Well, I found a somewhat interesting topic on Wii Hardware (where emulation seems to be the most controversial subject at this point) which asked people to express their own opinions on emulation.

The majority of the posters were divided into "ZOMG, ROMs are t3h devilz!" and "Screw it, what has this company done for me? I can emulate anything I want!", and it basically turned from an intelligent discussion into a flame war in about 5 posts.

So I decided to bring it here, to our safe little n00b-free (well, except for xiaNaix) corner of the Internet, in hopes that we might actually have an intelligent game-related discussion for once instead of clogging the Spam board.

So, people of Contopia, what are YOUR opinions on emulation and ROMs?

Personally I think that emulation can be OK, but it mostly depends on the game in question. If you own the game, or owned it but lost it due to reasons beyond your control (like your dad selling your Goddamn N64 for example) I believe that you SHOULD be able to emulate it. After all, you paid for it already.

Likewise if the game is abandonware/out of production. The only way you'll find these games is used (highly unlikely) or on a ludicrously overpriced Ebay auction. Buying them doesn't do anything to support the developers, which makes the argument pointless (as the main anti-ROM argument is "You should support the developers so they'll continue to make games")

However, if you don't own the game, and you have another way of purchasing it that actually benefits the developers (Virtual Console, XBLA, PSN, etc) you should probably buy it there.

So that's my general opinion. Thoughts? Flames? Post 'em here.

Well, I guess there ok but the bad thing is that the desighers loose money off of them.
Like when you make a game and or console, you don't want some nerd putting it on the web and making money off of your game and or console!
Note: Not all emulators are free. Most are but you get it, you want people to buy your product (Which is my GTA 4 isn't coming out for PC).

Also giving the fact that some of the controles are fucked rate up!
Also the game may sometimes fuck up!

Yeah, Scizzoman has a point though sometimes you "loose" you game by some jerk.
Seeing how I regret give my firend my SNES games!
But thats why they invented Wii classics right?
For people to life the past, I guess.

What Nintendo and other companys need to do is make a online store or something (like the Wii) to buy classics, because we all know there never "lost" because they are always in are minds. *plays speech ending music* *crowed cheers*
Now your going to say "Nintendo did that!" Well the didn't do it well enough!
The put good games yeah but there are so MANY others why don't they just put all of SNES, NES, N64 and when (NGC stops.) NGC games.
To me, putting SOME of the games is pointless!
Because theres so many games that par say I liked but you guys never even herd of.

So I guess that thought, if desighers want nerds from stop making emulators, then do something about it!

My thoughts exactly. See, if they would just provide every game for download on a VC-esque sevice (as impossible as that is due to licensing and such), then I'd say you should go ahead and purchase classic games from there (although pirates would still make emulators because they're cheapasses).

At this point though, I'd say your best bet is to emulate most classic games, as there's almost no way to get them that will help the developers, or anyone really besides a random guy on Ebay or Craigslist.

So yeah, we have two people with about the same opinion. Support the developers if possible, etc.

Now we need Death Seraph's undoubtedly very intelligent and humourous input.

roms and emus on pcs are enjoyable but I wouldn't recommend it, I can't play kingdom hearts chain of memories on the computer, the controls are too wierd to enjoy.

I do recommend emus and roms on game systems such as on the wii, ds and psp (keeping in mind that emulators probably suck at the moment and need much more time to develop to fully enjoy every game you want to play)

Well, as I'm currently using the Wii's Homebrew Channel to emulate Chrono Trigger (since my Goddamn FFC disk doesn't work) I can say that th SNES emulator at least is quite excellent.

It's currently just a Wii build of Snes9x, possibly the best SNES emulator on PC, so it works with basically every ROM, with only a few glitches.

For some reason it's always in widescreen no matter what your settings are (but that looks pretty cool, I just don't like those black bars), and when you want to use a Gamecube controller you have to enter the Configure Joypads menu and then exit it again or else the controls are messed up.

But they're extremely minor glitches that don't hamper the gameplay at all.

Well, w/e works for you guys... I guess
I think the a waste of time and rather play in the origianl system (meaning for the new emulators that do the 360, PS3 and the Wii) bit I guess the can be cool for them older ones like the SNES and the NES.

I guess for me, there a waste of time and dl

I don't even know if there ARE emulators for the pS3, 360 and Wii.

But yeah, it's great for SNES games and such. At least for me.

As long as they don't go against anything from mt first post. 'Cause then I'd feel like a pirate. So no emulating Kirby 64 for me. >_<

Theres a emulator of the 360 most get it for GTA 4.