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Want to play those great Tegra Zone games on your non-Tegra Android device? There is a way.

Lots of people want to play Tegra 2 games but don’t currently have a Tegra 2 device. This leads to lots of sad faces but there is hope in the form of an app called Chainfire3D. So what is Chainfire3D? It is an OpenGL video driver that lets you do some pretty awesome things in general but the main thing is with graphic manipulation.

Chainfire3D comes with a bunch of options to allow you to manipulate textures including reducing their size and quality to allow for better FPS (frames-per-second) when gaming. It can also allow you to change non-32bit graphics into 32-bit files as well. The whole thing comes with the ability to expand it through plug-ins as well using an API developed for just that purpose. Mind you the API is still fairly raw and is currently being worked on.

So what does this have to do with playing Tegra 2 games on your non-Tegra 2 Android device? With the use of some plug-ins for Chainfire3D, you’ll be able to play some of the Tegra 2 games on your non-Tegra 2 device. Before we get into the gritty details though, there are some requirements that need to be in place for you to use Chainfire3D and actually be able to pull this off.

  • Android 2.1+ on your device
  • You need to be rooted
  • Writable /system
  • Having root access from recovery is a bonus in case you run into problems

 

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So first, how do you get an actual Tegra 2 game onto your non-Tegra 2 device? It’s actually not that hard at all. Here are the steps to get Tegra 2 games downloaded onto your device:

1) Use Chainfire 3D to add Nvidia plugin for Tegra Zone. Redo market & add nvidia plugin to each of the Tegra Zone games that’s on your phone.

2) All within Chainfire 3D (make sure you install the drivers):

  • default openGL settings > Use plugins > Nvidia
  • Per-app OpenGL settings > Tegra Zone > USe plugin > Nvidia
  • Do the above for all Tegra games & make sure you Fix Market settings within CF3D.

 

So now that you can get the games onto your device, it’s time to play them right? Almost. Not all Tegra 2 games will work using this method unfortunately but some do like Pinball HD as seen in the video below. So if you are rooted and want to play some Tegra 2 games, now you can! As the API gets stronger and more plug-ins are made, there will most likely be a method to play them all. At least some is better than nothing!

If you do this, let us know what games you have working and what device you are using. We will compile a list to make people’s lives a little easier.

Website Referenced: XDA | Android Police

Android Market Link: Chainfire3D

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