Emulation vs hardware, talk some about your thoughts.
Emulation has been a viable thing for playing games for decades now, however in the eyes of some it enjoys a "lesser" status than the custom designed hardware things were originally made for, others still go for the opposite and consider the hardware often the inferior way. In the future this might be unarguably rendered moot by computers having programmable hardware that can quite literally recreate the original or approaches that software emulate from the transistors on up.
There are certainly fairly clear cut cases where emulation accuracy falls short and impacts a game, as well as more esoteric concerns. It should also be noted that transistors might not need to be the only things emulated.
To take it to a slightly different concept though we should first talk about vinyl records, here you would often hear many expounding the virtues of the format with phrases like "it is warmer", "it sounds better" and similar such things. Some of this might have a basis in limitations and mastering, though we spare bringing the loudness wars to our fair site, but in the end if any sample of sound can be described by a series of sine waves and thus are maths which can be modified. If computer games are quite literally a set of fixed computer rules, aka straight up maths...
Alternatively some argue that a kind of irrational nostalgia exists wherein the fiddling with gunk on contacts and scents of 30 year old fire retardant chemicals and plasticisers are necessary. It is an effect previously seen in books when computerised versions of those were on the rise, for those now considering the obvious then we hold no claim to that business idea.
Others take a different tack and argue the prevalence of cheats, filters, savestates, turbo buttons, et al, all perks for many when considering emulation, mean you are not playing the same game as the original people. From a game theory perspective this is quite accurate but one then never stops drawing increasingly unhelpful lines -- did playing with the sound off to prevent frustration in my parents which did not appreciate chip tunes, thus not appreciating the sound design or talespin on the NES at all points, mean I played a different game? Ask a video engineer what NTSC stands for and they may quip "never the same colour", and we have all seen what subtle colour changes can do to a design.
On the other hand what does someone's potential lack of self control have to do with your play?
Similarly if one played a later port, different region version with changes or so forth does that count as having played the game? Do the developers/publishers have some kind of vision or claim that gets perverted? What if you played a game steaming drunk one day?
This is part of a series on GBAtemp where we consider game design, aspects of play and game industry concepts. Previously we discussed a favoured game style that might have become less common in recent times. Earlier editions still saw skills one might have learned or honed because of a game, games on the PS4 and Xbone that will stand the test of time, games that got better after launch, cancelled games and shuttered devs, and story canon in games.
This is somewhat less involved than previous topics, though no less controversial at times.
You are invited to post your thoughts on the matter.
