Use a Playstation Emulator

An emulator is a software that mimics the functions of other platforms or devices. For example, when you use a PlayStation emulator on your computer, it copies the functions of a Sony PlayStation console and thus the emulator enables you to play games on your computer the same way you would play it on a console. To emulate a PlayStation system on your computer you need to download, install and correctly configure the ePSXe emulator.

Steps

Getting the EPSXe Files

  1. Download the ePSXe emulator from the official ePSXe website and save it on your computer's hard drive. You will have to download the file in a compressed format called ZIP.
  2. Unzip the compressed file using the following method.
    • Download WinRAR for free from the RARLab website.
    • Double-click on the downloaded file to install WinRAR on your computer.
    • Right-click on the compressed ePSXe emulator file and select an option to extract the files. After the extraction is complete, you should see all of the extracted files and folders, which will include the "bios" and "plugins" folder as well as the executable "ePSXe.exe" file.

Retrieving PSX BIOS Files

  1. Activate the emulation capabilities of the ePSXe emulator by getting the PSX BIOS files. These are files that are typically used to play games on a PSX (the PlayStation console and digital video recorder) and you need to put them on your computer so it knows how to emulate the PSX. Here is what you need to do.
    • Go to the Sony PlayStation emulator page on the EmuAsylum website and use the "Playstation Bios Files" link to download the zipped BIOS files.
    • Right-click on the downloaded ZIP file and select "Extract files." This will open the WinRAR application used to unzip files.
    • Browse to and select the "bios" folder (it had been created when you extracted files and folders from the zipped ePSXe emulator file earlier on).
    • Press the "OK" button to extract and install the BIOS files in the "bios" folder of the PlayStation emulator.

Installing Plug-ins

  1. Install plug-ins to make sure the emulator displays the game graphics, reads the CD drive and plays sounds correctly through your computer. This can sometimes be quite complicated but here is a more convenient way to do it.
    • Visit the PlayStation emulator page again on the EmuAsylum website. This time you need to click on the "PSX CD Plugin Pack," "PSX Graphics Plugin Pack" and the "PSX Sound Plugin Pack" links to download their respective ZIP files.
    • Right-click each plug-in pack and select "Extract files." However, this time you need to browse to the "plugins" folder (that was created earlier) and extract the files in each plug-in pack to that folder.

Configuring the EPSXe Emulator

  1. Double-click on the executable "ePSXe.exe" file to run the emulator.
  2. Press the "Skip Config" button. (Advanced users may want to press the "Config" button instead to customize the emulator's configurations and fine-tune its performance. However, skipping the configuration step will still make the emulator work without problems since you have the plug-ins already installed).
  3. Configure your game controller. The method of doing this will depend on what type of controller you are using, and the emulator will ask you which controller buttons you want to use to perform different actions within the game. If you don't have a game controller you can just configure the keys on your keyboard instead.

Playing Games

  1. Insert the game CD in your computer's CD drive.
  2. Go to the File menu and select "run CDROM." From here on you can use a PlayStation emulator to play the game on your computer in a very similar manner to how you'd play it on a PlayStation console.



Tips

  • When decompressing the ePSXe ZIP file it is better to extract the files to a new folder by selecting the option "Extract files to epsxe170." This will extract all the files in a separate folder so they don't get mixed with your other files.

Warnings

  • You may be required to add the "zlib1.dll" file separately for some versions of ePSXe. The file can be downloaded from the DLL-Files website and needs to be saved in the same folder as the "ePSXe.exe" file.
  • Only people who own a PSX are legally allowed to have PSX BIOS files on their computer.

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Sources and Citations

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