Confronting feelings: playing games on a huge plasma vs oldscool CRT

Today I had this feeling again and I'm posting this up to share, maybe you had it too once.

I have a dedicated room, like many here, to play old school video games, I have a nice CRT display with lots of system plugged via s-video to get the best picture I can (no rgb here sorry). That room always brought me joy and a time machine feeling but recently I decided to give xbox emulators a shot. Since I don't own a PCE-CD/Turbo Duo and wanted to play Dracula X Super CD that was my choice, even better than emulators on PC because I can play on my living room.
The game started and W O W!! I was playing Turbografx games on a 50" calibrated Plasma with B&W speakers that I use for my hometheater together with my projector.
The graphics, the sound, the "restoration" that emulation gives to it, it's such a feeling that makes me happy and sad at the same time.

When I finished playing I looked at my game room and was thinking that everything will end in high techonology. I felt bad, like cheating on my old friends, the snes I own is the same snes that I have since I was a kid.

Have you guys ever experienced that? Emulators are better than the real system?
Big screens are better than CRT?

If you had two rooms with great equipament and one that is full of old systems that have followed you for your entire life, which one would you choose?

OBS:I was even considering that a even more hardcore fan of the past would say the same about using original cartridges and a flash cartridge, lucky, this don't affect me. Playing a game in a flash cartridge is good as playing the real cartridge.

 

I have both. I have a retro room with a 29 inch Trinitron and 16/32 bit systems connected to it. (I want to get a flat CRT for that room, though - for the Component inputs mainly). I keep my old stuff in there. My idea is to make a time warp to the 80s and 90s. Little by little, I have succeeded, but it still needs work

I have an LCD for the newer consoles in my regular room. All the new technology here is used for retro stuff, though. Most of my gaming in new consoles winds up being 16 bit emulators on the Wii. It's quite convenient, actually, to have access to many games I never could get my hands on, and to not need to plug/unplug and change carts.

Still, it doesn't beat the real thing. My ideal retro room would have the actual consoles and a switcher. And it'd look AWESOME.

I wouldn't discard getting a second Wii for the retro room, actually, but I'd never use both at once, so I'd just move the one I have over there (once I get the decent CRT).


Which would I choose?

I think the retro room, if it were the ideal version. Pure class.

But I don't know for sure. Good thing I can have both.

 

I have a 16x9 HD CRT so I'm good

 

I output my systems through RGB/VGA on my 40' LCD, much better than my old 29' CRT and takes much less space.

 

People forget that not all CRTs are created equally.

 

In my opinion what modern consoles gain from LCD outweighs what old consoles lose from it. With space for only one TV where I use consoles most, I'm not sacrificing progressive scan. Especially if I decide to connect my PC later. Windows 7 desktop at 480i would be an ugly cramped disaster! Well under a sixth the resolution this very post has been written in.

Nice as it may look... I don't count on ever finding a 27" or above 1080p non-projection CRT TV (as opposed to monitor) out here. If makes even went that far.

My CRT that accepts 240p over component is relegated to another room. Once it dies I'll be over CRTs unless I mysteriously get a bizarre gripping urge to buy an NES and Duck Hunt again.

 

I always searched for one of those, and I can say, at least here, it's quite rare. Never saw one in front of me to be honest.

But this would kill the idea of old school. I have a flat screen crt LG model 29". It have s-video and component but it kills a little bit the spirit because it's flat screen.
A rounded CRT with composite would be awesome. I bet in the future there will be factories just to build that exact kind of crt tv.

Friday I'll have a final piece of furniture to place my remain systems, I'll take pictures when it's done. Maybe sunday.

One thing that was not so fine to me while playing castlevania was the controller, the xbox controller kills the feeling, it's too big.
I know that a snes/n64/nes/genesis (all in 1) adapter exists for the Wii but I'm not sure if anything like that exists for the xbox.
Anyway, even if it exists it's probably only for the most common controllers like the snes/nes, I bet there isn't an adapter for PCE/TG controller.

It would be even awesome an add-on to the xbox controller, something that hooks up on those little ports in the front that can enable any kind of school controller but that's me just dreaming about it.

EDIT: just an edit, the xbox controller port is an usb one. All the controllers in the world using an atmel or avr can connect to usb, it would be HID, but since the xbox is fully opened it would be possible to have any kind of controller using the usb port. Just an idea.

EDIT2: just found the answer to my dream and it's A LOT of work but very nice:
http://forums.xbox-scene.com/index.php?showtopic=509938 check the pictures of the vga female on the xbox controller ;DD

 

Nope.

I don't need to choose, as I have both. I use my HD setup for modern consoles and my CRT for everything else. My HD display is great for HD sources, but it sucks for older games. My CRT has an amazing picture and RGB sources (and even S-video and component sources) look great on it. Emulators are never 100% accurate, and you don't get the same authentic feeling you get from playing a real console with its own controller.

By the way, I just got Metal Slug for the MVS. It's fucking AWESOME. My dad and I built a wooden box to house my MVS, and it's now connected to my 20" PVM. I'll be posting some pictures of it soon.

 

I miss playing on my 52cm Sharp CRT (Mono). None of my newer TVs could beat the image quality even though I was only using composite - N64,Dreamcast and Super Nes.
I still have it in the garage, one day when I have more room I will use it again.
Now I have a 42'' Sony for PS3 and Wii in my room. I also have a Samsung LCD Tv with SCART, Component inputs set up in the garage, where I spend a lot of time playing (and smoking )
Where would one buy an LCD with SCART inputs nowadays?????

 

I'll always keep my HD and SD gaming equipment on separate televisions and prefer real hardware to emulation whenever possible. Just today, I bought up a few CRT TV sets and old gaming consoles from one of my brothers. In time, I hope to have a monitor for every 2-3 consoles in my collection.

 

I've always wanted one of these... This being said, I think I might know where to get one in this hellhole of a city. Thanks for reminding me; I'll do my research.

 

I'd never really settle for emulators over real hardware, but sometimes the image quality is a lot better.

I've tried playing my N64 on my 42" it looks quite horrible, playable but horrible. I've still got my old CRT behind my 42" I've just never had the motivation to move it anywhere, plus they're so heavy =.=

16:9 CRT is something I'll be looking for, since so many people are throwing them out on the street so I have to save one from being destroyed !

At the moment my gaming setup is really half-assed, the room they're in is really small and started to get cramped up with games and systems later on I'll have the CRT for retro games as it's meant to be played.

 

I've got a 16x9 SDTV CRT that accepts 240p over Component, combine that with a basic RGB converter, and I can FINALLY play wip3out in proper WideScreen mode without upscaling! However it has some small Geometry issues that I haven't fixed yet.

 

16:9 CRT are disgusting.

 

Those shitty smoothing filters that emulators use nowadays should be outlawed. Imagine my disgust when I bought Fate of Atlantis on Steam and by default it had a horrific filter on. Thankfully, it could be disabled.

 

What about projectors?

Before this crazy bitch took over Brown University's Anime Club and banned me (On the basis she hated me) I would bring my Xbox to play Soul Calibur II on their huge projectors and sometimes even 3rd strike and everything looked great even through Composite.

I'm sure projectors are different now but back in the day it was pure awesomeness.

 

Not to hijack the thread but I'd be very interested in hearing how you got banned from an anime club and what circumstances it involved!

As for CRT vs HD, I feel it most with the ps2 which isn't really well emulated yet even on a high end pc. To make it look nice on an hdtv takes alot of work. I think it may just be the ps2 has never looked as clear as the dreamcast in rendering textures. Even its nicest games had a muddy look to them.

 

This girl Dee was taking over and she had burned me and one of my best friends and I LET HER HAVE IT. She was also under the impression I had a superiority complex.
For fuck knows what reason she tracked down my mother's e-mail address at work and LIED to her about how I behaved at these showings (My mother works for Brown) Ignore the fact I'm an adult and if she had a problem she could have talked to me. But nooooooo she had to make it very hard for me she has since graduated from Brown and from my investigations has not amounted to anything.

I'm free to return to Brown's anime club now but I'm more interested in starting my own (which would play host to my 10 man bomberman tounament). So there you go.

 

We have 3 gaming set ups in this house. We have the Wii (component), 360 (HDMI) and PS3 (HDMI) connected to my sound system (btw, Jealous of your B&Ws. Looking to invest in some B&W CM9s) and 42" plasma. Sometimes I hook up the laptop uto it via HDMI and play Counter-Strike on it. The other day I loaded up some emulators and played them...not quite the same feeling as in my other room, which has my 26" Samsung CRT (a VERY nice one btw, much better than the older CRT I had). If possible consoles are hooked up via component (Ps2) or S-Video if possible. The same room has 2 desks with LED computer monitors with surround sound headsets with an Xbox at each one.

I can't stand playing FPS titles on the 42" screen unless I'm REALLY close to it, so the plasma screen is pretty much for fighting games, rock band, etc.

Can games on an emulator be better? I dunno, I guess it's a mental thing. I used to not mind emulators of NES games on my Xbox 1, hooked up via component and putting out 1080i. It was nice, but I still buy the originals.

 

In time i started appreciating emulators more and more. Still i think that anything up to snes is better on crt, never console make us of 16:9 displays and LCD clarity.

Out of the newer consoles i prefer emulated N64 over the real deal due to far better video output, and lately started loving pcsx2 upscaling of 3d games (even tought my pc can handle the emulator badly).

One thing i love to do is plugging my 2.1 system to the crt audio output and enjoy the bigger bass and cleared sound of my speakers