Beginner's Guide to PC Gaming

Emulation

Emulation is the process of using compiled code to run games that were not intended to be run on any system other than the original. An emulator is a piece of software that works exactly like or very similar to the hardware of the original system. Emulation is mostly associated with console games. But some people emulate MS-DOS which is an operating system previously used on computers before Windows. Emulating is great for people who want to play console games but do not own the console those games were designed for. It's also great for people who want to make their console games look better than they were originally intended to look. There are many different emulators out there, sometimes multiple emulators for the same system. Emulators are available for several versions of Mac OS X, Windows, and Linux. Emulation is not perfect, and probably never will be. Some games are easier to run than others with the same emulator. Some games run better in one emulator. Some games run better in one version than another version of the same emulator. And some games just run like shit, and some won't run at all. Depending on what you're trying to emulate, it may be easier or more difficult to run at full speed than it is to run a native game, some that look much better than anything you can emulate. Be careful when emulating, as it technically is illegal unless you own an original copy of the game you're emulating. Emulators use ROM and ISO files. If you're not sure what type a certain emulator uses, look at the original system. If it runs games from cartridges (plastic things that aren't discs), then emulators for that system use ROM files. If the original system runs games from discs, then the emulators use ISO files. So when looking for a game online, type the name of the system or if you have a specific game in mind, type the name of the game, and then the type of file that it would be, and search that. For example, if I want to look for PS2 games, I would search "PS2 ISOs". If I want to look for GameBoy games, I would search "GameBoy ROMs". Be careful when searching for emulators though. At the moment there are some emulators in development for PS3, 3DS, and Wii U, but even if there are versions available for download already, but the games are so hard to emulate even on the best gaming computers, they're just not worth downloading at the moment. If you see anything about a PS4 or xBox One emulator, it's fake. Even if it's on YouTube, it's not real, trust me. If you try to download something like that, you'll either get stuck on a survey that doesn't even work, or if you actually manage to download something, it either won't do anything, or it's a virus.