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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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On the subject of ps1 on the ps3 only the original fat model had actual ps2 hardware inside, the slim model supports the ps1 entirely through emulation.

 

All PS3's play PS1 software via software emulation.

 

Launch Japanese & North American PS3's had the PS2's Emotion Engine (CPU) and and the PS2's GPU, but no PS1 hardware. Then the GPU was eliminated in a cost cutting move in favor of a hybrid setup where the GPU was emulated in software for the European launch models and last round of BC units in Japan & North America. Then when the Emotion Engine was also killed off, that's why PS2 support was eliminated entirely.

 

And it's also why PS1 support never left. Sony didn't commission a PS1 emulator right on the eve of killing off the Emotion Engine. It had just always been an emulation solution since launch when the PS3 was full of bells and whistles, so there was no physical hardware associated with the feature to eliminate in Sony's drive to trim costs

 

I've read that even later production slimline PS2's apparently use emulation for PS1 playback. The Input Output Processor of the PS2 (Which was also the PS1's cpu) was changed to something cheaper, which ended native PS1 support.

Edited by Atariboy
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Also, exhibit B for more evidence. Before Kevtris worked on the Analogue NT Mini he was simply providing Analogue his HDMI kits for their original Analogue NT that used original hardware. During this video Kevtris was asked what was next for him. Sure, this was years ago and he was talking about just HDMI mods, but it shows what he considered priorities at the time.

 

https://youtu.be/ocpjW9tnb7w?t=2433

 

 

 

 

Also, I didn't say only 12 people on a single forum are hyped for a potential Mega NT. Go read twitter.

 

This was before Analogue hired him for FPGA work. It's still a "high hope" issue and not really evidence. Those are also Kevtris's priorities, not Analogues. Either one of their priorities could have changed since FPGA became a reality.

 

Also, I didn't say you specifically said 12 people. I was using an example. You need a good sample size based upon the amount of people who retro game. Even if there were (hypothetically) 1,000,000 retro gamers and 1000 people were interested in a FPGA solution, that's only 1% of that population. ***These are made-up numbers so the research police don't have a hayday.

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Does anyone see any reason why Analogue would even consider making FPGA Handheld clones? I mean the Analogue NT, NT Mini and Super NT offered obvious advantages over stock original hardware for use on an HDTV.

 

I guess the only thing that would make sense would be to consolize those handhelds to play on an HDTV, specifically the GBA. I mean there are millions of perfectly working Gameboy handhelds in the wild for handheld use, so I really don't a reason why Analogue would actually come out with their own handheld clones.

Brian Parker of retrousb was presumably working on a portable AVS with small screen that accepts 480p input.

http://nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=7&threadid=154317

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Analogue isn't a software gaming publisher/developer, so the same doesn't apply to them. They make very specific products for a more niche consumer base. The demand for a Genesis FPGA console is already there, so they don't have to use cheap marketing ploys to bait people only to release said product years later.

 

However, it's still possible to get a licensed TecToy Genesis III for presumably half the price of any FPGA console. The selling point of a FPGA is it's accuracy. Compare that with the SNES/NES Mini classic's which have no ability to play old carts, and accuracy is at best, suspect.

 

As much as I think there is a market for a Genesis FPGA unit, it would presumably have no selling point to it other than HDMI, as the Tectoy can both play carts, and play games from a SD card.

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Also, I don't know if Analogue would ever consider doing a 7800/2600 system, but they could probably crank one out for a solid price. They could use a much cheaper FPGA and less ram to keep costs down and of course the plastic case would help in that regard as well. Kevtris already has both those cores at the ready, so all the major R&D has been finished. Just have to layout a PCB, design the shell and come up with a price that people would be willing to pay for such a system.

 

One of the hidden costs of doing the VCS are those 6 switches. I'm pretty sure that every implementation and re-imagining I've seen does something different and somehow ends up with 4 or 5 switches.

 

It's unintuitive, you can get larger cheaper switches or smaller more costly switches, and every design seems to go with the smaller more costly stuff. In addition that the unit is mis-shapen and isn't anywhere near true to the design of the original. Sometimes they come out so retarded looking that not all cartridges fit!

 

Part of the metrics is, again, the switches and sufficiently spacing them out, not cramming them into a 2cm2 space for no good reason.

 

And of course there's going to be the 100% compatibility requirement. A system as simple as the VCS, in today's day and age, must be able to run every cart and support every controller. There is no excuse.

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At this point I'm starting to lose respect for Analogue and even Kevtris.

 

So the gameplan all along was to dupe people into buying a 200$ snes that doesn't even do what the SD2SNES can?

 

So the gameplan all along was to ignore 1000s of questions about the NT mini cores being ported and just relegate them to a 1300$ scalper machine? Duping many purchasers along the way?

 

Is somebody else able to port the cores then? Or do we just have to accept this giant middle finger from Analogue?

 

I'm about to sell my super nt, at least it looks like I'll be making a healthy profit!

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At this point I'm starting to lose respect for Analogue and even Kevtris.

 

So the gameplan all along was to dupe people into buying a 200$ snes that doesn't even do what the SD2SNES can?

 

So the gameplan all along was to ignore 1000s of questions about the NT mini cores being ported and just relegate them to a 1300$ scalper machine? Duping many purchasers along the way?

 

Is somebody else able to port the cores then? Or do we just have to accept this giant middle finger from Analogue?

 

I'm about to sell my super nt, at least it looks like I'll be making a healthy profit!

The Super NT does exactly what it was advertised doing. No duping there. the Super NT does MORE than what the SD2SNES can do. You can play Kirby Dreamland 3 on the SuperNT, can't load that game on the SD2SNES and play it.

 

The cores were never supported by Analogue, so they definitely aren't giving anyone the middle finger.

Selling it off doesn't do anything in regards to your disappointment. Did you buy it in the hopes you'd get something that was never supported, advertised, promoted, etc.?

Edited by F34R
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You probably already know but:

http://www.neo-geo.com/forums/showthread.php?274221-NEOSD-PRO-The-New-Terranonion-Neo-Geo-Product-March-2018&p=4277349&viewfull=1#post4277349

 

That baby will cost a pretty penny and it's the flash cart alone, not the whole NeoGeo, so 250US$ would be .... well extremely cheap for NeoGeo land .... likely even at 500US$ would be a smash hit (if JB then it would be a mint)

 

Wrt CoreStore I hope Analogue gives kevtris the green light to release it (maybe excluding the NES ... and avoid lots of grief) ... I doubt anyone would care to make a fuss because of the CV core or the SMS core or the CreatiVision or the 7800 .... you know what I mean ... NES may be "restricted" but the rest of the gang really should not be.

Those poor little cores beg to be released on the wild for all gamers to enjoy .... little cores ... they are frightened .... they have been imprisoned in an aluminum casket ;-)

 

they are coming, give it time... ;-)

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Did you buy it in the hopes you'd get something that was never supported, advertised, promoted, etc.?

 

I had this same conversation with someone else many pages ago... The system is advertised to play SNES cartridges via HDMI with high accuracy and no lag. Then people complain that it won't play all of their ROMs or other console games.

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At this point I'm starting to lose respect for Analogue and even Kevtris.

 

So the gameplan all along was to dupe people into buying a 200$ snes that doesn't even do what the SD2SNES can?

 

So the gameplan all along was to ignore 1000s of questions about the NT mini cores being ported and just relegate them to a 1300$ scalper machine? Duping many purchasers along the way?

 

Is somebody else able to port the cores then? Or do we just have to accept this giant middle finger from Analogue?

 

I'm about to sell my super nt, at least it looks like I'll be making a healthy profit!

Super NT is advertized and sold as a 100% accurate reproduction of the Super Nintendo, plus high performance zero lag, zero blur scaling to modern hi-definition. It does pretty damn well at that.

 

You can't play any games at all on SD2SNES, it's a flash cart, not a console. Conversely, Super NT is a console. not a flash cart. You CAN use SD2SNES in your Super NT if you want.

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At this point I'm starting to lose respect for Analogue and even Kevtris.

 

So the gameplan all along was to dupe people into buying a 200$ snes that doesn't even do what the SD2SNES can?

 

So the gameplan all along was to ignore 1000s of questions about the NT mini cores being ported and just relegate them to a 1300$ scalper machine? Duping many purchasers along the way?

 

Is somebody else able to port the cores then? Or do we just have to accept this giant middle finger from Analogue?

 

I'm about to sell my super nt, at least it looks like I'll be making a healthy profit!

 

Oh please. Analogue and Kevtris have said nothing about any extended functionality. Just the Super NT is the best way to play physical carts you already own (and any flash cart that would work on a real SNES.) There was no promise or expectation of playing the games off the SD-Card slot itself or any other cores. The same was said of the NT Mini as well. The only difference between the NT Mini and the Super NT is that kevtris was the one who made a JB/alternate core setup for the NT Mini, it's not in the official firmware.

 

The JB for the SuperNT comes from an anonymous source, and thus is limited to tweaking functionality that already exists (as the LED pattern loader has the file browser, and the Super NT comes with two games that play from internal flash, such it always had the capability to play games without a cart.) You won't see any other cores on it unless the FPGA core is RE'd. They are compiled specifically against the FPGA chip in the system and how it's wired up. It might be a trivial recompile if you have the VHDL source and the tools to compile it. But they are two specifically different things.

 

Sure some of us might have been more incentive to buy it if it came with other cores for systems that we love but don't necessarily have the carts for anyway.

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You forgot the "Perhaps we are already working on it" line. That makes all the difference to me.

 

Also, I'm not assuming Kevtris has actually written any code for the Genesis FPGA console yet. Just that this project has been green lit and when Kevtris is done finishing up the last remaining Super NT bugs he'll move on to the next project. I'm sure he can't wait to tackle something brand new. He must be sick of the SNES by now lol.

 

So, then, Analogue is officially producing an FPGA Genesis console?

Edited by Keatah
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You forgot the "Perhaps we are already working on it" line. That makes all the difference to me.

 

Also, I'm not assuming Kevtris has actually written any code for the Genesis FPGA console yet. Just that this project has been green lit and when Kevtris is done finishing up the last remaining Super NT bugs he'll move on to the next project. I'm sure he can't wait to tackle something brand new. He must be sick of the SNES by now lol.

 

Can you provide a link saying this is an official project in the works? Or are you...

 

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And as for a genesis FPGA, are people ignoring that Kev himself said the 32x and Sega CD aren't doable? You guys want a 200$ plain genesis? Really? You do know they're like 20-30$ with killer RGB?

I already have a a stock genesis with killer rgb, and I still want a fpga solution. Not having to rely on my framemeister or PVM has its appeal, for me at least.

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You won't see any other cores on it unless the FPGA core is RE'd. They are compiled specifically against the FPGA chip in the system and how it's wired up. It might be a trivial recompile if you have the VHDL source and the tools to compile it. But they are two specifically different things.

 

Sure some of us might have been more incentive to buy it if it came with other cores for systems that we love but don't necessarily have the carts for anyway.

I'd encourage anybody wanting additional cores to look at the open source FPGA projects. Those are being ported to different pieces of hardware and you will have plenty to keep you busy (e.g. MiST has more than 40 cores). For just playing games, their setup is not more difficult than downloading and installing a JB firmware.

 

I would hope that even if the "core store" doesn't come up for the Super NT, there would be some tweak in the firmware to allow side loading independent cores. But perhaps maintaining that could be more time consuming than just doing the cores. I won't be holding my breath.

 

I recently received my Super NT and it's a very sleek piece of hardware. I find it a great replacement to my aging Super Famicom + XRGB Framemeister + RGB cable setup.

Edited by Newsdee
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At this point I'm starting to lose respect for Analogue and even Kevtris.

 

So the gameplan all along was to dupe people into buying a 200$ snes that doesn't even do what the SD2SNES can?

 

So the gameplan all along was to ignore 1000s of questions about the NT mini cores being ported and just relegate them to a 1300$ scalper machine? Duping many purchasers along the way?

 

Is somebody else able to port the cores then? Or do we just have to accept this giant middle finger from Analogue?

 

I'm about to sell my super nt, at least it looks like I'll be making a healthy profit!

 

I don't really mean to counter-flame you here, but if you ask me this sounds incredibly entitled. This is the exact type of ungrateful and needlessly negative bullshit that could possibly convince people like Kevtris not to even bother doing things for this community. Being a dick to people who have put in multiple years of their live to the retro gaming community is a pretty damn good way of screwing everyone else over. Kevtris is just one of many people who have spent years doing research and development on retro gaming hardware, writing documentation, creating formats, providing knowledge to others, and now creating great products. You want people like him to step away from this community because of toxic attitudes like this? No? Good, then grow up. If nobody else will say it, then I will be happy to. Grow up, buddy. Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face.

 

The "gameplan" was to make an accurate, low-latency HDMI Super Nintendo for roughly $200. That's what they marketed the SuperNT and that is exactly what we got, and if you don't understand the difference between the SD2SNES (a flash cart) and the SuperNT (a clone console) then you sound pretty ignorant of what each devices actually does. We got exactly what we paid for, and then some. Listen, I'm with you as someone who has wanted and continues to want more cores for this puppy - I'd love to play NES, and gameboy games on this sucker using the great cores that Kevtris released on the NT Mini. I still have some hope that it will happen eventually! But those are nothing but our own personal hopes/dreams/desires. Nobody owes us shit, other than exactly what we got; a great little HDMI SNES.

 

Is someone else able to make cores? I'd imagine anything is possible for someone with enough knowledge to hack this thing in order to get it to run arbitrary code and load up some other core. But I don't have the skills to do that, do you? Outside of Kevtris there are really only a handful of good FPGA clone console developers out there. If you ask me, it's very, very unlikely that anyone other than Kevtris would be able to deliver high-quality cores on the Super NT. But, again, if you ask me, the only person giving a "giant middle finger" is you, and that doesn't seem like the best strategy for getting people to go out of there way to give you something for free, does it?

 

Go ahead and sell your Super NT, because there are many people who clearly would value it more than you do right now. But regardless of what you do, I do think you owe Kevtris an apology after you take some time to cool down. Maybe you should think less about what you don't have, and think more about what you already do have, and you'll be a little bit less angry and irrational. Of course, nothing personal, and I hope you come around.

 

And as for a genesis FPGA, are people ignoring that Kev himself said the 32x and Sega CD aren't doable? You guys want a 200$ plain genesis? Really? You do know they're like 20-30$ with killer RGB?

 

If people don't want a $200 vanilla Genesis, then it won't sell. It's as simple as that.

 

Personally, I'm not sure. On one hand, if I spend $200 on a system I'd like to think that it can play all the games in the library. On the other hand, most of my favorite Genesis games are vanilla system games. As for RGB, I currently have no way of plugging that into any of my TVs with buying an expensive upscaler and cables and the potential for an FPGA console to do other cool things is much higher. I'll have to wait and see how I feel if/when they announce one.

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I'd encourage anybody wanting additional cores to look at the open source FPGA projects. Those are being ported to different pieces of hardware and you will have plenty to keep you busy (e.g. MiST has more than 40 cores). For just playing games, their setup is not more difficult than downloading and installing a JB firmware.

 

I would hope that even if the "core store" doesn't come up for the Super NT, there would be some tweak in the firmware to allow side loading independent cores. But perhaps maintaining that could be more time consuming than just doing the cores. I won't be holding my breath.

 

I recently received my Super NT and it's a very sleek piece of hardware. I find it a great replacement to my aging Super Famicom + XRGB Framemeister + RGB cable setup.

 

That's a pretty good idea. I know that Kevtris isn't interested in open sourcing his cores, nor should he have to be, but it'd certainly be a great thing to have some kind of very basic and stripped down "open bootloader" or something for the SuperNT that would allow people to run their own firmware/cores.

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One of the hidden costs of doing the VCS are those 6 switches. I'm pretty sure that every implementation and re-imagining I've seen does something different and somehow ends up with 4 or 5 switches.

 

It's unintuitive, you can get larger cheaper switches or smaller more costly switches, and every design seems to go with the smaller more costly stuff. In addition that the unit is mis-shapen and isn't anywhere near true to the design of the original. Sometimes they come out so retarded looking that not all cartridges fit!

 

Part of the metrics is, again, the switches and sufficiently spacing them out, not cramming them into a 2cm2 space for no good reason.

 

And of course there's going to be the 100% compatibility requirement. A system as simple as the VCS, in today's day and age, must be able to run every cart and support every controller. There is no excuse.

Would it not be possible to simulate those switches via software? I don't think they would need to be physical.

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And as for a genesis FPGA, are people ignoring that Kev himself said the 32x and Sega CD aren't doable? You guys want a 200$ plain genesis? Really? You do know they're like 20-30$ with killer RGB?

1. 32X isn't doable, but Sega CD support can happen via an expansion slot.

 

2. So a $200 plain SNES is OK, but not a Genesis? What is this double standard? Its almost like you don't think the Genesis is worthy of such a standalone product. I've got some news or you, there are lots of people, including myself, who prefer the Genesis over the SNES.

 

3. Killer RGB alone is irrelevant unless you plan to buy an expensive external scaler. Yes, I know you can by component or Scart cables for CRT/PVM use, but we are talking about hooking up to an HDTV.

Edited by SegaSnatcher
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Would it not be possible to simulate those switches via software? I don't think they would need to be physical.

 

Of course it'd be possible. Might as well step up to the next level then and go with a deluxe emulator like Stella. Edited by Keatah
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At this point I'm starting to lose respect for Analogue and even Kevtris.

 

So the gameplan all along was to dupe people into buying a 200$ snes that doesn't even do what the SD2SNES can?

 

So the gameplan all along was to ignore 1000s of questions about the NT mini cores being ported and just relegate them to a 1300$ scalper machine? Duping many purchasers along the way?

 

Is somebody else able to port the cores then? Or do we just have to accept this giant middle finger from Analogue?

 

I'm about to sell my super nt, at least it looks like I'll be making a healthy profit!

1. It was never advertised to have built in flash cart compatibility. It was simply advertised as a high quality clone with great accuracy and low latency.

 

2. Kevtris probably has a contract that prevents him from talking about additional cores.

 

3. There is no middle finger given, you are just being an entitled baby.

 

4. Your loss, you won't find a better replacement for the price.

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I'd encourage anybody wanting additional cores to look at the open source FPGA projects. Those are being ported to different pieces of hardware and you will have plenty to keep you busy (e.g. MiST has more than 40 cores). For just playing games, their setup is not more difficult than downloading and installing a JB firmware.

I would hope that even if the "core store" doesn't come up for the Super NT, there would be some tweak in the firmware to allow side loading independent cores. But perhaps maintaining that could be more time consuming than just doing the cores. I won't be holding my breath.

I recently received my Super NT and it's a very sleek piece of hardware. I find it a great replacement to my aging Super Famicom + XRGB Framemeister + RGB cable setup.

Wonder if there is anything proprietary about the Super NT? Isn't it a rather generic setup with generic FPGA connected directly to all the other generic parts? I mean there aren't any custom chips exclusive to the console. Are there? So theoretically one could write new firmware from scratch. Shouldn't be more difficult than programming a developer board.

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