Consoles Not On MiSTer

[unkempt delta]

From the little I keep up, it seems Outrun has been a major hurdle. But that looks much closer to being finished soon. So I'm expecting NGPC news may pick up soon. (This is just a guess based on little tidbits, I have no solid knowledge)

[oblique zephyr]

He does seem to keep announcing he is working on smaller arcades I have never seen mentioned before, and often I have never heard of, presumably to keep releasing new content for his patreons. Which is fine, but ultimately opportunity cost of this is working on the big promises. Imagine how much longer Robert would have taken to release PS1 if he was also dropping a random arcade core every couple of weeks.

Also supporting Pocket seems to have been a massive time sink and a lot more involved that he thought and projected to people

[gritty geode]

Good point. I think the Pocket is slowing him down significantly

[oblique zephyr]

He seems to have had to completely refactor his workflow for it, and that has been messy based off of the accidental removal of his cores from the update script.

I am not a developer, but a product manager, and know far too well how things that you initially think will be simple wind up having a lot unforeseen issues that in turn need to be refactored and fixed. Got a retro tomorrow for a piece of work that was initially forecast to take a few weeks that has taken nearly 18 months. So I empathise there, but you do need to anticipate the possibility of these things.

[south grove]

I wish he’d drop the Analog Pocket. Let everyone else port his stuff over.

[unkempt delta]

That is all true, and I feel there has been some real growing pains over there. On the flip side, considering how many things he and his team are working on at once, I think he's making good progress. Supporting multiple FPGA platforms. Releasing schematics of boards for preservation. Multiple random arcade cores, and seemingly working on CPS-3, SuperScalar arcade cores, Simpsons/TMNT arcade cores, plus Neo Geo pocket.

[steel wagon]

The smaller arcades are usually using pieces of hardware that are getting completed on his end so no real gripes here other than really wanting that ngpc

Like I don’t care about Haunted Castle but getting Konami arcade parts running is a positive, and that’s a fairly straightforward implementation once you have em

[mossy token]

The arcade game I'm most excited to see is Aliens..that was one of my favorites. It was right next to Pit Fighter in the arcade here which had it's little cult following..lol

Despite not being that great of a fighting game. Pit fighter always fascinated me. It had huge characters on screen.

[viscid adder]

My local pizza hut had Pit Fighter. It holds a special place in my heart as well. Spent a lot of quarters on that game and even ended up buying the Genesis port. Not an easy game to beat either.

[unkempt delta]

I loved Pit Fighter as well. But man the hit detection and controls on that game are sloppy on the arcade, worse on Genesis, and unplayable via emulation (in my opinion). Really hope we get a core for it some day.

[viscid adder]

Yeah, as a kid I got used to it and figured it out but it took a long time. I doubt I'd have as much fun with it today as I did back then.

[unkempt delta]

Interesting handheld I never knew existed: http://videogamekraken.com/monon-color-by-md

[sonic hawk]

dont let moondandy know

[oblique zephyr]

Hah, I didn't add that to my page, don't think it has been dumped and thought maybe specs too high for MiSTer, but not sure

[sonic hawk]

100mhz cpu

[unkempt delta]

MCS-51 according to some mame sources

[unkempt delta]

I assume that is too much for the DE10?

[sonic hawk]

borderline

[unkempt delta]

so you are saying there is a chance!!!

[sonic hawk]

yes that's what that means

[oblique zephyr]

Oh, has it been emulated and the games dumped?

[sonic hawk]

but it falls pretty squarely into the "not worth it" category

like playstationish dev time maybe? It seems like a pretty late device

[unkempt delta]

Haven't got too far, but it looks like there has been some work by Team Europe and MAME

[oblique zephyr]

Oh, interesting, will look for the Team Europe post. Must have read it at some point and forgotten about it. That is a good source for obscure systems nobody remembers popping up.

[unkempt delta]

I found something stating that the 100MHz CPU is an optimized Intel MCS-51, which other places say is an 8051 microcontroller, and I'm seeing several references to verilog and vhdl implementations, at least in academic articles.

a. I don't know what I'm doing

b. I just found this

c. Not asking anyone to spend time on it, just putting info out there.

d. You can still buy them (Monon Color) on Ali Express....if you had more money than sense....

e. I probably fall into d.

[oblique zephyr]

Oh, how much?

[unkempt delta]

$30 USD for system. Games, around $15

I'll send you a link

[oblique zephyr]

Only 30 dollars?!

[unkempt delta]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIUecS4UwHM

https://team-europe.blogspot.com/2021/02/monon-color-128mbit-flashcart.html

[unkempt delta]

....and now I own one.

[oblique zephyr]

You have no one to blame but yourself my friend. 🙂

I will be be looking tomorrow...

[unkempt delta]

Last I'll post on it for now. Mame driver for it in github has more technical info with link to spec sheet of the processor. https://github.com/mamedev/mame/blob/mame0252/src/mame/misc/monon_color.cpp

Been a fun rabbithole

https://www.reddit.com/r/emulation/comments/wv4j1d/mame_emulating_a_handheld_console_with_20/

[unkempt delta]

The reddit post concerning the work done in MAME suggests the CPU may actually be underclocked running at ~48MHz instead of 98. So might be doable.

[oblique zephyr]

Curious nobody has been able to dump the audio, I wonder what is so tricky there

[unkempt delta]

Really surprised this thing isn't better known, considering the officially licensed Ironman game. ....which of course is the one I can't seem to locate on Ali

[oblique zephyr]

Yeah, the fact you can get one new for like $20-30 with postage, I am surprised more people don't just have one. It's cheaper than a round of drinks

[upbeat flower]

So am I the only one who wants a CD32 core? I know the games can kind of be played in the Amiga core but I'd love to have the console reproduced.

[autumn linden]

Nah many do but lot also want Saturn / 3DO or CDi

[teal tinsel]

I'm more after FM Towns/Marty era

[upbeat flower]

I'm down for both of those, preferably the harder to get consoles first. Saturn is already being worked on and there are already options for it.

[autumn linden]

I have tons of games on my backlog until a proper core is out 😄

Like not bothering with CDi or 3DO emulation at all

[upbeat flower]

Absolutely. My pile of shame extends to the horizon. I think it's partly a) because it's one of the best methods of preservation of old tech and b) ...it's cool? I like that it can be done almost as much as I like using it. It's like audiophile logic - you geek out almost as much about the tech itself as you do the content. 😄

[south grove]

Who’s going to do the Super A’Can core? It needs to be preserved!

[gritty geode]

My thought process is that when we have a BBC Bridge Companion core and a Mega Duck core, then no core request is too obscure lol

[sonic hawk]

put a console in some formaldehyde then

it will be more useful as a lab decoration in a jar than as an electronic device

[south grove]

I set ‘em up, you knock ‘em down

[gritty geode]

To be fair, I'd only really be interested in the Super A'Can if there were some English translations

[sonic hawk]

and games that aren't terrible I assume

[gritty geode]

There's a board game where you can play as Hitler and Sherlock Holmes lol: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WmghUrnRqY

[steel wagon]

I played some A'Can stuff at midwest gaming classic some years ago, it's all right

midrate 16 bit stuff

[oblique zephyr]

What state is emulation for the A'Can and did anything happen with the diecasts of the chips that Furrtek did and published images of?

[oblique zephyr]

Was looking through the list I posted on the forum, to see where we are at with the more doable cores (ignoring 1st Gen and more complex later gen). This is where we are at:

RCA Studio II - good progress was made by Jason but he hit a wall awhile back and needed help
RCA Studio III - should be doable once Studio II is finished
APF MP-1000 - under development by Jason and Flangango
Bandai Super Vision 8000 - Flandango just needs to clean up and release
VideoBrain Family Computer - We have the chips in Chanel F core so there for someone to take on
Microvision - No development
Epoch Cassette Vision - all dumped now but hardware a black box, Pierco stated but has since abandoned
Gakken Compact Vision TV Boy - is soon to be dumped and we will see how doable this one is, hopefully simple
Entex Select-A-Game - No development
Nichibutsu My Vision - Flandango just needs to clean up and release
Epoch Game Pocket Computer - No development
Philips Videopac+ G7400 - No development (an upgrade of the Odyssey2)
Super Cassette Vision - No development
Super Micro - No development
Action Max - No development
VTech Socrates - No development
Hartung Game Master - No development
Amstrad GX4000 - No development
Konix Multisystem - We have a WIP core
Commodore CDTV - some progress but seems Amiga core is hacky in points and proving difficult to implement
Neo Geo CD - WIP core from PaulN
Sega Pico - Shane was working on this but has been doing so for years now
Amiga CD32 - same boat as CDTV
Sega Saturn - WIP core from srg3000

Atari Jaguar - WIP core needs some more dev attention
NEC PC-FX - David investigating but no development
Virtual Boy - No development
3DO - No development
Philips CDi - No development
Tiger R-Zone - No development
Tiger Game.com - No development
Neo Geo Pocket Color - still waiting for the unofficial JT core
Sega Dreamcast VMU - someone needs to investigate the public code someone released and see how doable it will be to make into a core
Sony PockStation - No development
GameKing - No development

[autumn linden]

i don't see cdi, 3do, saturn

[gritty geode]

Great list. The good news is that one of these cores will most likely be covered when Robert announces his next core

[oblique zephyr]

I left off the 5th gen ones nobody was working on, but did forget Saturn - that wasn't actually on my list as I assumed everyone knew the status of that one, but I should probably add since we hear so little about it these days

[gritty geode]

That’s good to know that Flandango is almost done with the Bandai Super Vision 8000. What a neat obscurity

[oblique zephyr]

Yeah, and the My Vision as well

I was talking with him the other week and he just needs a little bit of free time to clean up and release those two, but is very busy with work right now

[gritty geode]

What wall did Jason hit w/ Studio II and has he gotten past it?

[oblique zephyr]

No, he got stuck and was hoping someone would be able to help him but didn't happen, people were busy, so has been stuck part done for a long time. I can't recall the issue now, he had it part running in the simulator

He and Flandango were working on the APF MP-1000 but it needs Flandango to pick it up, and he's busy right now

I think Flandango was quite interested in looking at VTech Socrates as well, since it's in essence just another 8 bit PC we already have the parts for so could be straight forward

[gritty geode]

That’s awesome! Flandango is really giving these 2nd gen consoles a lot of love

[oblique zephyr]

Yeah, hopefully things quieten down for him as he is keen to work on more cores (computers and consoles). I think maybe G7400 and Amstrad GX4000/CPC+ as well, but that's already a long list of things I've said he is working on or interested in and that doesn't include any of the PCs (I know he is working on a Geneve 9640 core most actively right now)

I'm very interested to see what they find after dumping the Gakken Compact Vision TV Boy chips and library, hopefully that one winds up being simple and clear, and it isn't another Cassette Vision situation

[gritty geode]

Who's dumping the Compact Vision TV Boy? I wanna follow that project

[oblique zephyr]

Seen it discussed on the Gaming Alexandria discord, currently someone has the hardware and is working on a video covering the system and the library, then it is off to the person who managed to dump Cassette Vision

[gritty geode]

Ok so I guess we'll learn more in due time

[oblique zephyr]

Have pinged in an invite if you want to join there

[gritty geode]

Thanks! Just joined 🙂

[oblique zephyr]

we were talking about it in the preservation channel a week or two back

[steel wagon]

I sent Jason the schematics and technical docs I had for the studio II but I dunno what more I could help with there

Short of visiting the archive again and that’s not in the cards for a couple months

[south grove]

lol tiger r-zone

That should be the punishment core someone has to work on if they screw up a submit

[gritty geode]

Aren’t the vast majority of R-Zone games not dumped?

[oblique zephyr]

I don't think they all have been, which is weird at this point, what is the reason for that?

[gritty geode]

I’ve heard that dumping the games somehow destroys the cartridge but I don’t know if that’s BS or not. Maybe there’s lack of interest?

[oblique zephyr]

Are the games especially rare and expensive?

https://seanriddle.com/rzone.html

Oh dear, so the games have chips on them and custom LCD screen for each game, so that explains it

[south grove]

You’re not missing much, I owned one as a kid

They released it alongside the Virtual Boy as the poverty version of that console

[oblique zephyr]

Would still be good if they were preserved though, if only to stop people over paying for the system and games, and to learn from the mistakes of the past 🙂

[unkempt delta]

I was very very wrong in my prediction/conviction. ....and it feels soooooo good.

In other updates. I've received one cartridge for the Monon Color. The other game and console itself still hasn't shipped, and has seemed shady. But it's Aliexpress so......

[oblique zephyr]

Oh, that's worryingly. Keep us updated, I didn't get round to buying one

[gritty geode]

I do want Jaguar and 3DO one day, but my god N64 is just a dream come true

[autumn linden]

N64 emulation is still so bad

[unkempt delta]

I sold my N64 and games in 2020 to buy my second MiSTer setup. I had sort of been regretting getting rid of OOT, Majora, and Mario64. Almost bought one again recently. So his is coming full circle.

[gritty geode]

I'm the opposite. I'm looking for a reason to sell my Everdrive 64. Even though N64 is my favorite console, I'd prefer if it can be on MiSTer

[unkempt delta]

Oh, I'll be super happy with it on MiSTer and will abandon plans to rebuy one.

[mossy token]

I actually had a few arguments with people about why I thought it was gonna be N64. Now I can't find any of them to rub it in their face .lol

[oblique zephyr]

Yeah, the clues were all there if you believed Robert could do the seemingly impossible 🙂

[gritty geode]

It's one of those things. Robert was certainly hinting at it over the past several months, but we've heard that it's "impossible" for so long that a lot of denial was happening

Since N64 is my favorite console, I didn't want to get my hopes up for my own sanity lol

[mossy token]

The way Robert talked in the past it just seemed like something he was interested in doing. Also it seemed like the mic drop thing to do after the psx. Everyone including me thought the psx core was the most awesome thing to hit mister. But @rigid flint is like alright "hold my beer" lol

[gritty geode]

Yeah it's like the most epic mic drop ever. Robert also mentioned that he wanted to do something smaller after the PSX since it took him so much time, but knowing he could get the N64 to work, he took it on himself as a personal passion project. It's awesome that the FPGA GOAT loves the N64 as much as me!

[rigid flint]

It's just such a difference being motivated again for the things that show up on the screen. This happened the last time in 2019 when i worked on the GBA core. This feeling that kept me up the night...it helps a lot to get thought all this long time until things work

[gritty geode]

Just want to personally thank you friend. N64 is my favorite console ever. MiSTer feels incomplete w/out it, especially since we have such a great PSX core now

[mossy token]

https://tenor.com/view/rare-conker-nintendo-64-gif-11667653

Almost forgot about conker 😁

[gritty geode]

I bought Conker for $7 in 2002 from Blockbuster. Best video game purchase I’ve ever made

It was surreal when I discovered Banjo’s head mounted on the wall lol

[mossy token]

I hated the remake where they pretty much just cut conkers nuts out .lol

Looked good but was missing the charm

[gritty geode]

Exactly bro. They censored the game and added those awful combat segments with the spiked turtles. The online was cool, but I preferred the N64 multiplayer a lot more.

[mossy token]

I don't think games need the crude humor to be fun but when you have a game like conker that was pretty much built around it. You can't just strip it out.

[earnest hawk]

You people think they will put some higher end emulators on the mister in the future sometime?
There already making a n64 one. Probably with some FPGA elements. Whatever they can fit.
Like a hybrid emulator FPGA core. If that's even possible.
Maybe do higher end consoles. Dreamcast, Noemi, ect that way.
Whatever really.
I am very pleased on what's on there.
Hope good things for n64. Hopefully they can get things down and capability.

[sonic hawk]

no

[cloud patrol]

"Hybrid emulator FPGA core"?

[south grove]

Probably thinking something that combines the Cyclone V and the Arm9

[south grove]

As Kitrinx said, no not possible. The GBA/N64 is going to be the most capable game systems available and nothing more. FPGA development is both a technical and personal hurdle as it’s a very time consuming and highly technical task with extremely limited hardware.

Higher end consoles like you described are an orders of magnitude more complex so even if theres some future affordable FPGA hardware capable of supporting it, it’s incredibly unlikely for someone who wants to devote a huge chunk of their personal time to do something for free.

Stick to software emulation for anything beyond the 5th gen consoles.

[steel wagon]

You’d straight up need an organized team most likely. And a better fpga

[oblique zephyr]

Even if there was some board that could do Dreamcast, or PS2, and someone did manage to emulate it then the cost it would be for you get the set up to play the emulator would be so much more than buying the original system, ODE etc. and get good video out. It is easy and not terribly expensive to play Dreamcast and PS2 well right now.

[mossy token]

But won't the price of some of the higher tier stuff come down as technology gets better?

[oblique zephyr]

Compare the price of the DE-10 Nano 2 years ago to how much it costs now...

Not having my breath there.

[mossy token]

I think that's more a supply issue not that these things are just naturally getting more expensive.

[gritty geode]

A MiSTer successor is inevitable some day. It's a matter of when, not if. There's already boards out there that can run N64 at full speed. Robert mentioned he has 2 of them. Those boards are around $600 so it's not an astronomically high number. If a successor board comes in at $300 in the coming years, that'll be the sweet spot to get most people to upgrade if they choose to

[raw forge]

That Kria board that is less than $300 would probably run N64 at full speed

but it's light on GPIO which is a problem for this project overall

many cores need SDRAM

[steel wagon]

I don't doubt at some point someone would be mad enough to try and implement Dreamcast hardware on an fpga but there's a lot of other cool shit that should happen first

[mossy token]

They've just about got everything covered that I would actually play especially if N64 gets a good core.

[oblique zephyr]

Something to also keep in mind is if Sorg does start a new project on a new board, it could likely be a very long time for everything to be ported over. Also the MiSTer user base it large and established, a new project may never get the same level of user base, it could be a small minority of MiSTer users who decide to spend a lot of money to get a new board and what benefits would the library have over MiSTer to justify the cost? How many people with a MiSTer already would want to spend hundreds on a new board and add ons (nobody ever mentions that, no iO, USB board, case etc on these other boards, those need to be designed and made) to get what? A more accurate N64 and Nintendo DS? A better 486 core? Maybe a few arcade games?

There is also the assumption all the Devs would want to buy more kit and support another board.

[autumn linden]

You know there was a MiST before MiSTer right? 😛

[oblique zephyr]

Exactly, and was about to say, there are still MiST user's and developers who don't have MiSTer despite the benefits of moving over to MiSTer are massive

[autumn linden]

😄

Hard to crack

Infiltrate Intel with MiSTer fanboys I'd say

[oblique zephyr]

Will be worse for MiSTer going to whatever is eventually next, even if a new board comes along MiSTer isn't going anywhere - we all have the set ups already

I do feel often when this comes up people thing about it being like when the next generation of consoles comes out and within a couple of years everyone has moved over to the next one and the old one is phased out. This wouldn't be like that.

[gritty geode]

I think it all comes down to how difficult or easy it is to port cores to a successor board. It’d be ideal if it was easy tbh but I’m no dev. Realistically, we’d see a split in the user base and new cores would be pushed to both platforms

[oblique zephyr]

The Pocket is probably the best indicator we have right now of how that could work

I feel with boards we need to wait until Terrasic end of line the DE-10 and replace it with something else, as that would presumably do everything the DE-10 can (some other boards don't have everything we would need even if the FPGA is faster), Terrasic has been good at keeping it available for the most part, they have made a load of them, and also subsidised it to keep the price down.

And at the end of the day for any successor to be a success Sorg would need to decide to do it, it will all comes down to when he decides the time is right. Otherwise it will just be a rival project on a different board and is likely doomed to fail, or certainly never fully eclipse MiSTer.

[gritty geode]

Yeah exactly. It’d only make sense to upgrade to a new board if it’s more powerful and the architecture is extremely similar. There’s plenty of years left in the MiSTer’s life so I’m not too concerned about a future board. The biggest challenge is porting the framework I think

[steel wagon]

I could see people taking up a successor if it has a Naomi core just because the marvel 2/cvs2 scenes would be all over it the same way that a variety of other crews are all over the Mister for CPS2 and Neo Geo

but Dreamcast is pretty accurate so I don't know that it's a major priority (plus Brook converters make it trivial to use USB controllers on it)

[gritty geode]

By the looks of it we may have very good but not perfect N64 and maybe DS on the DE10. I’d certainly upgrade to have perfect N64 and DS

[oblique zephyr]

Serious arcade players are a tiny minority of the MiSTer user base, how many people here out of all the users are doing arcade tournaments?

Things like that are niche

[gritty geode]

People want to be able to play all their games on one device so if a successor could do perfect N64, DS and maybe Dreamcast some day (not saying it’ll be easy) I think a lot will upgrade

That’s also assuming porting everything will be remotely easy

[oblique zephyr]

I think realistically by the time N64 and Saturn are here (assuming they are) then there isn't really much left that even on a new board would get a thousands of people to go and spend hundreds on a new set up

The things the vast majority of people into retro gaming, and probably retro computing at this point, are wanting we have covered

[gritty geode]

Yeah I agree. It’ll be interesting if the DE10 Nano gets discontinued some day what considerations will be made

[oblique zephyr]

Even when that happens there will still be thousands and thousands of DE-10 nanos kicking about and may be the case you can easily get them cheap on eBay as people who bought them for other projects of as part of an education programme sell them off

Another thing that never is mentioned, if Terrasic does end of line it could well mean it becomes cheaper to set up a MiSTer for someone and the community continues to grow

But my general point is that there is a lot more to consider with a MiSTer successor, it isn't going to be like going from one generation of PlayStation to the next.

[steel wagon]

truuuue but I feel like most of the folks I know with Misters in real life have them for exactly that purpose

and they are rapidly replacing superguns and arcade boards at fighting game events

pretty good advertisement for the hardware

[oblique zephyr]

Which is great, MiSTer arcade support is a real draw for the project. Tournament players is still small numbers of the total number of users though.

I don't know if arcade tournaments are even a thing in the UK for example, our arcade scene wasn't nearly as big as it was in the US. I assume they probably are, but I have never heard about them.

[raw forge]

Going by comments I've seen from Sorgelig on Github, he's not a very big fan of Terrasic as a company

I highly doubt he'd choose their boards again if there are other options

when the DE-10 Nano comes to the end of it's hardware life the project will be forced to find a replacement of some sort

MiSTer will live on but there won't be new boards the same way there is with MiST

[oblique zephyr]

Possibly, but not necessarily quickly. There are so many boards out there even if it goes end of life it may not be that big of an issue for awhile. Also the MiSTer user base is huge and established, if it means people who want a board struggle to find one then that doesn't really impact us lot and the developers here who have them already. There have been times in the past few years where you couldn't get a board or it took six months because of the parts shortage. It didn't really have any impact on core development or people who already had MiSTer set ups. So when it goes go end of life I don't expect some mad panic to find a new board. MiSTer users can still play and Devs can still Dev.

[gritty geode]

This community has grown substantially since I've been a part of it in 2020 to where it's one of the most passionate and dedicated retro gaming communities in the world. FPGA gaming in general has really caught on in the past few years too. I don't think any of that will change in the future and if a new board is necessary at some point in time, the community will find a way

If we manage to get cycle accurate Saturn and N64 cores, that'd open a whole new massive audience

We're still pretty far off, but at some point, maybe 5 years from now or later, MiSTer will be seen as a legit alternative to MAME. The quality of the emulation is better for the most part, the issue is the volume of supported titles atm

[proven ravine]

Assuming that the Nintendo 64 works out well on the Mister platform, thanks to FPGAZumSpass and his upcoming Summer demo, what're the chances that this may also give someone some leverage to develop pre-Dreamcast 64-bit cores, like the Hyper Neo Geo 64 arcade core?

[steel wagon]

I've heard Hyper Neo isn't doable but I dunno if anyone has seriously explored it

since MAME is only just recently really seeing progress on that front

[raw forge]

The video hardware on the Hyper NEO looks pretty advanced

[raw forge]

The MiSTer project is just another stepping stone. There will be lots and lots of future FPGA gaming projects.

[gritty geode]

Yeah I agree. Not to sound like an elitist snob, but FPGA gaming just feels so much better than software emulation when done right. FPGA emulation is 20 years behind software emulation chronologically, but many of the cores are already better than the best software emulators. With Saturn and N64 complete, people will view FPGA gaming as the best way to play retro due to the accuracy and the ability to play on an HDTV. We're just in the growth phase of FPGA gaming. More FPGA devices will come in the future and more devs and users over time too

[raw forge]

The main thing that keeps more users from jumping in now is price. I feel like the efforts to port the MiSTer framework to cheaper hardware are actually more exciting than the possibility of future more capable hardware.

[gritty geode]

Good point

I was just mainly referring to the diehard Saturn and N64 crowds. Also the Jaguar and 3DO have diehard crowds too. Getting cycle accurate FPGA cores for those platforms would unite a lot of disparate retro communities

[unkempt delta]

I understand the point you are trying to make, but I disagree. Maybe there is some large casual audience of MiSTer user's out there that I'm not aware of. But looking at Twitter, misterfpga.org, and here, it looks like the large majority of us are ones who kept (and still have) our old consoles when the next generation came out. I don't see why cores need to be ported to a MiSTer2. I kept my NES when I got a SNES. I can keep my MiSTer, and also have MiSTer2, or UltraMiSTer128, or whatever.

[south grove]

For me the attraction of a MiSTer is being this singular magic box that runs everything. I certainly wouldn’t complain if I needed to keep it around with a new generation but it would be disappointing as I’d expect the quality of parts and output would be substantially better and now I’d need two things connected to the TV with its own settings, saves, etc.

[unkempt delta]

Yeah I still don't follow that. How would having say a MiSTer (console generations 1-5), plus a physical Dreamcast, a PS2, and a NDS be less hassle and less things connected than say having a MiSTer and MiSTer2 (console generation 6+)???

[south grove]

Oh I wouldn’t have those other systems hooked up

I’d prefer 1 system, a successor, to have everything ported to it.

[unkempt delta]

Then you have proved @oblique zephyr's point. We seemingly want different things and that's cool. I sit corrected 🙂

[south grove]

But to your point, if that didn’t happen I’d just keep both hooked up lol.

[tawdry axle]

As much as I like the Dreamcast, I wouldn't jump to a successor unless it's proven to have a perfect or near-perfect PS2 core, since the console still doesn't have a proper ODE solution to this day.

And I just don't see that happening for many years.

[raw forge]

getting timing closure on a 300Mhz CPU is going to take an FPGA capable of running at twice that speed

it will probably be the "MiSTer 3" that can do that

[rigid flint]

current gen(2020) FPGAs are already much faster than the Cyclone5 is. E.g. take this example here: https://www.xilinx.com/products/design-tools/microblaze.html#processorDetails

Ultrascale+ (e.g. Kria board) runs a 32bit softcore (that is designed especially for FPGAs) at around 500mhz. the cyclone 5 is even below the artix 7, maybe at 150mhz in this comparison

ps2 would still be at the edge most likely. The biggest issue however is the amount of work it takes. One alone can probably not do it anymore in a somewhat reasonable time

[brisk leaf]

But products like that tend to charge money for the design tools

[rigid flint]

The ultrascale+ dev tools are free up to the device size "7", which is 4 times logic size, 8 times ram size and 15 times DSP count compared to our C5. I guess that should be enough 🙂

[brisk leaf]

Oh, sounds nice !

how about the IP ? Anything critical trapped behind a paywall ?

(I think Quartus calls these "megafunctions" or something like that)

[rigid flint]

Not sure, i haven't worked with it yet, it's still unused in the shelf....

the older Artix7 had no issues with that, but it probably depends on what you want. The only things i would consider really required is the HPS interface and memory interface, as you don't want to write a DDR4 controller yourself and that should both be free

[raw forge]

PS2 would be especially difficult since so much of the system is in just one chip and you can't even get out an analyzer and start measuring things

[proven ravine]

The PS2 still has many games that are difficult to emulate to this day.

I agree that a PS2 FPGA core would be monumental, to a point where a person or a group would simply give up.

I'm trying not to be a pessimist here.

[rotund carbon]

When I last compared them, quartus is far more product-gated per performance.

Real stingy.

And I vivado has way more tools than quartus overall for free

It's install size is like the largest AAA game though

[brisk leaf]

Yeah, I didn't think Vivado had many bits and pieces that cost money... but I knew that certain chips were off-limits to the free version

I thought it was a pretty low bar, but that was what I heard a few years ago already

they may have adjusted since then too

[barren cloud]

Still hoping the jaguar core gets finished with CD support (yes I know I am crazy)

[gritty geode]

It'll happen some day 🙂

[oblique zephyr]

So it's a year to the day that I posted my big list of console cores not on MiSTer over on the forum, that I've periodically gone and updated (worth a rescan through if you liked it and haven't looked for awhile). I thought it would be fun to have a look at all the systems that were on the list a year ago that we now have live in Main. It's pretty wild, 14 systems in 12 months:

Bandai Super Vision 8000
Nintendo Game & Watch
VTech CreatiVision
Entex Adventure Vision
Tomy Tutor
Casio PV-1000
Casio PV-2000
Nichibutsu My Vision
BBC Bridge Companion
Gamate
Watara Supervision
Mega Duck
Sega 32X
Nintendo Pokemon Mini

https://misterfpga.org/viewtopic.php?t=4902

[clear fjord]

@oblique zephyr There is also a Double Dragon and Ninja Gaiden watch if you want to add those. I saw you had the Zelda one.

I use to have the Double Dragon and Ninja Gaiden

[clear fjord]

Hoping for that don't make you crazy.

[proven ravine]

What about some hope for a 3DO core and a Philips CD-i core?

Too stupid?

[clear fjord]

No

All cores are welcome

[clear fjord]

3DO would be amazing with a Turbo option

cause original hardware has some slow performance

[clear fjord]

There seems to be a lot of Japanese 3DO stuff too that never came out in the west.... if I recall correctly

[strange jetty]

Yeah, few 3do titles have solid optimization. A lot of it being related to those few studios doing 3do stuff, it being their first 3d titles, or pure laziness in a couple examples like street fighter 2 lacking parallax

[clear fjord]

3DO would really shine with a core that has Turbo. Hopefully it happens one day

People would not shit on it so much

[unkempt delta]

Stumbled upon some technical info on the Sega Terradrive. This was a hybrid IBM 286 / Mega Drive. Unlike the Amstrad Mega Drive PC, the 286 could access the Mega Drive hardware (cpu, ram, etc) and vice versa. Probably a long long long shot anyone ever picks this up. But still sharing in case anyone finds it interesting: https://gendev.spritesmind.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=2887

At least one game made use of the combined hardware access, 'Puzzle Construction'. Making this a Mega Drive system, much like the LaserActive Mega LD games. Unsure if any other software takes advantage.

[unkempt delta]

Some more info here including pics of the motherboard and links to some schematics: https://gendev.spritesmind.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=1121

[misty rover]

I would love it if we could play M.U.G.E.N. games and Beats of Rage games on MiSTer

[south grove]

Won’t happen unfortunately unless someone writes it for the arm processor like with ScummVM.

[misty rover]

Damn would be awesome

[south grove]

Yeah it would be, those two open source projects are really cool! 🍻

[rotund carbon]

it looks like both open source mugen engines could probably be worked on to get them compiling for ARM with the right know-how, but in both I saw issues open on github that indicated this would need OpenGL to work, I guess? So that indicates to me that it would need a graphics chip when the DE10-Nano's SoC doesn't have.

[teal tinsel]

Holding out for that FM Towns update or the Marty. Not many updates since March was it

[rotund carbon]

they are significantly more complex than the previous systems he's worked on so it will necessarily take more time

[misty rover]

Wondering what the progress of Atari Jaguar on MiSTer

[oblique zephyr]

None for awhile, there is a Jaguar channel though if you want to talk about the WIP core

https://discord.com/channels/647909397477195803/1055574003810578503

[proven ravine]

I don't know if this was mentioned in here before, but once MARS FPGA becomes reality, I wanna see if a VM Labs Nuon core is possible.

That's obscure as obscure is gon' get.

[oblique zephyr]

Well at some point in the not too distant future there will be a successor to the DE-10 Nano that MiSTer will also officially support, that will presumably be more than powerful enough to support the Nuon hardware - but you will still need a talented Dev to want to spend a lot of time developing a core for it, and that will be the biggest hurdle to it ever existing.

[proven ravine]

I wonder which board is that. I'm not up-to-date on that info because of work.

[oblique zephyr]

Hasn't been decided/announced yet

[proven ravine]

Since I mentioned the Nuon on @dim garden's latest video today, I just found out that the Nuon port of Crayon Shin Chan 3 was just found, and dumped today on Archive.org.

It was thought to be lost, but some soul managed to find a copy I don't know how.

[oblique zephyr]

Oh wow, that's great something lost has been found. I still find it wild that old games are still being found and dumped in 2023.

We just got the final undumped Casio Loopy game, and may get the last Super A'Can game as well in the not too distant future.

[dim garden]

It was you who mentioned Nuon !

I was surprised anyone said they

That

[proven ravine]

I really hope more and more lost games get discovered.

[oblique zephyr]

How much do Nuon players go for these days?

[proven ravine]

From what I'm seeing on eBay, they go from $180 to ~$5,000.

And in terms of emulation, Nuance Resurrection is a continuation of the OG Nuance emulator.

[oblique zephyr]

Why the wild discrepancy in price?

[proven ravine]

Considering the $5K one is a Samsung player, I'm gonna take a guess that it's because it had compatibility with every game.

[proven ravine]

Ye. That was me.

[oblique zephyr]

Ah, OK, so different models

[proven ravine]

Yep.

[oblique zephyr]

Man, 5k is nuts

I wonder how many wound up in charity shops or chucked in the bin by people thinking they are just old DVD players

[proven ravine]

That would be scary.

[oblique zephyr]

This feels like one system you may stumble upon in the US still for next to nothing

[proven ravine]

Four manufacturers made their own Nuon players: Motorola, RCA, Toshiba, and Samsung.

Only Samsung came out on top, and Toshiba would be like the second best or something.

[oblique zephyr]

Sounds like some didn't have a way to use a controller and you had to (try) play with the remote

[dim garden]

Lol I paid a ten spot

[proven ravine]

Jeez.

[oblique zephyr]

I can't remember what is actually under the hood in these things

[proven ravine]

That would suck.

But to be honest, da hell are these controllers?!

https://www.nuon-dome.com/stealthre.html

https://www.nuon-dome.com/hard_warrior.html

https://www.nuon-dome.com/logitech_review_mo.html

https://www.nuon-dome.com/wingmanpre.html

https://www.nuon-dome.com/samconre.html

[oblique zephyr]

Four 128 bit 54 MHz or 108 MHz Nuon MPE (Media Processing Element) very long instruction word processors supporting parallel operations on (at most) 32 bit scalars. An MPE's register file contains eight 128 bit registers, which can be used to store vectors of that size (composed of 4 scalars), or be partitioned down to offer thirty-two 32 bit (scalar) registers, or eight packets of 3 (pixel) or 4 ("small") 16 bit vectors. Each MPE operates on RAM that is local to itself, but MPEs 1 and 4 can directly operate on data located in system memory. Those same specific MPEs can use their memories as configurable caches, and have access to additional tag RAM for that purpose. MPEs have a hardware multiply unit, but no hardware division. There is no hardware support for floating point computation.[7] Some report(s)[by whom?] suggested that a certain model had sported a 333+ MHz clock frequency but it was never released widely.
MCS-251 microcontroller for background task
32-megabyte 8-bit Fast Page DRAM at 33 MHz, 512-kilobytes sound RAM and 24-kilobytes programmable ROM
2x 3d Media GL MPE with 8-megabyte 32bit video ram at 66mhz.
64~256 MB writable rom and optional hard drive (up to 137 GB)
Optical drive support DVD or CD-R

[proven ravine]

Even though the SDK is available (for homebrew purposes at least), the documentation and board/chips scans don't exist yet.

[oblique zephyr]

Is this spec PS2 era stuff?

[proven ravine]

Since it released in the year 2000, it's gotta be.

[oblique zephyr]

Yeah, I think this isn't something we should ever expect a core for on any board, but be nice if it was preserved well in software

[proven ravine]

I know. I thought I'd love to bring the news of the last undumped game that released today.

Forgive me if this is the wrong channel to talk about it.

[oblique zephyr]

No not at all, this is definitely the right place to talk about such things and I for one really appreciate learning this has been dumped and enjoy chatting about obscure systems we may or may not ever get. 🙂

[proven ravine]

Yeah. I don't know whom I told this to, but I once said that every video game, every video game media, and every video game accessory, deserves to be preserved. Doesn't matter if it was a commercial failure or not.

It's pieces of history that can't be ignored.

When it comes to video games, this video from Ahoy explains the history and the concept of it. It's one of my favorite videos from YouTube of all time.

[oblique zephyr]

I am a firm believer in that as well, and more generally. If only to understand and learn from past mistakes, and understand the past.

And help plot a path of understanding to where we are today.

[proven ravine]

From a friend of mine:

There's no sound or printer emulation yet but video emulation is working and the machine properly boots stuff now

and it runs at the correct speed as well i presume

It turns out that the SH7021 is the entire SoC and not just a CPU as I initially thought```

[oblique zephyr]

Yeah I had been meaning to start a little channel on the Loopy, as there have been some big advancements recently. The final undumped game was dumped and all the others verified, and it is being emulated in Mame. They are expecting sound to work by the end of the year, so there will finally be a Casio Loopy emulator

[proven ravine]

What was the last undumped game?

[oblique zephyr]

https://www.retrorgb.com/final-casio-loopy-game-dumped.html

[proven ravine]

Looks cute!

[oblique zephyr]

I wonder how complex the SH7021 is

[steel wagon]

Rachel Weil had a great Loopy presentation at Long Island retro expo delving into each of the games, they’re really neat

Lot of creative stuff that uses the printer

[oblique zephyr]

Do you know if her presentation was recorded?

[steel wagon]

One that people online claimed was a dating sim is actually a cart for making your own comics

There was a camera but if it’s anything like my epoch panel, they provided the recording in a weird file format that doesn’t seem to play nice with YouTube

[swift vine]

I picked up a Nuon a few months back for $5

Even got an Aries 64 for it but

It went in the fire

[proven ravine]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNEemCFBfm4

These mad people somehow fixed the Atari Jaguar port of Doom.

[proven ravine]

https://github.com/mamedev/mame/blob/master/src/mame/misc/videoart.cpp

LJN Video Art can be emulated in MAME now.

Jesus Christ.

[south grove]

Is this a good or bad thing

[proven ravine]

It's great that it's now preserved. But we talking about LJN here!

[oblique zephyr]

I was meaning to start a thread on this one, is great news it has finally been emulated and people are working to get and dump all the carts

[proven ravine]

Maybe you can draw with ease this time.

I wonder which number of carts there were, and if they've all been found or not.

[oblique zephyr]

I am wondering if the undocumented/unknown chips are now readable in Mame

There are only like 7 carts, a couple of people are acquiring and dumping them. I don't know if any are especially rare

[proven ravine]

Shouldn't there be like 10 of them?

[oblique zephyr]

https://archive.org/details/centerofboardbottom

Video Art Activity Cartridge
A Trip To The Zoo
Disney Coloring Book
Disney Story Book
Looney Tunes
Marvel Super-Heroes
My Dream Day
My Favorite Doll
On the Move

So 9 carts

Here is the board details on the archive link:

7805CSP is a standard 5v voltage regulator.
EF6805R2P is an implementation of the Motorola 6805 microprocessor.
EF9367P is a Graphics Display Processor produced by Thomson.
The D41416C-15 appear to be 4-bit 16K DRAM chips.
The TSGB01019ACP is sadly a complete unknown.

The various "74" chips are generally known as "Glue Logic", used to connect between other components.
T74LS04B1 is a Hex Inverter.
T74LS373B1 is an Octal Transport Latch with 3-state Outputs.
I'm not entirely sure what DM74LS374N is.

[oblique zephyr]

Well that was quick... All the Video Art carts have now been dumped it seems

https://github.com/mamedev/mame/blob/master/hash/videoart.xml

[proven ravine]

All the carts that were thought to be lost?

[oblique zephyr]

Seems so, although not sure if any were thought to be lost?

Were only 9 of them

[south grove]

Ignoring “preservation”, any of it worth playing?

[oblique zephyr]

It is literally all colouring in programs, like a digital etch-a-sketch

If we ever got a core would be a funny competition to see who could colour in the avengers best or draw the best picture

[south grove]

lolol

[proven ravine]

Or draw shitposts and other meme images.

I'd imagine that the only controller you'd use on a hypothetical Video Art Mister core would be a tablet.

[proven ravine]

Y'all wanna a rabbit hole that would be fun mess to make a core of?

All the Jakks-Pacific Plug It In & Play TV Games systems.

[unkempt delta]

Isn't there one Mortal Kombat one that has a version that isn't emulated? Or am I thinking of something else?

[proven ravine]

I know which one you mean: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wthz3Rb3wnA&pp=ygURbXZnIG1vcnRhbCBrb21iYXQ%3D

What I don't know is if it's playable on MAME.

[unkempt delta]

Yep, that's the one.

[unkempt delta]

I don't remember seeing this one before or it being on @oblique zephyr 's forum post: https://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?st=2&c=696

The Hanimex HMG-7900 is a console with 11 games

Also, https://discord.com/channels/647909397477195803/1171573937013010503

[oblique zephyr]

Oh, didn't know about this HMG-7900 - do you know if has this been emulated anywhere and have the carts and rom been dumped?

[oblique zephyr]

Not looking promising, but this was from 10 years ago

https://forums.bannister.org/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=87585

[visual basin]

Has anyone considered a core based on Daphne?

Daphne is an open source emulator for running LaserDisc Arcade titles. E.g Dragon's Lair and Space Ace.

http://www.daphne-emu.com

[south grove]

Considered? Almost definitely. But it’s mainly just playing back FMV video which would be handled by the DDR3. There’s not really any benefit FPGA would provide here, hence the lack of interest.

I mean that shouldn’t stop anyone from doing it. I think a core would be great.

[oblique zephyr]

There's someone who was working on this, but getting LD games captured / preserved in a usable format is one hurdle. Not sure where this project got to

[unkempt delta]

I believe they had a Patreon, but I've had to cut back so I can't see updates. If I recall, progress was steady but slow.

https://github.com/dentnz/Daphne_MiSTer

No updates to the repo in 8 months.

[south grove]

Woah but still cool someone looked at it!

[unkempt delta]

.Aquaplus P/ECE ..and yet ANOTHER handheld that seems to have mostly flown under the radar, Never knew this existed: https://blog.gingerbeardman.com/2021/08/19/aquaplus-piece-vs-panic-playdate/

[unkempt delta]

@oblique zephyr ^

[unkempt delta]

Looks like the Aquaplus specs puts it below a GBA, looks doable (from my ignorant viewpoint) on MiSTer. Seems like good technical info exists for the CPU. But it's far beyond my current abilities. Has some neat games: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtY4h3rMpu0

[unkempt delta]

Another one I never new existed, an oddball from NEC with 4 whole games!!!

http://videogamekraken.com/pi-et1-by-nec

Sadly a quick search finds little technical information and no emulation.

[south grove]

Damn this sounds cool, thanks for the link

[unkempt delta]

Yeah, I've been digging into that one a little bit. I think emulation exists or is being worked on. The cool thing about this one is that it was meant to be to PC's, what the VMU was to the Dreamcast or PocketStation was to the PS1. So there are some PC games that have minigames that work on this in additon to standalone software. I'm sorely tempted to import one, but haven't seen many up on the auction sites.

[unkempt delta]

More info on the PI-ET1: https://www.reddit.com/r/retrobattlestations/comments/vzm9gm/nec_piet1_the_first_and_only_electronic_organizer/

[misty rover]

Any word on a Virtual Boy or Atari Jaguar core?

[noble parrot]

there's the alpha/betaish Jaguar core that requires dual ram, that is floating around this discord somewhere

[oblique zephyr]

https://www.gamingalexandria.com/wp/2024/01/every-gakken-compact-vision-tv-boy-game-preserved-scanned/

[jagged panther]

https://github.com/mamedev/mame/commit/a5af4e4ccb873be79e6273ef716002cf7dd73df3

[jagged panther]

https://github.com/mamedev/mame/commit/2eb02114f9450884c0c69a71195781e403a3ff5c

[oblique zephyr]

Wow, that was quick

[jagged panther]

Yes it is !

[oblique zephyr]

https://www.retrorgb.com/floopy-drive.html

Rysha rejoice! A flash cart and localisation patches being worked on for the Loopy

[proven ravine]

God, I can't wait to see Doom run on this thing.

[oblique zephyr]

Hah, Doom stickers for your school lunch box

Had a chat with the lady who wrote the article, it is crazy how quickly things are progressing on the Loopy front. The Flash card and emulation work has come from near nothing back in April. A group is already working on translating the games and have one done and getting the ROM patched.

Not a system many people know or care about, but it's exciting to see such a burst of interest in getting this obscure system more accessible and preserved.

[oblique zephyr]

Something bizarre as well, and quite funny, is the system's sound chip is a Casio keyboard one which caused an issue for a game where you look after a dog. The keyboard sounds can't replicate a dog barking so they put a sound chip on that games board just to do the dog barking. This chip hasn't been played yet but people are looking into how to do it.

[hearty hollow]

The music and sound effects on this game are probably the most enjoyable part of the system

I have a Loopy and a multicart with all the games (minus the one just recently dumped). It's definitely an interesting system. A rare early attempt to appeal to girls in the video game space, but in a pretty pandering way. Has surprisingly nice composite output and potential for nice sounds

[strange isle]

So, with n64 and saturn likely to be in a done state in 2024. What does everyone thing the next impossible/holy grail achievement core could be on a MiSTer? Also a bit of a side question, what is the likelyhood of any 3d (mid 90s) arcade core coming to the MiSTer?

[sonic hawk]

I dont really see any 6th gen consoles making it to mister as it is now (except gba which is sort of 6th gen in name only)

there's a variety of unpopular older ones that could work

[brisk leaf]

I think it's going to be more of a "fill in the cracks" situation - still several 5th gen system which would be large endeavours, but which had limited popularity during their lifetimes. (So, possible, but not necessarily developers' favourite systems)

OTOH, if a platform with higher frequency/more LEs becomes a reality, there might be Dreamcast one day.

But I'd guess Jaguar, 3DO, a few really niche systems (like Playdia or PC-FX), and so on

None of these are "impossible" or "holy grail"

[near terrace]

Maybe virtual boy

[brisk leaf]

maybe

[nova lotus]

Not a console but I would love a pentium core 🤩

[brisk leaf]

Pentium was a big change from 486. There might be some leeway to improve 486 (i.e. non-standard compatible), but not likely Pentium because it's over double the complexity

Well, it could probably be done on a bigger FPGA

[nova lotus]

I know it is surely undoable, but it would be a great "holy grail" core (counting on you Robert 😁)

[oblique zephyr]

How well can you emulate those P1 games on a modern PC?

[gritty geode]

6th gen handhelds would work like the Nokia N-Gage and GP32. Anything beyond that is a no-go

If there are any devs willing to cut their teeth, there’s still a lot of 2nd and 3rd gen consoles out there

[static drift]

there’s a lot of low hanging fruit remaining if we look to computer cores, though those are usually of more interest for computational archeology rather than gaming, with some notable exceptions

it’s still a lot of fun to see something like a relatively powerful (for the 90s) sparcstation boot on the mister

[latent jetty]

AFAIK and it’s not much but, the N64 core could come out cuz the PSX CPU were similar. Isn’t the PSP CPU in the same family of processors? PSP on MiSTer would be awesome.

[nova lotus]

i think the clock at 333 make it impossible to do but for all handeld with no video out (or not very good like the PSP) a better fpga board would be awesome. But perhaps software emulation is enough in these cases...

[steel wagon]

If you talk to Rachel Weil it wasn’t pandering at all. It was a fairly successful product

It wasn’t really competing in the video game space, it was more in line with their other multimedia products

[south grove]

who?

[oblique zephyr]

She has done a lot of research into the Loopy and still really champions it, she actually went to Casio in Japan to interview them about it and from what I heard they were so baffled anyone would be asking about this system they dug out all Loopy games and things they had in the cupboard and gave them to here, which is the library is now all dumped and available.

She runs this site and does a lot of presentations at cons

http://femicom.org/about/

There seems such a hardcore small fan base for the Loopy which has made huge progress in getting it emulated in the last year and now there is a flash cart, that at this point I wouldn't be surprised if someone from this scene went on to attempt an FPGA core for it

[south grove]

Oh wow!

[oblique zephyr]

On the off chance anyone with the skillset is interested in taking on a Loopy core then give us a shout and I can get directions to where all the emulation work is being coordinated

[hearty hollow]

Fair enough. I should read her writings on it. It is definitely an interesting system. More interesting than the Playdia at least.

[oblique zephyr]

I think since this server started Playdia has been mentioned about six times, four of them by me. Nobody even knows about it to bad mouth it let alone anyone interested in the system.

I wouldn't be surprised if I was the only person here who even owns one, and they aren't even that pricey or hard to get and they play burnt discs.

[south grove]

Playdia

sweet, now I’m part of the club

[hearty hollow]

I have one. I actually have 3 that I bought in a lot from Yahoo! for $40. One was completely disgusting inside and the motherboard was rusted out. One didn't power on (still on the to-do to fix) and the other one works perfectly fine

Love the design of the shell, but it's basically a low-grade VCD player

Considered putting a MiSTer in the shell of the first unsalvageable one

[south grove]

I set my MiSTer to play the Casio Loopy boot sound when a console core loads 👀

[oblique zephyr]

It actually doesn't play VCDs which surprised me, as they were repurposed into VCD players to show product videos in shops

I actually went to the trouble of trying a VCD in mine

It doesn't support CD+G either incidentally

[hearty hollow]

By low-grade VCD I meant worse than VCDs

Still some fun to be had with the unit though. I put the sampler disc on in the background sometimes

I think the Playdia is the only CD based console I've seen without some kind of splash screen when you boot it

Just a blue screen

[unkempt delta]

@oblique zephyr serious question, is any of the library actual games? The wikipedia article makes it sounds like at best it's similar to Dragon's Lair? Not knocking it, just curious cause I see a brand new system for less that $200 right now on Yahoo Auctions. Which is tempting, but I'm also busying collecting for the Monon Color at the moment.

[oblique zephyr]

I got a game with it where you are in a submarine and go from screen to screen and see different fish and have to do some quick time response things, like you get attacked by a seal and have to shoot food pellets at it, and another part you have to grab some rubbish from the sea bed with a grab machine mechanic. It's edutainment stuff, but it was quite fun for a little bit

[unkempt delta]

Thanks for the info

[oblique zephyr]

I haven't explored the library much, I burnt off a Gundam "game" but wasn't sure what I was doing and was mostly playing different anime clips. I think a lot of the library is probably like that

It depends how much you want to pay for a curio to play about with for a bit, I paid £100 for mine boxed and was happy enough to pay that to try out the system

[unkempt delta]

I'll probably pass for now. Prioritizing things that are a) weird and b) likely never to come to MiSTer. So right now that is Xavix and Monon Color.

Oh yeah, For an experience it's probably worth it. It looks neat. Just prioritizing. I've spent waaaay too much on controllers and such lately.

[oblique zephyr]

Maybe keep an eye out on ebay, a copy may turn up in the US for a reasonable price - that is how I got my one and my Loopy around the same time. Weirdly they turned up in the UK boxed with acceptable buy it now prices

[ionic canopy]

we got the SEGA AI Computer yet? https://x.com/ocornut/status/1752706821444546845?s=46&t=gu6MLSHzGcQj-MyfIYpJSg

Omar (@ocornut) on X

The stylish, unknown & extremely rare SEGA AI COMPUTER (1986) promised natural language processing via its Prolog interpreter.

Available today, for the first time ever: system roms, game cards, tapes recordings, scans, photos, MAME driver & more: https://t.co/hkwpr63lff

Twitter · Jan 31, 2024, 2:54 PM

[unkempt delta]

That's awesome. I just learned about this computer a few months ago and at that time there was next to no info on it online and no downloads. This is great news.

[static drift]

huh I actually really like prolog and I had no idea there was a computer dedicated to it

“The Prolog interpreter is for running applications only — it cannot be used for programming. The company chose the Prolog AI language because of its ability to handle unformatted input and to parse natural-language input. Prolog is not especially suitable for driving displays and controlling peripherals, so Prolog functions call up fast, efficient assembly-language subroutines for these tasks.”

ah that’s disappointing. prolog isn’t very exciting without a REPL, and it’s generally no better than an Inform-style parser at NLP (which is to say, pretty damn good for the 80s)

[rotund carbon]

😛 it's partially working on MAME. we'll see how it goes. the speech synth chip will need to be created from scratch, the eeprom seems like a fairly simple one, waka is rewriting hopefully the mostt accurate nec v20/v30/v33 cpu to date so anyone wanting to write this core should probably wait on that.

i was looking at it and taking some notes today to just keep in case anyone later is interested

datasheet for the speech synth chip

i don't think we have any fpga models of any of these retro speech synth chips yet, the votrax sc-01 would be awesome, but i don't think anyone is working on itt

this is kinda like a more advanced votrax too and i dunno if it's been decapped, i was gonna look, but i doubt it, so it would have be inferred what it does and given the hardware is insanely rare people would have to rely on how mame's model operates

the sound box module adds a ym2151, there is a core for that already which is good

the peripheral support isn't even working yet in mame i don't think so it's a bit hot off the presses lol

[oblique zephyr]

Good bit of deep diving there! How complex are speech synth chips like this? Are we talking CPU levels of difficulty?

[rotund carbon]

Its sorta like imagine the SNES sound chip but it has built-in samples.

[oblique zephyr]

Interesting they don't have keyboard protocols yet, I thought getting keyboard protocols was fairly straight forward for systems

[rotund carbon]

But with less complexity overall.

So it's pretty complex, yeah.

[oblique zephyr]

Hmm, so sort of thing only a handfull of experienced devs could do?

[rotund carbon]

It is an ADPCM chip (which are usually simple) but you can manipulate all of the sounds in multiple ways. I'm sure someone could do it if they want to.

[oblique zephyr]

Hopefully someone has a look after the Mame guys crack it their end

Still hoping someone picks up the Gakken TV Boy, that one should be really straightforward, we have all the parts for that one

[gritty geode]

Well the Gakken Compact Vision TV Boy being preserved in MAME looks like it’d be a good next project for any developer interested

[oblique zephyr]

I'm also curious what it would take to get a core of the LJN Video Art, is it so basic it would be another easy one for someone or it has some weird hardware in there

[rotund carbon]

it's all a matter of the people with the skills feeling motivated to do it, in the end.

[oblique zephyr]

What would be funny is if someone found a way to convert images into roms for the system

Have you glanced at the LJN Video Art MAME implemention Birdy? curious what your take on the hardware is

[rotund carbon]

they didnt' seem to be just static images, they were actual programs from what i'm reading

like a coloring book game with multiple images that could be colored in

or an animation game

[oblique zephyr]

AH, OK

Interesting there is more to them

[rotund carbon]

it's a piece of history but it was heavily criticized negatively when it came out, looks like it really was super clunky and not great haha

[oblique zephyr]

Oh yeah, it's not a long lost hidden gem

But always interesting to know what is going on under the hood and how straight forward it would be to preserve

Gakken TV Boy and LJN Video Art may be the sort of things @leaden vapor is curious about now they are in MAME, he has a penchant for old obscure systems. 🙂

[rotund carbon]

i think he's still working on an arcade core off and on in particular, can't remember which one

[leaden vapor]

I have way too many unfinished projects, don't give me ideas 🤣

[tulip delta]

@rotund carbon someone was working on the SC-01 for Apple II Mockingboard compatibility, I'm not sure where that project is at right now. Here is a picture of the prototype board (not my photo) for the SC-02 (successor but backwards compatible):

JROK (Multi-Williams FPGA) attempted to tackle the SC-01 for his Mylstar (Q*Bert) FPGA board, but in the end decided that the secret sauce in how the SC-01 worked was the analog mixing of pheonomes, so he switched to digital samples

I love the clunky computer voice of the SC-01, I picked up one of these for a steal @ $75 a couple years ago:

Intex "Talker" text-to-speech, 6502 based system that uses a RS-232 serial port connection

works great with my Apple II, and my modern Macbook 🙂

[oblique zephyr]

Oh, is there an FPGA implementation of the Qbert chip using samples?

[tulip delta]

@oblique zephyr not a general purpose implementation, but as part of a stand-alone FPGA Jamma board for the games on Q*bert's hardware

[tulip delta]

(of which only Q*bert uses the SC-01)

[rotund carbon]

right, it's a cmos chip with lots of super funky analog logic on it

the samples are "good enough" but something still feels off about that being all we have currently

[oblique zephyr]

Did Furrtek give up on his Super A'Can decap and documentation?

[unkempt delta]

His last Patron post (Dec 25th) said he hit a road block mid-October on the Super A'Can. If I understand the post correctly, he doesn't currently have the die and needs to get it back for more imaging?

[oblique zephyr]

As in the liquid to wash the chips in?

[unkempt delta]

I took it to mean he didn't have the chip itself. But it was a quick mention and I may have misunderstood.

[oblique zephyr]

https://twitter.com/MameHaze/status/1757903956108312620

David Haywood (@MameHaze) on X

Sean Riddle has managed to figure out how to dump the internal H8 ROM for the Bandai Design Master, something I'm sure @GamingAlexandri will be happy to hear. Being able to run the internal software is vital to the functionality of the machine, and makes emulation more viable.

Twitter · Feb 14, 2024, 11:05 PM

Sean Riddle still doing God's work when it comes to preserving obscure old ropey consoles 🙂

[unkempt delta]

That is awesome!!!

[unkempt delta]

This falls into the category of 'fantasy computer' but fpga implementation exists and it runs Doom @south grove and Quake: https://twitter.com/m_bitsnbites/status/1763513250887450719

m (@m_bitsnbites) on X

Want to run #DOOM. Need something to run it on.

✔️ Develop new CPU ISA.
✔️ Write new GCC backend.
✔️ Implement CPU and VGA gfx in FPGA.
✔️ Write a minimal OS.
✔️ Port DOOM to the new CPU & platform.
✔️ Optimize rendering code.

Now I can run DOOM 🤘

@romero #MRISC32 #FPGA

Twitter · Mar 1, 2024, 10:34 AM

https://gitlab.com/mrisc32

[south grove]

YESSSS everything will run DOOM!

[static drift]

I’m kind of surprised nobody (to my knowledge) has done a Linux-capable RISC-V core yet

it probably wouldn’t have that much utility but it’s very low hanging fruit

[nova lotus]

Not sure it is that simple, in the mrisc32 case, it seems there is a minimal vga/gpu and a specific compilation/build tools for its plateform. For a general purpose OS, you would have to develop everything an OS needs which is far beyond than a unique game.

[static drift]

I think there might already be a litex port for the de10-nano, though it’d need to be adapted to the mister framework

[nova lotus]

interesting (https://github.com/enjoy-digital/litex). There seem to be a de10nano target but is it really possible to build a fully functional linux with good performance with this framework? Depending on litex, perhaps there is a lot of work on the linux side to support the litex block.

There is this project : https://github.com/litex-hub/linux-on-litex-vexriscv (or this one https://github.com/litex-hub/linux-on-litex-rocket) but it seems terminal only.

If the performance is good, i think it is very interesting to have a risc/linux core, but it seems like a lot of work.

(but i m neither a fpga nor an OS dev)

[static drift]

I hear good things about it, but I kind of doubt a risc-v core running on the fpga would outperform our existing arm cores. like I said I don’t think there’s a point to doing it, but it is surprisingly low hanging fruit

(compared with a Linux-capable core from scratch, at least)

[nova lotus]

oh, we can have a Lichee Pocket 4A core with this (https://sipeed.com/licheepi4a) 😁

[proven ravine]

https://twitter.com/iDuckFilms/status/1766267370266624102

https://twitter.com/JohnEnigma99/status/1766630784239030292

iDuckFilms (@iDuckFilms) on X

• Zelda CD-i spiritual successor released
• Hotel Mario beta with alternate cutscenes found
• Morshu YTPs in MLB
The CD-i Renaissance is here.

Twitter · Mar 9, 2024, 12:58 AM

John Enigma (@JohnEnigma99) on X

@iDuckFilms All that it's missing is some good, open-source Philips CD-i emulation, be it software-based, or FPGA based.

Twitter · Mar 10, 2024, 1:02 AM

[oblique zephyr]

I made a wee poll for people to vote on what 4th/5th gen sustem they most want to see on MiSTer, hopefully get some traction, am curious to see the results.

Every option starts at 1 for some reason

Do-over, I forgot Jaguar!

[teal gulch]

moondandy asks: Which 4th/5th Generation Console Would You Most Like To See On MiSTer?

1⃣: 3DO
2⃣: Amiga CD32/CDTV
3⃣: Apple Pippin
4⃣: Atari Jaguar
5⃣: Bandai Playdia
6⃣: Casio Loopy
7⃣: NEC PC-FX
8⃣: Nintendo Virtual Boy
9⃣: Philips CDi

[oblique zephyr]

Note: every counter starts at 1

[verbal basin]

Where’s the Zeebo? 😐

[oblique zephyr]

Way more advanced than 5th gen, that's never happening on DE-10 Nano

Technical specifications
ARM11 / QDSP-5 in Qualcomm MSM7201A SoC running at 528 MHz[53]
ATI Imageon, later renamed to Adreno
1 GB eNAND Flash
128 MB NAND Flash in MCP
160 MB RAM, 128 MB DDR SDRAM in MCP + 32 MB stacked DDR SDRAM in MSM7201A

I did forget the FM Towns Marty though, so appologies there

[south grove]

@oblique zephyr Can we see who voted for 3D0?

[oblique zephyr]

I can, can you not if you hover over the numbers?

[south grove]

Oh I’m on mobile

Right I see

[oblique zephyr]

Have you voted?

[south grove]

Yes, but your list has a bunch of wrong options and the VB.

I mean why would you vote for anything else??!

[rotund carbon]

I see a bunch of wrong options and a PC-FX option

you should restart your mobile client

something's wrong with it

[brisk leaf]

Somehow I think some of the votes for some of the consoles are just out of curiosity, and because MiSTer is the least-inconvenient way to sample such machines... (i.e. I'm sure there's a CDi emulator out there, but it'll be out in the wilderness and anybody who doesn't already know about it, wouldn't feel like hunting for it...)

[real summit]

I used a cd-I back in the day, I have no curiosity for that system at all 😂

[brisk leaf]

Well, somebody voted for it.... 😉

[real summit]

I think people mentally lump it together with 3do sometimes without really comparing the two libraries

[oblique zephyr]

Possibly people who want to try those CDi Zelda games

[woven whale]

Do I really have to explain this again? The 3DO has photoCD technology! PhotoCD technology! Which means that you can pretend to be in blade runner and keep saying "enhance" while zooming in on unsuspecting peoples boobs!

I rest my case...

[teal tinsel]

https://tenor.com/view/ace-attorney-phoenix-wright-objection-capcom-gif-20965907

[oblique zephyr]

Wow, someone voted for Playdia, they must be really into 90s Bandai anime

[rare flicker]

The same person who voted for Playdia voted for every category

[woven whale]

You forgot to put the dvd player core in the poll...

[dim garden]

@brisk leaf

[brisk leaf]

PC-FX also has PhotoCD

[unkempt delta]

CD-i also has PhotoCD

[brisk leaf]

Yeah, it was "the next big thing" for... a very short time

[oblique zephyr]

I assumed these were literally just photos on a CD you could scroll through, but looks like there was more to them than that, some are like visual novels or even games

[brisk leaf]

There was at least one game I know of, that keeps popping up in a list of PC-FX games... but I don't think it's PC-FX specific

[oblique zephyr]

Mega CD, PCE-CD and PSX definitely don't support the format? i.e. the disc console cores we have already

[brisk leaf]

PCE CD does not.

The standard came out too late. Maybe PSX supports it ?

and/or Saturn ?

[oblique zephyr]

Looks like Saturn does if you run some software first then insert the disc

[brisk leaf]

I see somebody says Saturn does, with a VCD card

https://cdrom.ca/games/2023/01/02/photocd.html

[oblique zephyr]

I had a look on ebay to see if there were any cheap so I could just buy one for testing systems with and try one out, but there's none in the UK at all. Also this was the only one that popped up, which isn't in the redump, which makes me think there are probably lots not in it that are like this but are probably all in Japan
https://www.ebay.com/itm/192297285012

[brisk leaf]

In 2023, the CD-i is remembered mainly as a punchline in that generation's gaming console war, but it wasn't a game console first and foremost. Instead, it was a bet on a version of the future where appliances connected to a TV—and not computers or game consoles—were the centre of a multimedia household. It was the Apple TV of its time, with many of the same applications, and Photo CD was its first big bet.

After the CD-i, the majority of the other CD-based game consoles of the following generation would support the format. The NEC PC-FX could play Photo CD discs out of the box, and the 3DO and Saturn were compatible with relatively affordable accessories.

Sounds like the genesis of the point-and-click adventure

[oblique zephyr]

Right, so you need the VCD cards for 3DO and Saturn. Maybe the same with PSX, as it had a video CD model didn't it?

[brisk leaf]

No idea.

[oblique zephyr]

Do you have any of these discs David?

[brisk leaf]

I mentioend earlier there was a "game" for PC-FX called "Gokuraku Arena" which claims to be for PC-FX, but seems to just be a PhotoCD game. I never actually played it and I only have a burned disc (which I don't know if it still works)

Other than that, no.

[oblique zephyr]

Got you

[brisk leaf]

It seems plausible that Dreamcast might support PhotoCD too

[oblique zephyr]

Might be worth ripping that one if it can't be redownloaded

I think a lot of DVD players did later on

[brisk leaf]

If you do a search and can't find it, let me know and I'll search my cabinets for it

http://blog.livedoor.jp/lunchbox360/archives/10246492.html

That should help you

[oblique zephyr]

I started a sheet to try document media support of consoles awhile back, I should try get it finished off
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/19V_0pBUVksclceKFjKDgALJJHTAIEJOrpkHuwMYkpdQ/edit#gid=0

[oblique zephyr]

Thanks! Not in the PC-FX or Photo CD redumps

[brisk leaf]

https://page.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/h204868615

But wait, there's more !

https://page.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/h341899396

Price is pretty steep either way though

[oblique zephyr]

Yahoo auctions blocked in UK, how much these going for?

[brisk leaf]

Buyee.jp doesn't work ?
Anyway, first auction - 3 discs - 25000 yen (current bid; no other bidders)
second auction - 8 discs - 67000 yen (buyout price; no bidding)

[oblique zephyr]

£350 oof!

[brisk leaf]

10 hours left in the first listing; about 5 days in the second

[oblique zephyr]

Ah, here we go
https://buyee.jp/item/yahoo/auction/h341899396

[woven whale]

But did the PC-FX have a mandelbrot visualiser?

[brisk leaf]

It does. Written by enthusi

[woven whale]

Damn.

[brisk leaf]

in assembler !!

[woven whale]

I stand defeated.

However, I still think a 3DO core would be worth it, if for nothing else than the ability to play the best console version of the original pga tour golf. The quietest, most relaxing videogame ever made.

[dim garden]

FPGA Killing Time or GTFO

[oblique zephyr]

3DO definitely way out in the lead
#1055132056096624650 message

I'm really fascinated by these photo CDs now, I didn't realise they were a "thing" and had games in the format.

[south grove]

Can you edit a vote? If so plz change all 3DO votes to Virtual Boy.

[oblique zephyr]

Some people want to change the world, when they just need to look inside and focus on changing themselves.

[brisk leaf]

As long as enough is known about the console, and the capabilities of the target board are high enough, I trust that any/all of those would get ported. But several of them still have too many mysteries, and a couple are probably beyond the capacbilities of the DE10-Nano (but may well be within the limits of the next generation platform)

[oblique zephyr]

Which ones you think may be beyond the DE-10 Nano?

[woven whale]

I begrudgingly have to admit that this is the perfect response to my comment.

[dim garden]

It’s the best retro game nobody ever plays

It’s just Bioshock before Bioshock

[south grove]

the game is appropriately named because it kills my time having wasted it on the game

https://tenor.com/view/dog-gif-23458874

[brisk leaf]

Well, easiest ports of the machines I've heard of so far, would be next-gen Terasic Agilex 5 (whenever that comes out), and Replay2. But you get a big enough, fast enough FPGA, and anything could be the target.

MARS has some technical hurdles because it's a different FPGA, but that FPGA has some advantages too

This year, we'll see a generational change in consumer-grade FPGAs

[oblique zephyr]

Ah, I was meaning which consoles on the list you thought would be potentially not doable on the DE-10 nano

[brisk leaf]

The available data tells everything. If there's no data, you can't say it's not doable, but you can say it's not first in line.

If the data is available, but requires a weird capability that can't be worked around, then it's also not a candidate

[oblique zephyr]

The PC-FX was feeling lonely

Definitely sounds better coming out of the 3DO

CDi looks cleaner though over svideo though

Completely unscientific comparison there

[south grove]

Oh you own all these systems?

[oblique zephyr]

Enough that people cross the road when they see me coming

There is your meme image for if we ever get a 3DO core announced

The ones I own from the poll are:
3DO
PC-FX
Casio Loopy
Bandai Playdia

[dim garden]

gotta get into that Pippin lifestyle

[oblique zephyr]

I almost did a few years ago and drew the line after buying PC-FX, 3DO, Loopy, NG-CD

You got a Pippin?

[dim garden]

Yeah. Not worth it

Dev unit

[visual basin]

Not a console, but I'd love an m68k or ppc Mac emulator for os8.1, pippin is roughly same hardware as well.

Would be cool to have a 3DO and the dev kit for it.

[unkempt delta]

Another one we don't have: http://retro.hansotten.nl/6502-sbc/6530-6532/chessmate/

[brisk leaf]

Nor this one:

https://www.handheldmuseum.com/Mattel/BasketB.htm

[oblique zephyr]

Hmm, does this connect to a monitor and display anything or does it spit out opponent chess moves you are meant to do on a chess board sitting next to you?

[brisk leaf]

From that era, it's digital readout

[oblique zephyr]

Looks like a weekend project for someone into really old PCs, seems all the info needed to build it is in there

[unkempt delta]

I had a hand-me-down of the Mattel Football like that as a kid. Never did really learn how to play it...or real football for that matter.

[brisk leaf]

They had a whole line of those. Very popular in the late 70s

[static drift]

there’s real football? bullshit

[ionic canopy]

Whatever this is is not on mister

[oblique zephyr]

Dendy rides again!

[proven ravine]

Of, for fu--...!

[static drift]

canon cat core when https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canon_Cat

[unkempt delta]

Nice, didn't know of this before.

[oblique zephyr]

This is a computer rather than a console, but yeah, not seen this ever mentioned before. Is there anything special about it? Does it have any games?

Apparently wanted to be a Mac successor/killer. Maybe @meager brook knows about this one

[meager brook]

Wow. That is a new one to me!!

[static drift]

ah true, it is a computer so this might be better for #1047332497492553799. I’ll describe what’s cool about it briefly: it’s a 68k-based system whose whole software stack is written in modifiable forth, and the entire thing is designed to make editing the primary and fastest thing the computer can do. it’s such a weird computer that contemporary sources called it a word processor, but as you saw a lot of modern sources call it a Mac successor (and it’s powerful enough to be one, though I don’t agree that it was necessarily targeting that)

it has absolutely zero games to my knowledge but only 20,000 were made and certain parts of the design industry can’t shut up about it, so I figure it’s interesting from an archival perspective, and it’s not the most complex system on the inside

[rotund carbon]

it's still suitable here since this is a good thread for lesser known systems information

those "leap" keys are funny

[oblique zephyr]

It might be worth starting a thread on this machine on the forum if you are interested in it, there are quite a lot of old PC enthusiasts and Devs over there that aren't on Discord. Probably because they haven't found a way to load Discord on 40 year old computer. 🙂

[static drift]

one day I’m gonna log into discord on my Amiga. a forum thread is a good idea though! I should probably start one for the lisp machine core too — there are many more weirdos who remember lisp machines than the canon cat

[oblique zephyr]

Not sure what a lisp machine is...

[static drift]

oh shit here comes the infodump https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisp_machine

they’re notoriously excellent programming environments, and there is an fpga core for an early lisp machine (an MIT CADR) I’ve been slowly porting

these ones do have games and also the symbolics machines have extremely advanced graphics hardware https://youtu.be/V4HXPJtym2Q?si=s9DDz62CYs_s6tf9 but the MIT machines are usually better targets for archival work cause the remaining old fuckers at symbolics like suing people for emulating their shit

[unkempt delta]

Wow, that is a nice little media time capsule.

[static drift]

it’s even cooler in emulation! lisp machines were usually networked directly to mainframes, so a working setup involves emulating something like a PDP-10 too, but you’ll get access to the final archives of a research lab or company that used Lisp machines. and as soon as it pulls its source code from the network, the lisp machine will make a bunch of editor metadata and code exploration tooling available (plus all the OS customizations that site wrote)

[swift vine]

Hi-Ten Bomberman tetsujin core when

[oblique zephyr]

Had been awhile, so I went and updated the long post I did a few years back on the consoles not on MiSTer and their viability, as we have had a good few that have been released since it was last updated (and a lot of the images were now dead links). I haven't added any new systems, will have a think about that when I have some time to dig into the super obscure ones not on there.
https://misterfpga.org/viewtopic.php?p=53789

For my own amusement more than anything else I'm going to muse over what consoles are left and how viable they are now in 2025.

Skipping over first gen, as that is a whole messy situation of basically pong clones, lets have a look at second gen.

So we haven't got RCA Studio II (and III) yet, which is a shame as it is historically significant and opens the doors to a whole suite of computer cores from the late 80s using the RCA chips. Jason has done a lot of work on this one and thought it was ready to release for testing, but seems it works in simulator and not on MiSTer hardware. He has since moved on to looking at other things (CPC+/GX4000 and Sharp X1). Maybe someone could take a look at it and see if they can figure out what is stopping it from working, as it did seem it was nearly there.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c1/RCA-Studio-II-FL.jpg/220px-RCA-Studio-II-FL.jpg

https://github.com/JasonA-dev/RCAStudioII_Mister

Another one we don't have yet is the West German console, the APF-MP1000. Only 25 games but a Motorola 6800 processor and an MC8647 video display generator, both of which we have already in other cores, so probably a fairly easy system to be wired up. Like many of the consoles of the era you could buy a keyboard, ram cart and tape deck and turn it into a quasi-computer, in this case the "Imagination Machine". How fun is that?

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/83/APF-MP1000-FL.jpg/220px-APF-MP1000-FL.jpg

What a logo

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/b/b6/APF_Imagination_Machine_Logo.png/500px-APF_Imagination_Machine_Logo.png

Looks like Jason has a look at this one too, but not sure he got very far.
https://github.com/JasonA-dev/APF-MP1000_MiSTer

This next one is probably more of a computer than a console, but I included it back when because it has a core on the Analogue NT Mini.
Behold the VideoBrain Family Computer:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/50/VideoBrain_Family_Computer_-_Front_View.jpg/120px-VideoBrain_Family_Computer_-_Front_View.jpg

Interestingly this one uses the same CPU as the Fairchild Channel F, although I don't know how easy it would be for someone to repurpose the CPU from @still cargo 's Channel F core. It would be nice to see this on MiSTer one day, if only to bring parity with Analogue, but old obscure computers-cum-consoles are always nice to get.

Some more info on this one here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VideoBrain_Family_Computer

Next up with have the Epoch Cassette Vision, which was actually Japan's biggest selling console before the Famicom came along.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/db/Epoch-Cassette-Vision-Console.jpg/220px-Epoch-Cassette-Vision-Console.jpg

Despite being a primitive system, this one only had its library finally dumped and software emulated fairly recently.

This blockers were it using a uses a NEC uPD77xx CPU that wasn't in anything else, and a hardware situation where there wasn't actually much hardware in the console its self but each cart had CPU, and I think RAM, on it as well as the rom. I know Pierco had a crack at this one some years back, but this was before the system was better documented and emulated in Mame, so maybe there is enough info out there now to make this more doable as a core.

Another Japanese machine from this era we don't have, that was also not dumped until recently (thanks @hearty timber at Gaming Alexandria) and emulalted was the Gakken Compact Vision TV Boy. And just look at this thing.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/31/Compact_Vision_TV_Boy%2C_Gakken_01.png/560px-Compact_Vision_TV_Boy%2C_Gakken_01.png

This is another funny one like the Cassette Vision that had the CPU and ram on the carts themselves. Under the hood though this thing has CPU (cartridge): Motorola MC6801 CPU and
Motorola MC6847 for graphics, both of which are in Pierco's Alice MC-10 core. So maybe now this one is documented, and we have all the chips, it would be an "easy" one for someone to try wire up.

Moving on to third gen...
The Philips Videopac+ G7400
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3d/Philips_Videopac_G7400.jpg/220px-Philips_Videopac_G7400.jpg

So the G7400 was the 1983 follow up to the G7000 (AKA the Magnavox Odyssey² in the USA). Basically it is a slightly beefed up Odyssey2 with nicer graphics, that is backwards compatible. It would be really nice to see the Odyssey2 core get some love and be upgraded to a full G7400, hopefully someone gives that core some interest in the future.

I'll skip over any Laserdisc systems like the RDI Halcyon, if only because LD preservation and emualtion for games is something that just isn't there yet.

Here is another obscure one, the LJN Video Art
https://static.telepedia.net/newqualitipediawiki/thumb/1/15/Videoart.jpg/300px-Videoart.jpg

This one sported only 9 "games", including some Disney, Marvel and Looney Tunes. Basically it was a colouring in machine to use on your TV, so you could colour in characters. Not the most exciting system, but it has now been dumped (thanks again to Gaming Alexandria) and emulated in Mame.

Under the hood this one has a couple of Thomson-made chips, that I think are in the MO5 computer core. EF6805 Motorola 6800-based microcontroller Graphics, Thomson EF9367P VDP

Next up, there is the Action Max
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/0e/Action-Max-Set-FL.jpg/300px-Action-Max-Set-FL.jpg

This machine was used in tandem with a VCR and you played short films and shot at the targets on the screen, and the machine would give you your score at the end. Maybe if we get an mpeg1 player on MiSTer it could be used as a basis for an Action Max core, but only time will tell.

One I am surprised we don't have yet is the VTech Socrates
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4d/VTech-Socrates-Set-FL.jpg/220px-VTech-Socrates-Set-FL.jpg

-mainly because it seems very similar to a lot of 8-bit PC cores we have

With a Z80a CPU powering it, the library was small with only 9 games, all edutainment. This may be an "easy" one for someone with 8bit PC core experience to wire up if they were so inclined.

So let's have a couple of dodgy Asian handhelds we don't have yet.

The Hartung Game Master

https://img.itch.zone/aW1nLzE5NDU4NzcucG5n/original/n30Mkm.png

If you are familiar with the Watara Supervision, Mega Duck, Gamate (and if you are reading this then I know you are) you know what you are getting, a cheeky Gameboy knockoff.

This one came out in 1990 and had 19 games for it.

Another handheld we don't have is the older Epoch Game Pocket Computer

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/25/Epoch-Game-Pocket-Computer-FL.jpg/220px-Epoch-Game-Pocket-Computer-FL.jpg

Epoch released this in 1984, and it only saw 5 games released, so even in the world of Asian handhelds this one didn't do well

So the technical blocker for this getting a core for both the Epoch Game Pocket Computer, and the The Hartung Game Master, was it used an NEC uPD78c06 CPU, that we didn't have a core for.

However, @heady thistle 's excellent Super Cassette Vision core includes one of these, which makes these two systems low hanging fruit for someone with experience in (dodgy Asian) handhelds to bang out if they are so inclined

Edging into the fourth generation now

First we have the Amstrad GX4000
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/af/Amstrad-GX4000-Console-Set.jpg/220px-Amstrad-GX4000-Console-Set.jpg

People of a certain age in the UK will remember these as a staple at car boot sales for a long time. Amstrad's failed attempt to Sega and Nintendo in the UK.

It is actually a cool little system, that had about 30 games for it. It is essentially a consolised Amastrad CPC+ (a computer that seems like an omission on MiSTer at this point.)

The good news in Jason is actively looking at a core for this one and CPC+, so hopefully he sticks at it and gets it over the line.

So next I'll cover two at once the Commodore CDTV and Amiga CD32
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2a/CDTV.jpg/220px-CDTV.jpg
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/cf/Amiga-CD32-wController-L.jpg/250px-Amiga-CD32-wController-L.jpg
So these are the consolised Amiga 500 and Amiga 1200 respectively.

Most of the libraries are playable as Amiga games on the Minimig core, if you know your way around an Amiga, and there is a round about way to load CD32 discs on the Minimig core. The main benefit of getting cores for these two (note: CD32 is CDTV backwards compatible) is it would be a nice experience for console gamers to explore these libraries, and (hopefully) in an accurate way.

The way the Minimig core was build, it isn't possible to natively supporting these systems in the core, so it would require a separate core to be build for these two. On the plus side a lot could be lifted from the Minimig core. Maybe down the line a dev who has bested CD based cores will have a crack at this one, it is certainly doable.

Another early CD based system we don't have is the Tandy Video Information System AKA Tandy VIS

https://i.pinimg.com/474x/10/49/d1/1049d10dd03beda83fc501508034ff1c--consoles-video-games.jpg

This was basically an attempt to take on CDi and CDTV in the great multimedia CD rom wars of the early 90s. There were no winners in that war. Only losers. The Tandy VIS was the biggest loser.
I made a channel on this the other day for anyone who is interested in digging into this one more: https://discord.com/channels/647909397477195803/1408461688067330109

So I had written this one off as something that we had no chance of ever seeing, as inside this is quite a powerhouse for the time. It's basically a 286/386 with a OPL3 and a CD rom drive. It's no joke. Funny thing is we now have all these parts in other cores, so there is a real chances someone will try wire this thing together and make a core for it. Exciting times for fans of early 90s CD roms and edutainment.

Circling back, lets look at another dodgy Asian handheld
GameKing

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c0/Gameking_I.jpg/700px-Gameking_I.jpg

This cheeky little thing came out in 2003 and tried to pass its self off as some sort of GBA alternative, however it was more NES, GB and 2600 clones.

It did have around 50 games though, so more than most of these handhelds

The technical blocker for getting this one was around the CPU, that is a 65C02 that we didn't seem to have a core for. However we do have many cores with variants of the chip, like the 65SC02 which is apparently "a variant of the WDC 65C02 without bit instructions." This is in Lynx, Watara Supervision and various other computers and systems have other variants. The actual 65C02 does seem to have been used here though:
TurboMaster accelerator cartridge for the Commodore 64 home computer (65C02 @ 4.09 MHz)
Tube-connected second processor for the Acorn BBC Micro home computer (65C02 @ 3 MHz)

I am not a developer (clearly) but maybe someone who can build CPUs could repurpose one of the existing similar CPUs to be a bespoke 65C02, which seems like it could be useful for other things. It is quite an interesting chip with versions used in a lot of things.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WDC_65C02

[woven whale]

Awesome posts moondandy!

Just awesome

I love finding out about these machines

[oblique zephyr]

We are getting deep into fifth gen territory now, and the systems are much more complex. It is worth keeping in mind that we only have two developers who have successfully taken on big fifth generation systems, Robert and srg320, and these cores (PSX, N64, Saturn) each took over a year of full time development. That isn't to say other people won't appear, or level up to be able to do these massively complex systems, but keep expectations in check.

Lets start with the FM Towns Marty
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/14/FM-Towns-Marty-Console-Set.jpg/220px-FM-Towns-Marty-Console-Set.jpg

Very rare outside of Japan was Fujitso’s consolised version of its FM Towns computer system, the FM Towns Marty. Released in 1993 it boasts nearly 600 games, although the system is very Japan centric and many games not English friendly, there are a lot of gems on there.

Of the systems that the average gamer doesn't know, this is probably the best out there.

Sadly though it is a 90s Japanese PC in there, and those are no joke. To the point of really not being doable unless you are a Japanese super dev.

There is a Japanese dev Puu who has been working on an FM Towns PC core, but the reality is it is highly unlikely this will ever lead to an easy to use FM Towns Core that works similarly to how we enjoy CD based consoles like PSX, Saturn, PCE CD etc. Never say never but I just don't have high hopes of us ever getting a core for this one.

Bandai Playdia
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b6/Bandai-Playdia-Set-R.jpg/220px-Bandai-Playdia-Set-R.jpg

This CD system released in 1994, aimed at younger kids in Japan and was very FMV heavy. There were 38 discs released, many Bandai anime focussed (Dragonball, Gundam, Sailor Moon etc,) and edutainment titles.

In a large part due to the weak library, the Playdia is one of the few consoles that is still not emulated.

Hardware wise it actually seems very simple under the hood, a Toshiba TMP87C800F which seems to be Z80 based, and an NEC 78k, which is a basic 80s microcontroller... except for one beast of a chip that handles the video, the mysterious Asahi Kasei AK8000

You know things aren't great when Furrtek refers to a chip as "extremely complex"

https://x.com/furrtek/status/1789990207179112492

Furrtek (@furrtek)

#Bandai #Playdia main chip: Asahi Kasei AK8000 donated by https://t.co/Z8dyj2Zq1E
A Hitachi HG51 standard cell custom with several RAM blocks.
Extremely complex, but maybe not MPEG1-decoding complex ? The mystery remains.
https://t.co/UeANTyRYni

X · May 13, 2024, 12:04 PM

So in order for this to be emulated, someone would need to crack this thing. It would take a serious dev to do that.

I am keeping an eye out to see if a software emulation ever appears (Mame devs must be running out of systems to do at this point...), as maybe that will open the door to this being more doable. Or some super dev that just really likes Dragonball.

Lets do a couple of cartridge based next

Super A'can
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2c/Super-ACan-Console-set-h.jpg/220px-Super-ACan-Console-set-h.jpg

A Taiwanese system from 1995 that is impossibly hard to find and ridiculously expensive if you do find one. It is sort of a bastard child between the SNES and Mega Drive, but only got 12 (not very good) games. It has been said in the past that to make a core for this would require as much effort as making the SNES core.

So on the plus side, this one should have probably appeared a bit earlier in this list, as A'Can is very much doable, we have many comparable and more complicated systems on MiSTer already. However, it is not well documented, the hardware is basically unobtainium, and the library isn't much to write home about.

That being said Furrtek (who did initially do the Neo Geo core) did get the chips, decapped them, and was documenting them which would have opened the door to someone taking that work and building a core. Sadly he doesn't seem to have worked on these for well over a year, so I don't know what is happening there.

It is now supported by Mame, so there is a reference there.

Hopefully we do see this one on MiSTer one day, it's definitely doable and chances are if you are reading this you will never see one of these in the wild, let alone ever play one.

Casio Loopy

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/42/Casio-Loopy-Console-Set.jpg/300px-Casio-Loopy-Console-Set.jpg

This is the console people like to meme on as being nothing more than a sticker printing machine for Japanese school girls, and well, yeah... but there is a bit more to the system than that

It got ten games, all were targetted at younger girls, but more recently it has been reappraised and for what it was, it has charm to it.

This is another system that until very recently was not well documented, but in the last year or so a flurry of activity led to all the carts being dumped, a flash card being created, it being emulated and even a fan translation and homebrew

[brisk leaf]

I'm going to say something that needs to be said: Finding a system and identifying main chips is a nice start, but most of the work is in identifying how the internals work together, and especially any custom chips. Even a well-documented machine is a lot of effort, but most of the systems you are listing here have very little to no usable documentation, and are effectively impossible to put on MiSTer until such functionality is more clearly understood.

Even a machine like PC-FX, which has an open-source emulator for it, would not be possible to recreate on MiSTer without a certain level of additional breakdown and testing and documentation. Sure, Mednafen "mostly works" for published games, but the expectations around MiSTer are much tighter.

[oblique zephyr]

Great point, especially as the complexity increases exponentially as we go through the years of consoles

[heady thistle]

Are PC-FXs hard to acquire?

[oblique zephyr]

Easy to get boxed from Japan pretty cheap, I paid £150 for mine a few years back

[heady thistle]

Could be a fun follow-up to my SCV reverse-engineering.

[oblique zephyr]

Around the same time I also got boxed Bandai Playdia and Casio Loopy for about £100 boxed with postage as well - so these three of the that era Japanese systems are still (last I checked) reasonably priced to get boxed

Sounds like you and David should have a nice long chat 🙂

[brisk leaf]

The more the merrier ! I have a whole organization set up for that:
https://github.com/pcfx-devel
There are some technical documents (in Japanese), and I have built a devcart and we have a gcc version to make/run tests

[oblique zephyr]

We have a thread here on PC-FX might be of interest
https://discord.com/channels/647909397477195803/1091037349649068082
Although it is mostly a DM chat between myself and David

I never even got to do my write up on PC-FX here as well, that was coming after Loopy, so David has been saved reading that (for now) 🙂

[heady thistle]

Cool! Got some reading material now, for when I’m waiting for the SCV core to compile.

[oblique zephyr]

Skimming through the list of things I posted, I think the only things on there for anyone hunting for old hardware that is not insanely priced and/or near impossible to get are Epoch Cassette Vision (loads of those cheap on Japanese auction sites), and probably still Action Max and G7400 depending on where you are located. Amstrad GX4000 used to be easy to get in the UK cheap but those are getting pricey these days.

[soft ocean]

do you happen to have a picture of this thing's motherboard?

i've poked with it on MAME sometime ago but the I/O port where the video chip's pins go isn't 100% documented yet

a board picture should reveal where the pins go from the sound chip's I/O pins

[oblique zephyr]

We have a core for that one

https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/Super_Vision_8000_MiSTer

@hoary grove may be able to help, he made this one

[soft ocean]

ahh awesome!

well, i'm not familiar with HDL so i'm not sure where to locate where the pins are in here

[oblique zephyr]

Are you trying to fix Mame?

[soft ocean]

just curious if it's missing something, i don't understand enough C++ to fix it

from what the source comments say it seems that it's behaviour observed from the game ROM's

[soft ocean]

also the interrupts, they seem to be backwards? i can't tell if this is intended or an inaccuracy

[oblique zephyr]

I'm afraid I don't think I can help at all, this is all above my head

[soft ocean]

thank you either way! i'll see if Flandango answers in a while

[oblique zephyr]

He is only here periodically but hopefully he will see and this and be able to help

[soft ocean]

ahh i see

[hoary grove]

Unfortunately I don't have any pictures or schematics of the Super Vision 8000....
As for the Sound Chip's IO pins (from what I have gathered)...only Port A's output is used and they control the Video processor.
Port B's output is not used. Port A and B inputs are pulled and kept high.
The int/ext pin on the video processor, doesn't seem to have been connected or used.

If you know of any software/rom/homebrew that utilizes a particular graphics mode that doesn't work, maybe, as timer permits, I can try to debug it and see what it's trying to do (via sound processor) and from there I can see if it's something not being handled/connected correctly.

[soft ocean]

ohhh i see

do you have the SV8000? i kind of imagined EXT not being used but curious if the other 2 remaining pins could be somewhere in Port A or just tied to ground/+5

specially the A/G pin because i only know of the MP1000 which uses the semigraphics mode

[visual basin]

Apple pippin, m68k 68040 macs

[unkempt delta]

Here is one I hadn't heard of that (from a non-developer view) looks relatively easy to port. Has 26 known games. All info and schematics look to be available: https://hackaday.com/2025/10/29/recreating-a-homebrew-game-system-from-1987/

@oblique zephyr ^

[heady thistle]

Why is it standing on top of its own bare fab?

[oblique zephyr]

I have never heard about this before, I am guessing we have all the parts and it is well documented?

[unkempt delta]

At first glance it seems very well documented complete with schemematics and BOM as it's meant to be a DIY project. Could be a fun addition if someone takes it on.

[teal tinsel]

Surely people didn't buy that fire hazard?

[haughty sun]

Here’s an oddball homebrew console which could probably be simulated pretty well on MiSTer. It’s called the Game Tank:

https://gametank.zone

Apparently, it shares some hardware similarities with the Atari Lynx. It’s low resolution at 128x128, featuring a W65C02S CPU running at 3.5MHz but with a pretty capable blitter and 512K of graphics RAM.

[oblique zephyr]

Yeah, has come up a few times before. The guy who made it even popped up here a few years back and was very open to the system getting a MiSTer core and would help how he could. Just needs a developer who wants to take it on, I think we have all the parts in other cores.

[rotund carbon]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BSS_01

@oblique zephyr

[foggy geyser]

I would love a CD32 / CDTV real core and a GX4000 core too would be nice!

[haughty sun]

All the games of this system should be playable in the existing AY-3-8500 core (excluding the shooting games, which are not currently enabled on the core). It used the same chip for gameplay.

[oblique zephyr]

Might be worth tracking down the ROMs and seeing if they do indeed work

Maybe gun support could be added

[haughty sun]

That’s actually an interesting aspect of the AY-3-8500 - it doesn’t use ROMs, and the entire structures of the games implemented using that hardware were built using embedded TTL logic on the chip. (It’s similar in that way to the reimplementations of games like Computer Space, Pong, Space Race, and Breakout on the MiSTer.)

That logic has been deconstructed and reimplemented on the MiSTer, so if you load up the core right now, the game that starts up should essentially be a full reimplementation of what you could play on BSS 01, along with a number of other PONG consoles which utilized the same chipset.

I also believe that most of the actual chip logic behind the gun games is implemented in the core; they’re just disabled from appearing as menu options because no one has reimplemented the hardware of the gun (a simple light sensor, with detecting light being a hit and not detecting light being a miss) in a way that makes it playable using the MiSTer’s controller interface.

Granted, the gun game itself is very simple - all they are are square targets which either pop up as a stationary block on the screen or bounce around it, depending on the mode. Without a light gun, it would basically boil down to “click on the box with a crosshair”, so I don’t know if there’s a fun factor there.

[haughty sun]

(Re-reading the article, the gun games were only really possible to access on this hardware by hacking that functionality in, as no light gun or selector buttons were available for the BSS 01. So, in terms of everything actually playable on the base console, it would likely be identical to the core in the Monochrome color palette.)

[haughty sun]

I was just thinking - has anyone ever made MIDI synthesizer cores for any of the various console/computer sound chips implemented on the MiSTer?

[oblique zephyr]

There are a couple in Main, I think for the Megadrive and Gameboy?

[rocky crag]

i wish i knew how to use them properly

[haughty sun]

Huh - interesting, I think that’s the first time I’ve seen those.

Both seemed to be having some issues detecting my Reface DX keyboard, in some testing - despite setting the UART to MIDI over USB, it wouldn’t control the active synth, and when I unplugged it, it froze the whole MiSTer UI.

[haughty sun]

It’s a bit odd, considering I had this keyboard running with Miracle Piano on the earlier Genesis core, and have had other MIDI components running on MiSTer before.

[oblique zephyr]

It is possible nobody ever checked, the cores are pretty niche and probably not a lot of eyes on them. I forget who made these but they are on here and @rotund carbon knows him and helped on the cores.

[rotund carbon]

Yeah ModalModule made them. We used to be next door neighbors :p

I haven't tried unplugging a USB midi controller when in one of those cores.

There is documentation on how to set them up in the readme for the core repos

You can also use a PC to send midi to it over the network

https://youtu.be/1LbvnLnmczY?si=gtMWnYe_Rs-75kyI

I think you will want to make sure the midi controller is on ch 0 or 1, plug it in, maybe reboot the MiSTer with it plugged in to troubleshoot.

I know I one time had to do that.

[haughty sun]

Ah, yep - this fixed it. For some reason, my keyboard assigned itself to a weird MIDI channel on startup - thanks!

[unkempt delta]

New 3DO cores is nice and all, but when are we gonna get some Pocket Computer power up in here: https://x.com/yo6987/status/2035637964693447038

Yoshimine Horiuchi (@yo6987)

実機でRay-force動かしてみました。
すごいゲームですね。

▶ Play video

X · Mar 22, 2026, 8:41 AM

[brisk leaf]

Hey, I just found some "programs" I wrote in 1978 for the Commodore PR100 programmable calculator in case you make a core for that...

[oblique zephyr]

Oh wow, what format are those in? How did you save them back in 1978?

[steel pulsar]

casette tape maybe?

[brisk leaf]

Hahahahah. Handwritten on paper. It was a series of keystrokes

PR100 had no program storage AFAIK

just an execution buffer while it was on

[steel pulsar]

oh wow, looking up images of the PR100, i wasn't aware of how primitive this was lol. pretty neat

[oblique zephyr]

What is under the hood in that one? Is it supported in Mame?

[brisk leaf]

I doubt it

No idea what's inside; that was the age of blob chips

Meanwhile, I've been cleaning up the basement at my parents' house, and found one of these:

https://www.handheldmuseum.com/Mattel/Battlestar.htm