So, Nintendo Direct announced that at least one game from DS is now available in Wii U's Virtual Console. I was genuinely interested on how Yoshi's Island DS is emulated with the service, so I bought it and messed around with the configurations. I know it's tricky to emulate DS games on a Wii U, but I can't help but feel that the emulation seems to be a bit unpolished.
First off, the screen smoothing feature is basically outputting a 240p display to an HDTV. What it really does is to take the native resolution of both screens and enlarge them up to whatever size the screen will be displayed on TV/GamePad screen. While it does smoothen the rough edges, it also blurs the screens unlike the GBA VC counterparts. I don't think this is a big deal to me, but it's still saddening when you know they could've done better than that.
Second, there is no way to map the buttons however we'd like. Some of you may think this can be remedied by using the other types of controller (e.g. Wii U Pro Controller). However, DS VC games only support Wii U GamePad. Want to remap the ZL and ZR buttons to respond as L and R? Too bad. We're forced to stretch our index fingers a bit more to reach the actual L and R buttons on the GamePad. To some, this might not be too problematic. The second I noticed that I couldn't remap the buttons like I could do for the other platforms, my worries started to settle in quickly and only went worse as I took a look on how the screen configuration operates. I've got quite a bit to say about how poorly the VC service emulates Yoshi's Island DS and perhaps pretty much any title that constantly uses both screens for extended view of an area.
Third, even the most logical screen configurations also have theirs drawback while playing Yoshi's Island DS. The default configuration would let us play exactly how we play from the original DS system (or more precisely DS Lite and DSi models). While it's perfectly playable, the screens are ridiculously small on GamePad and even the TV if it isn't large enough. I wish they actually gave us an option to resize screens.
Then, we have a configuration that display the lower DS screen on the GamePad and the upper screen to the TV, and is a good way to play Yoshi's Island DS. The screens are large enough, but it can be disorienting when you have to switch you head between the two screens. And it got worse with the GamePad and TV. In Yoshi's Island DS, this screen configuration can be awkward when it suddenly switch screens and/or disable the ability to manually switch screens, making Off-TV Play somewhat disadvantageous due of the game's dual-screen estate design and its tendency to place enemies above your "main" screen.
If having to deal with moving your head between two screens is too annoying for you, then there's the option of having two screens in one TV/GamePad while focusing on one or another. And you can make the bottom screen sit right or left depending on which hand is your dominant one. For Yoshi's Island DS, it's a wise choice to focus on the bottom screen. Even with that, you still have to squint on the unfocused screen because it's freaking small again.
Next up, one of the configurations is basically a larger version of the default configuration, except this one expects you to hold your Wii U GamePad sideways. The latter displays both screen stacked up left-to-right and swaps the X and Y axis on both Control Pad and Control Stick, assuming that you're right-handed. Sounds like a no-no for Yoshi's Island DS, but getting hang of it isn't terribly difficult.
There's another screen configuration that does pretty much the same thing like the previous one, except it also mirrors what is actually displayed. Again, far from ideal when it comes to Yoshi's Island DS aside of flipping the TV 90° to left or right for a much larger dual screen display and adapt to the wrong screen configuration controls, but it works very well when a game asked you to hold your DS sideways (as you won't have to hold your GamePad sideways).
To sum up everything about the screen configurations, none of them are perfect for playing any game that uses two screens to extend the view of an area, especially because the DS VC isn't flexible enough for this type of game.
Thanks to the lazy smoothing effect, inability to remap the buttons and the lack of flexibility of screen configurations with games that utilizes two screens for larger view of an area are all indicating to me that the DS VC emulation was not only tricky to pull it off, but also feels like a massive step back from the surprisingly great GBA emulation quality. For those who also played any DS game via Wii U Virtual Console, what do you think on the way they are emulated?
Yeah, I felt like it was very poorly thought out. Why can't we have both screens displayed without the DS border and with normal controls? I'm glad that they included various screen setups, but I feel it could be better if they just let you manually choose what screen would be displayed where and how large it could be. I hope they remedy this, because Yoshi's Island DS is practically unplayable if you don't want to be squinting at the Gamepad screen to see what's going on.
I don't agree at all. The amount of options is pretty insane. I think it was a quality effort.
Also, I don't think DS Virtual Console could even be on 3ds. The 3ds can barely run those gba ambassador games, so how could DS be on it? Sounds kind of idiotic to me.
I rather enjoy Yoshi's Island DS I think the viewing and control options are varied though some are admittedly weird, however the 3DS console View And Top/bottom TV/Gamepad view have nearly perfect control schemes!
I don't agree at all. The amount of options is pretty insane. I think it was a quality effort.
Also, I don't think DS Virtual Console could even be on 3ds. The 3ds can barely run those gba ambassador games, so how could DS be on it? Sounds kind of idiotic to me.
...You do realize the 3DS is backwards compatible with the system, right? >_>
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I don't agree at all. The amount of options is pretty insane. I think it was a quality effort.
Also, I don't think DS Virtual Console could even be on 3ds. The 3ds can barely run those gba ambassador games, so how could DS be on it? Sounds kind of idiotic to me.
...You do realize the 3DS is backwards compatible with the system, right? >_>
This! The Wii U can't emulate Wii games and yet they're on the Wii U.
Also I personally think VC systems should be universal and not limited by whether it's a handheld or a home console. Everyone should have the opportunity to play their favorite games as long as the system can emulate or is backwards compatible with a particular game system.
I think the problem comes in part with the game they decided to launch the system with. It's really really hard to display it properly due to the way it decides to use the screens.
Just WHO thought Yoshi's Island DS would be a good way to introduce us to DS VC?
Wario Ware Twisted would've been a perfect choice.
What kills this for me, is that they're rendered at their native resolution and are merely upscaled, unlike N64 downloads.
So we're stuck with it looking like the screenshot at the left with the game rendered at its native resolution, rather than the magnificent looking screenshot on the right where it has been rendered in HD (Use the link below it to go directly to a full size version of it, to get the full impact).
And 2D games don't benefit by this, and would look great just upscaled. Yet Nintendo goes and messes up Yoshi's Island DS. Both screens should be stacked as they are, with the appropriate gap between them. But they should take up as much of the tv screen as possible while maintaining their original aspect ratio.
The DS should have been for the 3DS instead.........I have a feeling that Nintendo is trying to make consumers to get the Wii U.
and that would be a bad thing how?
Because seeing that the 3DS is backwards compatible with the DS, its only fair that they port DS games to the 3DS with cheap prices. Honestly, it looks like the Wii U's virtual console is superior to that of the 3DS. Atleast if the 3DS had GBA games, then fine. But no, only ambassadors had the chance.
Also Don't give me that anime look please......its somehow appealing to me.
The only issue I had with MKDS was that you couldn't change L/R to ZL/ZR, unless I just missed the option somehow?
I like how N64 and DS VC means essentially you could have 6 out of 8 Mario Kart games on your Wii U homescreen (the 2 unplayable ones being Double Dash and 7).
DS downloads on the Wii U don't have button remapping options.
And while someone may personally consider DS downloads on the 3DS as pointless due to its support for original DS cartridges, that's irrelevant with the wider picture. All three modern consoles support downloads of current gen retail software, while the 360, PS3, and Wii U all support digital downloads of last gen retail games (Two generators worth in the case of the PS3).
I find it funny how the DS emu for windows has various filtering options to make it look appealing in HD.
More so for why it looks good, is that it can render the image for a 3D polygonal DS game directly into HD. The results are often spectacular, as seen by this huge NeoGaf thread dedicated to pretty HD screenshots of DS software.
Nintendo's own DS emulator renders the image at its original resolution and then upscales it, yielding a poor looking picture in a game like Mario Kart DS. Again, we're getting something approximate to what's on the left in the link below, compared to HD rendering of it on the right.
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Topic: DS VC feels a bit disappointingly unpolished
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