Emulation vs Hardware

[Opa Opa]

Emulation for the popular consoles prior to the Ps1/Sat/N64-era is perfectly acceptable to me. I never had any trouble out of emulators until I started to use ePSXe, SSF, and Project64.
Those systems just haven't been nailed down quite like other consoles. Though I will admit I haven't followed any updates as of late. Although if I had to wager a guess, N64 emulation is still probably a mess.

Also, this topic made me realize that I don't hook up my old systems anymore and it doesn't bother me. These old consoles feel more like museum pieces; especially since a lot of the best games have had updated ports and remakes that I usually play instead.

[TheRev]

I only emulate on Consoles now, NES and Master System/Game Gear on the Dreamcast, Genesis and SNES (when I can find the SNES Station disc) on PS2. I'm going to get some Raspberry Pis to put a PC Engine EMU on and MAME/NEO GEO on the other.

[GSZX1337]

I'm just going to reply to some posts that stood out to me.

To the OP, I would get a decent HTPC, put your consoles in to storage, get your emulators set up and see how it feels before selling any consoles.

This is sound advice as even though emulation Sega 32X and prior is generally pretty good, you might not enjoy the experience as much. It'd suck to decide you'd prefer hardware and have to rebuy your sold stuff.

Emulation does make things more convenient in some ways, but then again what's more convenient than simply inserting a cartridge and pressing the power button?

I'd imagine you know about the advantages I'm about to say, but I'm still going to list them. Perhaps another poster will consider my point.
Yes, having the game sitting on your shelf waiting to just be inserted into the console is convenient. However to have that convenience, you have to deal with some inconveniences. You need room to store the games and consoles. This can be made difficult if you're trying to find cheap and aesthetically pleasing ways to display your games. Another inconvenience is that you need to have a TV with many inputs or some input selector boxes in order to have all of your systems connected. In addition, you're going to need quite a bit of space if you plan to have a sizable collection. Not only do you have to accommodate the console, you also need to accommodate your selector boxes and power strips. You can sidestep all this by keeping your consoles/games in storage and perform rotations, but that can be a pain in the ass. Don't even get me started on having a CRT for the light-gun games.

Emulators and front ends in some cases take a lot of time and effort to research and set up.

This would be the emulation equivalent to what I mentioned above. Admittedly, this is a pain in the ass. However, there are alternatives and pre-builds to get around this. The caveat to that is oftentimes the prebuilds aren't satisfactory so you end up configuring frontends anyway.

For a while I was spending all my gaming time just troubleshooting emus and frontends instead of actually playing, until one day I thought, "what the hell is wrong with me?!?!?! Njaaaaarghgh!"

I went through something like this with my HTPC. I messed around with multiple frontends, plugins, emulators, etc. for years and I still haven't found a configuration that satisfied me. I eventually gave up and just use Windows Vista on the big screen for the stuff I haven't configured for XBMC. I might try again for my next PC (this one is woefully out of date).

I may be wrong, but don't ISO's load faster?

Generally yes, but there are some games that have to be ran in "perfect sync" nullifying any speed increase.

I make ISO's from my own physical discs, I don't download them. It's like I'm "installing" the game.

I get a similar feeling when I burn a Dreamcast/Saturn disc and print a label for it.

Although if I had to wager a guess, N64 emulation is still probably a mess.

See my post on page 2.

As I expected, the Nostalgia/the Retro Experience is one of the primary factors for those going with original hardware. I completely understand, but I feel that it doesn't pertain to me. I grew up with Genesis/SNES games and later moved to PlayStation games and have no qualms emulating them or playing ports. Just over a year ago I was given a Sega Genesis Model 2 (same model I had as a kid) and was ecstatic. I immediately went on eBay and bought a power supply, video cables, and a copy of Truxton. Truxton being the game I have the most nostalgia for next to the Genesis Sonic games. I set everything up and began to play expecting to wade in reminiscence. I was for the first few times I played but the feeling wore off quite quickly. Once I started spending more time on the Genesis I felt like I just playing the games again as opposed to basking in the Retro Experience. While playing Truxton, I felt exactly the same way I did when I played on my HTPC and for Sonic I felt the same way I did while playing the PC conversions I acquired. I just didn't give a shit about playing on actual hardware and owning the original cartridge and box. That's not to say I didn't feel nostalgic as I certainly did. But I didn't feel anymore nostalgic on the actual Genesis than I did when I emulated on the PC. The takeoff in Truxton and the ending credits in Sonic & Knuckles feel the same to me no matter what device I used to experience them. I guess you can say that I'm nostalgic for the games and not the hardware.

[Damm64]

As I expected, the Nostalgia/the Retro Experience is one of the primary factors for those going with original hardware.

Nope, im just a crazy hoarder, materialistic man who loves to own stuff.

[TheRev]

Face it I'll never have my own arcade but when I can have an entire arcade on a PCB the size of a Credit card, I'm all over that shit.

[dunpeal2064]

Face it I'll never have my own arcade but when I can have an entire arcade on a PCB the size of a Credit card, I'm all over that shit.

And it still probably wouldn't play Raiden II

[fastbilly1]

Face it I'll never have my own arcade but when I can have an entire arcade on a PCB the size of a Credit card, I'm all over that shit.

And it still probably wouldn't play Raiden II

The Parallella should be able to rock Raiden II.

[GSZX1337]

As I expected, the Nostalgia/the Retro Experience is one of the primary factors for those going with original hardware.

Nope, im just a crazy hoarder, materialistic man who loves to own stuff.

Hence why I said it was one of the primary reasons.
What you're talking about is something I think of as the "wealth factor." I'd talk about it like I did for the nostalgia factor, but I'm lazy.

[KalessinDB]

I'm in the little bit of both camp, and they both have their allure. I doubt I'll say anything that hasn't already been said in this thread, but I'm trying to keep myself awake at work:

Original games work, and work beautifully. There's no emulator inconsistencies, there's no tweaks that need to be done, etc. To steal from Apple -- It Just Works. However, they do take up a lot of room. I have an old CRT and it's beautiful, but man is it heavy and big. And even with my enormous entertainment center to hold it, I still don't have room for all 30ish systems to be hooked up at once, so I end up choosing my favorites (NES, SNES, Genesis from my childhood) and swapping in others as the mood to play them strikes me (or a friend). But man, the shelf candy, just having it all displayed, it's amazing. Especially now that I've started boxing all of my games and adding art from TheCoverProject... man I wish I had never found that site

But by the same token, I cannot collect arcade cabs. I don't have the space or money, and short of hitting a Mega Millions lottery, I never will. I have one old retro-fitted cabinet dedicated to MAME, and that takes up enough space. So for that? The emulation is awesome. And I just recently (like, yesterday recently) got myself an Ouya that I intend to put upstairs in my bedroom in case I decide I want to play some old retro favorites to pass the time when I'm sick or feeling insomniac. I have terabytes of roms and isos because I have flash carts or mod chips for the majority of my systems that support them. And flash carts/burned discs walk the line between emulation and original hardware imo. They're not, strictly, emulation by the definition of the word, but they still give that experience of "turn it on and 801235609246 games to pick from at the push of a button" and so it will cause a little bit of the "what should I play?" confusion of emulation.

But on the whole, I love games. And I love the different hardware that's been used to play games, and I love tinkering with it to get the most I can out of it (video upgrades, standardized jacks, new BIOS, mods, ODEs, etc). And I love how games look on a shelf. So unless I meet the perfect girl and she demands I sell it all (in which case, she wouldn't be the perfect girl, would she? -- and my current perfect girl is just as into them as I am) or I run into a MAJOR, **MAJOR** financial crunch (don't see that happening), I don't see anything ever truly replacing my original hardware.

[Xeogred]

For me emulation is for ROM hacks, translations, arcade games that never got console ports, and exceedingly rare games/consoles. I prefer the real deal for everything else.

Keep in mind that 5th gen and up emulation has still yet to be perfected.

This.

And since I'm not a huge fan of handhelds/tiny screens, I'll go with emulation in those cases when possible. Got a lot harder to do with DS stuff and on though.