There are several ways:
Use the starter panel. You find it in the menu "Tools→Starter". From the list select the cartridge you want to start and double click the entry.
Open a vecx panel (menu: Tools→vecx), press the "folder" button and select a binary file. Press the start button (if another program is still running, press stop first)
Open a "codi" panel (menu: Tools→codi) navigate in the tree to an assembler program you would like to run and press the start button
do "the same" in vedi (menu: Tools→vedi), here load a project or a "single" source, and press the start button
See "How do I start a game", second bullet point.
Overlays are just "normal" pictures where some regions have some alpha values. Try your favourite paint program. Save them as "png" images. (The overlay provided were stolen from MESS!) The filename of the overlay should be the same as the "bin" file, only with a different extension (png).
Several options:
in the same directory as the binary
in the directory "overlay"
if the overlay belongs to a "cartridge" file, than just put the path to the image in the appropriate place (configuration of cartridges)
An analoge fault: "drift" is emulated. If you want (unnatural) correctness of all vectors, you should set drift to 0 (slider to the center).
See answer to last question, this also is a drift "feature".
Because the emulator is not a real vectrex. IMHO vide is pretty exact at emulating vectrex. But knowledgable programmers can certainly still outsmart vide with just a few lines of code.
Appart from that nothing comes close to the vector glow of a real vectrex :-)!
Yes.
Well, probably
first: there is the drift (mentioned above), this may be slightly different for each vectrex
second: "timing" parameter seem to differ for different vectrex generations. Just fiddle with the timings till emulation comes close to your vectrex. But be sure to try different cartridges with your settings - all of them should be working, not just one!
also, you may fiddle with "pure" display settings, like vector glow, brightness, line width, drawing splines, antialiazing etc...
In the configuration there is an option "Try autoSync". Well - if autosyncing is switched off, or the "auto" part did not work, display will "flicker".
Yep. Just remember, vide was never build for speed!
you can (in descending order):
if possible use JOGL as your display (see configuration)
be absolutley sure that "ray gun" is switched off!
if you do not debug - disable "debug core"
disable ringbuffer
antialiazing ON (on is faster on my system, why? I don't now!)
set line width to 1 (if not JOGL)
disable persistence (if not JOGL)
don't use an overlay (if not JOGL)
disable codescan
disable cycle exact emulation
switch off the use of splines
For all known 3d-Imager games the configuration includes "imager". If for some reason in the second joystick port no imager is present, that might be the problem. Chose "Imager" in the combobox for port 1. Also depending on your emualtion settings - the internal imager emulation needs to come up with the correct speed - this can take a few seconds!
Depending on your VIDE settings ("activate direct draw on debug"), vectors while single stepping/multistepping are REALLY drawn differently!
Explanation:
Usually vecxi emulates and "collects" vectors for a certain amount of time (one frame, depending on sync settings). All collected vectors are than drawn in one go, while in the background vector "collecting" continuous (different thread). When single stepping, a user is probably not amused, if the vector that should be drawn NOW is drawn 30000 cycles later... so while in debug mode vectors are drawn "directly". Directly here means after one "vector" is finished (if not in "ray mode" vectors are drawn as a whole, not in "single steps"). To be able to discern the just drawn vector, it is drawn in "yellow" (not in grayscale), the yellow is only visible for one frame in which the vector was drawn! (this can be best seen if "glow" is disabled in emulation, since the glow effect is still grayscaled!)