PCEngineFans.com - The PC Engine and TurboGrafx-16 Community Forum
Tech and Homebrew => Turbo/PCE Game/Tool Development => Topic started by: nodtveidt on January 25, 2008, 06:03:28 PM
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This is something tomatheous and I (and a few others as well) had talked about on IRC awhile back, but never really did anything with. So, I'll outline some of the ideas that we came up with as well as some of my own that I considered afterwards.
THE PLAN:
A new system card, revision 4.0. Designed to play all existing PC Engine/TurboGrafx CDROM software as well as new software built specifically for the new card.
WHAT IT WOULD HAVE:
Switchable rev 1.0, rev 3.0, and Games Express BIOS code + normal RAM
Full ACD support
New 4.0 BIOS, supporting the modern CDROM standard
Onboard 4-channel Vorbis decoder with 8MB buffer and mixer (would all but replace the built-in ADPCM circuit)
tomatheous also suggested an onboard coprocessor, possibly an NEC V810, but this would probably be very difficult to do
Like the original cards, two versions would be available; one for the normal hardware and one for the Duo.
Most of the card would likely be handled with an Actel flash-based FPGA chip.
Any suggestions, comments, criticisms, cash offers for development, etc. are welcome.
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Since my programming skill level is undoubtedly inadequate to help the project in any significant capacity, I'd be willing to offer to help back the project financially. Although I guess I'd probably need some kind of assurance that some fruit would come of the labor so I'd know I wasn't just blindly dumping money into a black hole.
All that said, it'd be really cool to see some kind of 32-bit CPU on the card that new 4.0 games could utilize.
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I think that its a great idea! I would definitely buy them from you!
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This is a very kool project. One suggestion, though: instead of a Vorbis decoder, use WMA. ;0
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This is a very kool project. One suggestion, though: instead of a Vorbis decoder, use WMA. ;0
Better yet, Real Media!
Anyway, do you really need to make one for the Duo and one for non-Duos? Unless I'm missing something the original reasons for there being "Pro" and "Duo" versions of the original AC (the cost of memory, mainly) have long past, and making two versions of a card now would just increase the price. Am I missing something?
Since an Arcade Card Pro will work in any PCE, it seems like you'd just want to make a card like that.
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tomatheous would know better than I would about the possibility of a single design.
I hope esteban was kidding about WMA. :P It's a proprietary format and Microsoft would throw a shit fit.
nat: I'll probably support the project financially (it's what I do, hehe) so no problem, but if anyone else wants to contribute, it'd be best to wait until there's at least a solid plan, perhaps a prototype or two.
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Sure, sounds great. You've got my word if you reach that phase I will be more than happy to contribute.
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As long as I get one of the prototypes after you're done with it. :D
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Youve got my word if it does not take more then 2 years to do,Ill buy one,esp if you trow in free signed copies of Neutopia 3 :)
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wow, i would buy one! 8)
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I'm going to add in here that the best system card you can make is one that is fundamentally simple and doesn't add too much extra functionality (at the risk of over-reaching).
That said, it'd be nice to have some expanded battery backup (save) capabilities. Though I suspect it to be near-impossible, save-state capabilities would rock, too.
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Save state probably isn't possible, but I don't know for sure. Battery backup was something that crossed my mind (built-in Tennokoe bank, perhaps). Adding too many capabilities wouldn't be a good thing; the original reason for doing a new system card was to standardize CDROM access so new discs would be much easier to produce.
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This all sounds great:
Switchable rev 1.0, rev 3.0, and Games Express BIOS code + normal RAM
Full ACD support
New 4.0 BIOS, supporting the modern CDROM standard
Onboard 4-channel Vorbis decoder with 8MB buffer and mixer (would all but replace the built-in ADPCM circuit)
Built in Tennokoe Bank
Can you elaborate more on what an onboard coprocessor, possibly an NEC V810 would allow homebrew programmers to do? Also, like someone else said, couldn't you just make 1 version of this card for all PC-E systems, Duo and non duo? Or would it actually save you money to make separate versions?
Is there any way to make a device that takes an internal screenshot and saves it to battery memory on this card or something? Then you could save your best 10 scores or whatever on it and show them off/view them again?
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An onboard coprocessor would give the system a major processing boost, as a lot of tasks could simply be offloaded to the coprocessor, similar to how it's done on the Sega CD. As for a screenshot function...I don't know about that one, the hucard port would have to have video in pins, and I don't think it does...
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An onboard coprocessor would give the system a major processing boost, as a lot of tasks could simply be offloaded to the coprocessor, similar to how it's done on the Sega CD. As for a screenshot function...I don't know about that one, the hucard port would have to have video in pins, and I don't think it does...
I was thinking of a video ram dump to the card, even if it might be a little cluttered. Maybe that cannot be done though, I have no idea.
Could a coprocessor be somthing like a mpeg4 video decoder? This would allow mp4 video to be used in new PC-E games since mp4 can be low bitrate and high quality, it sounds like the perfect format for a single speed cd-rom.
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A VRAM dump to the card *might* be able to be done (sequential buffering to main RAM -> upload to memory bank on card...I think it could be done), but it really wouldn't help much since this is a planar tile + sprite system, not a linear pixel system.
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You should add an FPGA that simualtes a SNES. :P
In all seriousness, this is freaking awesome.
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This all sounds great:
Switchable rev 1.0, rev 3.0, and Games Express BIOS code + normal RAM
Full ACD support
New 4.0 BIOS, supporting the modern CDROM standard
Onboard 4-channel Vorbis decoder with 8MB buffer and mixer (would all but replace the built-in ADPCM circuit)
Built in Tennokoe Bank
Can you elaborate more on what an onboard coprocessor, possibly an NEC V810 would allow homebrew programmers to do? Also, like someone else said, couldn't you just make 1 version of this card for all PC-E systems, Duo and non duo? Or would it actually save you money to make separate versions?
Is there any way to make a device that takes an internal screenshot and saves it to battery memory on this card or something? Then you could save your best 10 scores or whatever on it and show them off/view them again?
Sounds like a fun project, but there is always a danger of creating a system within a system that does not really represent the magic and the spirit of the PC-Engine.
For Homebrew projects, ISO 9660 support would be nice to allow for much easier mastering of the CDs. Extra built in memory banks also seem feasible.
Adding coprocessors and codecs may get complicated. There's relatively little space to work on using a HuCard form factor, so it may be hard to hack together with a soldering iron and off the shelf components. Plus, someone would need to synchronize this with the native hardware. The easiest thing to do would be a video codec whose output would be overlayed over the native output (but I'm not even sure if the hucard has all the pins necessary for this.
Other features like screenshots and save states are theoretically possible, but are much easier to implement on an emulator.
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I guess for those developing and for those of us reading, we must recognize where desires and practical reality split.
I would be most supportive of a simpler design that keeps costs down. More memory is great and support for more standard CD formats (like ISO 9660) might also be very welcome. I would be very concerned about including additional CPUs, DSPs, etc... as that could raise the cost dramatically. What, essentially, is the best compromise between simplicity, features, and cost?
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Is it going to be a region free hucard? I'd love to play my acd games without using a kisado for the system card.
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I'm sure it would be dual region, maybe even auto switching. That sort of thing is peanuts compared to the borderline impossible stuff other people are talking about (ie: MP4 decoding).
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The idea for an onboard sound processor wasn't mine originally (someone wanted to do mp3, but that's not a good idea), but that could easily be removed, as it's mainly a "perk feature". Again though, the main idea for this was mainly to develop a new card that brought in the standard CDROM format so new software would be easier to produce (this might also lead to re-pressing of older games). Making it ACD-able is also important, since it's an existing technology and would greatly help any new game development efforts. I certainly don't want to add a whole mess of features, as it's really outside the scope of the project. As far as region-free goes...don't know about that, tomatheous would know more. But really, a lot of people are having region mods done lately it seems, so I don't see that as an immediate issue. We'll see what happens in the next couple of months.
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The Old Rover: Forget all the extra features everybody wants and just make the basic universal System Card thing. Some people might bitch and moan about X feature might not be included, but it would be better to have a solid new System Card than some mediocre jack-of-all-trades "console enhancer".
Seriously, with all the features you guys want to add, why not just call his card the Aladdin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aladdin_Deck_Enhancer) Turbo Edtion.
(http://www.atarihq.com/tsr/odd/aladdin/aladdinb.html)
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the aladdin was awesome. Wish I had one.
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Yeah Kitsu, I tend to agree with that train of thought. Making a universal card is pretty much my own personal goal for this project; a card that will play all PCE/TG16 software regardless of format, including that one title (Altered Beast CD, was it?) that only plays on the system 1.0 card.
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If you do consider some sort of save file storage, I think that it would be worthwhile to do if it could copy and manage single save files. Otherwise, a Tennokoe Bank style bank swapping feature isn't a worthwhile complication.
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I like the title of this thread. :D
...best topic evar...
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Hey TOR, while I think the sound processor is pointless, it does bring up a fascinating question:
Was the OGG format chosen simply because the Turbo cannot do floating-point maths, or were there other reasons?
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I chose a Vorbis player because it's patent-free and has better compression and quality than MP3.
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Thank you, Old Rover, Thank you! My day started out great, recently took a slight turn for the worst, and now, reading this topic has made it better than ever! I would definitely support this in any way I can! (Which at the moment limits me to moral support but hey, you never know!)
One possible feature instantly comes to mind: No Turbo/PCE games up to this point have ever been more than one disk. I was wondering if there was any way to implement this as is. If not, this would be a great feature for your new system card!
*Returns to bouncing off the walls in excitement!* :dance:
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The biggest question on my mind is: Will you be able to get a really good artist to do the label for this card? I'd love to see one of those lables which is plastic and you turn the card back and forth to see it animate :twisted:
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that would be bad ass. It could be a hologram like my pokemon cards :)
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One possible feature instantly comes to mind: No Turbo/PCE games up to this point have ever been more than one disk. I was wondering if there was any way to implement this as is. If not, this would be a great feature for your new system card!
No game has ever been more than one disc because no game has ever required more than one disc. Multi-disc games are very possible; in fact, I've already done some experimenting with disc swapping techniques as proof-of-concept. It's just that there's never been a need, and I would imagine that back-in-the-day, since discs were expensive enough to produce, there was likewise no desire to make a game that required multiple discs. Times have changed...
Missa: We'd probably be able to convince Black Tiger to do the artwork for it, hehe. :D His artwork is fabulous, and I'm sure he'd enjoy the opportunity.
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Does the HuCard slot even have a "sound in" pin? From what malducci (I think) was saying, you can really only add RAM via the card slot. It can't be used to upgrade the video or audio in any way.
Would this be made to work with Jap or US machines?
Also I am considering moving this thread to the development forum unless I hear any convincing arguments against (and they had better come soon).
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Also I am considering moving this thread to the development forum unless I hear any convincing arguments against (and they had better come soon).
Someone already moved it! Is that a good argument?
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I'm moving it back to the old forum and then back here just so I can say I moved it!
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Does the HuCard slot even have a "sound in" pin? From what malducci (I think) was saying, you can really only add RAM via the card slot. It can't be used to upgrade the video or audio in any way.
The hucard slot has an "audio in" line, but it's monaural and I'm not exactly sure where it enters the system (mixed in with the ADPCM circuit maybe?). It lacks any kind of video lines though.
Would this be made to work with Jap or US machines?
It could probably be made to work with both.
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I like the title of this thread. :D
...best topic evar...
Agreed!
I support this idea and think it's really neat. However as BigT said, I hope this doesn't take away from the spirit of the Turbo/PCE.
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Thank you, Old Rover, Thank you! My day started out great, recently took a slight turn for the worst, and now, reading this topic has made it better than ever! I would definitely support this in any way I can! (Which at the moment limits me to moral support but hey, you never know!)
One possible feature instantly comes to mind: No Turbo/PCE games up to this point have ever been more than one disk. I was wondering if there was any way to implement this as is. If not, this would be a great feature for your new system card!
*Returns to bouncing off the walls in excitement!* :dance:
Nod/Rover probably forgot, but, we do have a game that Lord Cack & I have come up with, that will probably require more then 1 disc. But, this game is pretty far away from completion, seeing as how we haven't even released Mysterious Song yet, & we're seeing how long these projects can take.
The main thing I would like to see, is more ram or whatever to load stuff in a level, so levels can be longer, feature more paralax, more enemies(rather then just 1 or 2, with some color swap's)etc. Basically, you have a Hucard, which can load anything, anytime, but the Super CD, can only load 2mb's, & then to load anything beyond that requires more disc access. The Arcade card doesn't rememdy this, I forget how it works, people keep explaining it to me, & it never sinks in. The Sega CD, IIRC has 6mb's to tool around with. I would just love 6, 8, etc. mb's to for us to play with, to do more in a level or whatever. Get my drift?
All these other things sound great as well though. But, more then the standard 2mb's is the main thing I want. I want to eliminate that limit. :D
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The biggest question on my mind is: Will you be able to get a really good artist to do the label for this card? I'd love to see one of those lables which is plastic and you turn the card back and forth to see it animate :twisted:
that would be bad ass. It could be a hologram like my pokemon cards :)
Thirding the lenticular label art.
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I don't get why, if you guys want to do something like this, don't you just program for a more powerful system that already HAS these features? It seems completely preposterous that not only are you going to design and manufacture a System Card 4.0, but also manage to sell more than the 4 or 5 to people on this board. Especially when you consider that import adapters for the Turbo sell for so much money, yet no one has designed (or hell just ripped off existing designs) and manufactured a new batch in like 15 years, so the logical conclusion is that it just isn't possible or cost effective to manufacture something that will fit in the hucard slot anymore.
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Especially when you consider that import adapters for the Turbo sell for so much money, yet no one has designed (or hell just ripped off existing designs) and manufactured a new batch in like 15 years, so the logical conclusion is that it just isn't possible or cost effective to manufacture something that will fit in the hucard slot anymore.
I'm willing to pay a good deal of money for one as long as it has features like built in bank, the fact it has the arcade hardware as well adds a good amount of value. If it opens up cheaper or more available homebrew I am all for it. I figure a lot of junk hucards could be collected. The pin part and the main body of the card could be re-used and a new PCB would be attached to the pins. It might need a bubble back part of the card, but that could be manufactured or an existing part could be purchased that could be easly modified to fit.
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I don't get why, if you guys want to do something like this, don't you just program for a more powerful system that already HAS these features? It seems completely preposterous that not only are you going to design and manufacture a System Card 4.0, but also manage to sell more than the 4 or 5 to people on this board. Especially when you consider that import adapters for the Turbo sell for so much money, yet no one has designed (or hell just ripped off existing designs) and manufactured a new batch in like 15 years, so the logical conclusion is that it just isn't possible or cost effective to manufacture something that will fit in the hucard slot anymore.
I will buy one, and I don't even have a Turbo.
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I was thinking, maybe, if this gets made, it should be included with whatever particular game is the first to utilize it. However, even that, I don't know if that would work. But, it would force people to buy one particular game(Neutopia 3) to play other future games... Just an idea.
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I was thinking, maybe, if this gets made, it should be included with whatever particular game is the first to utilize it. However, even that, I don't know if that would work. But, it would force people to buy one particular game(Neutopia 3) to play other future games... Just an idea.
Maybe it could come with a unique digital coupon code to get a discount on a future homebrew game which supports it.
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Oh - you made a thread for this :D
I think the most important thing of all, is supporting absolute address booting of the first sector instead of the PCE's index 01 method. Seems the stupid pressing houses can't figure out how to set index 01 to the correct sector :roll: This would allow you to boot from an ISO9660 image.
Here are the main features that would be great and still have that PCE/TG feel(order of importance):
- Port based setup like the AC card did would be great. You could have up to 8 ports memory mapped on the hardware bank and could be programmed to point *anywhere* in the hucard address range. There's nothing like saving code/complexity and cpu cycles like free auto increment/decrement I/O port based accessing. That's like having 8 hardware indirect registers but with 21bit address range. Each port should have a Bank number associated with it too like the AC card. Making it compatible with the block transfer instructions.
- Simple single channel PCM DAC with volume setting. Standard 8bit version. You set the frequency and which buffer to read from. You wouldn't need much room, just maybe two 512kbyte buffers. The output could be on the audio input pin of the hucard port. It'd be great for things like samples or mono style instruments.
- External interrupt for a finer TIMER value. Maybe something that could even be in sync with hsync (you'd have to reset the TIMER on the first scanline VDC interrupt to resync it).
- 16bit/16bit -> 16bit MUL and DIV support. Port based of course, just like the SNES one. It help make coder cleaner and more convenient. Something under 10 clock cycle time.
A Bonus feature could be:
- Switch into all RAM mode for banks $00 to $7F. You could do this from main ram (bank $F8). Basically you could run any hucard/rom from a CD that's 8megs or less (or an all RAM with the SF2 32megabit address banking system - yeah I know it only *used* 20megabits). This would also allow for different/custom system cards to be dynamically uploaded into RAM(it would be lost on power off).
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Great stuff there, malducci. Keep it up!
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No game has ever been more than one disc because no game has ever required more than one disc.
It's obviously not the same thing, but CD Battle requires a few extra discs to generate character stats. Are there any similarities between your proof-of-concept program and CD Battle, or does CD Battle not really read much of anything from the extra discs?
I don't get why, if you guys want to do something like this, don't you just program for a more powerful system that already HAS these features? It seems completely preposterous that not only are you going to design and manufacture a System Card 4.0, but also manage to sell more than the 4 or 5 to people on this board. Especially when you consider that import adapters for the Turbo sell for so much money, yet no one has designed (or hell just ripped off existing designs) and manufactured a new batch in like 15 years, so the logical conclusion is that it just isn't possible or cost effective to manufacture something that will fit in the hucard slot anymore.
It's not like they're trying to make a 32x for the Duo; adding memory and support for a standard disc image is not going to make games look and feel earth shatteringly different from the old games. The success of Tototek and Neo Flash has shown that there is a market for new hardware, albeit not a huge one. I'll bet that the reason there aren't any new converters being made is because there is no source for the HuCard socket. Any monkey can make a board that'll fit the socket (the flash carts are proof), but it'd be mighty expensive to have a few sockets fabricated. The cost of new converters would end up being just as high as the old ones, so it's more logical to push for a region switch, which have been made recently.
I figure a lot of junk hucards could be collected. The pin part and the main body of the card could be re-used and a new PCB would be attached to the pins. It might need a bubble back part of the card, but that could be manufactured or an existing part could be purchased that could be easly modified to fit.
Cannibalizing old games would be unnecessary and would make little baby Jesus cry, even if they were all copies of Turbo Golf and Keith Courage. PCBs can be made with pins to fit the HuCard socket, just like the flash carts and converters.
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It's obviously not the same thing, but CD Battle requires a few extra discs to generate character stats.
Dude, that sounds like Monster Rancher! TELL ME MORE! ^___^
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Dude, that sounds like Monster Rancher! TELL ME MORE! ^___^
There's not much more to tell. After the game starts up, you insert various discs (audio or whatever - I don't think that it really matters), and the game sets your character stats (what you look like, weapons, spells, etc.) based on something from those discs. You set up three characters, fight three other characters in a Final Fantasy style side view battle, and you win or lose the battle. That's it. That's the whole damn game.
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ARISE FROM THE DEAD!!
Anything been worked on in the last year and a half+?
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I didn't see this thread back then so here s my thought :
First of all it is a very ambitious project indeed but as others said, It would be better if it didn't take away the spirit of the PCE. I wouldn't care about mode 7-like games or that other kind of features. What I think would be interesting, though, would be to upgrade the DUO to a "SuperDuo". By that I mean that it would be great if you could develop a card that would allow the DUO to be Supergrafx compatible. So if your card could have a chip that would simulate the second SGX GPU, it would allow developpers to make Super Arcade CD games. It would definitely be the ultimate PCE Hardware without adding extra features that don't already exist.
I think it's so frustrating that NEC HE or Hudson never thought of developping Supergrafx Cd games.
I'm not a dev myself but what I really like with the work everyone of you makes is when you use the already existing PCE hardware at its best.
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Wow... just looking back at the original specs. That's a whooooole lota system card. Kinda does break the spirit of the PCE though. I'd personally rather, now, go with something much less but still fits within the PCE realm. Some indirect ports mapped into the open address range like what the ACD card does. Maybe a nice very fine res banking system just for the $2000-3fff range or $4000-5fff range. Something that would make far access for C much easier to deal with (would still be 24bit). An option for ACD reading via ports (which is the only method anyway), to interlace bytes from two different regions. You could do auto opcode embedded graphics like that, and run the code out of banks $40-43. Other than that, maybe just add some more ram in the $20000-3ffff region. How much? Dunno. 16k to 32k maybe. This would really help out translation efforts.
Everything here is actually doable. It could work as a pass through card, for the ACD card/other systems cards. Like someone else suggested, this would make the legality of keeping the original system card ROM code - a non issue. Though, I personally don't care. I doubt Hudson or NEC would go after us for using this "copyrighted" ROM. The only problem with the pass through is, you'll need to have a hucard connector made - but the up side is that you don't have to try to copy/simulate/emulate any of the Arcade Card funky register system. don't have to include that rom, don't have to include that 192k of sram either. All those are plus'. And makes the pass through card much less expensive, I would imagine. The only concern I would have, would be trying to have a hucard connector made. I'm not sure the cost on something like that.
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What I think would be interesting, though, would be to upgrade the DUO to a "SuperDuo". By that I mean that it would be great if you could develop a card that would allow the DUO to be Supergrafx compatible. So if your card could have a chip that would simulate the second SGX GPU, it would allow developpers to make Super Arcade CD games. It would definitely be the ultimate PCE Hardware without adding extra features that don't already exist.
I think it's so frustrating that NEC HE or Hudson never thought of developping Supergrafx Cd games.
The reason they didn't think of it is because the Supergrafx was dead and out of production for a few years by the time the Arcade Card was even released. In fact, the SGX was dead before the Super System Card was out.
Making an Super Arcade Card game is already possible by just using an Arcade Card in a SuperGrafx with a CDROM unit attached. Figuring out a way to upgrade a Duo to SGX power is a vastly more difficult and expensive way of doing the same thing, assuming its even possible.
Of course the most difficult thing of all would be to organize a game production effort grand enough and capable enough to actually use the resources of all this kit. The more power you have the more time and effort takes to max the potential of the system, and I haven't seen any homebrew so far that even makes the potential of a standard HuCard.
Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see a Super Arcade Card game be made using stuff like high res mode and transparencies that we've seen in demos. Also, some HuVideo, some long load-free cinemas, etc. I'd be much more interested in buying a SGX for this that I would for any official SGX soft.
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The reason they didn't think of it is because the Supergrafx was dead and out of production for a few years by the time the Arcade Card was even released. In fact, the SGX was dead before the Super System Card was out.
Making an Super Arcade Card game is already possible by just using an Arcade Card in a SuperGrafx with a CDROM unit attached. Figuring out a way to upgrade a Duo to SGX power is a vastly more difficult and expensive way of doing the same thing, assuming its even possible.
I know all of this already but I said that because I don't know that many people who own the complete SGX/SCD/ACD set up ;)
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OK! Time for some naive self-indulgence! :-"
One thing that I see of importance when this project nears completion is the idea of having a flagship game, a game that will make people go, "OMG! I NEED THAT CARD SO I CAN PLAY THAT BADASS GAME!"
Do you have any ideas in the works? If not, I have an idea for a game. People say I'm a decent writer, so... 8-[
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The reason they didn't think of it is because the Supergrafx was dead and out of production for a few years by the time the Arcade Card was even released. In fact, the SGX was dead before the Super System Card was out.
Making an Super Arcade Card game is already possible by just using an Arcade Card in a SuperGrafx with a CDROM unit attached. Figuring out a way to upgrade a Duo to SGX power is a vastly more difficult and expensive way of doing the same thing, assuming its even possible.
I know all of this already but I said that because I don't know that many people who own the complete SGX/SCD/ACD set up ;)
Well, it would be a lot easier for those people to just buy an existing and extremely reliable system than to attempt the nearly impossible by adding it to a Duo via the HuCard slot. It would probably cost about the same too (cheaper probably). Most people hard core enough to want something like this (and pay for it) already have a Arcade Card, and there is a good chance they will have a CDROM2/SuperCDROM2 and/or a SGX too. One or the other anyway.
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The thing is that the SGX itself is quite expensive and the Super Cd Rom not easy to find and expensive as well. I'm not even talking of getting an IFU+SGX+RAU 30. I know a lot of people not that hardcore who'd like to have such a combo but who just can't afford getting all the stuff needed. How about the ones who own a DUO and would be glad if such a device was made?
It would be great if we could have SGX/ACD games, it would be greater if it was available to as many players as can be.
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You can get a bare SGX for $150 if you play your cards right. The CDROM2 is something a lot of us have. SuperCDROM2s are kind of scarce, but not that bad. I was thinking more of the RAU 30 route, and those aren't that expensive. So basically if you have a CDRROM2 (or maybe TG-16CD?, not sure) you can add Super ACD capability for $200-250. If you think that this is a lot of money consider the fact that this mega card thing you are hypothesizing is going to cost at least that much, and will probably be full of problems (if it works at all). Consider the price/problems that come with something like the flash cards from Tototek and multiply that by a factor of at least two.
I don't have a SGX, but if a homebrew Super Arcade CD game came out (that looked interesting) and I wanted to play it, I would be way more interested in playing it with as much NEC hardware as possible.
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If you think that this is a lot of money consider the fact that this mega card thing you are hypothesizing is going to cost at least that much, and will probably be full of problems (if it works at all).
:roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll:
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Sign Of zeat>IF such a card would cost that much, of course it would be better to just get the real hardware. What if it cost 50$? Then it would be much better to get a DUO-R and the card. But how can we now to that point?
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Why would the suppose card I just laid out, cost that much!? CLPD are in the $5 range 1-10 quantities and FPGA a little more in the same quantity. And that adds support for hardware large/fast MUL/DIV/etc to the PCE. Even if you had to add the 2megabyte DRAM of the ACD card, 256k rom of the system card, 192k sram of the 3.0 card (from a 512k sram chip) - all for the sake of backwards compatibility, I don't see how it would even be anywhere near that amount. Shit, you could even add video upgrades via some of those CLPD/FPGA (like a color intensity alteration device via image overlays or window registers (levels of transparency), be it composite or RGB in/out). *If* you wanted such an upgrade. Not sure people would like looking at video wires in/out of the front of the cart port and card though. At least on the 32x, they were behind the system. Making an Arcade Card Pro with a few upgrades, wouldn't break the bank. It also make it for people that don't already have an arcade card, that much cheaper because they don't have to buy the original card.
But of course the true question is: will any software justify the purchase of another card? Hell, for those that don't already own an Arcade Card - would they sell out the ca$h for one just to play ACD homebrew products?
And to answer any speculation about the SGX+SCD/ACD support. Well, I plan on supporting it. And since Nodt's making the jump to all ASM, he could easily support such platforms (and even if he stuck with HuC, I added support for ACD and SGX already. The SGX needs to be rewrite because they are nothing more than replicas of the original HuC graphic routines). But I have no idea what he plans on doing with said hardware in any future project. It's not like the SGX+SCD unit(and/or +ACD) is a big target audience.
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Why would the suppose card I just laid out, cost that much!?
Zeta and shubi are arguing the cost/feasibility of a card that adds SuperGrafx functionality to a Duo, which would undoubtedly be far more complex (or impossible) and expensive than the comparatively simple card you've proposed. My two cents on a SG card: why stop at just a card? If anyone's going to be so ambitious as to build such a beast, they might as well go whole hog and build an entirely new console (similar to the nes-on-a-chip or genny offerings).
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Tom: Unless I got confused along the way shubibiman and I were discussing a card that one could use on a Duo that would add SGX capability. Since a flash card from Tototek is $50 by itself and isn't even in the same universe capability-wise as these cards we are discussing (which are in may ways more complex that the PCE itself) I can't imagine the cost being anywhere near as low.
I agree that the audience is small, but viability is a balancing act. There are homebrew hardware addons for the DS (such as the motion sensing card) that don't have any use with legit software. Obviously the DS market is at least 1000 times the size of the PCE market, but PCE people are crazier so maybe they can make up for their lack of numbers by individually putting more $$$ into the scene. (Think Neo Geo here).
Re: my comments regarding possible jankiness of this theoretical product: Here are the things in my mind when I consider this (note the lack of douchebag emoticons):
Adding SGX compatibility via the HuCard slot: Is this possible? Seriously possible? And if it is possible, would be in any way reliable? If you make a piece of software that uses it, would it also work with real NEC hardware? Consider Altered Beast CD which only works with System 1. If a huge corporation can run into a problem like that then wouldn't a team with three guys working on it have even more problems with vastly more complex stuff? Remember a while back we were talking about how for some reason some games no longer worked with certain hardware combinations after grounding pin#29 on the Hu6280? I think it was the SuperCDROM2 when combined with a SGX that didn't work with some random games. Does anyone have the slightest idea WTF that happens?
People don't set out to make crappy hardware on purpose, but sometimes things go wrong. Problems turn out to be more difficult than thought at first, suppliers of parts change, things happen with money, people quit the project, etc.
The Tototek card: This thing is not famous for its reliability and ease of use, even though its made by rather experienced guys. I'd gladly buy a System Card 4.0 for any reasonable price (say, less than $200) but is has to actually work...more or less perfectly. No proprietary software that doesn't run half the time, thank you, and I don't even own a machine on it with a parallel port so f*ck that shit.
shubibiman: You asked the question, "But how can we now to that point?" Well, I don't have an answer because I don't understand the question, but I think you are asking how I can speculate on cost at this point? Well, $50...I don't think that's going to happen, even at zero profit, and I'd rather it be made at a profit because I'd like it to actually come out, and to take less time. In other words, I'd like to avoid a situation like the one with D-Lite years back.
Either way, making a card with all these features mentioned (easily the most powerful hardware add-on in history, except possibly the MegaCD) isn't going to happen unless people get more realistic. I'd love to see it, so I hope people start getting more real about it.
I've been involved with fan-ish things in the games and anime scene for a long time. It feels great to pull something off well, but I've also been through a lot of failed projects so I know how that feels too. All I'm saying is that if this topic is just a bullshit pipe dream that is never going to happen, then lets call it that (in that case, I want LDROM support!). If its a real possibility then lets pair down this ridiculous list of features (MP4 playback...wha?) and actually make the thing.
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Tom: Unless I got confused along the way shubibiman and I were discussing a card that one could use on a Duo that would add SGX capability. Since a flash card from Tototek is $50 by itself and isn't even in the same universe capability-wise as these cards we are discussing (which are in may ways more complex that the PCE itself) I can't imagine the cost being anywhere near as low.
Ohh... Well, the setup I was talking about wouldn't be that expensive as long you don't mind it looking like this:
(http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1213/1284713856_0a3c9de2d1.jpg)
Which I don't. Anything more fancy like a real looking hucard is going to be more expensive.
I agree that the audience is small, but viability is a balancing act. There are homebrew hardware addons for the DS (such as the motion sensing card) that don't have any use with legit software. Obviously the DS market is at least 1000 times the size of the PCE market, but PCE people are crazier so maybe they can make up for their lack of numbers by individually putting more $$$ into the scene. (Think Neo Geo here).
Yeah. It is a small target audience. But wouldn't it be a treat for owners of such SGX CD combinations get a cool homebrew soft? I personally think so. And, it's not like the SGX is some convoluted beast and hard to code for. It's just as straight forward as the PCE's video hardware, but really lets loose some of the original limits of the PCE. Imagine games running completely in 512x232 res. SGX has the realistic vram amount for it. SGX has the realistic sprite bandwidth for it. And a second BG layers makes things less complicated for scrolls effects. Not that I don't like a challenge and pushing hardware limits, but sometimes it's nice just to have the hardware directly for you.
Adding SGX compatibility via the HuCard slot: Is this possible? Seriously possible? And if it is possible, would be in any way reliable?
I've looked at this situation a while ago and what's doable. IIRC: From what I've looked at, it appears not 100% doable because of some mirroring issues of the original PCE. That's not to say that they couldn't have just made the SGX as an upgrade to the PCE originally. Given all the pins on the back, they very well could have. So, I *think* the problem might be mirror issues (otherwise if it was open bus, it wouldn't be a problem). If I remember (a few games access this mirrored area, thus the switch they put on the SGX to make it more compatible). This would cause bus conflicts. You can definitely at a version of SGX on a card. But the memory mapped I/O would be in different locations. Any new soft would detect which "SGX" setup, and use the correct address I/O's. You'll also need to have another VCE and redirect all writes to the original (so more hardware). And the biggest problem; you'd have to do analog mixing. Normally, the SGX handles all mixing digitally because the VDP(s) output it's data in digital pixel form. But since you don't have access to this on the cart port, you need to manually mix the two VDP signals. That means a composite scanline sampler (a quite easier it required it to only RGB input though).
If this were an addon via the backplane of a non duo unit, you don't need the analog mixing part. But the backplane isn't going to solve the mirroring(bus conflict) issues. You'd have to open up the system itself and make some modifications to remove the mirroring.
So, you could make an SGX card per se, just not one that is backwards compatible via ports. Though software can be easily mapped to use an alternate mapped ports - but is only for future SGX softs and not backwards compatible existing SGX hucards. Did I mention this would be expensive and will most likely require a separate power supply to this card?
Well, it's not entirely true that you can't do an SGX as a card addon. You could do both VDC's on the cart, and redirect original VDC read/writes to one of the primary VDC on the cart, and VCE/VPC/VDC#2 address writes to those on the card too. No need for analog mixing as you have all the digital pixel data you need right there. And the original VDC, since it has the same settings as the duplicate, still generates the interrupts you need and on the right vector (no SGX soft that I know of uses interrupts from the second VDC. There's no need to). So that means you need to have a VCE, 2xVDC, VPC on the cart. And, you need to find some way of syncing *ALL* of these chips with the VCE and VDC of the original console (because you need scanline interrupts to match up). That means running the composite output to the cart for the initial sync and any resync'ing. Oh and the last condition is: you can't read vram from the second/SGX VDC. As long as no game does this, then it'll be fine (I don't see why they *would* read vram back into main ram, but you never know with devs. The cool thing is, is that you only have like 5 games to test to see if this is the case). Reading from vram of the primary VDC is not a problem, because you're reading the duplicated data inside the original VDC. This card would probably still require an external PS. And yes, that would be expensive still. And 2 or 3 fast fpga's. The VPC and VCE can easily be combined into a single chip since they don't do very much. Probably condense the 2 VDCs into a single chip as well.
Remember a while back we were talking about how for some reason some games no longer worked with certain hardware combinations after grounding pin#29 on the Hu6280? I think it was the SuperCDROM2 when combined with a SGX that didn't work with some random games. Does anyone have the slightest idea WTF that happens?
It's not the SGX. It's the Super CDROM^2 unit itself (though the SGX *does* have this yellow wire modification inside the console, going to the back plane to the cart port. Might be this pin specific pin? Maybe not all SGX's got this mod from the factory?). I have a PCE and tested it on the unit. Came up with the same problems. Bubble Gum Crash had problems detecting BRAM (didn't see it, IIRC). The tototek card totally fails though with the SUPER CDROM^2 unit. It'll corrupt BRAM if a flashed hucard tries to access it. Lost all my save files because of this :( But the ACD Pro, the Super CD 3.0 card, Tonoke back up card, all have no problems accessing BRAM on that unit regardless of what main system is attached. Definitely weird.
The Tototek card: This thing is not famous for its reliability and ease of use, even though its made by rather experienced guys. I'd gladly buy a System Card 4.0 for any reasonable price (say, less than $200) but is has to actually work...more or less perfectly. No proprietary software that doesn't run half the time, thank you, and I don't even own a machine on it with a parallel port so f*ck that shit.
It's been very reliable for me. And very easy to use the programming software (just a gui where you pick roms, add cheats, enabled bit swapping, etc). It's finding a system and setting up the parallel port that's always been a bitch. It took a bit of messing with bios to get it to work on this motherboard. I could not get it to work on another tower I had, regardless of the settings. USB interface would be sooo much better though.
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Remember a while back we were talking about how for some reason some games no longer worked with certain hardware combinations after grounding pin#29 on the Hu6280? I think it was the SuperCDROM2 when combined with a SGX that didn't work with some random games. Does anyone have the slightest idea WTF that happens?
It's not the SGX. It's the Super CDROM^2 unit itself (though the SGX *does* have this yellow wire modification inside the console, going to the back plane to the cart port. Might be this pin specific pin? Maybe not all SGX's got this mod from the factory?). I have a PCE and tested it on the unit. Came up with the same problems. Bubble Gum Crash had problems detecting BRAM (didn't see it, IIRC). The tototek card totally fails though with the SUPER CDROM^2 unit. It'll corrupt BRAM if a flashed hucard tries to access it. Lost all my save files because of this :( But the ACD Pro, the Super CD 3.0 card, Tonoke back up card, all have no problems accessing BRAM on that unit regardless of what main system is attached. Definitely weird.
I thought there was mention of this "breaking" Aldynes, maybe a couple others that became unplayable, or other issues?
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I don't why it would cause problems with Aldynes. Does Aldynes try to save your hi-score to BRAM? That would be the only thing I can think of and even then. Actually, I've never heard of it having any problems with any SGX games (the SCD^2 unit attached to the SGX, that is). No have I had any with SGX games in that combo.
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Ohh... Well, the setup I was talking about wouldn't be that expensive as long you don't mind it looking like this:
(http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1213/1284713856_0a3c9de2d1.jpg)
Which I don't. Anything more fancy like a real looking hucard is going to be more expensive.
I personally wouldn't mind at all if it looked like that. :)
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hey tom where did that card come from? Googled the name on the card and didn't get anything useful!
That thing looks pretty interesting.
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hey tom where did that card come from? Googled the name on the card and didn't get anything useful!
That thing looks pretty interesting.
It is an old prototype for TurboBlodia, which was a file utility (32K for game data) + deluxe upgraded version of Blodia (apparently, Blodia is very popular with Japanese PCE enthusiasts). It has a level editor, so you can design and save your own boards in Blodia.
Pretty kool.
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hey tom where did that card come from? Googled the name on the card and didn't get anything useful!
That thing looks pretty interesting.
Memblers is his name (he posts regularly on nesdev forums). He manufactured quite a few of these. I talked with him about doing a two socket version (on for SRAM, but it'd have to be a different socket). And that the one in that pick only supports 4meg games. But it looks pretty decent. Much better than the tototek card.
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hey tom where did that card come from? Googled the name on the card and didn't get anything useful!
That thing looks pretty interesting.
It is an old prototype for TurboBlodia, which was a file utility (32K for game data) + deluxe upgraded version of Blodia (apparently, Blodia is very popular with Japanese PCE enthusiasts). It has a level editor, so you can design and save your own boards in Blodia.
Pretty kool.
Holy f*cking crap that's so awesome.
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does he do bulk-sales of them doodads or what?
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I searched around, and found the schematics for something much like the membler board (it might even BE the membler board), so now I have a few questions for you electrical gurus:
1) Assuming I want to build one of these, -and- I find a compatible (but much larger) prom chip, how big (in K) could I go? I don't want to add a lot of stuff to the basic layout, but I would like about 8Mb ( or larger )
2) Would I have to add RAM to it? I *think* the turbo has 8K built in, so if I can keep all the data in that space, would I be 'good to go' ?
3) (And don't laugh) Could this be modified so that one end is for the us tg-16, and the other end is for a japanese system ? Would I have to add the region check code if all I want to do is hook the data lines up in reverse on the other end ?
Thank in advance for any and all help with this. I -really- want to produce a game on an authentic-looking HuCard, and any help is appreciated.
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3) (And don't laugh) Could this be modified so that one end is for the us tg-16, and the other end is for a japanese system ? Would I have to add the region check code if all I want to do is hook the data lines up in reverse on the other end ?
I think the answer is yes. the region check code was something that was added to (some?) American hucards; if the software is being written by fans, they'd have no reason to include it. the only thing I worry about is whether one end or the other should have a cover, since handling it while it is on could be bad.
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A new system card would be great sure ,would you consider also building an action replay wich is sadly missing to the system ? :wink: