Emulation is a fickle beast. While some potato computers from the mid-2000s can run select emulators, and therefore ROMs, at a silky smooth 60fps, there are modern consoles in existence that somehow can’t quite run those very same games as well – despite the objectively superior hardware they pack in. Take Nintendo’s Switch Online, which somehow runs Super Mario 64 worse than the Windows XP computers in my old high school library back in 2009. I was a bit of a rebel kid installing emulators on there, looking back on it. Don’t follow my example, kids.
PS Plus or minus ten frames
Sony’s PS Plus service has come under similar fire. A majority of the PS1 games on the platform are presented in the European PAL format, and cap out at 50Hz (that’s 50fps to the layman). This is a whole 20% slower than the NTSC equivalent, and gamers, especially those in Europe who have these versions regardless, have been left feeling shortchanged. It’s a sad day when your PS-frickin’-5 struggles to get Ape Escape going at a non-nauseating framerate. But fear not! Sony have acknowledged the problem, and they’re on their way with a fix.
Per Video Games Chronicle, the company have posted a Tweet “via its PlayStation Europe account claiming that it’s working on the ability to switch to the NTSC versions of each game, but no date for this has been given.” Ah, ambiguity. The eternal friend of corporate evasion. “We’re planning to roll out NTSC options for a majority of classic games offered on the PlayStation Plus Premium and Deluxe plan in Asia, Europe, Middle East, India, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand regions,” it said.
In fairness, the rollout has already begun in some NTSC territories, so hopefully it won’t be too long til everyone the world over is enjoying their decades-old video games running at an acceptable speed on their exorbitant hardware. Or, y’know, pop over to my school library. The librarian was a nice lady. She’ll let you in. Give ‘er my name.
How do you feel about this framerate update? Let us know!
Via, Video Games Chronicle.
