NES Emulator for the ROKU 2 XS

[s2pidmunkie]

is there any nes emulators for the roku or is there any way to get a nes emulator or has someone developed a nes channel using the developers kit??

[stratcat96]

I wish there was, but there aren't. Roku has said before there wouldn't be any emulators on Roku basically because of copyright issues with the use of ROM files

[Gilgamesh]

As far as I know there is no such beast for Roku.

Also it is quite unlikely to happen due to the quite low processing power of the Roku and licensing issues.

The Roku has some games available but it is primarily a video streaming device and not really designed as a gaming device.

[s2pidmunkie]

so then is it posibble to create one with the developers kit?? for personal use and not a public channel

[s2pidmunkie]

this is why i primarily thought of the nes the roku controller would lend itself nicely for the games and with the micro sd slot you wouldnt have to store them on the unit itself

[Gilgamesh]

so then is it posibble to create one with the developers kit??

All things are possible. But while you might be able to write one for your own use it could not be distributed through Roku's channel system due to licensing unless you received formal rights to do so from the owners of the software licenses.

[stratcat96]

there is an Atari 2600 emulator that I use and have a few hundred ROMS for that I would love to have on the Roku. I know it has the processing power for those games too. I don't know that if the developer of that emulator would be able to port his program over to Roku without Roku giving him access to something else other than just the SDK. I could be wrong on that because I haven't looked at the current 4.x SDK though. Obviously it would need to be able to at least pull the ROM files from USB storage but I don't know if that is even possible. It would be great if those devs could do it, but I think Roku allowing that would put them in a very precarious position with potential business partners so I kind of doubt it would fly

[destruk]

I was thinking of creating Atari Chopper Command - shouldn't be too difficult to program that with roku and the standard SDK by hand. I expect it to be fairly slow and play minimum sound effects but it wouldn't need to emulate anything or use any roms to do it. Atari Outlaws might be a better first choice as you just have 5 objects moving at once. Then again, I doubt anyone would want to play a game that is ~40 years old.

http://videogamecritic.net/images/2600/outlaw.png

[knuckle]

I don't know...pong or tanks might have enough nostalgia appeal to be successful on roku...I don't remember outlaw tho

[stratcat96]

Outlaw is a fun game but it definitely is amazing to see how far games have come in 30+ years when you look at it's dead simple gameplay. I personally love the Activision titles like Pitfall!, River Raid, and Spider Fighter the best. I found the Atari-published games were hit-or-miss, with a few gems interspersed amongst a lot of chaff. There is a huge retro gaming community so there are many more people than you might think that want to play these old games.

[cwniles]

I just don't see the Roku (in it's current iteration) working as any sort of proper emulator, regardless of the power (or lack of) of the system being emulated.

What strikes me as feasible is, like destruk said, to code a game for the Roku. Now that game could be based on or inspired by a game you remember from your past but unless you can acquire the rights to it, you cannot blatantly recreate it.

I can see a scenario where a suite of game channels were to come out, maybe an Atari Classics package or something but each game would be an individual channel and probably bear only a passing resemblance to the original. Pac Man CE is a good example (though now that I think of it, Pac Man CE is a pretty faithful port of Pac Man CE it's just that I was comparing it to the Pac Man I know and love, plain old Pac Man.....of course you could always go the late 80's pirate route and just call it "Puck Man" or rip off Donkey Kong and call it "Crazy Kong".....ahhh, some of the late 80's pirate video games names were just terrific rip offs lol Frog (for Frogger) & Gatsbee (for Galaga) were pretty good too....ha, Pirate Pete for Jungle King

[mastermesh]

A wii that has some homebrew on it right next to a roku is a nice little combination.

[tsddave]

Im not sure but isnt there something like this on plex? I could be mixing it up with xbmc ofc^

[blaze92]

why would you want an emu on your roku? wouldnt it be way simpler to have it on your computer and get a $5 cord to run your display to your tv??

computer usb controller > roku remote for serious gaming

sure, games like angry birds work well with the roku remote but using the d pad as movement seems silly/inferior IMO...

[stratcat96]

the kind of games that the Roku would have the horsepower to play/emulate aren't the type that needs a 94-button usb controller. No one's talking about playing Call of Duty or anything like that. Galaga for example that's already on the Roku (besides being an arcade game) was on the Atari 2600 that used a one-button joystick as a controller. An SNES emu on the Roku wouldn't need anything more than the D-pad and simple button layout from the remote as well.

The idea of the Roku is simplicity, so if you ran a $5 cord from a computer to the TV to play games, why not leave that cable attached to watch Netflix?

It's all really a moot point anyway.