Since it’s difficult, sometimes even impossible to find this information online, I thought I’d post short “reviews” every now and then, about how certain games run on certain emulators on the ARCHOS Gamepad. Today, it’s Gran Turismo 2.
Note: If anything changes about this game and I’m aware of it, I’ll be sure to update this report to provide the necessary info.
December 2013, FPSe 0.11.116, ePSXe 1.9.11
The version of the game I tried playing was the US 1.2 version of Gran Turismo 2. In short, it runs, but there are issues.
If you play it in hardware mode, without OpenGL, it runs smoothly, for the most part, except it looks so pixelated, it’s difficult to see corners on the track in time sometimes.
Enabling OpenGL infinitely improves the look of Gran Turismo 2, but it creates a new issue – the game doesn’t run at full speed anymore.
I believe there is some sort of issue with sound, because every time you pass through a tunnel, or are surrounded by other vehicles (i.e. every time you’re in a situation where the should be some special sound effect involved), the game temporarily slows down, like it’s trying to load something.
As for the controls, it takes some getting used to, but after about an hour or two, I find the game controls nicely with the analog stick.
I’d say Gran Turismo 2, in this state, is playable on the ARCHOS GamePad, but it’s not a perfect experience, either due to pixelated graphics, or due to the strange slowdown issues in OpenGL mode.
