Well, I've run SMT Nocturne flawlessly, and I can beat both Persona games to completion regardless of the problems mentioned, so I guess that's more than I could hope for with something I got for free (the emulator), but I checked the system requirements, and they actually recommend an Intel Core 2 Duo that is around what mine is (if a hair faster), and on the whole triple/quad core thing, I've actually played these game on a Intel i7 Quad Core clocked rather highly (in the 3Ghz range) with a more than acceptable graphics card (a high end Geforce 8), and that computer staggered badly running Nocturne (the fog effects looked hideous) and often dropped into the thirties and forties running certain crap I have no problem with on my setup in P3 and P4, so to use a Tv Tropes term, I'm still convinced it's just a "Your Mileage May Vary" depending on your hardware (i.e. - each setup will run the emulation differently regardless whether you meet most of the requirements or not), and while the error margin is closing as the emulation is refined, I'm pretty sure you're right about it not being totally perfect.
However, and I may be repeating myself, what I get so far is playable to completion, so I'm not going to complain too badly, considering the emulator is free.
P.S. - As was stated in a earlier post, all I've heard still convinces me that from certain angles, the emulator seems to stumble badly processing the game code in rendering certain areas, and while it can be mitigated quite a bit, it seems to vary depending on the computer the emulator runs on, and since it affects nice and lame computers in the same way but for some in different areas (I for one generally have no problem maintaining full speed at the Junes Food Court in P4 regardless of the circumstances whereas people with nicer computers report Fps drop), it still sounds like this rather nettlesome issue is going to be a major crapshoot for some regardless.
Again, the emulator is free to download and comes with no guarantees, so there ya go.
You're absolutely right, but also keep in mind, that what could be the case is otherwise the drivers. Some Catalyst or Forceware run better with PCSX2 then other versions will do. F.e. on Catalyst 11.8 so far I haven't encountered any fps drop on P3 But oh well I understand it's annoying, but still it's not that unplayable, that u only get a FPS of 2/3 orso hehe xP
Nah that's months ago, I started playing Persona again after almost 9 months orso hahaha I was so curious towards the difference with my brand new Quad
I just tried that tip you mentioned about the 11.8 driver, and WOW, it seems to be working great.
The very first area I get slowdown is always after the anime cutscene showing Tartarus when Junpei is freaking out as Mitsuru and Akihiko explain things to him (it hovers in the low-mid fifties usually).
This time that scene ran at a smooth 60 Fps from beginning to end.
I plan to test a few other areas and post the results, but that actually seems to have improved things quite a bit.
09-03-2011, 12:32 AM (This post was last modified: 09-03-2011, 02:58 AM by arcane12.)
I think I got my problems with the crystalline enemies slowing the game down beaten.
After updating my graphic card driver to the ATI Catalyst 11.8, I set my custom resolution to 640 x 440 (low, I know, but I'm not a resolution whore and on my CRT this looks rather nice, not to mention certain things look very jagged on high resolutions), enabled 8-bit textures on the Direct3D 11 (Hardware) settings, and my SPU plugin was set to Timestretch at default settings.
I'm using the SuperVU complier with default settings and the Persona VU hack.
None of the speedhacks were on.
Included is a screenshot, and since I am an admitted noob, I need to know if this looks like its running nicely on my computer.
BTW, are the numbers for my EE and GS percentages fairly normal? I'm not the most knowledgable about how to gauge that, so from the screen shots do things look like the emulation is within normal parameters?
Also, I checked out the latest svn build and compared it to the official version, and even though on both the speed can dip a little into the high fifties in the problem battle mentioned previously, the slowdown complained about previously seems far less prominent, without having to use speedhacks, especially when coupled with using the Async music tweak.
On average, the speed was 50-55 at worst.
On 0.9.8 r4600 with all the previously mentioned tweaks, it occasionally dips into the high fifties, but without speedhacks can approach 60 frames a second for large stretches of time.
The MTVU hack and microVU compiler are worthless and run far worse than the SuperVu compiler on ANY build, and by default Persona 3 and 4 still love the SuperVu compiler better than the MicroVu compiler by far.
In essence, on both the latest official release and the svn build I checked out (r4895), it seems the emulation is still somewhat imperfect but getting better, and from what I can tell (I'm no programmer), it's the EE that's having problems rendering the action from certain angles, which translates to slowdown, and since I've noticed Persona games run far better at low resolutions than high (as opposed to SMT Nocturne, which I can run at very high res and gain considerable quality without reducing speed), it seems like the Persona games insist on using the CPU for the meat and potatoes of the rendering, and thanks to imperfect emulation (not to mention being picky how they interface with the actual graphics driver irregardless of the actual graphics card's power), that seems to be the main problem rendering certain battle scenes correctly.
Most non battle areas in the builds mentioned above now run near flawlessly, so it just seems like the emulation code just needs further polish, but since I've gone from occasional drops to the high forties-low fifties FPS wise to almost always high fifties-60 and above speed on average during the most troublesome parts, it still seems to support my initial assertion that the code is still something of a crap shoot (that seems to be getting better), not the hardware involved as long as it meets most of the requirements for playing these games comfortably (and I checked, mine does)
P.S. - All of this testing was done without speedhacks, as I wanted to see what benefit I could get without having to resort to them.
But oh well I understand it's annoying, but still it's not that unplayable, that u only get a FPS of 2/3 orso hehe xP
I was so curious towards the difference with my brand new Quad