Zerosquare

If they told you, it wouldn't be secret anymore, would it ? Seriously, the game has just been released... either try to discover it yourself, or wait a little bit

Nice trick, but it only works on the lower levels

Dunno about the SNES and SegaCD ports, but I believe the original computer version used 320x200 (which already looks decent on a TV ; most commercial Jaguar games use similar resolutions). If it's feasible technically, and if the author agrees, we'd like to support 640x400 and antialiasing as well for the polygon engine. ("prettying" up the bitmap elements would be cool also, but it requires more work.)

Yep, we're getting the source right from the author (in a few weeks, as he's currently busy with other things). According to Mr Chahi, a basic port to a new platform is pretty quick to do. We'll see

If you mean optimizing the code to take advantage of the Jaguar's power (compared to, say, an STF), which means e.g. eliminating slowdowns, then the answer is yes. If you mean things like enhanced graphics : we'd like to add this as well, but we need the agreement of Éric Chahi (the game's original author) first ; we've not discussed this with him yet.

Beware. The Jag is quite "dirty" when it comes to RF interference ; I've heard that running it without the shielding causes problems.

That's a very generous and positive attitude

Are you sure you're using the right lamp ? The wavelength of UV rays matter ; the EPROMs will erase slowly or not at all if it's not correct (I think you can even damage them with too long an exposure to the wrong wavelength, it happened to somebody I know). I know different kinds of EPROMs have different sensitivity to UV light, maybe the wavelengths that "work" are also different.

May I add that ROM emulation is not the only subject of this forum. Others aspects of the JagCF relevant to developers are also being discussed.

Maybe we should wait until the port is actually completed and available..? Yes, I think so. The Wikipedia editors would probably delete the info otherwise.

http://www.atariage.com/forums/index.php?s...t&p=1123735

There are two connection modes available. When connected to the JagCF, the Catnip acts basically as a USB-to-RS232 converter, at up to 3 Mbauds (the JagCF has an internal, high-speed UART). The protocol has not been defined yet, but it won't be based on BJL. Uploading programs this way is mainly intended for developers (debug features will also be accessible). For "standard" users, it will be easier to copy the software they want to run on a CF, using their computer. When connected to joypad port 2, the Catnip emulates a parallel BJL cable. This is done through an internal ATtiny2313 microcontroller, which gets its data from the FT232R chip, and handles the BJL protocol (using a standard USB-to-parallel chip directly would have been too slow, as BJL requires constant synchronization between the Jag and the computer, and USB is not optimized for transferring little blocks of data ; it also avoids the sync problems of the parallel cable on modern machines). (OK, I lied. There are three modes in fact, as the microcontroller can also be used to update the JagCF's FPGA ) I've also included a bootloader in the microcontroller, so that the firmware can be updated through USB to fix bugs, add new protocols and features, etc. Both , as well as the commands needed to auto-select the upload mode, reset the Jag, read/write the cartridge EEPROM, etc.Debug features (registers and memory dump, etc.) work also, but very slowly due to unfortunate timing requirement in the protocol. If you know the FT232BM, the FT232R is basically the same chip with fewer peripheral parts needed, and a few new features. Thanks for the interest.

Indeed, that's the case. One reason is that there's only one JagCF board in existence for the moment (it's not even the final hardware design, in fact), and its owner seems bizarrely reluctant to sharing it with the others Anyways, the first games will probably only use the extra RAM and storage (think larger graphics, streamed audio, etc.), so the main game logic can still be developed and demonstrated using BJL. The software needed to handle all of this is not ready yet (I'm partly to blame...) ; SCPCD has concentrated essentially on finalizing the hardware and firmware.

Can you give me a pointer to these, please ? (you don't mean the Alpine Boards, do you ?) I don't know anything about them... The design is based on the FT232R chip from FTDI, which has MacOS X drivers. In fact, I already did the a beta-test port of my software to MacOS X on a friend's iBook, and it works, but there are two problems : * As I don't have any Mac hardware, I need someone proficient in Mac programming to handle the support (producing binaries, fixing platform-specific bugs, etc.). * MacOS X doesn't support speeds higher than 115,200 bauds for serial devices prior to Tiger (10.4). (For the technically-minded, it's a POSIX limitation - a new system call has been introduced in Tiger to work around this). The hardware supports 115,200 bps, but it's slow...

What format are these in as Windows Media Player 10 does not appear to recognise them I believe it is Divx codec. Yes, it's DivX. You can either get the codec from DivX.com, or use a video player which supports the format natively, such as VLC media player (by the way, take the time to try it out if you can - it's more lightweight and powerful than WMP).

Hmm... Radio Shack... isn't that the one which used to be an electronics store WAY long ago ? You may want to try a sample request at OnSemi.

From the schematic on Matthia's Jaguar page, C134 is 330 µF. The maximum voltage is not specified for this part, but it's almost certainly 25 V considering the other capacitors connected in parallel.

Hmm, gold definitely shouldn't oxidize...

Back in the day, Brainstorm had some success with implementing MPEG-1 on the Jag, but they didn't finish the work because of the lack of support from Atari. Didn't it require a hardware addon card? It seems that it was software-only. From Jaguar Explorer Online Volume 4, Issue 1 :

Pocket told me something this weekend that explains the delays : the arrangements he made to get free shipping required a limited number of shipments per week. It's been slower than anticipated. But everybody should get their copy eventually

Back in the day, Brainstorm had some success with implementing MPEG-1 on the Jag, but they didn't finish the work because of the lack of support from Atari.

Keep cool, everybody . We'll ask the Jagware admin to create a private forum for developers to discuss the issue calmly.

By the way, Bastian Schick is credited as a co-author... does this mean he intends to become active on the Jaguar again ? That'd be cool !

I've just seen a demo of the game at the Retro-Gaming Connexion (as well as the not-yet-finished Clicks!, also by Matthias, which looks every bit as good). Unfortunately, only ConnectThem could be demoed, as the Jag hung on the loading screen every time they tried to launch Reversi (but this isn't a bug in the game : Arethius [the guy doing the demo] mentioned that his JagCD had trouble with CD-Rs). On sunday night, after most people had left, we [a bunch of Jaguar enthusiasts] were playing various Jag games, and decided to give it one more try. Of course, it worked flawlessly the first time ! (damn Murphy's Law ) So I got to play Reversi as well. I can confirm what I'd anticipated before : both games feature very nice and detailed graphics, enjoyable music and detail-oriented, well-thought design. The only flaw I could find is that the ConnectThem AI is a bit slow on the highest difficulty setting (on the other hand, it seems to be a strong opponent !). Overall, it's a solid Jag game. Great work, Matthias and others !