nhl24pc

NHL24 PC

NHL 24 (PS4, CUSA37933 / CUSA37934) running natively on Windows – a single-game fork of the shadPS4 emulator, tuned and fixed for one title, with a launcher that extracts the game from your own PKG and starts it. No console, no CPU emulation: the game's x86-64 code runs directly on your processor, the PS4 system libraries are replaced by native Windows implementations, and the GPU work goes through Vulkan.

Slovenská verzia je nižšie: Slovensky. Video: https://youtu.be/eGo1-W3FaYw

Video	NHL 24 running on PC – YouTube
Download	Latest release (ZIP) or the release/ folder
Ready-to-run package	release/ – launcher.exe, nhl24.exe, runtime DLLs, clean user\ template
Current build	v0.9.1 (2026-11-02), Windows 10/11 x64
Needs	your own NHL 24 PKG – US (CUSA37933) or EU (CUSA37934), base v01.00, optionally the 1.60 update – and a Vulkan 1.3 GPU
License	GPL-2.0-or-later (same as shadPS4)

How it works

The PS4 is an x86-64 machine. NHL 24's executable (eboot.bin) and its modules are ordinary AMD64 code, so this port does not emulate a CPU: the game code is loaded into the process and executed by your CPU directly, at native speed. What the emulator provides is everything around it:

• HLE of the PS4 operating system – kernel calls, threads, memory, files, audio (AJM), pads, video output, trophies, saves… are implemented as native Windows code (shadPS4's "libraries"). NHL 24 needs about 91 % of its imports resolved by HLE; the rest comes from the game's own modules.
• GPU – the PS4's GCN command streams are interpreted by a command-processor thread, the GCN shaders are recompiled to SPIR-V and executed through Vulkan, with a texture/buffer cache keeping guest memory and GPU memory coherent.
• Game-specific work in this fork (the full diary is docs/DEVLOG.sk.md): fence writes through a backing view instead of page faults (no GPU drain per fence), readbacks that wait only for the submission that wrote the data, full mip-chain depth/colour copies, CMASK/HTILE metadata with reference counting and a UI-coverage emulation (the game builds its HUD mask from CMASK), libSceJson2 and AJM fixes, wave64 lowering fixes, a GPU-thread idle backoff and pending-ops polling that halve the idle CPU load, a diagnostics suite (frame trace, draw log, image/buffer dumps, hotkey capture) compiled in but off by default, and memory patches (game_patches/nhl24.xml, loaded automatically from user\patches\).
• Launcher (launcher/, C# WinForms, needs only the .NET Framework 4 that ships with Windows): extracts the base/update PKG with shadPS4's PKG/PFS code built into nhl24.exe (nhl24.exe --extract-pkg), shows the installed version, exposes the useful settings (resolution, fullscreen, vsync, sharpening, language, controls, the Windows red-zone protection) and starts the game.

Support / Podpora

If this project is useful to you, you can support its development:

What's new in v0.9.1

• Black boxes and lines in cutscenes fixed (issue #17, NVIDIA and AMD). NHL 24 renders cutscenes and intros at a dynamic resolution and re-describes the same render targets with a new width, height and pitch every few frames. The texture cache served those requests with an image of the previous size, which clipped draws and shifted sampling. Such images are now recreated at the requested size with their contents carried over.
• Out-of-video-memory crashes after several matches (ErrorOutOfDeviceMemory on 8 GB cards): images left behind when the game reuses memory for another surface are now released once they go idle, and the garbage collector no longer stalls on images it cannot release.
• Be a Pro and NVIDIA fixes from torpedatorpeda/NHL24-Be-a-Pro, reimplemented in the emulator source: no crash when a texel buffer starts inside an image (match start), shared-memory ordering for compute shaders on GPUs with 32-wide subgroups (NVIDIA), separate descriptors for colour sampling and depth comparison of the same texture, depth-store synchronisation when a depth target is also sampled, and 16-bit uniform buffer access enabled where supported.
• The shader cache is rebuilt once on the first start (expect a few minutes of stutter).
• Launcher: ♥ Support the author button (Ko-fi).

Playing

1. Download NHL24-PC-v0.9.1.zip from the latest release (or the repository via Code → Download ZIP and open its release folder) and unpack it – everything you need is there (launcher.exe, nhl24.exe, runtime DLLs, user\). Keep the unpacked folder somewhere you can write to (not Program Files).
2. Start launcher.exe. Click Install PKG and pick your NHL 24 base game package (v01.00). The 1.60 update PKG can be installed afterwards the same way; since v0.9.0 the port runs game version 1.00 and 1.60. Both the US (CUSA37933) and the European (CUSA37934, since v0.9.0) versions are supported; the 1.60 update has so far been verified on the US version only. The launcher checks the title ID and the kind of package, shows size and version, and extracts into game\ next to the launcher, with progress.
3. Press PLAY. Simple view = the settings most people touch; Advanced = everything, including the keyboard mapping and the game folder.

First run: saves, the profile and the shader cache are created under user\. The first minutes stutter while the shaders compile; afterwards the game runs at 50–60 fps on a mid-range GPU (Ryzen 5 4500 + RTX 5060: 51 fps in play, 30 fps locked in menus and cutscenes, like the console).

Requirements: Windows 10/11 x64; a Vulkan 1.3 GPU with current drivers (NVIDIA GTX 10xx/RTX, AMD RDNA; integrated GPUs are too slow); 8 GB RAM (16 GB recommended); about 40 GB free for the extracted game; a gamepad (Xbox, DualShock 4, DualSense) is detected automatically, the keyboard works too.

Known issues (v0.9.1): on 8 GB graphics cards the video memory use can exceed the card's budget in long sessions (the driver then moves part of it to system RAM, which costs performance); rare "device lost" crashes. If the game crashes while a match loads (right after team selection, error 0xc0000005, issues #1/#3), turn on Red zone protection (Windows) in the launcher's quick settings (off by default, experimental; see docs/DEVLOG.sk.md, section "v0.8.3: ochrana red zone"). Windows SmartScreen may warn about the unsigned exe (More info → Run anyway); some antivirus products dislike emulators that map large memory regions – add an exception if needed.

Repository layout

release/        ready-to-run package (binaries + clean user template), rebuilt by tools\make_release.ps1
launcher/       launcher sources (Launcher.cs), pictures, icon, build script (csc from .NET Framework)
src/            emulator sources (shadPS4 fork; NHL-specific changes are marked "nhlport")
externals/      third-party libraries as git submodules (clone with --recursive)
game_patches/   nhl24.xml – memory patches applied by the emulator at start
tools/          build, run, measurement and diagnostics scripts (PowerShell / Python)
docs/           DEVLOG.sk.md (development diary, Slovak), bbport_analysis.md, patches/ (early fixes)
documents/      shadPS4's own documentation and README

Building

Only needed to change the emulator or the launcher; players use release/.

• Windows 10/11, Visual Studio 2022 Build Tools (MSVC v143 + Windows SDK), LLVM (clang-cl, lld), CMake 3.24+, Ninja, Vulkan SDK.
• git clone --recursive https://github.com/HajDEO/nhl24pc.git
• powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File tools\build_nhlport.ps1 -DebugInfo → build\nhl24.exe (+ .pdb)
• powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File launcher\build_launcher.ps1 → build\launcher.exe
• powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File tools\make_release.ps1 → refreshes release\

Development notes: tools\run_nhl24.ps1 runs the build with the diagnostics log enabled (NHLPORT_DIAG=1; F1 captures a frame: draw log, image dumps, screenshot), tools\measure_nhl24.ps1 scripts measurement runs, tools\capture_report.py summarises a capture. The version lives in src/common/port_version.h (also used for the exe resource and the launcher title).

Contributing

Issues and pull requests are welcome – performance, the open rendering issues above, DualSense features, Linux. Keep changes focused; NHL-specific code is marked nhlport in comments so it can be told apart from upstream shadPS4. Please do not upload game files, PKGs, saves or shader caches.

Legal

This project does not contain any game data. You need your own copy of NHL 24 for PlayStation 4, dumped as a PKG from a console you own. "NHL" and "EA SPORTS" are trademarks of their respective owners; this project is not affiliated with EA, the NHL or Sony. The emulator is derived from shadPS4 (GPL-2.0-or-later); this repository is distributed under the same license, see LICENSE and LICENSES/.

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Slovensky

NHL 24 (PS4) bežiace natívne na Windows. Fork emulátora shadPS4 doladený pre jednu hru plus launcher, ktorý hru rozbalí z vášho PKG a spustí. Kód hry (x86-64) beží priamo na procesore bez emulácie CPU; systémové knižnice PS4 sú nahradené natívnou implementáciou (HLE) a grafika ide cez Vulkan s prekladom shaderov GCN → SPIR-V.

Video: https://youtu.be/eGo1-W3FaYw

Novinky vo v0.9.1:

• Opravené čierne obdĺžniky a pruhy v prestrihoch (issue #17, NVIDIA aj AMD). Hra kreslí prestrihy a úvody v dynamickom rozlíšení a tie isté render targety každých pár snímok opisuje s inou šírkou, výškou a pitchom. Texture cache takéto požiadavky obsluhovala obrazom predchádzajúcej veľkosti, čím sa kreslenie orezalo a vzorkovanie posunulo. Obraz sa teraz vytvorí v požadovanej veľkosti a obsah sa prenesie.
• Pády na nedostatok videopamäte po niekoľkých zápasoch (ErrorOutOfDeviceMemory na 8 GB kartách): obrazy, ktoré ostanú po tom, čo hra použije pamäť pre iný povrch, sa po nečinnosti uvoľnia a garbage collector sa už nezasekne na obrazoch, ktoré uvoľniť nemôže.
• Opravy pre Be a Pro a NVIDIU z projektu torpedatorpeda/NHL24-Be-a-Pro, prepracované priamo v zdrojákoch emulátora: žiadny pád, keď texel buffer začína vnútri obrazu (začiatok zápasu), poradie prístupov do shared memory v compute shaderoch na GPU s 32-šírkovým subgroupom (NVIDIA), samostatné deskriptory pre vzorkovanie farby a porovnanie hĺbky tej istej textúry, synchronizácia zápisu hĺbky, keď sa depth target zároveň vzorkuje, a 16-bitový prístup k uniform bufferom tam, kde ho GPU podporuje.
• Shader cache sa pri prvom spustení raz preloží nanovo (pár minút sekania).
• Launcher: tlačidlo ♥ Podporte autora (Ko-fi).

Hranie: stiahnite NHL24-PC-v0.9.1.zip z posledného vydania (alebo repozitár cez Code → Download ZIP a prejdite do priečinka release), rozbaľte ho (všetko potrebné je tam); spustite launcher.exe, cez Install PKG vyberte PKG základnej hry (v01.00) – hra sa rozbalí do game\ vedľa launchera – a stlačte PLAY. Update 1.60 môžete potom nainštalovať rovnako; od v0.9.0 port podporuje verziu hry 1.00 aj 1.60. Podporovaná je americká (CUSA37933) aj európska verzia (CUSA37934, od v0.9.0); update 1.60 je zatiaľ overený len na americkej. Uložené pozície, profil a shader cache vznikajú v user\; prvé minúty sa hra zasekáva (kompilácia shaderov), potom beží plynulo.

Požiadavky: Windows 10/11 x64, GPU s Vulkan 1.3 (NVIDIA GTX 10xx/RTX, AMD RDNA), 8–16 GB RAM, asi 40 GB miesta na rozbalenú hru. Gamepad funguje automaticky, klávesnica tiež.

Známe problémy (v0.9.1): na 8 GB grafických kartách môže využitie videopamäte pri dlhom hraní prekročiť rozpočet karty (driver potom časť presunie do systémovej RAM, čo stojí výkon), zriedkavé pády „device lost“. Ak hra padá pri načítaní zápasu (hneď po výbere tímov, chyba 0xc0000005), zapnite v launcheri Ochrana red zone (Windows) (predvolene vypnuté, experimentálne; rozbor v docs/DEVLOG.sk.md, sekcia „v0.8.3: ochrana red zone“).

Vývoj: zdrojáky emulátora v src/ (zmeny pre NHL sú označené nhlport), launcher v launcher/, skripty v tools/, denník vývoja v docs/DEVLOG.sk.md. Build: tools\build_nhlport.ps1, launcher\build_launcher.ps1, balík: tools\make_release.ps1.