Table of contents
We use special emulators that support tools such as savestates and frame advance, and generate movie files from them. These movie files are nothing more than a recording of input. They do not contain images or video. All movie format specifications can be found here.
The list is separated into preferred, accepted, and unaccepted emulators. If you wish to make a movie for submission, you should additionally read the Movie Rules.
For a comprehensive list of supported platforms and their emulators, see the Platforms page.
Emulator overview
See also: Other Emulators.
Supported Operating Systems
Tell us if one of the entries is wrong or if you can resolve one of the "Unknown" ones to a "Yes" or "No". If in doubt, just test it yourself.
| Emulator | Windows | Linux | Mac OS X |
|---|---|---|---|
| BizHawk | Yes | Yes (with Mono)[4] | Yes (1.x; with Mono)[5] |
| Citra | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Dega (altered versions) | Yes | Yes | Unknown |
| DeSmuME | Yes | Yes (with Wine)[6] | Unknown[6] |
| Dolphin | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| DSDA-Doom | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| FCE Ultra | Yes | Unknown | Unknown |
| FCEUX | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| FinalBurnAlpha | Yes | Yes (with Wine) | Unknown |
| Gens | Yes | Yes (with Wine)[7] | Unknown |
| Hourglass[1] | Yes | No | No |
| libTAS[1] | Yes (with WSL2) | Yes | No |
| lsnes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Mednafen-rr | Yes | Yes | Unknown |
| Mupen64-rr | Yes | Yes (with Wine) | Unknown |
| openMSX | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Pcejin | Yes | Unknown | Unknown |
| PCSX | Yes | Unknown | Unknown |
| PSXjin | Yes | Unknown | Unknown |
| Snes9x | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| VisualBoyAdvance | Yes | Yes (with Wine) | Unknown |
| VBjin | Yes | Unknown | Unknown |
| Yabause | Yes | Unknown | Unknown |
Explanation
- "Yes" - The emulator compiles and runs. Limitations are given via annotations (e.g. "Yes (with Wine)") or footnotes.
- "No" - The emulator does not compile or run at all (even with Wine or Mono).
- "Unknown" - It is neither known whether the emulator compiles nor whether it runs at all.
Usage Distribution Over Time
Using Emulators
- Using - Instructions on how to perform common tasks on different emulators. For more specifications, see each emulator's Source Code Repository.
- Platforms - List of all rerecordable platforms and links to emulators and movies
- Platform Resources - Contains knowledge and notes for TASing various platforms using BizHawk cores.
- Platform Framerates - A list of framerates used for each platform to determine movie timing.
- Encoding Guide - Instructions on how to encode movies into high quality multimedia files suitable for easy viewing. (You do not need this for submitting movies.)
Development
- Potential support for single game/series/engine TASing tools - Discussion thread for developers interested in submission support for specific game based TAS movies.
- Recent emulator bug reports - Recent bug reports for the rerecording emulators.
- Desired features - Lists emulator features wished by users and compares the features of different emulators.
- Development - List information about source code projects, how to compile, and how to contribute to emulator development.
- Potential emulators - List of ideas for developers. Lists non-approved open source emulators with links and status of their development.
- TASVideos Requirements - Lists emulator features required by this site.
- Laws Of TAS - Tips on TAS tools implementation.
Accuracy tests
- NES emulator accuracy tests
- Game Boy emulator accuracy tests
- SNES emulator accuracy tests
- Playstation emulator accuracy tests (Archived mirror)
[1] Technically speaking, Hourglass and libTAS are not emulators. They are API translation layers between the game and the operating system, or "rerecording frameworks" as the term dwangoAC uses.
[2] Dolphin versions prior to 4.0-3595 are deprecated and will not be accepted in the future.
[3] Sega Saturn movies in BizHawk must use 2.0 or a higher version of the emulator. Older versions are not accepted.
[4] Most features and cores work, a notable omission being Mupen64Plus (N64). See BizHawk issue #1430 for a more detailed breakdown.
[6] Some tools may not work or look garbled (e.g. Memory viewer) and various (minor or major) bugs may occur. There are native versions, but those don't seem to have rerecording. Alternatively, a Windows virtual machine may be used (though it runs rather slow).
[7] AVI capture may be dysfunctional.
[8]: Mednafen-rr supports all flavors of TurboGrafx/PC-Engine, including CD-ROM, as well as Atari Lynx, Neo Geo Pocket/Color, and WonderSwan/Color. It also supports PC-FX, but only for the Linux version.
TODO: Standardise movie format pages