Search the Community
Showing results for tags 'Clone system'.
-
So, I decided to put this topic here since it's the closest to an actual Master System/Game Gear subforum, this is also an offspring of the Mega Drive clones thread. Unlike Nintendo, Sega only got popular in the fourth generation with the Mega Drive, but on some parts of the world the Master System also got popular, this made a lot fans of the 16-bits hardware interested in the 8-bits too, so here are some options for playing Game Gear, Master System and the SG-1000 games. Adapters for the Mega Drive: These are a great way to start, although there are some problems with compatibility, for a few games you are going to need a Master System controller or a controller that can mimic that with the MODE button, after that you have a good compatibility with almost the entire library, with the Power Base converter you are getting compatibility with the Card games and the 3D glasses, third parties don't include the port for that, there are many homemade adapters and by popular brands you can buy, you at least need to look for one that includes a pause button. Other thing to note is that SG-100 can't play with these. Compatibility with clones varies, some might have wrong colors and some won't play, as always, take a look at Sega Retro to look for more information, it's also a good idea having a clone just for playing Master System. Adapters for the Game Gear: For some reason these adapters are really expensive, as far as I know compatibility is 100% with everything that doesn't require peripherals, for playing Japanese and Card games separate adapters are necessary. And of course nothing is backwards compatible with the Game Gear(yet), so it's the only option for playing the exclusive games. Brazilian official clones and Plug and Plays: In the 2000s after Sega stopped supporting 8-bit hardware Tectoy had to come with a way of selling Master Systems, so they made a clone console using an ASIC based on the Game Gear and a cheap Altera FPGA, these systems look very similar to the Master System redesigns but with different colors, the ones to look for are the Master System 3 Collection units, these come with a bunch of games included, with about half of them being classic Sega games and the other half being homebrews made by Tectoy, the numbers go from 74 up to 112 for the normal consoles, 120 has a fake cartridge slot, and 131 uses a chip called Noza that emulates Game Gear. As for the Plug and Plays, the ones shaped like controllers are the only ones that don't use emulation. FM sound: Although only Japanese consoles officially supported it, all consoles after the Mark III can support it, the Mega Drive can play it with the Power Base Mini FM, Master System and Game Gear can be modded, but there are also adapters that can do it for people that don't want to mod their systems, these come with built in speakers so it's possible to have both FM and PSG sounds playing at the same time, these are all homemade and I have seen a lot of people selling those for quite a lot, so perhaps it's not the best option until a company makes a more affordable option. Sega Computer stuff: Sega tried to make computers out of the SG-1000 and released a lot accessories for it like disk drives and keyboards, there aren't any games made specifically for these so the only reason to want to have it is for the curiosity, only consoles with the expansion ports on the back support these, there are also some models that have built-in keyboards. MSX cross-compatibility: The SG-1000 and the MSX line of systems are very similar, in fact, so similar that there's a weird compatibility with both, the general rule for that is that for a system to be able to play the other it needs to be more powerful than what it wants to play, so it's possible to play MSX on everything above MK III, and it's (technically) possible to play SG-1000 on everything above the MSX-2. Initially the only way to do it was by converting the files to play in a flash cart, this is more of a hack than an actual way of playing MSX, but some years ago a guy by the name of Naska88va2 made an adapter to play original games and it only requires a small board to be soldered into the main PCB, he didn't made it available or anything and the last time he gave any updates was 4 years ago, so it's probably still a prototype. BONUS: would it be possible to make an actual modern Master System/Game Gear clone? For the Master System it's totally possible by just using Mega Drive clone, modifying the cartridge ports for both Master System cartridges and cards, and maybe add switches for things like pausing and alternating between PSG and FM sounds. Now, the Game Gear is a totally different story, since it has even more colors than the Mega Drive, 32 out of a palette of 4096 versus 61 out of 512. An easy fix for that is an adapter made by Apocolypse that RetroRGB showed in a recent video, it basically translates the colors exclusive to the Game Gear into the 64 colors the Master System can display, this also leaves garbage around the screen for games exclusive to the portable. A much more interesting way to do it would be using the 512 of the Mega Drive, that's close to the point that most wouldn't notice the difference, the only problem is that the adapter doesn't work on the Mega Drive using the Power Base or the Mini FM, but that's probably because it's using two adapters in a row, since the Hyperkin 3-in-1, an adapter that was supposed to be used on the Retron 5 but also works on original hardware, kind of does the same thing, the only difference being that the colors get all messed up since there's no controller doing the translation. A new project that reverse engineered the entire board of the single ASIC Game Gear also shows how close this system is to being cloned, it only needs the original ASIC to be built, the creator also recommends extracting the cartridge connector, the crystal and the LED light since it's already destroying the original board anyways, other than that everything is made of brand new parts. It would be very interesting if these two projects merged for creating a full clone, even more so if they partner with company like Retro-Bit or Tectoy that could produce more and in a wider range.
-
- sega master system
- sega game gear
-
(and 2 more)
Tagged with:
-
Recently I've seen a lot of people that seem to think that NES clones are either a perfect FPGA recreation or a cheap NOAC with screwed up audio, but during these last two years a lot of good clones have appeared, but before talk about that I'm going classify clones by the type of hardware inside of them: Full hardware clones: Mostly made by companies in countries that didn't had received the NES officially, these had components for each chip inside the NES, so compatibility was high, and sometimes the quality was better than the product it was based on, since Nintendo just assembled it in Japan, but the components were made in China. NES-on-a-chip: This is where the bad perception that people have on Famiclones come from, wrong color palette, bad audio, hollow carcass with just some components inside, not all of them are bad, but most are. FPGA recreations: As of now, the only two examples are the AVS and the Analogue NT, these are very expensive and hard to find, but claim to be 100% compatible with anything you throw at them. So, back to the what I was saying, recently there have been a huge amount of hardware clones that have a lot more quality than the products sold by the likes of Hyperkin and Retro-bit, the only problem is that they are sold almost exclusively by Chinese companies without a name or a brand. First there are the Zoga and a generic one that mimics the Famicom, both having a good compatibility but with not all games tested, and there's a full hardware clone called Coolbaby RS-40, a clone that's PAL but can be modified to NTSC, there are also some variations of the first 2 ones, like one that is a 2-in-1 with the SNES and a portable one. I could spend a lot of time saying what works and what doesn't, but I'm going to sum it up to: each one of these clones have their own features, but there isn't one that has everything yet, but what is here shows that a perfect clone could exist without the use of an expensive FPGA, and that any of these problems will probably be solved with each hardware revision, because even if it's a gray Chinese market, these companies are trying to improve their products, some of these clones even have wireless controllers and HDMI ports. So, what does a clone needs to be on the same level of FPGA products? 1. Region switch 2. Compatibility with cartridges that have sound chips or extra hardware inside. 3. Compatibility with games that usually don't work on other clones or emulation. 4. Famicom expansion port, not essential but I included it here anyways, it was mostly used for things related to sound or the BASIC keyboard.
- 14 replies
-
- nes
- clone console
-
(and 1 more)
Tagged with:
-
Ok, so in this thread there's a lot to talk about, and I also needed to split Sega's 8-bit systems into another topic so I can focus on the 16-bit hardware, this is a sequel to the threads I made about clones of the NES and SNES: (In retrospect, the SNES thread looks very incomplete and doesn't have a lot of information and details) So, I just want to start with the fact that no clone console is ever going to have 100% compatibility, even FPGA ones, why? Because there's also no Mega Drive official model that has 100% compatibility, see, unlike Nintendo, Sega didn't thought the world would get tired of their games if they kept releasing new models every year or gave a license to third parties to do so. So I am going to list some of the specific models that have their own software just as an idea, a Mega Drive PC, a module for a computer that plays Laser Disk versions of Sega CD games, as well as some exclusive games, 3 arcade boards variations, and two Brazilian models that have either 4 EA games or a Guitar Hero clone (guitar peripheral included). Now, taking these uncommon models aside and considering just the main ones there's still a lot to discuss, like: Sega CD support The only modern clone that can use the Sega CD on the expansion port is the Analogue Mega SG, and it still has some small problems, the reason why it's the only one is because companies don't think it's worth it putting the expansion port there since the add-on isn't that popular, but many clones have support for the Terraonion Mega SD that plugs in the cartridge port. 32X support Nope, there isn't a single one, but Krikkz seems to be developing a 32X clone that will work on modern systems, we just need to wait. Now, for the sake of simplicity I'm going to define three levels of compatibility, original models(it plays "everything"), Genesis 3(small incompatibilities with some games, doesn't even start others) and Nomad(doesn't play some games simply because it's portable). So, to start things out I'm going to talk about the special clones so I can get them out of the way. Atgames/Genesis Mini Android Clones There are some clones that use systems similar or almost identical to the emulated systems licensed or made by Sega in the past, these have SD and cartridge ports included, the drawbacks are the fact they are emulated, so, only games that just have a simple ROM file. Portable/Nomad Clones These are on the same level of an actual Nomad but with problems similar to the ones found in the Genesis 3, interestingly, I found some clones that have exactly the same outsides as the Atgames portables, but with cartridge slots, some with custom designs, and a clone on a cartridge that can plug into some portable SNES clones. Clone Consoles Now, one of the things that held me from doing this is the weird compatibility with these clones, first, there are only Systems-on-a-Chip(technically on 2 chips since there's also the 8-bit one) available on the market currently, no full hardware clones. But to the clones themselves, they seem to use the same chips with little variation, but compatibility and quality are wildly different for each one, most surpass Genesis 3 compatibility by not too much, but others don't. A common problem that I found is the Mono audio, the only one with Stereo audio that I found is the Hyperkin Mega Retron HD. Since there are too many special cartridges for the Mega Drive I'm going to list the issues on another day
- 4 replies
-
- 1
-
- mega drive
- genesis
-
(and 2 more)
Tagged with:
-
So im a huge fan of bootleg/obscure hardware, and two of my favorites pieces of my collection are these old 1993 Megadrive clones i bought. The first one is a Nasa New 16 bit, the clone lacks a lot of features like the headphone jack and the MegaCD port, and is incompatible with the 32x and some multitaps, but the console has a great built quality. The second one is the infamous Kw-501, which i was kinda disappointed that the built quality was very bad, but the console has most of the features the Nasa lacks. Any of you guys owns an old Megadrive clone or similar?
- 6 replies
-
- 1
-
- clone system
- clone console
-
(and 7 more)
Tagged with:
-
Some days ago I made this thread about NES clones, some of the things I said there also apply to the SNES: Now, if you are looking for a clone system that's not based on FPGA but has almost the same quality SNES clones are definitively the ones to go(at least the recent ones). I took a look at some videos by people with big SNES collections, and every game seen to have worked other than a regional variant, but the problem was with the game not playing instead of some incompatibility issue, so who knows, maybe it's something could be fixed. Other than that, these clones have their own adapters for NES, Mega Drive and GB Boy Colour (a GBC clone that's 4:3 unfortunately), and if you want the 2-in-1 with the NES seems to be a good option too, maybe not the portable one, because it comes with an extremely big 16:9 display that makes the console bigger than the Switch, and in Japan there are companies releasing DIY SFC kits if you are into those things.
- 1 reply
-
- snes
- clone system
-
(and 1 more)
Tagged with:
-
I had this machine for a very long time in my collection of weird clone hardware, this one is probably among my rarest ones. Is a 64k pc similar to an commodore 64, that has a famicom built in, its a weird specimen even for famiclone standard, it uses a specific 5v ac adapter, wich makes some games have sound error's and visual glitches. Uses nes ports for the controllers, and has an expansion port that i still have no clue whats for, i have two of these but this is the only one that i have that has a fully working keyboard, the machine was bought in 1992 from a magazine number in CDMX, is a very interesting piece of clone hardware, and the last of the 3 bit corp computers. Im thinking about trading it for other weird clone console, or maybe another Gentry sufami clone to fix mine, if someone is interested pm Anyway, has someone ever heard of these computers by BitCorp before?
-
- clone system
- clone console
-
(and 7 more)
Tagged with:
-
In this one, we are taking an indepth review of the MP5 X7, a sort of love child of the Nintendo Switch and PS Vita. What is it and is it any good? Find out here! If you enjoy, please drop us a like and consider subscribing Social Media : Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/groups/33011... Twitter : http://twitter.com/RetroGamerVX Channel Support: Paypal donations : https://streamlabs.com/stephentwigg Patreon : https://www.patreon.com/RetroGamerVX Mine Exploration Channel : https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsW2E1LQ7EETG9NQgij2dWA/
- 1 reply
-
- fake
- nintendo switch
- (and 10 more)