bsnes vs Play!

bsnes is a free, open-source emulator for Super Nintendo and Super Famicom games, with support for Super Game Boy and Satellaview. It runs on Linux, macOS, and Windows. Graphics options include HD Mode 7 with optional supersampling, a multi-threaded PPU renderer, and OpenGL multi-pass pixel shaders. The emulator also provides low-level emulation for SNES coprocessors such as DSP-n, ST-01n, and Cx4. It accepts standard ROM files, optional higan game folders, and 7-zip decompression, and can apply BPS and IPS soft patches. Its games database has thousands of entries, and its cheat database covers hundreds of popular games. Save states can include screenshot previews and names, with undo and redo. Other tools include rewind, frame advance, cheat code search, movie recording and playback, and screenshots. Speed settings are 50%, 75%, 100%, 150%, and 200%, with smooth audio output retained. The project lists nightly builds for Windows, macOS, Linux, and FreeBSD.

Play! is a free, open-source emulator for PlayStation 2 games, with builds for Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, and iOS, plus an experimental browser port. Its high-level emulation means a BIOS is not required, and the project says users do not need custom settings to fix specific games. Games can be played by inserting a disc; desktop builds also offer command-line options for disc images, ELF files, arcade games, save-state slots, and fullscreen mode. The Play!.js browser version supports ISO, CSO, CHD, ISZ, BIN, and ELF files, but is not intended to run every game supported by desktop and mobile builds. Play! has preliminary support for Namco System 246 and 256 arcade games; release notes described 246 support as desktop-only. A compatibility tracker lists game statuses from Nothing to Playable. On iOS, playing requires JIT code generation, with device, jailbreak, or alternative JIT requirements documented by the project. Automatic JIT activation through AltServer requires it to run on the same network as the iOS device.