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FPGA Based Videogame System


kevtris

Interest in an FPGA Videogame System  

682 members have voted

  1. 1. I would pay....

  2. 2. I Would Like Support for...

  3. 3. Games Should Run From...

    • SD Card / USB Memory Sticks
    • Original Cartridges
    • Hopes and Dreams
  4. 4. The Video Inteface Should be...


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You can't pay to "unlock" cores. The system has no internet connection so the only way it could verify would be with a firmware update that one person could buy and hand out to everyone. And as I stated, having different versions for ports is fine as long as the cores are available on all of them.

 

LOL no. There is nothing illegal about having cores on their system or else Analogue would be sued for both consoles and Kevtris would be quadruple sued for the jb firmware. Everything about them is 100% legal because they do not violate any copyright laws by including any code/bioses still protected by copyright. My best guess is that Analogue as a company doesn't want to appear to advocate piracy so they are keeping quiet about it because telling people they can play pirated games on it would mean they were advocating it as piracy device which would be illegal as they are telling people to break the law and while they could say that it can play "backups" everyone would know what they were talking about and maybe they wish to avoid that kind of image leaving the ability there for the people that want it while keeping their own name away from "officially" supporting it.

 

They would get a MASSIVE return on their investment because many people would buy the console looking forward to those cores being released and even more would order it after that became a reality. People don't just go "This is awesome... not going to buy it". More awesome = more sales. They did that with the nt mini and it kept that console selling despite the stupidly over priced shell.

Ugg... You guys don't get it. Analogue sells Super NT, a future cost reduced "NT Micro" NES, a Mega NT, etc, billed as physical hardware designed to run a single cartridge based system. Kevtris releases jailbreak software for free to boost sales, but if you want to play with physical carts, you buy the console with the form factor that supports it. The cart adapters were a great idea, but now you need separate series of cart adapters for the NT Mini, Super NT, or Mega, and endless add-ons to convert one console to another one. So the Zimba3000 becomes more of a pipe dream with time as the Analogue hardware evolves with physical FPGA clones released for each system.

 

On second thought, perhaps a Retron style FPGA solution would be a better idea? :dunce:

 

= = = = = = = =

 

And I just read what I wrote and comared it to the replies written by everyone else. Geeze, have we gotten petty with the speculation? Everyone has their own idea of what Analgue's business plan will be, everyone else is wrong. Everone is a self-proclaimed pundit who knows more than the people working at Analogue, or Kevtris whose brilliance made it all possible.

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On second thought, perhaps a Retron style FPGA solution would be a better idea? :dunce:

 

It would be nice to hear some sort of update on the original point of this thread: FPGA multi-console

 

Is it still happening at some point in the distant future? I suspect Analogue might not want it discussed because of potential reduced sales of their dedicated consoles, which is totally reasonable. But it would still be nice to get some sort of update, even if it's just "it'll happen eventually but it may be many years due to other priorities." :thumbsup: I will probably buy every product that Kevtris contributes to regardless of overlap, so they don't need to worry about reduced sales from me.

 

But of course this is all contingent on Kevtris retaining some sort of ownership (or perhaps licensing ability) to the cores he develops while working for Analogue. Because I suspect he's not going to want to re-engineer everything from scratch.

 

Or perhaps Analogue's plan is to eventually release an FPGA multi-console of their own... Ok, I'm going to stop the speculation for now.

Edited by cacophony
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Ugg... You guys don't get it. Analogue sells Super NT, a future cost reduced "NT Micro" NES, a Mega NT, etc, billed as physical hardware designed to run a single cartridge based system. Kevtris releases jailbreak software for free to boost sales, but if you want to play with physical carts, you buy the console with the form factor that supports it. The cart adapters were a great idea, but now you need separate series of cart adapters for the NT Mini, Super NT, or Mega, and endless add-ons to convert one console to another one. So the Zimba3000 becomes more of a pipe dream with time as the Analogue hardware evolves with physical FPGA clones released for each system.

 

On second thought, perhaps a Retron style FPGA solution would be a better idea? :dunce:

 

= = = = = = = =

 

And I just read what I wrote and comared it to the replies written by everyone else. Geeze, have we gotten petty with the speculation? Everyone has their own idea of what Analgue's business plan will be, everyone else is wrong. Everone is a self-proclaimed pundit who knows more than the people working at Analogue, or Kevtris whose brilliance made it all possible.

 

"Past Performance Is Not Indicative Of Future Results"

 

That's what's happening with the speculation here.

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Quick summary of MLiG livestream for those that don't want to sit through two hours of video: The Super Nt is pretty much perfect. They found some minor graphical and sound bugs which Kevtris quickly fixed. They currently only know of one very minor graphical glitch that hasn't been fixed yet, which is in the Japanese only release Marvelous: Mouhitotsu no Takarajima. It's an SA1 chip game that Kevtris doesn't own, so somebody needs to get him a copy :)

 

Also, they said the build quality is fantastic and that their review would be coming out on Feb 7th.

Edited by cacophony
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Quick summary of MLiG livestream for those that don't want to sit through two hours of video: The Super Nt is pretty much perfect. They found some minor graphical and sound bugs which Kevtris quickly fixed. They currently only know of one very minor graphical glitch that hasn't been fixed yet, which is in the Japanese only release Marvelous: Mouhitotsu no Takarajima. It's an SA-1 chip that game Kevtris doesn't own, so somebody needs to get him a copy icon_smile.gif

I'm sure some very minor stuff will turn up once hundreds of people start using it but it would take Kevtris several lifetimes to check them all by himself so I'd say that is as close to absolutely perfect as is humanly possible. Especially if the MLiG guys say that because they really go over things with a fine toothed comb. Thumbs way up (as expected).

Edited by Wolf_
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An FPGA multi console appeals to me big time. I find myself using my retro duo more than my original NES and SNES just because of the convenience and portability of having both systems in one small unit. That being said, I'd happily pay $400+ for a well made FPGA "retro duo". One unit with NES, Famicom, SNES, GB/GBC, GBA, Genesis, and TG16 would be all I'd really want.

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An FPGA multi console appeals to me big time. I find myself using my retro duo more than my original NES and SNES just because of the convenience and portability of having both systems in one small unit. That being said, I'd happily pay $400+ for a well made FPGA "retro duo". One unit with NES, Famicom, SNES, GB/GBC, GBA, Genesis, and TG16 would be all I'd really want.

Plus Sega CD/32X and Neo Geo!

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Love all you do kevtris :)

 

You should hand over your footage to MLiG.

 

I thought about it, they were interested in some of it, but I really need to add a bunch more stuff after the fact, to explain what I was doing or thinking at the time since a lot of it might not be clear. The video runs from the very start before anything ever happens to the end where the plastic arrives and the board is installed and a time lapse of me testing games over the course of 12 hours or so.

 

I have to say Kevtris, you're a big reason why I've started to get into hardware engineering myself.

 

It would be a pleasure to watch videos on the entire design process for this system.

 

Glad that I could inspire someone else to do the electronics thing

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It would be nice to hear some sort of update on the original point of this thread: FPGA multi-console

 

Is it still happening at some point in the distant future? I suspect Analogue might not want it discussed because of potential reduced sales of their dedicated consoles, which is totally reasonable. But it would still be nice to get some sort of update, even if it's just "it'll happen eventually but it may be many years due to other priorities." :thumbsup: I will probably buy every product that Kevtris contributes to regardless of overlap, so they don't need to worry about reduced sales from me.

 

But of course this is all contingent on Kevtris retaining some sort of ownership (or perhaps licensing ability) to the cores he develops while working for Analogue. Because I suspect he's not going to want to re-engineer everything from scratch.

 

Or perhaps Analogue's plan is to eventually release an FPGA multi-console of their own... Ok, I'm going to stop the speculation for now.

 

At this point, I dunno. It still might happen but I keep getting lured away to do paid work that is on FPGA videogame stuff. I can't pass up making FPGA videogame systems and get paid to do it, and get a kickass FPGA dev board out of the deal at the end with everything I want on it. Doing the two projects has really me see how much effort and money and time it takes on the back end of production to make it all happen. I don't think I could really swing all that myself. So for me, this has been kind of a sweet spot. Get to work on the cores and hardware, get paid to do it, and then everyone can enjoy it.

 

Quick summary of MLiG livestream for those that don't want to sit through two hours of video: The Super Nt is pretty much perfect. They found some minor graphical and sound bugs which Kevtris quickly fixed. They currently only know of one very minor graphical glitch that hasn't been fixed yet, which is in the Japanese only release Marvelous: Mouhitotsu no Takarajima. It's an SA1 chip game that Kevtris doesn't own, so somebody needs to get him a copy :)

 

Also, they said the build quality is fantastic and that their review would be coming out on Feb 7th.

 

Yeah the MLIG guys have been great during the whole testing phase, I am happy they got to do it. They found some really esoteric things I would've never caught. The final graphic issue is the high rez + colour math mode, and the main reason I couldn't fix it before is I simply could not see what the actual hardware did on my 8" PVM since it was too small. I have broken out the 21" PVM though so I can see it, and will write a test ROM that exercises all the registers on one screen using a bunch of HDMA fun to show it all at once. I am very curious too if emulators are accurate to hardware behavior here, since this part of the hardware is pretty much totally undocumented. What little documentation exists made literally no sense.

 

After this is all over I am going to release my "findings" document with all sorts of fine SNES detail that I figured out over the course of the project.

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At this point, I dunno. It still might happen but I keep getting lured away to do paid work that is on FPGA videogame stuff. I can't pass up making FPGA videogame systems and get paid to do it, and get a kickass FPGA dev board out of the deal at the end with everything I want on it. Doing the two projects has really me see how much effort and money and time it takes on the back end of production to make it all happen. I don't think I could really swing all that myself. So for me, this has been kind of a sweet spot. Get to work on the cores and hardware, get paid to do it, and then everyone can enjoy it.

 

 

Yeah the MLIG guys have been great during the whole testing phase, I am happy they got to do it. They found some really esoteric things I would've never caught. The final graphic issue is the high rez + colour math mode, and the main reason I couldn't fix it before is I simply could not see what the actual hardware did on my 8" PVM since it was too small. I have broken out the 21" PVM though so I can see it, and will write a test ROM that exercises all the registers on one screen using a bunch of HDMA fun to show it all at once. I am very curious too if emulators are accurate to hardware behavior here, since this part of the hardware is pretty much totally undocumented. What little documentation exists made literally no sense.

 

After this is all over I am going to release my "findings" document with all sorts of fine SNES detail that I figured out over the course of the project.

 

Thanks for the response, and what you said makes sense. You're getting paid to do what you love, and making lots of people happy. A pretty good place to be, so let me offer some congratulations :cool:

 

I'm looking forward to checking out this findings document!

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Yeah. I was thinking about that. With all due respect Kevin, I think the fact you're doing the guts of this system, but have partners working on all other fronts probably brings this product to a level of polish and quality you wouldn't be able to do alone. It's only natural. Of course, I would personally not have a problem getting a Z3000 with a simpler case, and smaller community, but if Analogue keep being awesome as they've been up till now, your work might change the retro gaming landscape.

 

 

So if you enjoy this, and working with analogue is good, this is definitely a win-win for everybody.

 

And you guys did hear te community. People asked for the DAC and it's comming.

 

I'm glad this is working out so well this far. I can barely believe something like this is happening. With all the negative experiences we have with gaming companies, people always expect the worse. It can be seen in this thread.

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Here is my speculation:

 

Release Super Nt and then after the fact release the Core Store.

Release Mega Nt and then after the fact release the Core Store.

Release Turbo Nt and then after the fact release the Core Store.

Release a few other consoles and then after the fact release the Core Store.

Release some handhelds and then after the fact release the Core Store.

Release some combo units of more obscure and/or less popular consoles like an Atari VCS, ColecoVision, and Intellivision combo then after the fact release the Core Store.

Release some combo units of past Analogue consoles like an NES and Super NES combo then after the fact release the Core Store.

When Analogue runs out of consoles then they pay Kevtris to take all that he learned from them all to create the Zimba 3000 under their brand name.

Analogue and Kevtris corner the retro gaming market.

The border wall gets demolished to make room for President Kevtris' castle.

Mike Kennedy, Chris Cardillo, and all of Atari's 5 employees become Kevtris' maids.

We all live happier ever after until my last CRT dies which causes the rapture.

Simple as that.

For the record.

 

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Yeah. I was thinking about that. With all due respect Kevin, I think the fact you're doing the guts of this system, but have partners working on all other fronts probably brings this product to a level of polish and quality you wouldn't be able to do alone. It's only natural. Of course, I would personally not have a problem getting a Z3000 with a simpler case, and smaller community, but if Analogue keep being awesome as they've been up till now, your work might change the retro gaming landscape.

 

 

So if you enjoy this, and working with analogue is good, this is definitely a win-win for everybody.

 

And you guys did hear te community. People asked for the DAC and it's comming.

 

I'm glad this is working out so well this far. I can barely believe something like this is happening. With all the negative experiences we have with gaming companies, people always expect the worse. It can be seen in this thread.

Yes you are exactly right. I feel that the Super nt is showing off what I am best at; the hardware, while letting someone else (Ernest) do what he does best which is the enclosure design and manufacturing. During the design phase we were swapping 3D design files like baseball cards to make sure everything was perfect between the enclosure and PCB design. This resulted in fast development and everything worked the first time; both the PCB design itself worked first go, and it fit into the plastic first go. It has been a long difficult road but seeing the results and how it all came out makes it all worthwhile and I am glad I got the chance to do my part.

 

I think the secret is to not announce anything until the thing is done and ready to go vs. what we have seen on at least 3 (or 5 if you count the name changes) other videogame console projects. :-)

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Kevin, agreed 100%. I have asked you about stuff myself many times, but I think you guys do the right thing by just keeping quiet about anything you guys aren't 100% sure on. This just spares people tons of misinformation. I mean, just look at the level of speculation and how much people make up. If you give more material to speculate on, it just gets worse.

 

Now that the Super NT is almost out it kinda feels like time flew by. And you're delivering on time! Hoy many projects actually keep their planned schedule? I mean, if you have no idea when you're gonna actually finish your project, don't give it a date. If you give a date and can't keep it, what's wrong? I know stuff can happen, but there has to be someting wrong when most projects need to get delayed. Or if your project was supposed to take a year to complete and it takes you 2 years, again, there has to be something wrong going on somewhere in the chain. And that was probably the fact you didn#t even start making anything by the time you gave that date.

 

Schizophretard, I kinda think they might release an NT mini revision before they go for Mega Drive. Something very similar to the Super NT, but with the internal logic of the NT Mini. Makes sense to me as next project. Besides that I don't want to speculate. But I'd buy the following:

 

HDMI Famicom clone, Mega Drive clone, TG16 clone, NEO GEO clone. I'd buy every single one of these if they get released. Now I'd personally rather have cart adapters for the NES and PC engine. Mega Drive I'd be happy about a dedicated console so I can also use the original controllers. and Neo geo obviously had to be a dedicated system.

 

Now as an idea, SNK Playmore licensed out their games to those random guys who made the Neo Geo X. If Analogue paired up with playmore and made a good NEO GEO, and released carts on that, that would be so amazing. It's kind of a big project, and a bit dreaming, but I do think it would be possible. I doubt it would take less than 2 years to do that one, and Analogue would need to have a pretty good footprint by then. Still, that's where they started, I bet they'd like that too. Actually, now thinking about that, I am pretty sure they've entertained the idea already.

Edited by leods
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It's pretty awesome to see a team of guys put out a genuinely great product that comes from the heart with a true love for the console and technology driving it.

 

In a sea of crappy, shoddily built clones and relative vaporware, it really is refreshing. Thanks for all you do Kevtris & Analogue.

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I feel that the Super nt is showing off what I am best at; the hardware, while letting someone else (Ernest) do what he does best which is the enclosure design and manufacturing.

I hope for the sake of smart business that "Ernest" put aside several thousand units for the 7th. Otherwise, once the reviews hit, you'll have tons of interested customers, and nothing to sell them. Any word on a timeframe for restocks since 2 of the 4 models are sold out?

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I kinda think they might release an NT mini revision before they go for Mega Drive. Something very similar to the Super NT, but with the internal logic of the NT Mini. Makes sense to me as next project.

I'd be on board with this. I've been considering the AVS, but would jump on a plastic NT Mini redesign instantly. (Provided that it also was 189.99)

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Doesn't my life in Gaming test input latency? I would hope Retro RGB got a review unit, if he didn't, he has bought one, and he'll measure that for sure.

 

Besides that, Lon Seidman always reviews these consoles and he does films ar 120fps to show input lag. It's not the most precise of course, but it's enough. It's definitely enough to show differences between one frame of lag or 3, or something like that.

 

That said, some emulation based solutions are pretty low lag, and aren't that much of a problem. the worse offenders are some of the hardware based solutions that upscale the video with cheap generic upscalers. Some of those will lag 4 frames or even more. Although some lag "only" 2-3 frames. LOL

Edited by leods
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Hopefully at least one of the reviewers demonstrates how much lower the Super NTs input latency is, compared to the emulator-based SNES clones.

If the NT Mini is anything to go by, it should be pretty much exactly like the original SNES. IIRC, the Super NT has a "direct mode" that uses no frame buffer and outputs the exact oddball refresh rate of the original SNES, and a buffered mode that brings it in line with what most displays expect. I guess you may experience some miniscule amount of delay with the buffered mode if you're super sensitive. Then there's the lag that every single digital display exhibits to varying degrees. The only fair test would be when the DAC comes out and the Super NT's analog output can be compared with a real SNES.

 

Edit:

I forgot to mention that the "having no frame buffer" thing pretty much means that the whole scaling process should add no perceptible lag, at least as far as I understand it. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the (unbuffered mode) scaling process in the NT Mini and Super NT are more akin to the OSSC than the Framemeister. I would think the unbuffered Super NT mode would have even less latency than a real SNES put through the OSSC because the Super NT would skip the digital to analog conversion that the SNES does, and the Analog to Digital step the OSSC does, for the Super NT it should be digital all the way.

Edited by cfillak
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