Nintendo emulation is getting a major arcade upgrade

When you think “Nintendo gaming,” where do your thoughts immediately go? Consoles like the NES? Handsets like the Switch? Both solid answers, and both probably a lot more popular ones than “arcade games.” While the arcades may not be Nintendo’s main business, the company’s had a presence there on and off since its early days. And now one of the most popular Nintendo emulators around is getting a big upgrade that lets you relive some of Nintendo’s best arcade moments.

The early 2000s were a weird, transitional time for gaming. Sega’s struggles with the Dreamcast led the company to get out of the hardware business, and it quickly found itself turning to some unexpected partners to maintain a presence in the arcade. Those included Microsoft, with the Xbox-based Chihiro arcade system powering titles like Crazy Taxi 3, and also Sega’s long-time rival Nintendo. In fact, it was Sega, Nintendo, and even Namco who all teamed up together for the TriForce arcade platform — basically, an arcade version of the GameCube.

While there weren’t a ton of TriForce games ultimately released, that short roster does feature a few stand-out entries from beloved series, including F-Zero AX and Mario Kart Arcade GP. So far, if you’ve wanted to play those games, that meant tracking down those arcade cabinets in real life.

Emulator fans probably already know about Dolphin, one of the best and most full-featured around. Dolphin targets GameCube and Wii hardware, and offers enhancements like high-res graphics output. In a blog entry today, the Dolphin team describes some of the challenges they’ve faced over the years in extending TriForce support, finding mixed success and never really optimizing their approach to it.

Well, that was then, but now TriForce emulation has matured to the point that Dolphin is reintegrating it back into the emulator’s main codebase. Not only does that mean that you finally have access to these classic arcade titles from the convenience of your PC, but they’re also already working on Android:

There are a few small issues with the implementation as it stands today, like the lack of on-screen buttons for Coin, Test, and Service — but you can still inset coins with a gesture: Just shake your phone. There are a few other hard-coded bits you can’t yet change in the UI on Android, but we expect to see that improve over time.

Maybe most impressive, at the last second the Dolphin team also managed to get networking operational. These arcade cabinets were built to support elaborate multi-cabinet gaming, and after a whole lot of troubleshooting, emulating it has finally started to work well. The team promises that a full guide on setting up multi-cabinet emulation is in the works — we can’t wait to give it a try for ourselves!