RPCS3 Tutorial Complete: Install Guide/ setup / config and all

About RPCS3- The best PS3 Emulator

RPCS3 is an open-source PlayStation 3 emulator developed to bring PS3 games to the PC. After over 10 years in the works, it is regarded as the best PS3 emulator available today. First released in 2011, RPCS3 has gained immense popularity due to its excellent compatibility with both Windows and Linux platforms. At the time of writing, this emulator can smoothly run over 98% of all PS3 titles ever published. Of course, to achieve 60FPS gameplay at high resolutions, your hardware needs to be beefy enough to handle the workload.

In essence, RPCS3 allows you to download PS3 game ROMs and run them on the emulator with customizeable display resolutions. After hundreds of updates by its development team, RPCS3 can now smoothly run most PS3 games with graphics and audio that rivals the original hardware. In fact, it brings exclusive enhancement options that let you crank up resolutions beyond what regular PS3 consoles can do.

RPCS3 is frequently updated to improve performance and compatibility across various PS3 titles. The active user community also contributes greatly by testing games and reporting bugs, allowing the RPCS3 developers to further refine and expand the PlayStation 3 library playable on the emulator.

Support

Currently, RPCS3 only officially supports two platforms – Windows and Linux. On these platforms, you can install and run the RPCS3 emulator to play PlayStation 3 games. Of course, your gameplay experience will depend entirely on your device’s hardware configuration.

On Windows, RPCS3 is compatible with operating system versions from Windows 7 onwards, including Windows 8 and Windows 10. You just need to download the RPCS3 version suited for your OS from the official website and install it on your computer.

On Linux, RPCS3 can run on various Linux distributions, including Ubuntu, Fedora, Arch Linux and more. Linux users can download the corresponding RPCS3 build for their OS and install it to start playing PS3 games on Linux.

The ability to support both Windows and Linux makes RPCS3 a flexible and convenient emulator option for users on both platforms.

RPCS3 for mobile?

RPCS3 is not supported on Android and iOS. Currently, this emulator only has official versions for the Windows and Linux operating systems on personal computers.

However, other emulators like DamonPS2 and PPSSPP allow you to play PlayStation 2 and PlayStation Portable games on Android and iOS mobile devices. For playing PS3 games on mobile devices, creating an efficient emulator compatible with smartphones’ hardware configuration is a big challenge. At present, there is no official and stable PS3 emulator on Android and iOS.

Complete guide to RPCS3

Get ready, we bring you the most complete guide to using RPCS3 on your computer.

1. Check the required configuration

You first need to check your hardware to see if it can run the emulator. Emulators tend to use a lot of RAM.

Although the Quickstart section on rpcs3.net only requires a minimum of 4GB of RAM as shown:

In reality, based on my research, that is just the average configuration needed to run a moderately sized game at 30fps. Therefore, to minimize issues like frame rate drops or crashes, you should consult the Compatibility section of the website: https://rpcs3.net/compatibility

This section contains a list of all released PS3 games. They have been classified with color-coded labels next to each title. Now refer to the image below and I will explain some key information you should know.

For “Playable” games in green: the Quickstart configuration of 4GB RAM for 30fps and 8GB RAM for 60fps is sufficient.

For “Ingame” games in yellow, you will need a more powerful machine than the Quickstart, with 16GB RAM.

For “Intro” games in orange, even a very powerful PC may not be able to run them properly, so wait for the RPCS3 developers to upgrade and improve the software to play these types of games in the future.

As for “Loadable” in red and “Nothing” in grayish black, these games either cannot be loaded or played at this time, so you don’t need to worry about them for now. In the future, the RPCS3 developers may release updates to allow these ROMs to be played, but not now.

All PS3 ROMs are now available on ROMsdl.net. All files are in ISO format and can be downloaded for free.!

2. Download RPCS3

Access this link to download the official application: https://rpcs3.net/download

The official developer website will automatically detect your device’s operating system and display the compatible version. Just download it and save it to disk.

Extract the file; you get a root folder containing all the emulator’s core files. However, it cannot run just yet. You need a few more steps to run ROMs.

Note: You don’t need to turn off the antivirus because this application is completely free.

3. Install Firmware

We all know that Firmware is the backbone of every emulator and RPCS3 is no exception. To run game ROMs, you need to install the latest PlayStation 3 Firmware Update (currently 4.88). The good news is this Firmware is readily available on the official PlayStation website: https://www.playstation.com/en-us/support/hardware/ps3/system-software/.

After downloading, you will receive a file named PS3UPDAT.PUP. It has a PUP format.

Now move this PUP file into the root folder of the RPCS3 software.

Run the rpcs3.exe app

Then select the File/Install Firmware menu as shown:

Browse to the PS3UPDAT.PUP file, then click Open.

Wait a moment for the Firmware installation process to complete.

You should check for new Firmware versions regularly. The current version is 4.88 but if newer ones are released, just download and follow the steps above.

4. Download PS3 ROMs

Instead of ROMs, the files used to run PS3 games on the RPCS3 emulator are called “ISOs” or “disc images.” These files are backup copies of the original PS3 game disc data in file form. They contain the full content of the game disc, including game data, settings, etc.

You must have the corresponding ISO file to run a PS3 game on RPCS3. These ISO files are large, around 10-25GB for a single game.

We have a complete PS3 ROMs collection with more than 2 thousand game titles. You can access and download it for free HERE.

5. Run and Play Game

You have the ROM file; now try running it on the emulator. The steps are straightforward:

From the main application screen, select: File/Boot Game

Select the game folder, then click Select Folder.

RPCS3 will then load the game from the folder you selected. The default settings of RPCS3 allow you to play most PS3 games at standard resolution smoothly. However, some less compatible games may not run stable with these settings. Some common issues are a black screen, FPS drops, files not loading, etc. Don’t worry, you’ll need to make additional configurations we suggest below.

6. Check the game version and update the game (Important)

At the main interface of RPCS3, added games will be displayed in a list. Now carefully check the Version column as shown:

As you can see, I have six games.

Of these, Air Conflict: Vietnam, God of War: Origins Collection, and NieR Replicant only have version 01.00. With these types of ROMs, you can play them smoothly without any issues.

For games with Updated available status, there will be 2 cases:

Case 1 is the game can still run without needing to update, for example God of War Collection. For this case it’s up to you, but I recommend updating as it may fix some in-game bugs.

Case 2 is games that require you to update to the latest version to enter and play, and God of War Ascension is an example. As you can see, my game has an Update available ver 01.12 and this game basically can’t run at ver 01.00.

To update PS3 games, you need specialized software. They can automatically check for the latest game version as well as download update patches. For this step, I advise you not to google search and look for update patches online. With ROM games, you can do that; feel free to search for ROMs to play but not for update patches. As mentioned, you must download and install these updates using specialized software, not getting them from a free online source.

Update