Hadlee Simons / Android Authority
TL;DR The ARMSX2 emulator for Android has just received its V1.0 release on GitHub, with a Play Store release coming later this week.
The app differs from NetherSX2 due to its open-source nature and its use of a more recent foundation.
NetherSX2 still offers better performance, though, while this ARMSX2 release had a major bug for some.
PS2 emulation on Android has been in a strange place since the pioneering AetherSX2 app was abandoned. Some developers took over this shuttered project and made impressive changes to it (resulting in NetherSX2), but the somewhat closed nature and aging foundation suggest this isn’t a long-term solution. Fortunately, the ARMSX2 emulator has been in testing for a while, and it’s finally received a version 1.0 release.
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The ARMSX2 development team released version 1.0 (and version 1.0.1) of the PS2 emulator on GitHub over the weekend, and the app is also supposed to be available via the Play Store. The store listing isn’t live as of writing but should be accessible later this week, according to an announcement on the emulator’s Discord channel.
This emulator uses a more recent version of the PCSX2 code for PC as its foundation, as opposed to the much older version underpinning NetherSX2. This should theoretically result in more fixes and optimizations for problematic games.
However, it’s also worth noting that PCSX2 uses x86-to-Arm64 translation in addition to emulation. This means you can expect slower performance than native PS2 emulators for Android, like AetherSX2 and NetherSX2. In saying so, the team says performance is subject to change as development progresses.
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