(Part 3) Top products from r/speedrun

Easycap clones ($5-10~)

If you're extremely short on funds you can play the easycap clone roulette and hope you get one that kinda works maybe.

You might end up getting one that just happens to suite your needs fine.... or you might not.

Not Reccomended, but cheap

Used Dazzle DVC100 ($20~)

Dazzles can be somewhat cheap used, they're still not the best capture cards money can buy and have some driver issues, but it's a popular choice and works for a lot of people well enough. Can be found on ebay for pretty cheap.

Probably the cheapest option aside from the "Easycrap" clones

KWorld ($30~)

/u/TLoZSR mentioned a while back that he was a fan of This KWorld Capture card.

I've seen a few of his videos with it and they look perfectly fine.

EZCaps ($30-$35~)

I've heard ok things about the legit EZCaps (not the cheap clones)
If you go this route make sure you're not ending up with a fake!

I don't have any personal experience with them.

GV-USB2 ($50~)

This defiantly deserves an honorable mention, although isn't anywhere as cheap as a used dazzle. Default settings out of the box are great, picture quality is very good, good drivers, and pretty much no complaints. Oh and here's an amazon link I guess (can be hard to find elsewhere). Box / driver installation is in Japanese, but not too difficult to figure out.

I use it personally and I really like it

These are all SD capture cards with composite/S-video, composite will look not so great regardless of a powered splitting setup, however it's defiantly recommended if you use S-Video (powered splitters can cost $30-50~), alternatively you may be able to get by without splitters if you have a video cable with both S-Video and composite (s-video would go into your capture card), but you may also lose a bit of quality that way if the cables aren't too good.

https://kb.speeddemosarchive.com/Splitters explains a fair bit

Good Luck!

This is the third part of a work of content aggregation, a kind of video remix, that serves as trailer for what will hopefully be a much longer work exploring what I think is the most interesting story in gaming this year.
It will be a comparative look at the high score and speedrun communities, how they deal with accusations of suspicious behavior, and how they gather evidence and come to conclusions about what is to be done. It will also attempt to examine the motivations behind cheating and deception in high level competitive single player gaming.
This is the final of three trailers focusing on the exposure of three gamers thought to be among the most talented in the world. This one focusses on Billy Mitchell. This story is still developing, and a lot remains unknown, but credits to Xelnia and the people at DKForum for putting together a lot of the best most comprehensive evidence.
As I said, I hope for this to be a prelude for a much longer work, but that will depend somewhat on the feelings of the communities involved, how the story continues to unfold, and of course the reactions of viewers like you, so let me know what you think!

Sources:
The King of Kong
https://www.amazon.com/King-Kong-Fistful-Quarters/dp/B000XQ4HR8

The Perfect Fraudman
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3JOgbxI8x0

Donkeykongforum.com/Xelnia
http://donkeykongforum.com/index.php?topic=2055.0

Twin Galaxies
https://www.twingalaxies.com

GDL Arcade - Big Bang 2010
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-LRptUQwFE

CPPCon 2016 - The MAME Story
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAUnUWYaA5s

I can't speak much on the NES but I've streamed the SNES plenty.

When you say "horizontal lines", does it look this this? That's interlacing, which is characteristic of older TV and consoles, and that can be fixed to an extent with software. Amarec is a popular program used to capture video, and it's able to de-interlace. If you're capturing directly with Xsplit or OBS they should have de-interlace functions too (though in my experience OBS's can be pretty cruddy unless they've improved it recently).

If you're interested in quality I also highly suggest getting an S-video cable. I'm not sure if the Dazzle 710 can capture S-video but my Dazzle DVC-100 can. According to Amazon this is the one I use with my SNES. S-video makes things look cleaner, gets rid of rainbowing effects and dot crawl.

Irrelevant game? Maybe you've heard of a game called Doom? Pretty popular. A company named id software developed that game. Guess where they got the money to develop that? From their previous wildly successfully series, Commander Keen. Since you seem to like books, I'd recommend picking up a copy of Masters of Doom, which tells the whole story of id's success. A little history goes a long way.

Since you say you're not tech savvy, I'm gonna assume you'd rather not hard-mod your N64 to output a component (480p) signal. Also, N64's output resolution is remarkably low so it doesn't take much to capture good looking N64 gameplay.

What you probably want is an S-video cable (this is the kind I use). I know it says for gamecube, but video cables for gamecube, n64 and snes are universally interchangeable, so you're good.

For capture, the best bang for your buck is gv-usb2. For streaming a composite or s-video signal it's pretty much the universal standard.

Hope this helped.

First play through a few and find one that you like. Then play that one a few times and get to where you can play beginning to end without too much trouble.

Watch some speedruns of it. Start emulating those strats into your playthrough and time yourself. ???? Profit.

As far as streaming, cheapest way would be to just emulate, use your keyboard or get an adapter (check Amazon) for your SNES/NES controller, use a wiimote with a bluetooth adapter, ps3 controller, logitech usb, whatever the hell floats your boat.

Use OBS (broadcasting software, google is your friend) to stream on twitch. Look up guides for the set up. It isnt hard, if you have any trouble then report back here.

NOW: if you want to stream from your actual console, here's what you need:

1. Check the tv that you are going to use, see if it has an av OUT port (red, white, yellow jacks and it will say OUT specifically on it) if it does then you DO NOT need a video splitter. Most modern tvs, however, only have av INs, so you WILL need a splitter.
   
   
2. A capture device. These will cost you anywhere from 70 to 100 dollars. HOWEVER, I am a poor bastard and I recently got one of these and while the reviews are a little all over the place I will tell you it works like a charm for me. Well worth the 12 bucks I spent.
   
   
3. If you do need a splitter, I use one of these and you'll want either one of these or a set of these (I personally use the latter but the cord is probably more convenient since its fewer pieces, although they are functionally identical).
   
   If you can't figure it out, all you do is plug the rca (red white yellow cables) from your console into that first adapter i posted. Then plug the the male end of the second cord I posted (or the three separate pieces of the last listing I posted) into the other side of said adapter.
   
   Then you will need two double male rca cords and plug the end of each into the female ends of the cord (or the separate adapters).
   
   From there you just plug one set of the cord into your tv and the other set into the easy cap and the easy cap into your streaming pc. Real easy.
   

If you did not understand what was happening but thought "wow" and wish you had, reading this book is a great way to start (maybe the best) : https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0735611319/ref=mp_s_a_1_1

I've personally used the GV-USB2 to record composite video and audio and it works pretty well. You'll need to purchase something like this to split the video/audio. Then purchase 2 sets of these male to male rca cables: 1. Plug each of the 3 RCA cables coming from your Gamecube into its own splitter in the side with one female port.
2. Then plug the corresponding colors from one side of your male to male rca cables.
3. With the resulting 2 sets of male RCA plugs, one set goes into your TV, the other goes into your GV-USB2/Dazzle.
Hope this helped.

Logitech C920 is the go-to webcamera but it is out of your budget unless you can find a used one.

I would personally recommend the Logitech C270. I used to own it and it works great in all scenarios. I don't know anything about the C310 so I can't tell you if it's any better or worse than the C270.

You need the dazzle and a couple splitters (if you want to play on the tv). With that you can use obs (open broadcast software) to stream.

edit: I doesn't have to be a dazzle. Cosmo uses this one for n64:

http://www.amazon.com/DATA-connection-video-capture-GV-USB2/dp/B00428BF1Y/ref=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1415515983&sr=1-1&keywords=i-o+data+gv-usb2

the splitters can be found at:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00H4L6UO8/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

with the splitters you will need a male to male av cables:

http://www.amazon.com/Premium-Audio-Video-Composite-Cable/dp/B001VJ465O/ref=pd_sim_e_1?ie=UTF8&refRID=1KV4BF0YP4E0PYEC1A0T

To get the capture card to work on obs, you create your scene and source a video capture device. You need to make sure all the drivers are installed for the capture card.

Other than the capture card linked, elgato makes good ones, dazzle, and there are probably others. DO NOT BUY CHEAP CAPTURE CARDS. They are shit, trust me.

Get a GV-USB2 capture card! It's basically the go-to for standard definition console gaming.

He'll also need a video/audio splitter. I use this one and it works wonderfully. You'll need an extra set of composite cables as well. (That's just an example. Get whatever will ship on time for you)

If he wants to stream on twitch, consider getting him a webcam and mic. Let me know what your budget is and I can recommend some options for you.

I got really lucky with this cheap cable for under $10.

I tried to buy an NES USB controller and it was really crappy. This SNES controller has worked out pretty well for me so far. Definitely not as good as playing on the real thing but it's held up well the past few years https://www.amazon.ca/Buffalo-iBuffalo-Classic-Gamepad-BSGP801GY/dp/B002B9XB0E

On the plus side.. some of the levels from Gauntlet: Dark Legacy are almost identical to Gauntlet: Legends, which most certainly does have maps. as I had one when I was younger http://www.amazon.com/Gauntlet-Legends-Primas-Official-Strategy/dp/0761531017



A little more searching unearthed the strategy guide for Dark Legacy http://www.amazon.com/Gauntlet-Legacy-Primas-Official-Strategy/dp/0761533567

which might have most of the information you need.

Elgato external video capture card, AmaRecTV and OBS.

These were the cables I purchased. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000SJ61BK/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o06_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

You might need to buy a PS2 man sorry but if you need a Japanese one you don't need to spend that much man here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B000IWPM9E/ref=dp_olp_0?ie=UTF8&condition=all

You could always get something similar to this. It's not too expensive, and you can find them for cheaper. It's not the best quality but it's something.

I know it doesn't really help, but if you have access to one, you can use the hori gamecube controller. I believe it's officially licensed by Nintendo, and I hear nothing but good things. Apart from the price.

http://www.amazon.com/Hori-Gameboy-Player-Controller-Indigo/dp/B00076R67C

If you're looking for something cheap, try an EasyCap. If you want something that's decent but not too expensive, check out a Dazzle DVC100. Or if you're big into quality and don't really care about the price, check out an AverMedia.