Disclaimer: This guide is outdated! You can follow through it, but there might be better ways now to set things up.

Part 1: Introduction and Overview

What is Yuzu?

Yuzu is an experimental Nintendo Switch emulator for the PC from the creators of Citra. This is the website: https://yuzu-emu.org. People found a way to get a better online experience than using Nintendo’s online service by using Yuzu and a particular streaming technology.

The point of this guide

I suffered and struggled for many hours to make my Yuzu experience as good as possible.

I want to save you unnecessary time and stress and make the start into Yuzu way easier.

Also people, who already use Yuzu should check out this guide since I will post optimizations for Yuzu so the emulator runs more fluently (shoutouts to Nursejoy at this point, got tons of help and I want to spread the word)!

There is also a section, which helps you setup live streaming Yuzu via Twitch/Google/Whatever for your audience!

How does playing online Smash with Yuzu work?

The two players are categorized into host and client.

The host is the person, who runs the emulator and the game.

The client is the person, who joins the game to the host.

Imagine the host streaming the game like many people do via Twitch. This is what basically the host is doing for the client. The host streams his computer screen to the client - with one major difference to Twitch: It’s nearly real time. If the distance and internet connection between these two is good there will be only 2-3 frames of input delay. This is done via one of two special streaming technologies called Parsec or Moonlight.

Therefore the client doesn’t need to own the emulator. Neither he needs a good PC. Anyways the host won’t suffer additional input delay, while the client does! But with a good internet connection and close distance the client will experience way less input delay than on Nintendo’s official online mode, therefore it is worth it.

Regarding the distance, it will be still a struggle for the client if the distance is too much - like EU to US. I highly recommend to play with people in your region or the input delay will be significantly higher.

How stable is it? Is it worth it to give it a try?

Updated on December 2022: The emulator runs now very smoothly and is stable!

Rarely I feel like the input would have worked on Original Switch, but it didn’t on Yuzu.

Discords and places where to find mutual people

https://discord.gg/JFmWvyebNV Europe Yuzu Smash

https://discord.com/invite/3jgrxPTkgB North America Yuzu Smash

https://discord.gg/rjRbPCKSq6 France Yuzu Smash

Feel free to link me more discords to add here

Help me improve the guide

If you want to help me expand the guide (eg. helping with the Host guide for AMD users), you found inconsistencies or just have general questions I didn’t cover here feel free to write a tweet on this Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/quikssb/status/1336789216605429762

In general I will keep improving the guide, the moment I publish it it is only its first version!

Spanish version of this guide made by ChefElBardo

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1lnStNF1mQFSIhfTYLPaBTWOtVnucQNubKDp2dxEY8Zw/edit

Feel free to translate this guide to any languages

Overview: good internet connection

NurseJoy did a little overview, when to expect a good and stable connection with someone else:

For more information about this graphic check out the original tweet: https://twitter.com/sweetenernj/status/1350575259779543047

You are very interested in Yuzu and want to give it a try?

You came to the right place.

You have to make a decision first, do you want to start as host or client?

If your PC is not the best, you may start as a client first. Find a host (for example on Discords i linked), and check out Part 3 of this guide. It should take around 30mins to set it up.

You want to become host, go to Part 2 of this guide. Setting up as a host will take longer, but I got your back and will lead you through the process (except getting the ROM). Let me know your set up time!

Part 2: Setting up Yuzu as host

Initial note: I used @kawibuun‘s Yuzu guide for the host part as a base and added some additional stuff to it. Also a very helpful person named NurseJoy helped me do a lot of optimizations. Shoutouts to them!

Requirements

* A PC or laptop with Windows 10 (other OS will work too but this guide is optimized for Win10)--with decent hardware is important because a stable 60 FPS is necessary especially for competitive play. Hardware requirements as listed on the official website:

* A stable internet connection, preferably wired. As a host, a good upload speed is very important.

As a reference I don’t think I have the best internet, but it is fine enough for me to be host and even stream via Twitch at the same time. I have around 100mbps download and 25mbps upload and 10-20 ping.

* A Nintendo Switch that can be modded or is modded to dump Smash.You will need to obtain the Base Game, DLCs, Patches, prod.keys and title.keys all yourself (I can’t help you with that!). You are able to obtain that all legally via dumping by owning the game. Visit the official quickstart guide for dumping: https://yuzu-emu.org/help/quickstart/

The game can also be pirated but I will not tell you how to do so for obvious reasons, Google is enough to help.

* Smash Ultimate ROM (Base Game, DLCs, Patches, prod.keys and title.keys), which as I said is obtained through dumping or pirating online.

* As far as I know, Nvidia GPUs seem to work better than AMD ones. Since I personally own a Nvidia the optimization tips explained later in this guide mostly apply to Nvidia cards. Eventually I will add help for AMD owners in the future, if an AMD owner will help me improving this guide.

Initial Setup

1. Install Yuzu through the download link available on the website: https://yuzu-emu.org/downloads/.

Note: If you successfully followed through that guide and are happy as a host I recommend you to become Patreon for Yuzu. You will get the Early Access version of Yuzu by paying 5 bucks per month. It runs way better on most PCs than regular version at the current state according to people, also does for me. In the access version you immediately get new versions and improvements of Yuzu

(https://yuzu-emu.org/help/early-access/ ). Of course feel free just to support them for the sake of helping the devs.

2. Once installed, you should be able to open up to a fresh screen:

Keep in mind your game directory / icon won’t appear immediately, ignore my already finished setup.

3. Locate your system’s app data folder. Windows Key + R and enter %appdata%.

4. Locate the ‘yuzu’ folder inside your app data folder.

5. Inside your yuzu folder, create a new folder named ‘keys’. Put the prod.keys and title.keys you obtained through dumping (you'll need to use lockpickrcm on your modded Switch to obtain title and prod keys or other ways...) inside the newly created keys folder. You will not be able to run any games without these.

Smash Setup

1. With the obtained ROM file either by dumping or downloading, place it into a dedicated folder for games. Said folder can be created and placed anywhere desired.

2. On the new Yuzu window, click ‘Add New Directory’ and browse and select your folder containing the ROM. The icon should appear immediately or after some time on the home screen. Do not launch it yet.

3. The DLC characters and patches are delivered in form of additional files in addition to the ROM. Like the ROM for obvious reasons I can’t tell you how to get them. To install them click File > Install Files to NAND…, choose them and install them.

After a successful install you can see the DLC stuff listed under “Add-ons”:

4. Navigate to Emulation > Configure > Controls to configure your. GCC, Pro Controller, 3rd party controllers, Xbox controllers, etc. are all compatible. Make sure ‘Connect Controller’ is ticked.

For Pro Controller users: Plug in and play, should work out of the box!

For GCCs used with the original Adapter: Please follow this guide on setting up proper GCC support Using this driver your GCC should work without configuring additional stuff! Make sure to select “Gamecube Controller” in Input Device. Note that this method only works for the host, not for the client (for more infos check the client section).

All other controllers or adapters: Should straight up work when selecting the correct device in “Input Device” but I can’t guarantee, since I never tried myself.

In general: Make sure to change deadzone values if you have an issue with dashing or tilts. First two options should work without configuring deadzones though.

Performance Optimizations and Fixes for Smash

Optimization is very important otherways you might suffer a lot of stutters and FPS drops. The following settings are used by myself and I managed to have the best possible performance with it.

Note that all following infos are based on a Nvidia GPU. If there is an AMD user making the emulator work fluently I will appreciate your help optimizing this guide. However AMD users feel free to go along with this guide as much as possible.

1. Navigate to yuzu’s settings under Emulation > Configure. Ensure the following settings are enabled for the best possible performance:

Note that OpenGL will work for everyone but AMD GPU users might find better performance using Vulkan instead. This all under API settings. Additionally, Accuracy Level set to ‘Unsafe’ may give a boost in performance. Test it