v1.2

Sections

Introduction Downloading Gens Installing Gens Installing Games Setting Up Gens Playing A Game

Introduction

Unlike arcade emulators, console emulators emulate hardware only so should work with near enough all games made. Gens is a very good Sega Genesis / Megadrive emulator for Windows. It is very fast, has good compatability and does some really fancy screen effects. Gens is also one of the first Genesis emulators to support the SegaCD system. Have Fun ;) P.S. There is an "Official Manual" that can be found here... http://www.genesisproject.co.uk Update 20/07/02 Gens now supports the 32X addon with a very high compatability rate. The only problem is you need a fairly meaty PC to run it on. Top

Downloading Gens

You can find the latest version of Gens from it's homepage here. To set up it's required folders download this file as well. For Sega CD and 32X emulation you need some BIOS images which can be downloded from http://www.eidolons-inn.de. The files you require are... 32X BIOS Files 32x_g_bios.bin 32x_m_bios.bin 32x_s_bios.bin   SegaCD BIOS Files eu_mcd1_9210.bin jp_mcd1_9112.bin us_scd1_9210.bin Top

Installing Gens

To install Gens you will need a copy of Winzip. All you have to do is to open the zipfile, press the extract button and type C:\Gens into to the path area of the window that opens. If you have downloaded the Gens folders zip file then extract it into the same C:\Gens folder. Here is what your Gens folder should look like... To use the SegaCD and/or 32X emulation you need to extract the 3/6 bios files into the C:\Gens\Bios folder. You can use the method above that you used to extract the main zip file. Top

Installing Games

Because Gens is a console emulator there aren't many sites around holding roms for it. You could try a search engine like Google with the keywords Sega Genesis Roms or Megadrive Roms. All you need to do to install roms is to put the zipped files into the C:\Gens\Roms directory. If you are not sure how to do this try the basics tutorial. The CD files need to be treated a little differently. Gens supports both original CD's and ISO files. If you want Gens to use CD music when using downloaded ISO's then the best thing to do is set up a new folder for your game. To do this open up you Roms directory find some white space, right click you mouse and select New -> Folder. Then rename the folder to the name of the game you want. The way to install the music is to make sure that you have downloaded it in MP3 format. Make a note of the ISO filename and simply rename each track to the ISO name + track number. You need to remember that the game on every CD is track 1 so music tracks start from track 2. For example... ISO Name : ff.iso Music Track 2 : ff 02.mp3 Music Track 3 : ff 03.mp3 And so on. Heres my Final Fight folder as an example.... If you want to run an ISO without the CD music just put in in the C:\Gens\Roms folder. Top

Setting Up Gens

This is the screen that you will see when you first load Gens... Here is a summary of the menu system... File Menu Open Rom Open a rom (They can be zipped or unzipped) Close Rom Removes then current game from memory Boot CD Boots a Sega MegaCD disc Netplay Starts the Kaillera netplay software. Game Genie Lets you enter Game Genie cheat / patch codes Load State Load a saved state Save State Save current state Quick Load Loads a quick save game. Quick Save Saves the game position not using a state. Change State Change current state number Rom History Shows the last 10 games played for quick access. Quit Exit from gens Graphic Menu Full Screen Switches to a fullscreen display Vsync Syncronizes the display to you monitor to stop graphics from tearing. Stretch Stretch the image to fill the screen Colour Adjustment Sets up the brightness and contrast in Gens. Also you can invert the colours or change the screen to greyscale. Renderer Lets you choose effects to be use when displaying games. Sprite Limit Limits the amount of sprites on the screen (I think for compatability???) Frame Skip Set this higher if your games run slow. Screen Shot Saves a screenshot of the game CPU Menu Debug Opens a debugging screen for each CPU. Country Lets you choose which country / system Gens emulates Hard Reset Completely reset the current game Reset 68000 Resets the main CPU (for debug purposes) Reset Z80 Resets the Z80 sound processor (for debug purposes) Perfect Synchro Synchonizes all the chips being emulated exactly as they are in a real Megadrive. This improves compatability but make the emulator run slower. Sound Menu Enable Enables Gens sound system. Rate Lets you choose the sound rate for games (If your game slows reduce the sound rate) Stereo Enables / Disables stereo sound Z80 Enables / Disables the Z80 sound CPU YM2612 Enables / Disables the YM2612 sound synthesizer PSG Enables / Disables the PSG sound enhancer DAC Enables / Disables the DAC sound processor PCM Enables / Disables the PCM sound processor used in the 32x PWM Enables / Disables the PWM sound processor used in the 32x CDDA Enables / Disables the CD Audio sound processor used in the 32x YM2612 High Quality Uses better quality sound in the YM2612 music. Start Wav Dump Starts saving all sound output as a wav file. Start GYM Dump Starts saving the music as a GYM file that can be played in a GYM compatible player. Option Menu Misc Auto Fix Checksum Fixes the checksum on damaged roms Auto Pause Pauses Gens when windows loses focus Fast Blur A very fast blurring effect FPS Settings for how the Frames pre second is shown. Message Settings for how system and netplay messages are shown. Intro Effect Changes the colour of the fancy intro screen Joypad Controller Connected - Selects between a Gamepad or a team player (supported by some games) To redefine the keys just press the player you want to configure and press the key you want to correspond to the function displayed in the Setting Keys box. Directories If you download Gens from easyEmu then I've already set this up for you but you can change the directories Gens uses from here if you want. You can get the BIOS images from http://www.eidolons-inn.de BIOS/Misc Files This is where you can set where the bios images are for the Sega CD and 32X emulation. I've set it to look in a folder called Bios and I suggest this is where you put the images. Current CD Drive Lets you choose which CD Rom Gens will use for the Sega CD SegaCD SRAM Size Sets the internal RAM available to the SegaCD Load Config Loads a saved config Save Config As Lets you save separate configs for different situations Top

Playing A Game

To play a game all you need to do is open the file menu and select Open Rom. Select the game you have downloaded and press the open button. The screen will go black and then the game will load. To run from an ISO image you still go to the Load Rom option but at the bottom of the new window change the File Type to Sega CD Image (ISO/Bin). You can now select the image you want and press the Open button. If you want to use an original CD you need to put the CD into your CD/DVD drive, go to the Drive menu and make sure your CD/DVD drive is selected and finally go to the File menu and select Boot CD. If all is O.K. then you'll see the SegaCD boot screen and your game will load. Keyboard Settings Cursor Keys Up, Down, Left, Right (P1) A Button A (P1) S Button B (P1) D Button C (P1) Z Button X (P1) X Button Y (P1) C Button Z (P1) Return Start (P1) Right Shift Mode (P1) Y, H, G, J Up, Down, Left, Right (P2) K Button A (P2) L Button B (P2) ? Button C (P2) I Button X (P2) O Button Y (P2) P Button Z (P2) U Start (P2) T Mode (P2) F2 Auto Frame Skip F3 Frame Skip -1 F4 Frame Skip +1 F5 Save State F6 Previous State F7 Next State F8 Load State F9 Fast Blur F10 Show FPS F11 Previous Render Mode F12 Next Render Mode Alt+Return Fullscreen / Windowed Mode Shift+S Take Snapshot CTRL + S Stretch Screen CTRL + V Enable / Disable VSync (Fullscreen Only) Tab Hard Reset If you want to use a joypad then you need to configure it in the joypad menu. Here is Gens playing a few games... Top

©2000-2003 MrV2K