

(if improper, or too much off-topic, just delete it )

i agree 1001% :bouncy:

 

[zilmar]

only thing I could think of that I would get another developer to look at is the intergations of mantis (bug tracking) in with joomla (web site). This is of course basicly all php coding with some sql. I have some idea's on how I would do it, but I would prefer to work on the emulator these days then the site. Now what I really would love is to get enougth money from doing emulation that I could work part time on emulation like 6 months of the year and doing contracting the rest of the year, but that is still a long way off before that would be possible

 

[nanobyte]

>I hear that Goldeneye & some other Rare(ware) titles won't be downloadable for the Revolution because it is property of >Microsoft now.

That would be aweful :/ Let's hope that's not the case. I would be horrible if Goldeneye was trapped in M$'s license prison and never saw daylight again ...

 

[gendoikari4]

I think part of the problem is the cost; when I descovered that one could donate to use version 1.7 I told myself that I would do it if it were any less than $15, but it wasn't so I didn't. Of course, it is worth more than $15, but if I were offered the bigest building in LA for 2 million, I would still have to say no.

 

[laynlow]

I think part of the problem is the cost; when I descovered that one could donate to use version 1.7 I told myself that I would do it if it were any less than $15, but it wasn't so I didn't. Of course, it is worth more than $15, but if I were offered the bigest building in LA for 2 million, I would still have to say no.

damn you're a penny pincher. What's another $5.00 for all the hard work these guys have done to get pj 64 to work they way it does today?

 

[revl8er]

Basically the problem with making this emulator commercial would be legal issues. Just as you remember the PSX emulator Bleem, and the issues it had. Also the emulator would most likely be cracked in about a week or two so even if it went commercial for the full version then people would still have it without paying. Basically what you have to realize is that this emulator isn't a way for them to make money, it's a hobby AFIK.

damn you're a penny pincher. What's another $5.00 for all the hard work these guys have done to get pj 64 to work they way it does today?

We all know the work they put into it, but not everybody can donate $20. Some people have other things they have to pay, or just plain don't work.

 

[Ballard]

I'm just very curious as to how accurate Nintendo's "backwards compatibility" emulation will be with the Revolution. Being someone who knows a thing or three about the "overhead" of emulation chips in software, it makes me wonder if Nintendo is so hardcore about their stand on emulation, but is willing to develop "cycle-accurate" emulation like NEStopia and BSNES for the Revolution. If they really care about their former (out of production) consoles, they will make them run as precisely and accurately as possible, including the N64 emulation. I'm sure the Revolution will be powerful, but we'll see how good their emulations are.

 

[Ballard]

Basically what you have to realize is that this emulator isn't a way for them to make money, it's a hobby AFIK.

It's also a documentation/preservation tool, in the event the physical software and hardware no longer functions.

 

[arnalion]

I'm just very curious as to how accurate Nintendo's "backwards compatibility" emulation will be with the Revolution. Being someone who knows a thing or three about the "overhead" of emulation chips in software, it makes me wonder if Nintendo is so hardcore about their stand on emulation, but is willing to develop "cycle-accurate" emulation like NEStopia and BSNES for the Revolution. If they really care about their former (out of production) consoles, they will make them run as precisely and accurately as possible, including the N64 emulation. I'm sure the Revolution will be powerful, but we'll see how good their emulations are.

Gamecube emulates for example zelda - ocarina of time in zelda collectors edition. I don't think emulating the games would be a problem for Nintendo when they're sitting on the code for everything

 

[Doomulation]

It isn't about reverse engineering. The zelda emulated games, for example, was not flawless, as I was told.
The problem lies in the challenge to create a product that works on the machine, without limitations, to imitate the games to its near perfectness.
Again, note, that no emulator is 100% accurate, and neither will nintendo's be, I bet. They will make it good, probably, but not perfect.

 

[Ballard]

Gamecube emulates for example zelda - ocarina of time in zelda collectors edition. I don't think emulating the games would be a problem for Nintendo when they're sitting on the code for everything

Remember, just because you have the specs, BIOS and all the available info on the hardware, that does not mean your programmers are as talented as say, Nicola Salmoria, Aaron Giles, Razoola or byuu. Project 64 is not a 100% accurate emulator, nor are most others like ZSNES, Gens or NeoRageX. The opcode order that the real-time processors demand MUST be executed in the order it says...otherwise it's merely a hack of it's real operation.

Here's a description of the difference in "Lameulators" and those with cycle-accurate coding:

http://byuu.cinnamonpirate.com/?page=bsnes

Just because you have uncorrupted and exact ROM files, does not mean the software coded to run it, is doing it properly. I have my original Sonic CD and several others, but I've yet to find an emulator that can run them perfectly with no bugs or weird blurriness in how the layers and sprites are drawn and move. Imagine the difficulty in making a more advanced piece of hardware like the N64 "cycle-accurate".

That's my point. Nintendo better have some talented coders and guys who understand not only the hardware, but how software can emulate it perfectly.

:sombrero:

 

[ShadowFX]

I am still really willing to donate but I'm waiting until another method of payment is offered, like a banktransfer or along those lines. Just can't go with Paypal atm

 

[arnalion]

Remember, just because you have the specs, BIOS and all the available info on the hardware, that does not mean your programmers are as talented as say, Nicola Salmoria, Aaron Giles, Razoola or byuu. Project 64 is not a 100% accurate emulator, nor are most others like ZSNES, Gens or NeoRageX. The opcode order that the real-time processors demand MUST be executed in the order it says...otherwise it's merely a hack of it's real operation.

Here's a description of the difference in "Lameulators" and those with cycle-accurate coding:

http://byuu.cinnamonpirate.com/?page=bsnes

Just because you have uncorrupted and exact ROM files, does not mean the software coded to run it, is doing it properly. I have my original Sonic CD and several others, but I've yet to find an emulator that can run them perfectly with no bugs or weird blurriness in how the layers and sprites are drawn and move. Imagine the difficulty in making a more advanced piece of hardware like the N64 "cycle-accurate".

That's my point. Nintendo better have some talented coders and guys who understand not only the hardware, but how software can emulate it perfectly.

:sombrero:

Don't you think that Nintendo have talanted coders? They have already succeded to emulate some nes, snes, n64 games on the cube. Is there many bugs in Zelda CE (ain't got it...)? I think they will work pretty hard on the emulating because it's one of the things that makes revolution interesting to buy. They're sitting on the code and it will probably give them "handicap" . This is just my opinion