How can emulators effectively speed up their gameplay to 5-10x speed?

Question

I understand that emulators have to convert “console-language” to “emulator language” which causes stutters and otherwise poor performance.

But how can that same emulator play the game at 5-10x the speed using speed up features without sacrificing gameplay, loading screens, or resolution?

I just played through an emulated gamecube version of Twilight Princess with a 4K texture pack, which had its fair share of stutters. But I could also hold the speed-up button during loading zones and while saving my file and the game would handle it just fine.

If it requires extra processing power to emulate, how come emulators can speed the game up to such high speeds?

In: 15

Answer 1

Broadly speaking, it depends on what console is being emulated. Any console more than 15 years old would have hardware that runs very slow compared to new PC hardware. We’re probably talking hundreds or maybe even thousands of times slower. An emulator software on a modern PC would need to have some intelligence to “slow down” the execution of the console software to make it playable. The emulator can remove some of that “slow down” to speed up the game.