Super Nintendo (SNES) Emulation on Windows PC: ZSNES
Note from racketboy: �For those starting out in the world of classic gaming, emulation is one of the first places people start out in order to get their feet wet. While emulators may be a bit more work to set up and use than the original console, it lets curious gamers play around with the system without investing any financial resources. Our resident emulation enthusiast, Ivo has volunteered to share a series of emulation guides that will focus on helping new retro gamers get started on their emulation journey.�
This guide will teach you how to run Super Nintendo (SNES) games on your Windows PC. I’ve skipped through some of the very basics. If you want to get a more detailed example, check out the guide for Sega Genesis emulator, KEGA Fusion.
The Best Emulator for the Job
There are a couple of excellent SNES emulators for Windows — primarily ZSNES and snes9x. However, we are going to use ZSNES for this guide as I feel that is is the best Windows-specific emulator at this time.
- ZSNES has the most accurate SNES emulation
- ZSNES has superior filters
- ZSNES crashes a bit less than SNES9x
Download The Emulator & Get Some ROMs
To obtain the latest version of the emulator, I would recommend browsing the ZSNES site, but you can also use this direct download link to get the emulator.
Often the place where you download the emulator from has some instructions on how to proceed from here, a FAQ section or a forum. If you are having trouble with anything, usually it�s a good place to try and get help. Someone on the forums here might be able to give you some specific help or know the answer to your questions.
It is useful to have some ROM to test it on. As usual, Google is the tool of choice – there are actually some public domain / freeware ROMs available. Using Google I found some of these in a website called Zophar’s Domain (don’t expect anything great). As far as commercial games/ROMs are concerned, you can rely on Google as well or use a dependable download source like Underground Gamer. (Just a reminder: a responsible retro gamer should only download ROMs of games he owns original copies of, or possibly a modern re-issue of the game.)
Install The Emulator & Run It
- Once you have downloaded the emulator, extract the files into an appropriate folder on your PC.
- Usually the file format is .zip or .rar
- From the official site, ZSNES came in a .zip, so you probably just need to right click on the icon an extract it to wherever you want.
- To run ZSNES, just double-click the main EXE file (on of the files you extracted) to launch the program.
- ZSNES has a very particular look (which some like and some don’t)
- As you can see below, to load your game of choice, go to the “Game” menu option and select “Load”
Exiting a Game
Once you are done trying out your first game/ROM, just hit the “ESC” key to return to the main menu
Configure Controller Schemes
If you simply run a game right after starting the emulator for the first time, you might not even know the proper controls since PC emulators typically default to some obscure keyboard combinations. You can usually figure out the default controls by reading a �readme.txt� (or equivalent) that comes with the emulator. However, if you want a more a console-like experience, lets set up the emulator to use a gamepad.
To get your emulator set up to your liking, just navigate into the controllers configuration panel:
- On the �Config� menu, select �Input� (screenshot)
- The program will then bring up the �Input Device� box
- You will see tabs on the box for up to five controllers/input devices.
- Select the tab for the controller number you want to set up and select the device (typcially the name of the gamepad) you want to use.
- Hit the �Set Keys� button to the right to map the Super Nintendo controls to your particular PC gamepad.
- As you can see below, ZSNES will pop up a little box asking you to press a button on the gamepad to identify which button you want to correspond to a certain command.
Configuring Graphics/Video Options
If you are picky about your window size and video output, you can also tweak your graphics options. ZSNES is very rich when it comes to display options and configuration.
To get to the Video Configuation screen, just hit the “Config” menu and select “Video”
As you can see below, SNES gives you a good amount of filters to choose from:
You can load your test ROM and use it to check out the effect of these filters.
Here is a quick comparison (although in .jpg it should give you an idea – try them out for yourself though!). From left to right we have unfiltered, interpolation, 2xSAI engine, Super 2xSAI, Super Eagle and HQ filter (I think this is the best one, but probably the most demanding in terms of processing).
Saving & Restoring Game States
There are also more advanced features that you may or may not care about. Saving and loading at any time is a very important and versatile feature on a emulator, and ZSNES doesn�t fall short. Saving states can save you time (e.g. saving just after a lengthy intro you can�t skip), lets you stop playing at any time to resume later, or can help you �cheat� through a particularly difficult part of a game.
It works much like it does in other emulators; select the state you want to save to, or load from:
And select the appropriate option from the “File” menu (the same you used to load the ROM):
There are a bunch of other options to tinker around with ZSNES, which I personally don’t use that much (if at all), and don’t see the average user spending time with them either.
Another note from racketboy:
�I want to thank Ivo again for his hard work in creating these emulation tutorials. If you have any questions, comments ,corrections, or even have some additional tips or tricks to add, please post in the comments below, or head to the emulation section of the forums.�
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Ulysses, I haven’t tried it. If I find one I like, I don’t typically change.
Bsnes is now the top snes emulator achieving perfect emulation of all snes hardware, game and special chips. Truely an epic piece of software!
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