Glide64 (Glide HQ)

Glide64 (with the GlideHQ texture enhancement library) is one of the most versatile and compatible video plugins for Nintendo 64 emulators.

It reproduces many games’ graphics faithfully where other plugins fall short, and it is particularly good at emulating the N64’s complicated frame buffer effects.

Other plugins have some frame buffer support, but for a long time none matched Glide64.

It fully supports high-resolution texture packs, and can cache and compress textures so packs load within seconds after the first run while using less memory.

Its biggest drawback is that it was written for the old Glide3x API, so it needs a wrapper such as Glitch64 to translate its calls for modern hardware. Its successor, GLideN64, is now the more actively developed choice.

Glide64 lives on in two forks. Project64 Video, the default graphics plugin in Project64 2.x and 3.x, is Project64’s own continuation of it, and Glide64mk2 is the Mupen64Plus port, which Mupen64Plus still ships.