2 replies to this topic

[Penguin101]

In theory, with Nintendo's precise knowledge of their hardware.  If the NX was backwards compatible with say 3DS (portable mode), GC,  Wii (tv mode), and Wii U digital eshop titles. BUT was using AMD x86 architecture - could Nintendo's genius technicians find a way of perfect software emulation of these digital downloads (with button mapping to the NX) without the general rule that emulation requires many times the power to do so?

Just theoretically is it impossible? Or if anyone could do it would Nintendo be able to do it?

Edited by Penguin101, 22 March 2015 - 12:20 AM.

[Marcus]

I'm not an expert on such things but I would've thought the technical barrier to emulation is actually tied to the fact that dedicated hardware-based functions are just in principle faster than software. Rather than people just struggle to efficiently reverse engineer the software. Although obviously that does play a part too.

[tboss]

emulators need to be able to interpret the hardware commands from the game, and then convert them to commands for the operating system, and later, to machine code. This means your computer needs to operate several times faster to make up for having to do multiple extra steps for each 1 step the original system had to do. Note if Nintendo used a new hardware architecture, They wouldn't need to be as powerful in comparison to normal PC, as the emulator can skip several steps such as translating to the OS first, then the actual hardware, it can just translate straight to hardware. That said, it will still have to be noticeably more powerful for 1:1 emulation.