Iris 0.14-alpha

Buckle up for a big release! We've finally implemented the IPU which is the hardware component that allows the PlayStation 2 to play Full Motion Videos, or FMVs for short, this in turn fixed a big batch of games that were hanging on FMV playback and opens the door for DVD playback emulation in the future.

Other improvements:

• We're now batching GS transfers, this reduces the amount of times we lock and unlock the render mutex, improving performance in games that transfer data very often (some games tend to transfer to VRAM hundreds of times per frame!).
• Implemented basic MFIFO support (used by Final Fantasy games, Namco Museum, Simpsons Hit & Run, etc.)
• Added multiple debugging widgets: a symbols list, EE threads list and DualShock 2 viewer
• Several bug fixes: DualShock 2 detection, ELF loading, UI crashes, EE timer crashes, FIELD mode deinterlacing, and more.

Seeing so many new games come to life sure has been very exciting, but now it's finally time for some serious performance improvements, stay tuned!

Screenshots

What's Changed

• renderer: Fix bilinear setting by @allkern in #12
• Merge master into hw-renderer by @allkern in #13
• Merge master into hw-renderer by @allkern in #14
• vif: Fix write cycles by @allkern in #15
• Update README.md by @allkern in #16
• Merge master work into hw-renderer by @allkern in #17
• Merge master work by @allkern in #19
• Merge master work by @allkern in #20
• iris: Fix Windows builds by @allkern in #21

Full Changelog: 0.13-alpha...0.14-alpha

Iris 0.13-alpha

Family-sized release this time around! After implementing several user-facing features that should make using Iris more enjoyable, I've decided it was time to bump that version number up a notch. The improvements include:

• Cached EE interpreter (better performance)
• VU improvements (fixed graphics on a number of games)
• GS renderer rework: Implemented correct fractional coord rendering (better graphics, vastly reduced visual artifacts)
• UI improvements

We've also added proper support for screenshots, which are saved to a user-configurable directory, I hope you enjoy this release!

New Contributors

• @Randomuser8219 made their first contribution in #18

Full Changelog: 0.12-alpha...0.13-alpha

Iris 0.12-alpha

This is a fairly "minor" release, we've reworked large chunks of the underlying codebase, transitioning from SDL2 to SDL3, and rebuilding our entire build system, which is now CMake-based. macOS builds have had a lot of work put into them and should now work (thanks to Layle for lending me his Mac Mini), and we're now also distributing AppImages for Linux distros.

With the transition to SDL3 fully realized, we can now start working on support for hardware-accelerated GS rendering, which is the first step towards improving performance to a usable state, the journey begins now. Stay tuned!

A lot of bugs also have been fixed, this includes DualShock 2 emulation bugs that were preventing some games from processing inputs, this includes OutRun 2 SP, OutRun 2006 - Coast 2 Coast, Auto Modellista, etc.

What's Changed

• Merge master into sdl3-cmake by @allkern in #8
• iris: Transition to SDL3 and CMake by @allkern in #9

Full Changelog: 0.10-alpha...0.12-alpha

Iris 0.10-alpha

After more than 7 months of hard work, I'm finally releasing Iris for anyone to try out! It's been a pretty long time and since Iris can now actually run games, I decided it was time to make a release.

Warning

Please bear in mind that Iris is currently VERY early in development and even though it can boot and play games, they will ALWAYS run at very low framerates. The PlayStation 2 is a very complex and demanding console so until I write a JIT and hardware renderer, full speed won't be possible.

Funnily enough, it was only very recently that I fixed a DMAC bug that was keeping a lot of games from booting, and now this opens up a ton of potential to further debug and fix other issues, which may lead to even more games to boot. There's still a lot of work to be done, especially in the optimization department. I'm really looking forward to continue working on this project and advancing PlayStation 2 emulation!

Screenshots