Welcome to the Emulators thread!
Playstation 2
What is PCSX2?PCSX2 is a Playstation 2 'emulator', a free program that tries to replicate the Playstation 2 console to enable you to play PS2 games on your PC.
Advantages over the Playstation 2 console-Custom resolutions, up to 4096x4096, Anti Aliasing and Texture filtering to make your old PS2 games look better than their HD remakes!
-Unlimited memory cards
-Save states, enabling you to quick save and load practically anywhere in your game
-Easy cheating using our pnach patching system
-Use any controller (PS3,Xbox360 etc) that works on Windows, keyboards and mice
-Increase or decrease the game speed by using the built-in frame-limiter for fast grinding or passing hard spots by slowing them down
-Ability to record in full HD with the built-in video recorder (F12 using the GSdx plugin)
Download:
http://pcsx2.net/download/releases/windows.htmlGetting Started Guide:
http://pcsx2.net/getting-started.htmlPCSX2 is a fantastic emulator that is in its current state, able to play pretty much every PS2 game start to finish without many hiccups. All the PS2's best games are currently 100% playable:; FFX-XII, Shadow of the Colossus, The Metal Gear Series.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Gamecube / Wii
What is Dolphin?Dolphin is an emulator for two recent Nintendo video game consoles: the GameCube and the Wii. It allows PC gamers to enjoy games for these two consoles in full HD (1080p) with several enhancements: compatibility with all PC controllers, turbo speed, networked multiplayer, and even more!
Advantages over the Gamecube / Wii Console:Features of Dolphin include the ability start games regardless of region, record tool-assisted speedruns, and cheating with Action Replay and Gecko codes. Dolphin supports real Wii Remotes via Bluetooth. Its expansions, such as MotionPlus adapter, Nunchuk, Classic controller, Guitar, Drums, and Turntable, are also supported.
Like many other console emulators on PC, Dolphin supports arbitrary resolutions, whereas the GameCube and Wii only support up to 480p. The ability for high resolution graphics has been widely lauded by the gaming community and has received features on numerous gaming networks, as the emulator has surpassed the limits of the original console.
Dolphin can load customized texture maps. These can also be of higher resolution than the original textures. The emulator also has ability to export a game’s textures in order that graphic artists can modify them.
Download:
https://dolphin-emu.org/download/Getting Started Guide:
https://dolphin-emu.org/docs/guides/---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PSP
What is PPSSPP?PPSSPP can run your PSP games on your PC in full HD resolution, and play them on Android too. It can even upscale textures that would otherwise be too blurry as they were made for the small screen of the original PSP.
Even on modern Android phones and tablets, you can often run at double the original resolution.
Advantages over the PSP:-Play in HD resolutions and more
-Play on a tablet for big-screen mobile gaming
-Customize on-screen touch controls or use an external controller or keyboard
-Save and restore game state anywhere, anytime
-Crank up the anisotropic filtering and texture scaling
-Continue where you left off by transferring saves from your real PSP
Download:
http://www.ppsspp.org/downloads.htmlGetting Started Guide:
http://www.ppsspp.org/guides.html---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
3DSCitra
https://citra-emu.org/What is Citra?Citra is a work-in-progress Nintendo 3DS emulator started in early 2014. Citra can currently emulate, with varying degrees of success, a wide variety of different homebrew programs and commercial software. It's currently able to run quite a few games well, though very few can run at full speed on existing hardware, and most titles have sound issues.
Due to its preliminary state, it has not yet had a stable release
Download:
https://citra-emu.org/download/Getting Started Guide:
https://citra-emu.org/wiki/FAQ/----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
RETRO EMULATORS Super Nintendo (SNES)
SNES9Xhttp://www.snes9x.com/What is SNES9X?Snes9x is a portable, freeware Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) emulator. It basically allows you to play most games designed for the SNES and Super Famicom Nintendo game systems on your PC or Workstation; which includes some real gems that were only ever released in Japan.
Download:
http://www.snes9x.com/downloads.php-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sega Mega Drive
Genshttp://www.gens.me/What is GENS?Gens is a Sega Genesis, Sega CD and Sega 32X emulator.
Downloads:
http://www.gens.me/downloads.shtml------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nintendo 64Project 64
What is Project 64?Project64 is an open source, plugin-based Nintendo 64 emulator. Project64 is currently the most compatible N64 emulator, and is a decent choice for emulating many games, both popular and lesser known. It is currently very actively developed, is capable of using a wide variety of plugins, and has a relatively user-friendly interface. However, it presently remains confined to Windows, though work is underway to port it to Android and Linux.
Download:
http://www.pj64-emu.com/downloads/---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Coin Op / Arcade
MAMEWhat is MAME?MAME originally stood for Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator.
MAME's purpose is to preserve decades of software history. As electronic technology continues to rush forward, MAME prevents this important "vintage" software from being lost and forgotten. This is achieved by documenting the hardware and how it functions. The source code to MAME serves as this documentation. The fact that the software is usable serves primarily to validate the accuracy of the documentation (how else can you prove that you have recreated the hardware faithfully?). Over time, MAME absorbed the sister-project MESS (Multi Emulator Super System), so MAME now documents a wide variety of (mostly vintage) computers, video game consoles and calculators, in addition to the arcade video games that were its initial focus.
Download:
http://mamedev.org/Getting Started Guide:
http://docs.mamedev.org/