Spine (emulator)

Spine is a free and closed source video game console emulator for the PlayStation 4 platform that runs on Linux.
Development
A demo version of Spine was released for free on June 9th, 2019 through Github, though the developer, "devofspine" says it has been in development since January 2018. According to the developer, the only supported game was the Mega Man Legacy Collection, which was required to be dumped on a PlayStation 4 console, and then copied to your computer. This version reportedly had no sound.
The developer has stated that they wish to keep this project closed source for the time being due to parts of the code being a mess and they wouldn't feel comfortable releasing them for public consumption, and out of fear of loosing control of the project, resulting in forks. However, the developer has stated multiple times on Reddit that they will eventually make the project open source.
The Spine application is packaged with FlatPak, but according to the developer, the runtime doesn't seem to work with Nvidia GPU drivers. Due to this, the developer created an alternative version of the application with Fedora 29.
There is no official website for Spine, but on a Video Game Blog Website called wololo.net, updated versions of Spine are apparently released there, with the latest blog post being created on September 24, 2021. The original Spine release is still needed, in which you replace the Spine executable program with the newest one from the download.
Game Compatibility
Currently, Spine is not compatible with every PlayStation 4 game. Testing is performed by users who have access to Jailbroken . (Not to be confused with Jailbreaking for Apple devices) This is so testers can dump game files from their PlayStation 4 and import them onto their Linux computers and document how they perform on Spine.
There is a maintained compatibility list hosted on Google Drive.
Features
To launch games on Spine, you need to open the folder where Spine is located in Terminal and type in the following: ./spine eboot.bin
In a recent update, devofspine added a feature which allows you to run games in windowed mode. To do this, you need to type in -w at the end of the Terminal command.
Graphical improvements
Reception
The original reception of Spine was very poor. The developer was not known at all in the emulation community, and due to the project's lack of documentation, uncommon file hosting site choice, lack of source code, or lack of trust from the emulation community, (and additional circumstances, like the developer posting the thread on , trying to make it come off as a semi-serious joke because Linux emulators are not common at all) the developer was mocked and his work was removed from the r/emulation subreddit. On June 4th, 2019, the developer of Spine replied with a Youtube video that was a showcase of Spine in response to another user who stated that there was no other legitimate working PS4 emulators that existed besides Orbital. Again, the developer of Spine was mocked and other users believed that the video they posted was entirely fake.
However, the developer did not give up. They urged users to test it out for themselves, and many did, later confirming that Spine was in fact, a legitimate PlayStation 4 emulator. Many Youtubers and blog writers later picked up this emulator for themselves and began to spread the word further on their respective social media sites.
As of November 2nd, 2021, the developer of Spine is still relatively active on Reddit, and gives updates on the development of their project.
Variants & Forks
As Spine is close-sourced, currently there are no custom forks or variants of the emulator.

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See Also

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