Ruzu vs Strato

Ruzu is an experimental, open-source Nintendo Switch emulator written in Rust for desktop computers. Its graphical library can browse game directories, manage settings for individual games, and show detected updates and add-ons. The interface supports controller navigation as well as keyboard and mouse input, and offers themes, translations, configurable hotkeys, and game-list display options. Graphics APIs include Vulkan and OpenGL, with an experimental native Metal backend on macOS. Ruzu can run homebrew applications through graphical and command-line frontends. Its CPU emulation supports ARM32 and ARM64 guest execution through the rdynarmic dynamic recompiler, with x86-64 and ARM64 host backends. Packages are listed for Windows, macOS, Linux, Ubuntu, and Steam Deck. The latest listed release is v0.1.1-rc4, a pre-release for testing before v0.1.1. The project says compatibility and performance vary with the game, hardware, and graphics backend, and that bugs, crashes, and incomplete features are expected. Ruzu is free under GPL-3.0-or-later and is intended for legally obtained games; it does not include games, keys, or system files.

Strato is a free, open-source experimental emulator for ARMv8 Android devices. It aims to reproduce Nintendo Switch system functionality through an ARM Compatibility Layer and System Emulation, with goals of accurate, performant and user-friendly operation. The project remains in development and is not ready for public release. Work has covered texture management, synchronization, queries, MSAA rendering and the blit engine, including a texture-manager rewrite intended to improve rendering accuracy. A texture-variant system improved compatibility with Mali GPUs, and firmware importing supports games that use firmware assets. Developers were also modifying core components for 32-bit games, with that work still ongoing in a February 2024 report. Its shader compiler is a modified fork of yuzu’s compiler for mobile GPU emulation. Strato began after Skyline ended in May 2023. Lynx and TheASV are named developers, with additional contributors. The source is licensed under GNU GPL v3.0 or later.