Zelda - OOT - how ?

[Blondie]

I've never dipped in to the Zelda series before - I've always been very much a 'twitch' gamer since my early days. Whilst my fellow Atarians were frothing madly about Alternate Reality I would always slam in the Defender cart and rack up a good few hours...

So anyways. I picked up Zelda - TWW and my intention is now to play through OOT first (ironic as my N64 is sat a few metres away) and then onto TWW.

So what's the deal ? Is OOT being emulated on the 'Cube then ? Anyone have any ideas how they did it ?

[Valken]

It's definitely come kind of emulation... but I don't know how other than they've used an emulator. Notice the way the entire game gets loaded into RAM when you start it? Have you tried opening the GC lid mid-play?

[Saurian]

It's definetly emulated - you can open the lid, take the disk out and carry on as normal.

[Sidder]

It's definetly emulated - you can open the lid, take the disk out and carry on as normal.

That doesn't mean that it's emulated though, just that the whole program is resident in memory and isn't dependent on any disc activity. I hope it is emulated though, think of the possibilities for other releases from the N64's back catalogue...

[zathras]

Hmm, I'm not sure that it is emulated to be honest. It might be worth starting the game at one end of Hyrule, opening the disc lid, then seeing far we can get - I bet the game will have to load at some point. Also, all the Z-trigger references have been changed to L-trigger, so they've modified the source at some stage.

[recipher]

From an interview with Nomura and Miyamoto (on IGN):

Q: Was it very difficult to do those ports from the N64, and might you be considering doing it again with other N64 titles?

Miyamoto-san: When we switched from the cartridge to disc media, we did it in a way that would make it very similar. In terms of the actual port, it was quite simple. Technically, it's easy to port N64 games, but what types of games would people really want to play and would there be a value there?

Though it's not conclusive, he mentions an port, rather than an emulator. He does however, say that it's easy to do...[/quote]

[yashiro]

It's definetly emulated - you can open the lid, take the disk out and carry on as normal.

I thought that too, so I tested it. Unfortunately its either not all loaded into ram or there is a disk check at certain points.

I popped the lid inside the Temple of Time and went to leave. 'Please shut the bloody door' was the request from the cube.

[Valken]

It's definetly emulated - you can open the lid, take the disk out and carry on as normal.

That doesn't mean that it's emulated though, just that the whole program is resident in memory and isn't dependent on any disc activity. I hope it is emulated though, think of the possibilities for other releases from the N64's back catalogue...

Yes, that's a good point...

Thing is I remember reading *something* *somewhere* and indeed recipher quoted it. I guess my wires were crossed since he does say that it was easy to port N64 titles by design.

[Jason]

I am sure it is emulated. Look at the opening sequence when NAVI flies into the Village, there is a little pause. I have the exact same pause on Project 64 on the PC.

** IDLE SPECULATION** Hey you don't think that the discontinuation of said emulator and the release of this bonus disc is linked?

[hub]

In the opinion of John Pickford it's a port... nintendo obviously have the source code for the games and it wouldn't be that big a deal to compile it for the GC.

[Lyris]

Keep in mind though that the ROM being used (if it's an emulator) has had the copyright date altered and the "Nintendo 64" screen taken off the start.

[Kirby]

Hmmm. I'm still undecided.

If it really is a port surely they could have sped it up? It plays at the same sub 30 FPS speed of the N64 version, and even has slowdown and pauses in the exact same places.

But if it's emulated then it is one seriously hot emulator. Even the PC versions of Project64 aren't anywhere near as accurate as the WW version of OOT. No timing glitches, sound glitches or graphics glitches at all. For all intents and purposes it is the N64 version. Obviously Nintendo have 1000 times more information on the N64 than the PJ64 authors do..but still..

[weresheep]

Errr, what does having a large portion of the game in ram have to do with whether its a port or an emulation?

My guess is that its a port and to make up for the GCs slower loading times they load more of the game into main memory.

Why would Nintendo want and therefore write/buy a N64 emulator?

If it really is a port surely they could have sped it up?

And risk ruining the balance of one of the best ever games. Umm, I don't think so. A little tweek here, a slight change there and, oh, it plays like crap. Nintendo spent a long time make OOT and it turned out pretty good. Why would you want to change anything?

-weresheep

[recipher]

It's a port. My feeling is that the underlying architecture of the GC and the N64 are relatively "similar" and moving the codebase over was relatively simple.

If they had an emulator, they could easily have stuck it on a chip and provided backward compatibility, like the PS2. But who uses that feature (now) ?

[Kirby]

How would changing the framerate from at times a headache inducing 20 odd FPS to a smooth 60FPS alter the gameplay or balance?