Revisiting multi-console emulation with OpenEmu, getting PS1 emulation to work

In my last post about OpenEmu I mentioned the “experimental” build that adds support for many more systems than the official release of the program. Over the weekend I tried out the experimental version’s Playstation 1 emulation. Wow, it’s actually better than PCSX-Reloaded!

The official release version of OpenEmu supports:

• Game Boy Advance
• Game Boy Color
• NeoGeo Pocket Color
• Nintendo (NES)/Famicom
• Nintendo DS
• Sega 32X
• Sega Game Gear
• Sega Genesis/Mega Drive
• Sega Master System
• Super Nintendo (SNES)
• TurboGrafx-16/PC Engine
• Virtual Boy

The experimental build version adds support for:

• Atari 2600
• Atari 5200
• Atari 7800
• Atari Lynx
• ColecoVision
• Commodore 64
• Famicom Disk System
• MAME
• Nintendo 64
• PC-FX
• PlayStation
• PSP
• Sega CD
• Sega Saturn
• SG-1000
• TurboGrafx-CD/PC Engine CD
• Vectrex
• WonderSwan

I tested out PlayStation support, and ran into a few obstacles before getting things to work.

1. The UI does nothing to explain how to provide the PlayStation BIOS file. Searching around, I learned that you add the BIOS file(s) by dragging and dropping the *.bin files (BIOS ROM images) like you would a game ROM. But, after I found a set of BIOS ROM images online, adding them this way still didn’t work. It turns out the filenames were also important, and that I had to rename the files I had to be the expected filenames:
   scph5500.bin (JP) (sha1 sum: b05def971d8ec59f346f2d9ac21fb742e3eb6917) …matched what I had in the download pack I found.
   scph5501.bin (NA) (sha1 sum: 0555c6fae8906f3f09baf5988f00e55f88e9f30b) … for me, this file was SCPH7003.BIN, and had to be renamed.
   scph5502.bin (EU) (sha1 sum: f6bc2d1f5eb6593de7d089c425ac681d6fffd3f0) … for me, this file was SCPH5552.bin, and had to be renamed.
   After renaming these BIOS images, it was possible to drag them into OpenEmu and have them be recognized as PS1 BIOS ROM image files. The UI doesn’t make it clear that it has done anything with the files, but the lack of warning is your indicator that they have been accepted.
2. OpenEmu’s “emulator core” for PS1 emulation is Mednafen, and this emulator requires all games be provided in cuesheet format. I had only ISO images, so I had to re-rip a game in cuesheet format in order to successfully add it to my OpenEmu game library.