Optimal Super Mario 64 Graphics

[Iconoclast]

Project64, if not all Nintendo 64 emulators, have two emulation glitches with the most simplisticly programmed Nintendo 64 ROM:

• There is crust around the extra life, coin, and star indicators.
• The dissolve effect, used when Bowser disintegrates, Mario teleports, and when Mario is wearing the invisibility cap, is missing.

There is only one available graphics plugin that can fix both of these problems. The plugin is called Direct64, and you can get it here. Note that you must have DirectX 9 to use this plugin. Simply copy Direct64.dll from the ZIP archive to the plugins subdirectory of your emulator.

Now apply the new plugin. In Project64, use the Options/Settings command. In 1964, you can use the Ctrl+P shortcut to change your plugins. I am not explaining how to do it with other Nintendo 64 emulators; you should not be using Nintendo 64 a emulator other than Project64 and 1964. There are exceptions, but none that apply to the few ROMs, if not only Super Mario 64, optimal with this plugin. Change your graphics plugin to the Direct64 v0.5 ALPHA setting. Apply the settings, and exit the configuration prompt.

Now, on the same menu that you used to configure which plugins to use, there should be another command on that menu used to configure the graphics plugin Direct64. Execute that command. Make sure that the plugin settings match these:

The following Direct64 plugin options have no universally good setting:

• Resolution (Full Screen): Basically, you should pick your current monitor resoultion (typically 1024 by 768 pixels). It could be anything, so I can't tell you the best choice. Unless you like old MS-DOS resolutions in a pixelated arcade soft of way, I don't think you'll like 320 by 200 pixel resolution. Not only is this not one of the 4:3 ratio resolutions, (It's really 8:5.) but it's very small and leads to object aliasing. To summarize, you want to pick the highest resolution possible in this option. If your game runs slow, try decreasing the resolution.
• Refresh Rate: I would pick the highest refresh rate available, but I honestly don't know what refresh rate is. I only know that it's another monitor setting measured in Hz (hertz). Rather than decreasing the resolution to improve emulation speed, try decreasing this. No matter what I set it to, the game always looks the same to me.
• N64 Depth Image: I leave it at the "Ignore" setting. I'm not even going to bother to check to see if it slows down your emulation speed because it's completely unnecessary with ROMs like Super Mario 64. The N64 Color Image setting, however, will result in your emulator's termination if it's set to anything other than the "Ignore" setting.

And that's about it. Here's what some of the other options do:

• Enable Fog: This doesn't seem to make any difference in Super Mario 64. But in the Majora's Mask final boss room, it changes the lumination of the vertex connectors of the room. I don't recommend this plugin with other ROMs, but should you use it with other ROMs for whatever reason, many plugins come with the "Enable Fog" option already checked. Therefore, I assume that this is a recommended setting for most games. Although, I sincerely doubt it has any effect on Super Mario 64.
• Simulate Overscan: Try emulating Super Mario 64 with and without this option on, and you will see the difference. I think Direct64 is bad at positioning the ROM screen for all Nintendo 64 ROMs, but in full screen mode, this is quite tolerable. In full screen mode, the edges of the game screen may go outside your monitor a little bit, but that's nothing like flickering. You see, with this option off, the game flickers in full screen mode. Besides, a little bit of the game running out of the monitor doesn't hurt. In fact, it honestly increases the resolution of the part you can see in your monitor when in full screen mode. You can still see all of the important parts of the ROM edges fine, so I would suggest that you keep this option on.
• Force Bilinear Filtering: All I know is that this gives the File Select menu text bad anti-aliasing, and that it should not be enabled for games like Super Mario 64.
• Increase Culling Distance: I know nothing about this option. It seems to make no difference in the game. It may or may not deduct your emulation speed. I see it as an unecessary option, and you should, too. Or at least so long as you use the plugin to emulate Super Mario 64. Anyone care to tell me what this option does? I'd like to know. Post your answer in this thread if you know.
• Noise at PC Resolution: Fortunately, the only effect this has on Super Mario 64 that I know of is a positive effect. Direct64 is not the only plugins that will emulate the missing dissolve effect in Super Mario 64. It is one of the very few, but it is the only one to emulate the dissolve effect at a much, much higher resolution. The resolution that the actual Nintendo 64 emulates the effect in. Without this option on, the dissolve effect, in action, will look quite pixilated.
• OrkinSkin Sampling: Really slows down your emulation speed for some reason. It may be for screen captures, but I don't see a difference. You can try screen capturing with this option on if you like, but again, I don't see a difference. It doesn't seem necessary.
• Advanced Texture Filer: Texture enchancement is not good for Super Mario 64, as it takes away the classic intentional pixilation of the white text you see in the game (in the File Select menu, when you're talking to characters, or when you're reading signs, for example).

As for the only other disadvantage of using this plugin, no full screen anti-aliasing, increase your ROM resolution to the max. Anti-aliasing is when partially transparent pixels are emulated next to pixelated edges of drawn objects in any Nintendo 64 ROM to make the edges look smoother. This is usually good for Mario. Anyway, there doesn't seem to be an option like that here. The best you can do is increase your ROM resolution. This inability to anti-alias occurs when playing the game on the actual Nintendo 64 console as well, so you're in little loss.

Well, any questions or problems with the plugin?

[chaos master]

what do you mean that Super Mario 64 is the most simplistically programmed N64 game? Where is your proof and source? I would like to see!

[Kameo]

Originally Posted by chaos master

what do you mean that Super Mario 64 is the most simplistically programmed N64 game? Where is your proof and source? I would like to see!

I second that.


And can ur plug-in do this??

[Iconoclast]

Kameo, I don't get it. Nice image, though. NVM, I just read your text. No, my plugin can't do that. I doubt any plugin can do that, either. Direct64 is a four-star plugin that is best for Super Mario 64 and perhaps other N64 ROMs I have not yet researched. What is that, a Japanese or different country version of Zelda OOT? Some other version of Zelda OOT, v1.1/1.2, or Master Quest? No, no plugin just makes graphics look so much more 3-D all of a sudden. Computers aren't magic.

Ah, you are missing some hearts (not health, but heart pieces left in the game to get)! I have one last heart piece to get, but I can't find it!

Originally Posted by chaos master

what do you mean that Super Mario 64 is the most simplistically programmed N64 game? Where is your proof and source? I would like to see!

Super Mario 64 is the easiest ROM to emulate and is the last game that would be deemed unsupported by any emulator. It is probably the first Nintendo 64 game ever published, too, if not only very close to being so. Zelda OOT, as of Kameo's screenshot, has more textures and better graphics. Super Mario 64...very standard-colored textures. I mean, just look at it. I would have to say there could be a more complex-programmed game than Super Mario 64. Every emulator perfectly supports it, as well as other simplisticly-programmed ROMs. Mario Party is complex and hard to perfectly support because of the 53 mini-games using different game programming. Some mini-games blink too much and others are extremely slow. But Super Mario 64? Even TRWin, the worst Nintendo 64 emulator, supports it.

Where is my proof and source? Good question. It tells me you must have learned about judging and rating website content and information or something. I have no proof or source, so forget I said it! IDK, I'm wrong, I guess! Heh, so leave me alone. My bad assumption. Wasn't worth saying.

[Iconoclast]

The best plugins for "Ms. Pac-Man: Maze Madness":

I mean, Direct64 is only best for Super Mario 64. The only GFX plugin that I know of that fixes the issues in "Ms. Pac-Man: Maze Madness" is the five-star plugin, out of the only two or three, Rice's Video Plugin. There are two problems with the game. The 3-D label text has no color and things seem monochrome and the character text is way too hard for anybody to read. If you fix one of these two problems, the other remains a problem no matter what. Rice's Video Plugin, using the below configuration, fixes both of these issues. Do not enable TMEM emulation.

[chaos master]

Originally Posted by Iconoclast

Kameo, I don't get it. Nice image, though.

NICE IMAGE?? NICE IMAGE!!?!!! yes it is

Originally Posted by Iconoclast

Where is my proof and source? Good question. It tells me you must have learned about judging and rating website content and information or something. I have no proof or source, so forget I said it! IDK, I'm wrong, I guess! Heh, so leave me alone. My bad assumption. Wasn't worth saying.

I have waited long for this. GO, GO, CHAOS MASTER!!

Also, yeah, judging and rating is simple stuff. My school made me take it in a research skills class, and I already knew it all! Easiest class ever. My teacher says I am a natural genius at that stuff and I should consider going into computers, but I digress..............

[Iconoclast]

Originally Posted by chaos master

NICE IMAGE?? NICE IMAGE!!?!!! yes it is

I have waited long for this. GO, GO, CHAOS MASTER!!

Also, yeah, judging and rating is simple stuff. My school made me take it in a research skills class, and I already knew it all! Easiest class ever. My teacher says I am a natural genius at that stuff and I should consider going into computers, but I digress..............

Did you now? I thought you did. Asking for proof and stuff, it sounded like you knew about that stuff. Like I said, it is almost as if I am psychic. I have forgotten the definition of 'disgress'.

Anyway, those are two games that you do not want to use Jabo's Direct 3-D 8 GFX plugin on.

[Fierce Deity]

Super Mario 64 is not the easiest ROM to emulate. I would say Forsaken is. It's just that, what do you think of when someone says Nintendo 64? Mario 64. So anyone who made an emulator knew it had to emulate Mario 64. So that was usually one of the first things that they made work. It isn't that it is the simplest.

[Iconoclast]

Then how come the FPS is so much faster than the other ROMs? It was the first Nintendo 64 game ever made that I can see, why shouldn't it be so simply programmed? Just forget I brought that point up.