Versions & Emulators

NOT recommended for use [for Glitched runs]:

  • Steam (and Nintendo DS) has all the useful glitches patched, and is generally very different from SNES.
  • PSX has extremely bad load times, and some important glitches are disabled.
  • WiiVC crashes frequently, possibly due to music emulation (SNES has these crashes as well, but it's far more rare). WiiVC has slightly incorrect ATB (behavior in battles), due to non-cycle-accurate emulation. It runs at 59.94 fps, which is slower than SNES (99.7% speed).
  • (The above may possibly apply to the SNES Classic)
  • MOST emulators run at 59.94 fps, and usually have incorrect ATB. Newer versions of [otherwise-recommended] emulators Bizhawk (bsnes v96+) and Snes9x (1.54+) have the ATB issue, coinciding with the addition of MSU-1 (custom music) support.

Recommended for Speedrunning:

  • SNES console (60.09 fps). Flashcarts (e.g. SD2Snes) and "repro" carts are allowed (no difference from original, except for some minor graphical noise).
  • Bizhawk (.zip files here (bsnes v87). Runs as fast as SNES (60.09 fps), and has minimal input lag. Using the "TAS Profile" is required for correct emulation. If performing runs on emulator, suggest making a 2nd copy of the entire emulator with all the hotkeys & tools permanently disabled.

Recommended for Practice:

  • Snes9x 1.51-rr v7 svn225 (find .zip here under Assets) is easy to use, lightweight, and is able to fast-forward at high speed (ATB emulation is confirmed accurate, but ONLY if Disable Cheats is marked, under the Cheats menu). It runs at 59.94 fps and does have a bit of input lag.
  • Bizhawk 1.11.5 (find .zip here under Assets) (bsnes v87 core). Great both for runs and for practice using emulator-tools. Use the "TAS Profile" for accurate emulation. Suggest using 2 separate copies of the emulator
  • (The above versions specifically listed have community resources available. If you wish to share a savestate or input-recording or Lua script file, you must make certain of the precise emulator version in order for the file to load properly, or at all. It's just how emulator development is. But, if you use Snes9x1.51rr.7.225, or Biz1.11.5, you'll ensure that multiple people in the CT community will be able to easily check a state/recording for you, for purposes of troubleshooting.)
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