Gens/GS

[SonicEpsilon]

I've been asked by the creator of this version of Gens to post it here, since you guys are still stuck with the official Linux port, Gens/GS is superior than the official Linux port. The main goal of Gens/GS is to clean up the source code and combine features from various forks of Gens.

Features of Gens/GS:
* 7z support added
* Screenshots saved in PNG format
* Real 32-bit colour rendering
* Many more

For more information about Gens/GS along with downloads, check the article on the Sonic Retro Wiki: http://info.sonicretro.org/Gens/GS

The next version of Gens/GS will include packages for Ubuntu 8.04 & 8.10. For now, you'll have to build from source.

[megamaced]

Why fork Gens? Hasn't it been forked enough??

Would make much more sense if the author contacted me so he could upload his changes to cvs....

I've made a quick debian package of this anyway, because people deserve a better Gens, and theres no doubt that the changes here are good.

package here: http://www.zshare.net/download/20609146abf66343/

[GerbilSoft]

Hi,

I created Gens/GS because I was sick of the current state of Gens/Linux (2.15.2 at the time). However, I didn't attempt to submit it upstream because I've done massive code overhauls, not just feature additions. For one, I'm working on converting most of the program to use C++ classes and proper abstraction instead of scattering things all over the codebase. Also, I'm converting the x86 assembly language code to C/C++, so Gens will eventually be ported to other architectures. (I have a G4 Cube that wants a decent Genesis emulator. )

Finally - and this is the biggest change - I'm integrating cross-platform support into a single codebase. That is, I'm adding a Win32 UI using the native Win32 APIs instead of GTK+ and SDL. With the appropriate cross-compiler setup, you can build both the Linux version and the Win32 version on the same machine from the same codebase. I also plan on writing a native Cocoa UI for MacOS X (Intel at first) later on. The Windows integration is almost done, and will be part of the next release (m5).

[disturbedite]

OMG! this is awesome!

i really liked gens32 on windows, the best genesis/md emulator there is/was imo on windows. i remember begging him to port it to linux but i don't think he ever got around to it.

it would be awesome to see some of those options in gens32 find their way to this new gens fork...
(you could consider that a feature request. )

[wingnux]

7zip support? YAY!!!

Thanks for the deb megamaced =)

[GerbilSoft]

Just a note in case anyone has problems opening 7z files: 7-zip support requires that you have p7zip installed. p7zip's available in the Ubuntu repositories. (I used a hackish method of calling out to the /usr/bin/7z binary to extract ROMs instead of using a library, since I couldn't find a decent 7z library.)

Gens/GS currently doesn't show an error message if the 7z binary isn't found. I will add one for m5.

disturbedite: Which features from Gens32 would you like to see in Gens/GS?

[BigSilly]

Thanks for the package megamaced, and thanks for your hard work on this GerbilSoft. I'm thrilled to bits that Gens is continuing to improve.

I've just installed the .deb above, but I'm losing my render when I select full screen. Is there a way to fix this? I use scale2X. Thanks all.

[megamaced]

If you installed the Gens Debian package and your Gens launcher is missing the Gens icon, just download the package again. I've fixed it.

I've noticed this Gens doesn't use 50% CPU when idle like official Gens. It actually sleeps when idle, which is good..

Another positive is that you've managed to create a consistent GUI. The OK, Save and Close buttons are all the same.

[GerbilSoft]

I've just installed the .deb above, but I'm losing my render when I select full screen. Is there a way to fix this? I use scale2X. Thanks all.

The original Windows Gens had separate render modes for windowed and fullscreen. I reimplemented this in the Linux version; however, since there's no right-click menu, it's not too simple to figure it out. You can press F11 and F12 to cycle through the renderers, but if you're using 32bpp, it might not let you get to Scale2x. (I plan on fixing this for m5.)

A quick workaround is to open ~/.gens/gens.cfg and copy the value for "Render Windowed" to "Render Fullscreen".

Another positive is that you've managed to create a consistent GUI. The OK, Save and Close buttons are all the same.

That was one of the main reasons why I started my fork in the first place. The UI is completely rewritten using GTK+'s C API (i.e. without Glade). Also, I split each window into separate files to make maintenance a bit easier.

Also, here's an additional list of features in Gens/GS m4.2, in no particular order:

• Multi-file archive support. If you select a ZIP or 7z archive that contains multiple files, it will prompt you to select which file to open. Note that this will show up even if there's only one ROM file in the archive, and the other files are just text or images. I plan on fixing this eventually.
• Screenshots are saved without applying a renderer. (Fast blur does get applied though, but I will fix this later on.)
• Border color emulation. (Currently SDL rendering only, and the border color is not affected by the renderer.)
• SegaCD savestate support, ported from Gens Rerecording.
• Re-enabled the built-in debugger and ported several features from Gens Rerecording.
• Extra spaces in game names are removed when the name is placed in the title bar. This is most noticeable in Sonic games, where the internal header says something like "SONIC THE [blank spaces] HEDGEHOG".
• OpenGL, PNG, ZLib, physical CD-ROM, and x86 asm renderers are all conditionally selectable in the configure script. (They default to Enabled.)
• The video, audio, and input layers were rewritten using C++ classes.

Not-so-comprehensive list of changes in the upcoming m5 release:

• Windows support. The same codebase can be used to build either a Windows version or a Linux version. Everything is exactly the same in both versions except for video/audio/input and the UI.
• Fixed PWM audio volume and the 8th PCM audio channel.

[disturbedite]

...disturbedite: Which features from Gens32 would you like to see in Gens/GS?

the audio options & video filters, if you haven't implemented them already. gens32 also has an improved game genie code manager.