Emulation has unlocked many classic systems for a whole new generation of players, and devices such as handhelds, micro-consoles, Nintendo Switch, emulation boxes and MiSTer FPGA have made connecting with the past easier than ever before.
However, it's wrong to blindly assume that all platforms are emulated equally based purely on their age.
For example, PS1 emulation is in a really good place these days, offering accurate performance and bonus features such as upscaled visuals. Likewise, Dreamcast emulation is robust even on lower-level devices thanks to the console's PC-like architecture.
However, the N64 – which launched a few years before the Dreamcast – is still a hit-and-miss affair, and Modern Vintage Gamer has released a new video that explores why that is the case.
N64 emulation today is plagued with legacy problems which can be traced all the way back to the dawn of the console's emulation story. Back in the early 2000s, PCs simply weren't powerful enough to reproduce the N64's performance correctly, so developers had to resort to using 'plug-ins' to improve things.
This was often done on a game-by-game basis, so while the big hitters in the console's library reached good levels of performance, more obscure games suffered.
Even today, many of these legacy problems are present when playing on modern hardware – hardware which should be powerful enough to provide accurate N64 emulation. Even Nintendo's N64 emulator on Switch has issues with timing and overall accuracy, although, as Modern Vintage Gamer notes, you'll probably only notice if you're compared directly with the real thing.
The conclusion is that N64 emulation needs a real shake-up in order to eradicate the issues of the past, with a new emulation solution required that faithfully replicates all of the console's architecture without using plug-ins to paper over the cracks.
Even FPGA options – such as MiSTer FPGA and the forthcoming Analogue 3D – are unlikely to offer a totally accurate degree of performance, says Modern Vintage Gamer.
What do you make of the state of N64 emulation currently? Let us know with a comment.