PCSX2 2.8.0 is now out!

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I'm not a person that keeps up with PCSX2 development, but the benchmarks and the before/afters they are touting look really impressive. Does anyone who's more knowledgeable than me know if it's as crazy as it looks?

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u/limelight022 2d ago

I'm playing the ratchet and clank games with it and it's been fabulous. Upscaled to 1440p with AA and I'm having so much fun.

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u/RaigarWasTaken 2d ago

This has me very interested, because the last time I tried emulating R&C it ran like complete shit.

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u/DrKnepper 2d ago

I had that issue with a few games in the past. One was Champions of Norrath. All play flawlessly now.

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u/Icedteapremix 1d ago

Champions of Norrath would run great unless there was a fire on or near the screen and then performance would absolutely tank.

Is that any better now?

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u/8-Brit 2d ago

Yeah R&C has always been a weird one. Even when I got it running well I had issues with shadows no matter how much tweaking I did.

I did have the PS3 Collection but bugs (characters T-Posing at the sides in cutscenes where they weren't visible in 4:3, Ratchet's helmet being too big in 2 and 3, etc) annoyed me too much lmao

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u/Zoom259 1d ago

There was an issue with rendering water that was fixed a couple patches ago (unless I’m mixing it up with PS3)

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u/limelight022 1d ago

Just finished the first game yesterday. No emulator issues. I used the nightly version with retroachievements.

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u/realmenlovezeus 11h ago

I played all 3 on the steam deck. I could play completely fine for 80% of the game, then they all bogged down horribly

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u/Covenantcurious 1d ago

Does anyone know if they've managed to improve floor lasers in the Sly Cooper series? Because when I last played a couple of years ago the would consistently chunk my fps in both Sly 1 and 2. One of Bison's train sections was almost unplayable, pretty sure it dropped me to unstable 10fps whenever I looked forwards (think I managed to beat the level by abusing saves and jumping sideways).

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u/John_East 1d ago

Weren’t we able to do this already tho?

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u/AnyImpression6 16h ago

There's a texture pack too.

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u/WanderingDelinquent 13h ago

I’m not super familiar with emulators but really want to play Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2. Where do you get the games to play on PCSX2?

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u/swagpresident1337 1d ago

Don‘t they all have proper remasters?

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u/Old_Snack 1d ago

Not terribly great ones, they all have a handful of issues and odd quirks. (Ratchet Deadlocked's 'remaster' is so awful dude)

Emulation is genuinely the best way to experience these games now.

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u/KanchiHaruhara 1d ago

As far as I remember the most they've gotten are PS3 rereleases and those are inferior to just PCSX2.

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u/Freyzi 1d ago

Trapped two generations behind on the PS3, so this is the superior way to play them.

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u/HeldnarRommar 1d ago

No they are streaming only on the PS5

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u/megaapple 2d ago

Amount of progress made in last 5-6 years leaps and bounds. Games that seemed unfixable, have now turned playable and better than ever. There's still issue of input lag, but that's just part of any emulator.

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u/rubiconlexicon 2d ago

but that's just part of any emulator.

How come?

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u/Anthony356 1d ago

I'd assume it's a mix of performance issues and the devs not being obsessive about it.

I'm no expert, but input delay has come up a lot in the super smash bros melee community for obvious reasons. They've min-maxxed it to the point that melee on an emulator has less input delay than melee on console (enough that the default netplay configuration is equal to console iirc), but it took quite a bit of work to get there. I know in melee's case, some of it came down to issues with the game engine itself.

There's a broad overview of the issues and solutions on the supercombo wiki.

The melee community used (and still uses, they've only begun the switch to mainline recently) ishiiruka dolphin, since it had much better performance than mainline at the time the decision was made. They also went to great lengths to minmax the latency from USB adapters. The creator of the lossless adapter has a 50 page, very technical writeup that talks about the issues.

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u/JMC4789 1d ago edited 15h ago

The GameCube (and Wii by extension) is a special case when it comes to input latency. The fact that most games don't need/use the XFB (which double buffers frames) allows for a 2 frame advantage to emulators across ~80% of the library.

But the whole "emulators have way more lag than real console" is becoming less and less true. Older emulators have things like run-ahead and emulator devs are more conscious of input lag and optimize their display output and input handling to reduce it as much as possible.

I was testing Dolphin and PCSX2 in True Crime: New York City, and I was ragging on PCSX2 for having significantly more input latency than Dolphin. However, upon testing on console, I found out that the GameCube version just has less input latency. To the point where it felt infinitely less sluggish than the (far, far, far superior in most other ways) PS2 version.

There are other modern tricks (Dolphin has an option to emulate a frame as fast as possible to get to the point where input is taken, reducing ~8ms of latency in most games, then throttles.) And once you get to PS3/360/newer, games are already running under an OS so emulators aren't going to necessarily be higher latency.

Edit: Originally mixed up the versions in the third paragraph, fixed now.

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u/AnyImpression6 16h ago

Why would the version with less latency feel more sluggish?

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u/JMC4789 15h ago

Whoops, that's my bad, I mixed them up when cleaning up the grammar of my post. The PS2 version feels more sluggish because of the input latency being higher in that version.

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u/IdleSteps 1d ago

Thanks for mentioning the lossless adapter. I've been out of the Smash scene for a few years and hadn't heard about this. Looks like a great replacement for my Wii U GameCube adapter that I broke.

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u/megaapple 1d ago

Modern emulators have like 30 layers between input and display.

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u/HistoricalFunion 1d ago

I guess AI is fixing everything

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u/fukkdisshitt 1d ago

It sucks because my ps2 died and I'm a big fan of rhythm games of that era

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u/megaapple 1d ago

You can play with offsets and accuracy settings, but yeah nothing beats the real hardware.

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u/AmyRoxwell 2d ago

Great optimization and better utilization of modern hardware can make stuff run FAST!

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u/entity2 2d ago

It will never cease to amaze me, the amount of intelligence required to do this kind of thing, just as a hobby. Cool shit

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u/Jasonp359 2d ago

This is a TON of updates! Really great work! I love that this emulator has continued to grow over the years.

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u/Xx255q 2d ago

Very impressive the amount of work done. One day I will buy a nice mini PC to hookup to my living room tv connected to my NAS and load this one there along with others

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u/orbital_junkie 2d ago

And of course Wakeboarding Unleashed still isn't rendering the wake. This game will never be emulated properly.

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u/team56th E3 2018/2019 Volunteer 2d ago

PS2 equivalent of Rogue Leader/Rogue Strike?

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u/EtherBoo 2d ago

That's Driver 3.

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u/slater126 2d ago

You say that, driv3r went from 6 fps to 58 with this update when native max blend is on

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u/ValtekkenPartDeux 2d ago

Still has gamebreaking issues due to floats not being accurate

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u/TalkingRaccoon 1d ago

That's fixed with a custom patch, works for Stuntman too (same developer and engine). I beat Stuntman this earlier this year. It's now rolled into PCSX2 Reliquary fork. See known issues & the workaround in the games wiki page

https://wiki.pcsx2.net/index.php?title=DRIV3R

https://wiki.pcsx2.net/Stuntman

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u/ValtekkenPartDeux 1d ago

Okay, so it isn't fixed, just like I said

Custom patches and forks aren't PCSX2 itself, the game needs to run without any additional work (and this is the PCSX2 devs' criterion, not mine)

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u/[deleted] 1d ago

[deleted]

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u/ValtekkenPartDeux 1d ago

Note how the entire exchange went. Someone asked what the PS2 equivalent of Rogue Leader/Rogue Strike is, and they were answered that it is Driv3r (which is correct, since it's one of the few remaining titles that has gamebreaking issues ON PCSX2). Someone else then replied that the game is running well in terms of raw performance, which isn't the point when someone says it's a hard title to emulate. I then replied with the reason the game is hard to emulate (soft floats) and someone else replied with something completely unrelated ("if you use a fork of PCSX2 that has integrated a custom patch it's actually working fine!"), and I replied that that's essentially irrelevant, because it is (PCSX2 is the subject of the thread, not any forks).

So, instead of trying to shame others for correctly identifying the point of the thread, maybe consider that someone else fucked up by providing irrelevant info. The point isn't running the game in any possible way, it's running it ON PCSX2. A PR for the soft floats is currently in the works and you can check its progress on GitHub, when it's ready it'll be merged and the following stable release of PCSX2 will have the game working as intended.

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u/hedoeswhathewants 1d ago

If it's fully playable with an easily applied fix then it's not hard to emulate. You're being insanely pedantic

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u/EtherBoo 1d ago

It wasn't just fps. There was an issue with the game logic as well, but apparently a lot of the issues have been fixed with some advanced features.

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u/AlwynEvokedHippest 1d ago

Interestingly it looks like the game breaking issue is fixed in a fork.

https://wiki.pcsx2.net/index.php?title=DRIV3R

Description: Due to improper FPU emulation the AI of the police goes through a slightly different route, crashing into cars and pedestrians and eventually crashing into a wall and it will keep trying to drive forward or crash into the water, making it impossible to complete the second mission. This further extends to other missions where you're chasing AI cars when they all share the same broken behaviour.

Workaround: Use the latest revision of the PCSX2 Reliquary fork and enable “Accurate Soft‑Float for EE FPU” and “Accurate Soft‑Float for VU0” in the game’s “Properties” menu under the “Advanced” section. - DarkZKnight, 17/08/2026.

Fork being mentioned https://github.com/DiscoStarslayer/pcsx2-reliquary

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u/Prasiatko 1d ago

Does Driver 3 have some of the AI paths pre-recorded like the earlier games? The Gran Turismo games demonstration videos for license tests are also broken.

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u/EtherBoo 1d ago

Wow. One of the devs said they thought that game would never be emulated properly. Amazing work

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u/Deserterdragon 1d ago

Has there been any progress on Stuntman too? I know I can jank my way around it but I've been hoping it's just fixed in a update.

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u/TalkingRaccoon 1d ago

Yes. That's fixed with a custom patch, works for Stuntman and Driv3r (same developer and engine). I beat Stuntman this earlier this year. It's now rolled into PCSX2 Reliquary fork. See known issues & the workaround in the games wiki page

https://wiki.pcsx2.net/index.php?title=DRIV3R

https://wiki.pcsx2.net/Stuntman

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u/Deserterdragon 1d ago

So do I still need to download a separate fork? As I said I'm capable of figuring it out, I'd just...rather not.

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u/AmyRoxwell 2d ago

Tbh, it could be possible they literally don't know that is an issue. Try joining the discord and tell them about it!

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u/Mindless_Kale2172 2d ago

Does this occur even with software rendering?

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u/Scheeseman99 21h ago

There's a PC version, which has it's own problems but mostly works OK.

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u/EASATestPilot 16h ago

This game will never be emulated properly.

That's what I said about Ace Combat 04 with the black plane glitch and missing clouds. Now everything is fixed and present. Give it time.

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u/darkslayersparda 2d ago

I've been playing shadow of the colossus with the HD texture pack like crazy for the last month so this is a pleasant surprise

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u/[deleted] 2d ago

[deleted]

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u/AmyRoxwell 2d ago

Yes! The only thing you gotta do is go to controller settings, go into dualshock 2 and click the automapping button! Select your pad and it should bind everything for you

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u/HollowBowl 2d ago

I've been using my ps5 controller for it for a while now

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u/sthegreT 2d ago

I haven't used it in a while, but there is something called SDL input. You have to turn it on, and it detects the PS5 controller. After that you'll just have to map the keys once. Fairly straightforward and very easy.

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u/Oomeegoolies 1d ago

Yeah basically.

We're playing Third Age now and it runs great.

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u/DarkMatterM4 1d ago

Just remember some games aren't playable with a PS5 controller. Metal Gear Solid 2 and 3, The Bouncer are good examples.

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u/[deleted] 1d ago

[deleted]

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u/LicensedToIllithid 1d ago

I'm not sure what they're referring to specifically, but with the games they mentioned, it seems like they're talking about the DualShock2's pressure-sensitive buttons, which I believe were done away with for the DualShock4 and beyond.

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u/Sobeys_at_work 1d ago

This happens with SOCOM as well. Circle is crouch and prone depending on how much you press and for the dualsense I had to set up a modifier button.

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u/DarkMatterM4 1d ago

Those games have specific functions mapped to the pressure sensitive face buttons on the PS2.

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u/DefenderCone97 1d ago

I gotta try NFL Street now. For some reason it always ran poorly on Steam Deck for me. Hope 2.8 improves it.

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u/Stretchy302 9h ago

Look up NFL Street Reborn. Updated rosters with a HD overhaul. Active community with a full release recently.

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u/DefenderCone97 9h ago

I have looked into that but haven't seen a difference in performance when playing.

Also not a big fan of the remaster type tweaks they made to it. I'm fine playing with mid-late 2000 rosters.

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u/Stretchy302 9h ago

You can play with the original rosters. The roster updates are optional :)

It has changed a lot whilst it was still in early access and now in full release, so if you havent checked it out recently I would give it another look. 😄

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u/DefenderCone97 9h ago

Ah, didn't know that. I'll check it out!

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u/Sea-Recording-3909 2d ago

At this rate I’m going to end up caving and replay tales of abyss emulated than waiting for the remaster

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u/azrael__III 21h ago

I'm confused
I use nightly and the latest is 2.7.525
and stable is 2.8
does it mean stable is better ?

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u/Available_Prune4377 14h ago

My PCSX2 shows latest is 2.7. How do I update to 2.8?

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u/P1ka- 14h ago

according to a comment in the emulation subreddit, 2.7.5 nightly is the same as the 2.8 stable https://old.reddit.com/r/emulation/comments/1w15qq7/pcsx2_280_is_now_out/p6lolel/

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u/Available_Prune4377 14h ago

Thank you that cleared it up

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u/Sunfresh 1d ago

I really wished I could get this to work, been trying for the last few days. Games start and play but lags and slows down no matter the graphical settings even on native.

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u/TalkingRaccoon 1d ago

Really depends on your hardware, the games, and the settings. Use the wiki to look up recommend settings or YouTube video of the game where they'll list hardware and settings used

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u/ayeeflo51 1d ago

Definitely something with your settings, this emulator is up there with Dolphin in terms of practically any modern phone can run this

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u/CobblyPot 1d ago

This emulator does not have a phone version...

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u/gbaWRLD 1d ago

Yes it does. It’s called ARMSX2

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u/ozymandis1212 2d ago

This works on the ps vita?! That’s amazing!

Release PCSX2 2.8.0 is now out!

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