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PlayStation (Games) Entertainment Games

Sony Hiring Emulation Experts? 59

Posted by simoniker from the emulate-surprise-and-shock dept.
Thanks to TotalVideoGames for their article indicating that Sony are hiring an 'Emulator Development Engineer' on their Japanese website. According to TVG, the move "..fuels speculation that the PlayStation 3 will indeed run PSOne and PlayStation 2 titles", though it could equally be for the handheld PSP or, well, a red herring. But the site still boldly claims: "It's an ironic situation however and re-ignites the debate between Bleem! and Sony; for those who missed out on the multi-million dollar law-suit, Sony successfully muscled Bleem! from the market for selling emulated PSOne titles for the Dreamcast."
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Sony Hiring Emulation Experts? More

Sony Hiring Emulation Experts?

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  • It wasn't all Sony (Score:5, Interesting)

    by zaad ( 255863 ) on Wednesday July 16, 2003 @11:48AM (#6453637)
    Bleem did as much to kill themselves as anything Sony could have done. First they were late on their shipping date for something like a year. Then instead of releasing a single disc that could be used for all games, they released four separate discs that were tweaked for only certain titles, etc.

    And this is not to mention that the controllers weren't compatible (two analog sticks on the Sony, only one on the Dreamcast).

    It all became such a pain in the ass, that it was simply easier to pick up a PSX1 on the cheap if you really wanted to play PSX1 games.

    • Re:It wasn't all Sony (Score:5, Insightful)

      by aleonard ( 468340 ) on Wednesday July 16, 2003 @11:51AM (#6453660)
      Well, Bleemcast had one perk - so far as I know, the graphics were better on Bleemcast than on a PS2 running a PS1 game. Sony was probably just sour that someone might *gasp* provide a better experience than them, without interfering with their product at all.
    • Seemed to me that Bleem! always sucked. I never did the "dreamcast bleem", but I tried it out on PC. I got rid of it after going through horrible 1 fps lag on a 500MHz Athlon with NV Tnt2. Even the PSXEum was better than that steaming pile of crap.

      And they wanted 50$ for it. Sad.

      • Re:It wasn't all Sony (Score:2, Interesting)

        by Nonki ( 682234 )
        In my experience, BLEEM! wasn't all that bad...except for it costing so much. It actually ran Final Fantasy VIII better than the offical PC demo on my machine. That is sad. This was on the full version of bleem though, it had better hardware support and ran faster, not like I paid for it or anything... But now ePSXe is way better than bleem ever was.

    • Re:It wasn't all Sony (Score:4, Informative)

      by ronfar ( 52216 ) on Wednesday July 16, 2003 @12:19PM (#6453918) Journal
      Without Bleem! my expensive import copy of Rockman 3 for the Playstation was just an overpriced coaster. Sure, I would have preferred to play it on my modded Playstation, but I would've had to re-mod it with a "stealth" modchip. (Or pirate the game...)

      Bleem! for the Dreamcast works well, it would have to considering the way they decided to sell it (one "Bleemcast" disk per Playstation game, I only have the one for Tekken III).

      But there is a key point here, Sony wasn't just killing Bleem! (I sincerely believe they could've stayed afloat if they hadn't had legal bills), they were killing the idea of commercially viable emulators (they also went after Virtual Game Station). Remember, Bleem! played any disk that would work in a modded Playstation. Later they regretted not adding "pirate" detection, I think, because they put it in the Dreamcast version.

      At that time Sony wasn't really cracking down on the modchip market, I think they were terrified (unjustifiably so) by the implications of Bleemcast.

    • A single disk to include all games, while awesome, would have delayed the project until right about now (considering that's how long it took most of the other projects to get to the level they're at). They did what they could under tremendous legal pressure and not nearly enough funds. Personally, I've got Bleemcast for MGS and I've gotta say, it looks quite a bit better. The controls aren't awkward (if you're decent with the DC controller) and it's not that hard to do a simple disk swap at the beginning

    • Re:It wasn't all Sony (Score:3, Informative)

      by Guppy06 ( 410832 )
      "Then instead of releasing a single disc that could be used for all games, they released four separate discs that were tweaked for only certain titles, etc."

      "And this is not to mention that the controllers weren't compatible (two analog sticks on the Sony, only one on the Dreamcast)."

      You do realize that Bleem! came out for the PC long before "Bleemcast" came out, right? And that said disk played most PSX games and let you use any PC controller you wanted, right?

  • Why not? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by CashCarSTAR ( 548853 ) on Wednesday July 16, 2003 @11:52AM (#6453670)
    Seriously. Although I don't think it's so much necessary for the Playstation, to be honest, but I want emulators in my games. I've said this before and I'll say this again.

    I want classic games included with newer ones.

    This is something for the GameCube, of course, considering how Nintendo has the only straight-through hardware chain left these days.

    In my dream world, every big new release would come with 3-4 old classic releases. They can even reuse them, I don't care. License the SMS and Genesis technology from Sega, and have Sega include their old games in their games. Old game-boy games, 8-bit and 16-bit games, would be great to see.

    Would I be more apt to purchase a borderline game (as it is, I only buy the best) if it had a classic game I wanted to play? Of course I would. And considering if they could make a common emulator program, the costs would be low.

    Even better would be if the system had a small amount of storage media to store roms you wanted to keep to both save games and ROMS so you didn't have to jump between discs...but I think that's asking TOO much.
    • Both of these games have an NES emulator on the game disks.

      Animal Crossing can play a bunch of NES games through itself and the e-Reader adaptor for the GBA.

      Metroid Prime just has the original Metroid on the game disk that needs to be unlocked by beating Metroid Fusion on the GBA and linking the games (or getting the cheat disk which allows you to unlock it without a GBA, link cable, and Metroid Fusion).

      IIRC, Sonic Mega Collection has a Genesis emulator on it to play the Genesis Sonic games it comes w

    • The *FIRST* application for Sony to be getting running on any new games systems should be an emulator.

      If the new box can't emulate the old box in hardware, its not good enough.

      That said, I believe that Sony have woken up to the fact - as have many, namely Microsoft and Apple - that hardware emulation has its place in the modern computer software development field, where obsolescence happens faster than pubescence.

      Emulation is a total solution to hardware market re-definition, and not only that: its a pre

    • Re:Why not? (Score:3, Interesting)

      by RzUpAnmsCwrds ( 262647 )
      Look at Legend of Zelda: Wind Walker. It came with a free disc containing an N64 emulator that runs on the 'Cube and a copy of Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.
      • Actually they ported the games to cube, infact some magazines and I think maybe a website or two compared it to the N64 version and the Cube version looked a bit better.

  • Backward Compatibility aka Console Lock-in (Score:5, Interesting)

    by jvmatthe ( 116058 ) on Wednesday July 16, 2003 @11:57AM (#6453720) Homepage
    In the console and handheld department, the two systems that are dominating are also two that have backward compatibility: Sony's PS2 and Nintendo's GBA. While many people don't consider it a killer feature on the PS2, I think it's fairly important to the GBA.

    What's more important, long term, is that once you've got a customer you're much more likely to keep that customer if you can guarantee that new hardware, especially hardware that enable better games, will still play the old games the customer has already paid for. Just like the old lament here about Microsoft lock-in for its software: once you've bought in, it becomes harder to rationalize switching to another system.

    This was Nintendo's trick, but they resisted using it in the console world. Sony, through the happy accident that a small component of the PS2 is the main part of a PSX, found out that it works just as well in the console world as it has for Nintendo's handhelds. Nintendo, meanwhile, still seems to be chasing the dream of cross-system functionality, the Super GameBoy, GBA Player for the GameCube, and GBA/GC connectivity being the prime examples. Each of these is a nice trick for people already in the Nintendo fold, but not one of these has set the world on fire and drawn new customers by the millions.

    If Sony can pull it off, telling everyone that the PS3 will allow them to keep all their PS2 and PSX games while offering a great platform for new games, then I think they'll have a leg up. I wouldn't be surprised to see the Xbox2 doing the same thing, since it will be more like a PC upgrade than the PS3 would be. As for the Cube and the next Nintendo platform, who knows?

    The real question, of course, is whether the PSP will turn out to play PSX games in some way. If it does, then perhaps the Sony handheld is an attempt to cut into the handheld market by using a library of software developed on a console. That'd be a neat trick. And, in the sense that the GBA titles are ripping from the SNES library, is another interesting example of Sony using an idea already in use by Nintendo.

    I'm not trying to make Sony out to be super-clever here, just trying to point out that some of the things Sony is doing (and that Microsoft may eventually do) are ideas that Nintendo has been using, in some form or another. Coincidence or not, I felt it was worth explaining.

    • It's HIGHLY doubtful that the PSP will play PSX games right out of the box - the form factor for CDs is too big. People are already used to very small MP3 players, the small GBA SP, etc. I think the PSP will be using the Minidisc form factor, if not the disc format itself outright.

      Having said that, it might be possible for the PSP to play PSX games with an add-on - perhaps a cd-player like attachment. Klunky but hey, if you want to play your old, old, old PS1 games on your PSP...

      Also, how important is bac
      • ...How many of you out there are *actually* playing your PS1 games on your PS2???

        Me? I am but one, but I will speak for those with no voice. Or something.

        I play Vagrant Story, Jarrett & Labonte SCR and GT1 (Japanese) on my American and Japanese PS2's. And DDR. Mustn't forget 3rd Mix, 5th Mix, Konamix, etc...

        The only reason I didn't find Ken Kutaragi and throw Ridge Racer V at him for launching the PS2 with such a suck library is that I could entertain myself with my then-unfinished PS1 games.

        Si

    • Re:Backward Compatibility aka Console Lock-in (Score:4)

      by dogbowl ( 75870 ) on Wednesday July 16, 2003 @12:36PM (#6454094) Homepage
      You act as if backwards compatibility is something new. It was done years and years ago on some of the first consoles to be released ... and its not always a sure fire winner. The 7800 didn't exaclty wow the market because it could play 2600 cartidges.

      What I'd like to see again is the equivalent of the Colecovision 2600 adapter. Can you image if someone released a boot disk for the xbox that allowed it to play all PS2 disk flawlessly?!
      There'd be anarchy in the streets I tell ya!

    • Nomad (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Nonki ( 682234 )
      If it does, then perhaps the Sony handheld is an attempt to cut into the handheld market by using a library of software developed on a console. That'd be a neat trick. And, in the sense that the GBA titles are ripping from the SNES library, is another interesting example of Sony using an idea already in use by Nintendo.

      Sega did this a long time ago. They made a handheld called the Nomad [retrofaction.com] that played regular genesis carts. You can even use a genesis A/V cable to play on the tv like that new gamecbe addon,
      • The Nomad was a mixed bag. It has a beautiful screen but didn't run well on batteries and was honking huge compared to other handhelds and cost too much. I love the machine itself (I, too, have one) but I never really considered it a valid attempt to crack into the handheld market. YMMV.
        • I just used the rechargable game gear battery pack, alot more cost efficent and you didn't need the 6 battery attachment, but it meant having a wire going to the ni-cad. But if you compare it to the GBA SP, there are still things the Nomad has that it doesn't -- headphones (without a crazy ac/headphone port adapter), a/v out, and a real backlight, this is 7 years later, GBA should have these features. Maybe Nintendo's monopoly over the handheld market has made them somewhat careless. I'm glad to see Sony
    • "Sony's PS2 and Nintendo's GBA. While many people don't consider it a killer feature on the PS2, I think it's fairly important to the GBA."

      You bring up the PS2 and GBA, I'll bring up the Genesis and Game Gear. Both were backwards compatible with the Sega Master System, and both got trounced by Nintendo's competing products.

      And what was the PSX backwards compatible with?
      • The GBA and PS2 are backward compatible with prior systems out of the box. Not true of either the Genesis (required Power Base Converter, IIRC) or the Master System (also required an add-on, IIRC). The PBC was offered bundled with some early Genesis systems, but the installed base of SMS owners wasn't big enough to do anything for Sega's fortunes. (Yes, in Europe and South America, it had more of a following. Those were not dominant markets at that point.) In short, your attempt at a prior example of the ty
    • I've never understood the importance. I have a PS2 and even kept a few PS1 games. But if I buy a PS3, I will still have the PS2, so I really don't give a crap if the PS3 will play PS2 games.

  • Bleem! (Score:5, Informative)

    by ronfar ( 52216 ) on Wednesday July 16, 2003 @12:08PM (#6453834) Journal
    Bleem! also marketed a commercial PC emulator that ran most PSOne games, and they never lost any of their court cases. Sony "muscled" them by running up their legal bills, something that a tiny company like Bleem! couldn't afford.

  • Probably not for backwards compatability... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ryants ( 310088 ) on Wednesday July 16, 2003 @12:22PM (#6453939)
    ... and more likely for building a PS3 emulator to get into the hands of developers before the actual hardware is ready.
    • ...more likely for building a PS3 emulator to get into the hands of developers before the actual hardware is ready.

      Given that the PSOne still out-sells the XBox in Japan (something like 3 to 1!), Sony would be pretty retarded to not put PSOne and PS2 compatibility into the PS3. By the time the PS3 releases, they could probably put the PS1 and the PS2 onto one chip that shares the PS3's DVD input and graphics output. Even if the compatibility adds $10 per console, they can turn around and say "The PS3: 1
      • "The PS3: 1543.2 games available from day one!" No other console maker could compete with a statement like that.

        Well, there is one company who can compete with that. It seems the Phantom [infiniumlabs.com] will have upwards of 32,000 games at launch!

        Infinium continue introducing the 'Phantom', claiming that there are currently 32,679 retail game titles available and 418 shareware game titles not including; adult, casino, sequels and new releases of the past 6 months. [ferrago.co.uk]

        That is, if there ever actually IS a launch.
      • "The PS3: 1543.2 games available from day one!" No other console maker could compete with a statement like that.

        Except the gameboy.
      • Sony would be pretty retarded to not put PSOne and PS2 compatibility into the PS3.
        Well, yes, but, Sony would be more retarded to not expend effort to get developers good and ready for making PS3 games by launch first, and then worry about backwards compatability later. Especially given the rumours of the complexity of the PS3.

        Not very many people are going to buy a PS3 just so they can keep on playing their PS2 games... it will all be about the PS3 titles at launch.

        • ...it will all be about the PS3 titles at launch.

          This is true for magazine reviews and marketing, but, to the pragmatic consumer, being able to buy PS2 games for $10 at a flea market will be very good.

          For example, I am one of the people who has a very hard time justifying $50 for a brand new game, so I wait until it drops to $30, $20, or $15 before buying it. $50 is really only the fair market value for teenagers and hard-core enthusiasts. In fact, there was a while, where I had more PSOne games than
          • where the PS2 discs are proprietary but don't require registration or master-server checkups.

            PS2 discs are just regular DVDs and CDs, they work in most normal DVD-ROM drives. XBOX (reads from outer edge > in) and Gamecube (mini) do have thier own discs though. Also I don't know of any console that requires registration or anything like that.
            • PS2 discs are just regular DVDs and CDs, they work in most normal DVD-ROM drives.

              I thought the format was proprietary, but perhaps they are more open than I thought.

              Also I don't know of any console that requires registration or anything like that.

              It seems some are being proposed or developed. That Phantom console probably gives the BSA and RIAA a hard-on with its central control features. Also, some on-line gaming features, such as those for XBox, appear to be centrally-controlled access points for
              • I thought the format was proprietary, but perhaps they are more open than I thought.

                Yeah, they're just regular DVDs and CDs. It's handy if you like to rip soundtracks to listen to them outside the game, or you want to get into Action Replay hacking.

                The only odd one I've come across is Primal. I put it in my DVD-ROM drive, and I just see a handful of files. I assume it has the rest on another data track.
      • they can turn around and say "The PS3: 1543.2 games available from day one!" No other console maker could compete with a statement like that.

        Assuming the idea works well enough and Nintendo includes both gamecube backwards compatibility and maybe have something like the Gameboy Player included in their next console, they could actually say "2000+ games available from day 1" (2000 since it'll still be a few years and with all the junk GBA titles that come out a year, it'll have some more games.

        Some of th
  • And this article [ps3insider.com] says that the PS3 won't be backwards compatible. Trying to discern what Sony is up to with the PS3 from who they hire and don't hire is a little like reading tea leaves. I think we're just going to have to wait it out, although people are going to speculate.

    Another point I might bring up is that, and maybe I'm just alone in this, but I don't play my old PS1 games anymore so I would have no need for that type of backwards compatibility. Of course, I play a lot of sports games so that might b

  • Maybe if they do a good job emulating the PS2 on the PS3, the emulated PS2 could emulate the PS1 since it's built in already!
    • The PS2 emulates the PS1, because the entire PS1 (on a chip) is included within the PS2, to do the sound. It is not a software emulation.
      • Exactly, so if you emulate the PS2's hardware fully on the PS3 (through software most likely, don't see them including the cpu/graphics emotion engine chip in the PS3 for anything other than emulation) then PS1 emulation would naturally come with it, since the PS1 emulation is part of the PS2's architecture and would need to be included to work properly. All this is granted they emulate the PS2's hardware, and don't just use a wrapper to interperet commands. Anyways, the point is that because it is not so
      • Correction, the PSOne chip is the I/O Controller.
  • Well, instead of PSOne and PS/2 games on a PS/3 (that's pretty much a given) maybe Sony wants the emulation so they can emulate a PS/3 using already existing hardware?

    I mean, Sony could want to get as many bugs and issues identified as soon as possible before go and start finalizing the hardware designs and making a bunch of prototypes. I imagine being able to emulate a PS/3 on existing X86 desktops or other already easily accessible existing hardware would be useful, especially OS developers.

    • There have been articles speculating that the PS3 will be backwards compatible with PS2 games but not with PS1 games, so I guess it's not as much of a given as you think. Just do a google search for PS3 backwards compatible and you should get the news articles I am talking about.

  • SHOCKING!!! (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    To think that Sony would try to incorporate something in their next generation system that was key benefactor to the success of the PS2. If anybody doubted that the PS3 would be at least partly backwards compatible they have been smoking too much crack. Backwards compatability sells systems.

    Remember in soviet russia PS2 plays you.

  • Point of Order... (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Thedalek ( 473015 )
    Bleem LLC -never- sold emulated PSOne titles for Dreamcast. Bleem sold an emulator, and you still had to get the game elsewhere. Since Sony's complaint with Bleem was that it used copyrighted code to check for original discs, Bleem simply made their emulator capable of running CD-rs as well.

    Had Sony bought out Bleem, it probably would have been cheaper for both parties, and more than likely would have been more than a little profitable.

  • People seem to forget... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by LionMage ( 318500 ) on Wednesday July 16, 2003 @04:07PM (#6456104) Homepage
    ...that Bleem! wasn't the only commercial emulator for the PlayStation out there. (And Bleem! existed for platforms other than the Dreamcast, too. As another poster noted, Bleem! was available first as a software package for the PC, and worked quite well.)

    The other commercial emulator besides Bleem! was none other than Connectix's excellent Virtual Game Station, which was cross platform. Virtual Game Station was first demonstrated and sold on the Power Macintosh, then ported to Windows. Sony had more success hassling Connectix legally (many speculated that Bleem! did a better job doing a clean room reverse engineering job on the PlayStation), but ultimately what killed VGS was Sony settling out of court with Connectix. Part of the settlement was that Sony got the rights to VGS, and Connectix stopped selling the product themselves.

    Sony made vague rumblings about updating VGS and bringing a better version to market, but really all they were interested in doing was sitting on it.

    Sony did everything they could to kill PlayStation emulation, but all they succeeded in doing was driving the emulator writers underground and promoting OpenSource solutions; the proprietary commercial offerings from Bleem! and Connectix were squashed through legal pressure and back room deals.

    Is anyone else suspicious of Sony now trying to hire emulator writers? I wonder if this is a honeypot to entrap emulator coders and rake them over the coals (legally speaking)?
  • Sony has already stated that the PS3 will be backward compatible with the PS2, but not the PSOne. Perhaps they are changing their stance and looking for a way to emulate the PSOne in software.

  • Actually (Score:3, Interesting)

    by xenocide2 ( 231786 ) on Wednesday July 16, 2003 @09:57PM (#6458338) Homepage
    The number one utility of emulation as far as Sony's concerned is software development. If I recall correctly, the devkit Advance contained an emulator (tied to a hardware dongle). This can be especially useful when the hardware isn't fully available, tested, or produced. Its simple to write a correct emulator; whats difficult is writing one thats fast and efficient. But for locating serious bugs an emulator can often suffice during early testing.
  • I really hope Sony hires the author of Bleem... he's already proven he can do the job!

    Hiring him (Randy Linden) would do good toward restoring some of Sony's goodwill in the gamer community that they lost while harassing him earlier. Now that Sony seems to have a true need for emulation, they should let this guy do what he's good at!

  • ... if slightly less exciting.

    A ex-colleague of mine (now a PS/2 programmer) mentioned that he expected Sony to release an emulator for Vector Unit code, to allow standard debuggers to be used on VU code. Apparently there is no debuging capability in the VU architecture.

    Could be way out on this, he wasn't completely sober at the time.....
  • From the "what if?" department:

    If they indeed are writing an emulation layer for the upcomming playstation 3 - the step to providing support for virtual machine based platforms becomes a lot easier...

    I guess some companies are quite happy with this (as they have bet a lot on this virtual machine architecture), and one company which probably won't get their virtual machine platform supported (but that company got their own gaming console anyway ;).

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