Retroblox

[Steven Pendleton]

8 minutes ago, phoenixdownita said:

Behold the MD/32X module:

 

 

I watched this a little while ago. Still seems to not have proper scaling. I wonder if the machine is capable of it (I don't know why it wouldn't be capable of it, but still...) or if he just doesn't use it for whatever reason.

[Atariboy]

Not awful, but it makes me even happier I bought a Mega Sg.

[thedoppelganger]

4 hours ago, Atariboy said:

Not awful, but it makes me even happier I bought a Mega Sg.

Makes me glad I have an original Megadrive and Everdrive. The prices make RetroGamePloyBolx a non starter though at this time.

[cybercylon]

So, assuming these are ever available for sale outside those that preordered, what is the reason for yet another rom dumper once someone figures out how to side load rom files?

 

That high pitched whiny sound would tick me off. If I notice it, purists will definitely notice it. I'm not as picky, and if this was just some $50 clone unit, I wouldn't expect perfection. After $400 for the base unit and another $80 for the Genesis module, I expect it to sound better than that.

[godslabrat]

On 5/12/2020 at 12:34 AM, phoenixdownita said:

Behold the MD/32X module:

 

 

You mean... is it worth $80 AFTER I've already dropped $400 on the console?

 

Please... explain to me why I'd want to pay just shy of $500 to play Genesis games under software emulation.

[derFunkenstein]

the controller has the top row of buttons offset instead narrowly spaced. It reminds me more of an SNES controller with two extra face buttons than a Genesis controller. Might take some getting used to, though it does look nice enough. 

 

edit: you need the module to dump the games, but once they're on the system you don't need the module any more. And just like that there's another reason to not support ROMs from an external storage medium. The privilege of dumping a game will cost you $80. 

 

The emulator needs a low-pass filter something fierce. Gens can do it, but Kega Fusion never had one. 

Edited May 14, 2020 by derFunkenstein

[Ricdeau]

Another day, another delay. Now they are adding game streaming...because that makes total sense for this product.

 

https://www.polymega.com/2020/05/29/where-games-go-next/

[godslabrat]

Yikes.  It's not a terrible idea in a vacuum, but it does nothing to help the "what can this do that my PC can't" dilemma.

 

[thedoppelganger]

I have followed RetroPloyMegaBolx since early 2016. I was on their original forums. Streaming but no commitment to additional retro consoles and a stupid price.....

 

It's finally over now.  I am done with it.

 

It might be interesting to check on it in  year or so to see how long the launch delay is though.

 

I don't do TwitFace or others but we know Poly read this thread. Bye bye to them.

 

[Steven Pendleton]

Streaming

 

whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

 

That's just going to increase development cost and take more time. I don't know anything about or care about streaming, but I get the feeling that the target market might not exactly care about that, either. Maybe I'm wrong and we'll see some statistics or mathematical evidence to support the addition of streaming, but I doubt it.

 

Anyway, I finally got a Saturn. Avoiding the Saturn's resolution stuff was one of the main reasons that I was considering this thing, but so far, I've not had any real trouble with resolutions and the OSSC. Thunder Force V's menu is in an interlaced resolution, but it's not so bad, and I can always use my CRT if I really wanted to. I only have the 2 Thunder Force Gold Packs and Thunder Force V, so perhaps it's too early to say, but for now there's really no reason for me to buy this thing at all.

[thedoppelganger]

All the delays have made me re look at the PS2 homebrew scene recently and it has developed well over these last 4 Polyflop years.  I had overlooked it I suppose in expectation of RetrobloxFPGA then the Polyflop. So PS2 homebrew is where I am heading. No costs really. I have all the kit. It plays PS2 games oddly enough.....

Edited May 30, 2020 by thedoppelganger

[godslabrat]

Well, here's the thing... functionally, a streaming service is just an app.  By definition, all the heavy lifting is done by a larger computer in the cloud.  So it's a feature that can be added with no technological cost.  And it's always nice to have another bullet point on the box.

 

The bigger picture question is... who asked for this?  Polymega buyers?  I really doubt that people putting big money into a Saturn emulator are looking for a game streaming box.  R-Blo spent literal years talking about catering to people with retro collections... where does this feature fit in?

 

I'd suggest this is the work of an angel investor who is no longer confident in a ROI.  I'm by no means certain of that, but let's put the possibility on the table.

[imstarryeyed]

I am totally still looking forward to getting this once they release it.  I love the idea of being able to play my Saturn games with English patches on an unified unit.  The cloud thing is not a big thing for me but I don't see a problem with it.  I am not worried if it takes longer, those of us who have been on this board are used to wait a long time for something to be developed.

[Keatah]

Imagine if early Atari operated this way. It'd be the 1990's before the VCS came to market.

 

[godslabrat]

I can only assume they are providing a front end for one of the many existing streaming platforms that already exist.

 

If R-Blo is seriously stupid enough to sink capital into making their own streaming service, with the massive hardware and bandwidth costs, I look forward to seeing them implode in such a way that makes the Coleco Chameleon seem like a lark.

 

Interestingly, Playmaji was criticized heavily for dropping twitch streaming.  I wonder how buyers will respond to them now supporting a feature no one asked for, while simultaneously still not delivering on something big.

[thedoppelganger]

Zero commitment from Polyflop to further retro consoles support is an epic fail from my pov. Once the community gets hold of it sideloading roms will likely happen. Polyflop said somewhere that while they do not support that they will not seek to block it. But homebrew and side loading really needs a big install base. All very catch 22. The opening pages of this thread read much like the latest ones as do Polyflops posts on TwitFace. I will check in here in a years time when Polyflop launch will be just a month or two away as usual.

[Steven Pendleton]

On 5/31/2020 at 5:05 PM, thedoppelganger said:

Zero commitment from Polyflop to further retro consoles support is an epic fail from my pov. Once the community gets hold of it sideloading roms will likely happen. Polyflop said somewhere that while they do not support that they will not seek to block it. But homebrew and side loading really needs a big install base. All very catch 22. The opening pages of this thread read much like the latest ones as do Polyflops posts on TwitFace. I will check in here in a years time when Polyflop launch will be just a month or two away as usual.

When I met Bryan last year, he actually said the same thing about loading ROMs. They know someone's going to hack it, so their stance is just to quietly accept it, it seems.

 

I can't believe this thing still hasn't gotten an announcement for Famicom support yet. I'm sure that many people want to play Famicom games, and it makes the NES attachment thingy almost completely useless here. Why in the world is there no Famicom support? A strange and baffling decision for sure.

Edited June 2, 2020 by Steven Pendleton

[cybercylon]

I think there have been many strange and baffling decisions regarding this console.

[godslabrat]

24 minutes ago, Steven Pendleton said:

When I met Bryan last year, he actually said the same thing about loading ROMs. They know someone's going to hack it, so their stance is just to quietly accept it, it seems.

 

I can't believe this thing still hasn't gotten an announcement for Famicom support yet. I'm sure that many people want to play Famicom games, and it makes the NES attachment thingy almost completely useless here. Why in the world is there no Famicom support? A strange and baffling decision for sure.

Ostensibly, the Famicom support "requires" an FPGA module, since they want to support FDS.  Of course, this would mean Playmaji would have to get the FPGA support working in the first place, and that's something we haven't heard a word about in well over a year's time.  
 

I suppose a FC->NES adapter would work, and I'm sure that's the solution that will be suggested.  

[Steven Pendleton]

Yeah, the whole thing with this system is strange. I don't want to hate the thing and I'm not trying to, but the combination of the delays, strange choices, unknown target consumer, massive price, bad customer relations, long periods without any updates, and the fact that it's just running a bunch of emulators make it very easy to find fault with the thing.

 

I've mentioned before that I've played it, and it absolutely does work as advertised, so at least that much is true. I'm just here for the impending train wreck at this point.

Just now, godslabrat said:

Ostensibly, the Famicom support "requires" an FPGA module, since they want to support FDS.  Of course, this would mean Playmaji would have to get the FPGA support working in the first place, and that's something we haven't heard a word about in well over a year's time.  
 

I suppose a FC->NES adapter would work, and I'm sure that's the solution that will be suggested.  

The thing with this, and why I didn't bring it up earlier, is the thing with expansion audio. Can it do it through the NES cart slot with an adaptor? I didn't know anything at all about the NES/Famicom when I tested the thing, so I didn't know about the expansion audio or I would have asked.

[thedoppelganger]

I do think though that had they stuck to the original FPGA vision but within the modules not the base and minus the hybrid emulation failure, maybe with delays, they would now have a monster hit on their hands. Analogue have proven FPGA is the way. That would have been more costly but would have created more custom. The overly high price now is to recover wasted spending. 

[phoenixdownita]

On 6/1/2020 at 8:48 PM, Steven Pendleton said:

Yeah, the whole thing with this system is strange. I don't want to hate the thing and I'm not trying to, but the combination of the delays, strange choices, unknown target consumer, massive price, bad customer relations, long periods without any updates, and the fact that it's just running a bunch of emulators make it very easy to find fault with the thing.

 

I've mentioned before that I've played it, and it absolutely does work as advertised, so at least that much is true. I'm just here for the impending train wreck at this point.

The thing with this, and why I didn't bring it up earlier, is the thing with expansion audio. Can it do it through the NES cart slot with an adaptor? I didn't know anything at all about the NES/Famicom when I tested the thing, so I didn't know about the expansion audio or I would have asked.

The NES did not quite support expansion audio so you need a mod/enio-board to enable it .... and then use a famicom adapter ... at any rate given these are all emulated on the PolyMega it would not matter ... dump the ROM (sounds and all) and emulate that  [maybe it's not quite possible just that way I am not sure].

I think they could have just had a famicom slot into the NES-dumper/controller-adapter and sidestep the FDS with a "for later".

[Steven Pendleton]

5 minutes ago, phoenixdownita said:

The NES did not quite support expansion audio so you need a mod/enio-board to enable it .... and then use a famicom adapter ... at any rate given these are all emulated on the PolyMega it would not matter ... dump the ROM (sounds and all) and emulate that  [maybe it's not quite possible just that way I am not sure].

I think they could have just had a famicom slot into the NES-dumper/controller-adapter and sidestep the FDS with a "for later".

Yeah, that's why I regret not asking if the thing supports expansion audio through a converter.

 

In theory, if the emulator is any good, it should be able to recognize any games with expansion audio and do the expansion audio properly, but I guess we'll have to see. It may not work with Famicom games at all, but we'll see.

Edited June 3, 2020 by Steven Pendleton

[Steven Pendleton]

I forgot to mention that apparently your converter needs to be able to pass the expansion audio through to the system in order for it to work. I have never used a Famicom and only saw an NES for the first time in my life on Monday (it was the Hong Kong version), so I really have no idea how the thing works. This happens when you're a Sega kid. I was expecting something that takes up about the same amount of space as the Neo Geo AES, so it's actually a decent bit smaller than I thought it would be...

 

Anyway, assuming the converter is good and the emulator is good, I don't see why cart expansion audio wouldn't work, but there is always the chance that the current NES emulator can't handle Famicom games or Famicom expansion audio for whatever reason.

[XtraSmiley]

So, is it another month, another delay yet?

 

I'll post this again, I got banned from their Twitter for saying this MIGHT be a Ponzi scheme.

 

I'm really curious how they got a Walmart deal though. I mean, this product is SO expensive for the Walmart crowd, I have no idea how this happened.

 

I wonder if the Arcade 1-ups convinced Walmart there is a "retro" market out there.

 

Well, I watch all two of the Beta testers and the system OS still looks great. I hope it's a success, sells a ton, lowers the price and actually comes out with the cool light gun.

 

Barring that, I hope backers get a system and it gets hacked so we can apply their OS to home PCs before the company goes belly up.