> > 1) MAME's primary goal is emulating the system. For this we can ignore information > > that has no effect on emulation requirements. In this sense all we theoretically > need > > for debugging is VBI data and 'images' where images are parts of the video data > > consumers actually care about. AFAIK it doesn't even matter what the images are > > because the emulated system didn't actually depend on the content of these images. > > And here, yet again, you show your fundamental misunderstanding. MAME's primary goal > is to document the hardware and preserve and document the software. Usable emulation > is a nice side-effect, but it is very much not the primary goal. > > Emulators like Daphne have playable emulation as their primary goal. That's why > Daphne takes the easy route with conventional video files and auxiliary "frame files" > containing additional data, including information the players/games get from the > vertical blanking period. > > If that was MAME's goal, we would have already gone down that path. We probably would > have used pre-decrypted NeoGeo graphics ROMs, and kept the CPS2 XOR files. We also > likely would've faded into irrelevance just like NeoRageX.
No I totally agree with you. I think I just have a strict definition of 'emulation'. I never considered HLE techniques to be full emulation. What I meant to say was that documenting the hardware and preserving the software are two separate, although almost always coupled, goals.
I am no way advocating that we do things like Daphne.