HomePSPHomebrew EmulatorsgpSP: GBA Emulator Updated to v0.6

gpSP: GBA Emulator Updated to v0.6

GBAThe latest version of Exophase‘s gpSP GBA emulator for the PSP is now out for download.

gpSP v0.6 is still a beta release, so “watch out for new bugs,” says Exophase. This new version still manages to fix a couple of bugs from the initial release, and offers a few new features, and adds new games to the game_config.txt file. New to this update are (taken from the Readme file):

Bug fixes

  • Fixed a nasty bug that shouldn’t have made it into the initial release; a lot of games that TECM.. erm.. crash won’t anymore. NOTE: This doesn’t mean that no game will ever crash, freeze, otherwise not work.
  • Fixed some crashes in the GUI and the ability to “go up” past ms0:/PSP. Made the “go up” button square like it was supposed to be (instead of cross).

Feature additions

  • There’s now a menu that you can access, by default press right while holding down triangle for the frameskip bar.
  • Menu option: resize screen aspect ratio, the default is now “scaled 3:2” which makes it look more like a normal GBA. You can use “fullscreen” (what it was like before) or “unscaled 3:2” (tiny but pixel for pixel like a GBA)
  • Menu option: You can now load new games while the current one is running.
  • Menu option: You can now restart the currently running game.
  • Menu option: Frameskip variation – this defaults to “uniform” whereas it defaulted to “random” last release. Basically, turn it on random if you find that frameskip causes flickering animations to make things disappear. Other than that it will generally look better on uniform.
  • GUI and file loading now have “auto repeat” on the buttons so they’re not such a pain to navigate.

Download: [gpSP v0.6 GBA emulator for the PSP binary file]
Download: [gpSP v0.6 GBA emulator for the PSP source file]
Discuss: [gpSP v0.6 Forum Release Thread]

Read on for the full changelog.

GBAThe latest version of Exophase‘s gpSP GBA emulator for the PSP is now out for download.

gpSP v0.6 is still a beta release, so “watch out for new bugs,” says Exophase. This new version still manages to fix a couple of bugs from the initial release, and offers a few new features, and adds new games to the game_config.txt file. New to this update are (taken from the Readme file):

Bug fixes

  • Fixed a nasty bug that shouldn’t have made it into the initial release; a lot of games that TECM.. erm.. crash won’t anymore. NOTE: This doesn’t mean that no game will ever crash, freeze, otherwise not work.
  • Fixed some crashes in the GUI and the ability to “go up” past ms0:/PSP. Made the “go up” button square like it was supposed to be (instead of cross).

Feature additions

  • There’s now a menu that you can access, by default press right while holding down triangle for the frameskip bar.
  • Menu option: resize screen aspect ratio, the default is now “scaled 3:2” which makes it look more like a normal GBA. You can use “fullscreen” (what it was like before) or “unscaled 3:2” (tiny but pixel for pixel like a GBA)
  • Menu option: You can now load new games while the current one is running.
  • Menu option: You can now restart the currently running game.
  • Menu option: Frameskip variation – this defaults to “uniform” whereas it defaulted to “random” last release. Basically, turn it on random if you find that frameskip causes flickering animations to make things disappear. Other than that it will generally look better on uniform.
  • GUI and file loading now have “auto repeat” on the buttons so they’re not such a pain to navigate.
  • Menu option: Added support for 128KB flash ROM, some games require it (Pokemon Firered/Leaf Green, Super Mario Advance 4), turn it on before running the game to make sure it works. NOTE: There are some versions of these ROMs that have been hacked to get around their 128KB flash, and may not even work properly at all. Look out for them, these games should save 128KB save files after you set the setting to it, IF they use 128KB flash.
  • Menu option: Added ability to make the .sav files only update when you exit the emulator, use with extreme caution (in other words, it’s not a good idea to use something like this in beta quality software if you care about your saves). Does NOT update if you exit through the home button, don’t use the home button if you can help it.
  • Zip support thanks to SiberianSTAR. It will load the first file with the extension .gba or .bin that it finds.
  • Menu options are saved to gpsp.cfg. Note that it does not save frameskip options or flash ROM options because these are very per game particular.
  • The emulator will now try to save backup files to something more matching the backup size than a fixed 64KB.

Optimization

  • Loading ROMs and the auto save of the .sav files is MUCH faster now. Thanks for the heads up on how to improve this from pollux!
  • While coding for the screen resize code I found that SDL just wasn’t cutting it and had to code for the GU myself. Turns out the new code is faster (but because it is render code any improvement will be diminished to nothing as frameskip is increased). Special thanks to Zx-81 for the tips on this one and for his GU code in the PSPVBA source as an example.
  • Added some games to game_config.txt. Note that not all versions of these ROMs will work with these options, try to use the USA version if possible.

Games in the new game_config.txt file (from game_config.txt file):

  • Castlevania: Circle of the Moon (U)
  • Megaman Battle Network (U)
  • Megaman Zero (U/E)
  • Megaman Zero 2 (U)
  • Megaman Zero 3 (U)
  • Megaman Zero 4 (U)
  • Kirby: Nightmare in Dreamland (U)
  • Super Mario Advance (U)
  • Super Mario Advance 2 (U)
  • Super Mario Advance 3 (U)
  • Super Mario Advance 4 (U)
  • Advance Wars (U) (This one was really annoying to find, I hope it’s okay.. there might be a better one somewhere)
  • Pokemon Emerald (U) (I don’t know why this has an idle loop when Ruby doesn’t….)
  • V-Rally 3 (E)
  • Mario Vs Donkey Kong (U)
  • Pokemon: Fire Red (U) (as well as European version; see the game_config.txt file for details)
  • Pokemon: Leaf Green (U) (as well as European version; see the game_config.txt file for details)

You guys know the drill: standard warnings still apply when you download, don’t forget to read the Readme.txt file for the full details and instructions on how to upload to your PSP and get this program running. Any bugs you find, we have the comments page below and the gpSP 0.6 forums hotlinked at the end of this article.

Download: [gpSP v0.6 GBA emulator for the PSP binary file]
Download: [gpSP v0.6 GBA emulator for the PSP source file]
Discuss: [gpSP v0.6 Forum Release Thread]

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