I do not advocate game piracy in any form, but I have to admit these pics posted at NeoGAF, of Super Mario Galaxy running on the Dolphin emulator at 720p, have me wanting to just sell my Wii already and build an HTPC running Dolphin, to plug up to my living room TV.

For those who are not in the know, Wii scaled up to 720p looks pretty bad, especially if you are using a large screen TV (in my case, 46"), but scaled up to 1080p, Wii games look like complete shit. The Dolphin emulator apparently outputs natively in 720p, rendering a much better image quality, than just merely scaling the Wii to HD.















The overall image fidelity is still not as crystal clear and sharp as Xbox 360 and PS3 due to Wii's lack of true next-gen textures, shaders, lighting, etc., however these are light years better than simply just scaling your Wii up with the standard scaler that comes built into every HDTV.

Having this emulator around, may just make me fall in love with my Wii all over again . . . or more correctly, fall in love with the few Wii games worth owning.

So technically, if I sell my Wii, and just keep the games, then running the ROMs on the emulator is not piracy . . . and is looking more and more like a real option.

can the emulator run the games from a disc? surely it can seeing as the game is only on a DVD? that way you avoid having to d/l any games, and instead can just play them via disc.

I remember reading that the disc's are made so that those wont work on a regular DVD drives.

This is still emulator it wont run most games perfectly and will have errors. Some games might run extremely slow and look strange. I don't think this can replace Wii just yet. I could be wrong I haven't tried or read much about it. Pictures do look nice.

Wtf? I get Boulet Timed and warned in a fairly condescending tone for suggesting someone download a pirated version of a game to try as a demo IF there wasn't actually an official demo for said game, but this thread goes untouched?

not really the same thing, since everything in this thread is based on owning the game in the first place, just replacing your Wii with a emulator.

Do you have to own the game first to use the emulator, or can you just download it?

If you can just download it, then mentioning Dolphin as a "reason not to buy a Wii" seems a lot fucking worse than anything I had said...despite some of you *saying* you'd only play games you owned.

there are bearly any good games for the wii, and i own them all, wanting to play those games in HD is a damn sight more legal then downloading a game you dont even own just to "test it out".

no-one here has mentioned ripping off a developer by d/l a game without owning the disc version. the idea is that you can play wii games in HD. thats all this thread is about.

And I didn't mentioning anything about "ripping off a developer" either. If you folks are all honest enough to have an emulator and access to all of the free Wii games you want and still only play the games you own, then I don't think it's a far stretch for someone to download a game to try it out before dropping a bunch of cash on it....which doesn't hurt the developer at all.

Sure, you could argue that once someone has the pirated game, they will just keep playing it an not purchase it, but I could also argue that some of you folks or others who just happen to be looking at the thread may also download a bunch of games you haven't bought either. I mean really, do you honestly think that once people have access to a library of games that will look better on their PC that they'll go out and buy the Wii version only so they don't feel guilty when they download it?

Fucking ridiculous.

Also, this thread is basically talking about "ripping off" Nintendo by offering up a free alternative to buying the Wii itself.

Again, fucking ridiculous.

That's what I'm agreeing with.

Nope. This is just as wrong if not more so that what I had said. I honestly think it's stupid to think otherwise.

so far you're the only one who thinks that way...take that however you want.

but at the end of the day, promoting the download of games when you dont even own the game itself, is called piracy, and is illegal, no matter how likely it is you *MAY* buy it later. fact is, in that act of downloading said game, you broke the law. no matter how you want to look at it or how you want to try to justify it.

sure, a person may not buy the game after they d/l to "try " it. and similarly, a person may not own a retail copy of a game before downloading and using a ROM for this emulator....but not one person has said anyting about that. only you have admited to d/l illegal copies of games (i dont care what you do afterwards...whether you keep them, delete them, buy the game then or later) it's breaking the law, and thus breaking the rules of this forum by descussing it. nothing in this thread does the same. hance it isnt even remotely on the same level.

it's a thread about emulating games we own in HD. a completely legal act.

I don't think there is anything bad as long as you do own the console and use your own bios file and bought games with the emulator. I do think it's wrong to suggest that you wouldn't buy Wii and instead just use emulator. I am not 100% sure but that would make the most sense.

Sometimes, I just cannot believe the internets. Give people something good to feel fantastic about, and they still manage to find the most negative thing to comment about - insessantly.

THIS IS NOT, AND NEVER WAS MEANT TO BE A PIRACY THREAD. If you are so pessimistic that you cannot find joy in the very thought of being able to play Wii games in 720p or 1080p on your big screen HDTV, and have them look absolutely gorgeous, then please leave and go muck up someone else thread with the negativity. This emulator is the best Wii news in a very, very, very long time for Wii owners, and some of us would really appreciate it not being crapped on for at least the first 24 hours, while we bask in the little happiness Wii owners get these days.

In the interest to get this thread back on topic before it gets locked, I present to you, EVEN MORE DOLPHIN GOODNESS!!! Some of these in 1080p even, with a stable 30fps frame rate.

Some of what I found out while doing a little digging, is the Dolphin emulator is very CPU dependent. So for best usage, run it on a very fast dual core, or better still, a quad core CPU. The faster the CPU the better. A lot of games run very good on the emulator and very solid frame rates. Obviously, the better CPU you have, the better the emulator is going to run. Many gamers are even getting 1080p at a rock solid 30fps out of it on many games.

Wii-mote and nunchuk work great with this, as does the Classic controller, however, for games that require the classic controller, I have heard that the Xbox 360 controller works better for those games. So anyone with the wireless Xbox 360 controller adapter for PC, is in luck. Keyboard and mouse also work for all games, but is not recommended. And if none of that were not enough goodness, Dolpin also emulates Gamecube games up to HD.

I've linked plenty of photos below, and in the interst of not turning this thread into a bandwidth hog, most of the images are simply linked to, with the occasional image actually rendered here on this thread to show off the glory that is this emulator.








GHOSTBUSTERS

http://img38.imageshack.us/img38/8448/51570dolphin...







FOREVER BLUE (ENDLESS OCEAN)

http://i44.tinypic.com/ngh3r.jpg

http://img25.imageshack.us/img25/9004/fblue2.jpg







SUPER PAPER MARIO

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a336/defferoo/SP...







RESIDENT EVIL 4 WII

http://i39.tinypic.com/33xj8sx.png

http://i43.tinypic.com/2ecewyv.png

http://i40.tinypic.com/30a9qmp.png

http://i44.tinypic.com/1195i6e.png

http://i40.tinypic.com/2hmom7a.png

http://i41.tinypic.com/15dnvnn.png







SUPER SMASH BROS. BRAWL

http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/6634/brawl4hd.png

http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/9812/brawl5hd.png

http://img8.imageshack.us/img8/3969/brawl6hd.png

http://img21.imageshack.us/img21/4325/brawl3hd.png

http://img21.imageshack.us/img21/449/brawlfhd7.png

http://img8.imageshack.us/img8/784/brawlfhd4.png

http://i213.photobucket.com/albums/cc195/cataferal...

http://i43.tinypic.com/2w3954i.jpg

http://i39.tinypic.com/11gsz12.jpg

http://img5.imageshack.us/img5/5862/brawlfhd5.png

http://img27.imageshack.us/img27/979/brawlfhd1.png

http://img11.imageshack.us/img11/8851/brawlfhd3o.p...

http://img240.imageshack.us/img240/3302/iz69f62391...







LEGEND OF ZELDA: TWILIGHT PRINCESS







RESIDENT EVIL: UMBRELLA CHRONICLES

http://i41.tinypic.com/so8due.jpg







FRAGILE

http://img25.imageshack.us/img25/1041/fragile1.jpg







METROID PRIME 3: CORRUPTION

http://img16.imageshack.us/img16/9582/metroid12.jp...

http://img18.imageshack.us/img18/1107/metroid13.jp...

http://img12.imageshack.us/img12/8290/metroid14.jp...







FATAL FRAME

http://img13.imageshack.us/img13/4461/fatalframe45...

http://img6.imageshack.us/img6/2795/fatalframe44.j...

http://img4.imageshack.us/img4/4885/fatalframe43.j...

http://img26.imageshack.us/img26/1401/fatalframe42...

http://img4.imageshack.us/img4/1729/fatalframe41.j...







TATSUNOKO VS. CAPCOM: ULTIMATE ALL-STARS
http://i44.tinypic.com/2en9r1w.png

http://i40.tinypic.com/2hrhes9.png

http://img242.imageshack.us/img242/7605/dolphin200...







VIEWTIFUL JOE - GAMECUBE

http://img24.imageshack.us/img24/7279/vj2.png







SOUL CALIBUR 2 - GAMECUBE







RESIDENT EVIL REMIX - GAMECUBE

http://i39.tinypic.com/23k59n5.png




I just want to conclude, that this emulator is a godsend. Because all of my TVs are HD, I had long ago decided to put any Wii game purchases I was interested in, on the backburner until such a time as I could pick them up used and cheap off of eBay. Games like Mad World, for example. I've played it at a friend's who still has SD television, but I have yet to actually buy it. However, the Dolphin emulator is a game changer. With emulation this good on HDTV, I can finally start looking at Wii games as day one purchases, right along with Xbox 360 and PS3 titles. For the first time since they were announced at E3, I am actually excited to get my hands on Super Mario Galaxy 2, and Metroid: Project M . . . plus whatever new Zelda game Miyamoto has hinted that he is working on. The games worth owning on Wii may still be few and far between, but for the first time in over a year, I feel excited again about new titles.

My only problem, is that the computer I am using now, well let's just say, it is not the best PC to run Dolphin on. So that is the bad news (for me at least). However, the good news is that I was going to build a new PC this fall to celebrate the release of Windows 7. I had initially spec'ed the new PC to be a monster of a machine, simply because I love to indulge myself in a top of the line PC, every once in a blue moon. I'm looking to outfit this monster with two quad-core CPUs, dual 1GB GPUs in SLi, and at somewhere between 8GB to 16GB of DDR2. Like I said, a monster. Not that I am ever going to need a machine that powerful, just that I like to spluge old school that on very rare occasions. So I have been saving up for this monster for several months now, already. Come Black Friday this year, me and Newegg are going to be spending some quality time together.

So that is more than enough machine to run this emulator. Judging by the forums, most people run Dolphine on far less machine than this. But I am wonder just how high I am going to be able to push the framerates at 1080p with this kind of monster config. Until then, I am going to just have to be satisfied with scrounging the internet for screen shots and videos of other people enjoying their Wii games in HD. However, I intend to make up for lost time once this puppy is built. Super Mario Galaxy 2, New Super Mario Bros. Wii, No More Heroes 2, Fragile, Demon Blade, Dead Space: Extraction, The Conduit, Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, Red Steel 2, and Mad World are all just going to have to wait until then.

How do you control games with Dolphin?

Man, RAM is freaking expensive, better go with the budget stuff from 03 ;)

With a Wii-more and Nunchuck, of course. Says so in my post. You'll need a bluetooth adapter for your computer, and a wireless sensor bar. You can get both for under $10, complete with free shipping:

WIRELESS SENSOR BAR: http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.3389
BLUETOOTH DONGLE: http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.11866


That was quite obviously a typo. The two is right next to the three on the keyboard. And when you type at 95wpm, you are bound to make a few mistakes . . . from time to time.

So while my computer isn't the fastest in the world i can say that this emulator will not be replacing anyones wii for quite some time. It runs sluggishly to say the least, even at low resolutions. But it works, and that's impressive in itself.

So what kind of PC do you need to run games at STABLE 30fps or more?

I remember PS2 emulators are IMPOSSIBLE to get at a stable 30fps+ framerate. Besides, you need a monster processor/PC. Simply put, if you are going to be spending that much on a PC to be able to play Wii games you'd be crazy. So if anything this applies to anyone with monster PC's out there who are also interested--somehow--in playing Wii games.

EDIT: Sound is also an issue all the time. Basically, the pain to play these things is simply not worth it.

See I think this is pretty much nothing right now. Right now it has issues (sound, framerate, stability, and specific problems with each game). By the time you solve this, you can buy a Wii for dirt cheap--including the games. By then, you no longer want to play these old games. 10-15 years later it becomes relevant once again as emulation is pretty much perfected and these games are now classics (lol, is any Wii game worth that label?).

Anyways, just my thinking of this. I should probably change all the "you"'s with "I"'s, meh you know what I mean.