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General Arcade and Retro Chat - Insert Coin -

LoGiE

Brand new Arcade and Retro Chat thread....careful now.

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Doge

Tim Robbins wrote: »

Any advice on what to look out for for sticks?

And similarly for buttons?

Like I am assuming there are ones that you simulate the arcade feel better than others?

I think Sanwa and Seimitsu sticks would be the ones to go for.

The Seimitsu have a shorter throw generally, the sanwas are a bit looser.

It all comes down to personal preference really.

Maybe some of the arcade fighter heads on here can give a more in depth comparison.

o1s1n

I've used Seimitsu now for so many years in so many devices that whenever I use a Sanwa they feel like they're broken!

Although I don't spend my time trying to do fireballs and dragon punches so I guess I'd appreciate that if I did.

Touch Fuzzy Get Dizzy

They've a few videos up of this screen, it's really cool
https://www.instagram.com/p/BnWBEPYHzf8/?utm_source=ig_share_sheet&igshid=104or1i0d3k4g

Retr0gamer

Doge wrote: »

I think Sanwa and Seimitsu sticks would be the ones to go for.

The Seimitsu have a shorter throw generally, the sanwas are a bit looser.

It all comes down to personal preference really.

Maybe some of the arcade fighter heads on here can give a more in depth comparison.

Shmup fans use Seimetsu sticks, Fighting game fans tend to use Sanwa. It's personal preference though. I prefer to use Seimetsu for everything myself.

Buttons again are personal preference. I tend to go for Sanwa as you could press them with a feather while Seimetsu take (barely noticeably) more pressure.

You can't really go wrong with either.

DaveyDave

Anyone see the Polymega? Plays disc games and cartridges. PlayStation, TurboGrafx-CD, Sega CD, Neo Geo CD, and Sega Saturn along with separately sold cartridge modules for Mega Drive, NES, SNES and Turbo Grafx 16.

$250, plus the cost of the cartridge modules. It installs games to the system so you don't have to keep swapping them out. Region free too. Pricey but could be interesting. The Retron5 is geared more towards Nintendo so this looks appealing...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pucot56iRiw

Inviere

The Saturn side of it interests me. Vanilla display by the looks of it though, so not gonna be pretty unless you've an external method of generating scanlines.

o1s1n

Id never usually be interested in something like that but it actually looks super slick!

The module changing thing reminds me of the Pioneer Laser Active.

CosmicSmash

It wouldn't be for me but it might go down well with the hipsters.

Shapey Fiend

Have they explained how the Sega Saturn stuff is going to work. I know they've been making big inroads with Yabause lately in terms of compatibility with it still not being terrifically system intensive but they're still going to need something a little more punchy than a Raspberry Pi in there.

Someone in the comments pointed out that's Arcade Sega Rally in the trailer I was thinking myself that looks pretty amazing are they filtering the textures or something?

Tom Mann Centuria

A Spectrum Next handheld. Swoon.

http://www.dorchester3d.com/printing/blog/2018/09/speccyx-zx-spectrum-next-handheld

CiDeRmAn

Looks lovely tbh, but my Retron5 got very little play, I don't imagine this would be any different.

Tim Robbins

So checking out the prices for the ready made bartops and they are pricey. Is there another option whereby you can kinda get a flatpack and make it yourself?

Note: any sawing, cutting etc, I am useless at - has to be like Ikea if you know what I mean.

Thanks

Touch Fuzzy Get Dizzy

The Ninja Warriors Is Getting A Remaster In The Vein Of Wild Guns Reloaded
http://www.siliconera.com/2018/09/05/the-ninja-warriors-is-getting-a-remaster-in-the-vein-of-wild-guns-reloaded/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=facebook

I really liked Ninja Warriors but never got that far into it, thought Kunoichi was a really cool.character

Doge

A secret in Doom II was discovered recently which had not being discovered in 24 years of its existence.

https://twitter.com/romero/status/1035625146458025984?s=20

Inviere

Shapey Fiend wrote: »

Have they explained how the Sega Saturn stuff is going to work. I know they've been making big inroads with Yabause lately in terms of compatibility with it still not being terrifically system intensive but they're still going to need something a little more punchy than a Raspberry Pi in there.

That's what I've been wondering. We've all seen the retro systems do Nes, Snes, etc...but Saturn is different. It's emulation isn't perfect, neither with software, nor hardware like FPGA. I'm wondering how they'll do this...

The Last Bandit

This is the old RetroBlox system reborn so its using emulation to some degree, maybe they'd presumed Saturn emulation would have substantially by the time they were ready to ship..

Retr0gamer

Saturn emulation will never be good unless they go really low level ala BSNES. With two processors and two video processing units there's just too much reliance on timing of data between all 4 components. FPGA might be able to come close but it will take a significant amount of work.

CiDeRmAn

So, just buy a Saturn.... then region mod it.... get an RGB while you're at it too....

The Last Bandit

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Saturn emulation will never be good unless they go really low level ala BSNES. With two processors and two video processing units there's just too much reliance on timing of data between all 4 components. FPGA might be able to come close but it will take a significant amount of work.

The SH-2 core used in Saturn has been implement on FPGA already so the rest should be easy peasy right ?

Inviere

The Last Bandit wrote: »

The SH-2 core used in Saturn has been implement on FPGA already so the rest should be easy peasy right ?

Genuine tech question, if they can program an FPGA to emulate the SH-2 core, what's stopping them accomplishing same with software?

The Last Bandit

See the FPGA isn't emulating the SH-2 core - its a cycle accurate simulation so should behave identically to the original chip. FPGA are commonly used now to replace obsolete ASICs, basically the original logic design at the gate level is reimplemented in the FPGA.

Emulating it on x86-64 chip is probably just a total b1tch of a job to get right and current CPU don't have the horsepower or more likely the investment to do it.

Inviere

The Last Bandit wrote: »

See the FPGA isn't emulating the SH-2 core - its a cycle accurate simulation so should behave identically to the original chip. FPGA are commonly used now to replace obsolete ASICs, basically the original logic design at the gate level is reimplemented in the FPGA.

Emulating it on x86-64 chip is probably just a total b1tch of a job to get right and current CPU don't have the horsepower or more likely the investment to do it.

So is there coding involved at all in FPGA, I assume not if it's physical gate level simulation? If correct, how do they 'know' what to do...do they base it off a complete documentation of a chip, is it based off of decapping? I thought FPGA used hardware as a means to an end, but that hardware was still based off of a software engine? See the below from Byuu (author of Bsnes etc)

FPGA devices are emulators too. Nothing inherently makes FPGAs more accurate than software emulation

FPGAs, or field-programmable gate arrays, are components that are programmed through code written in languages such as Verilog or VHDL. This code tells the component how to operate, in the same way that C++ instructs a general purpose CPU how to operate.

How these two differ behind the scenes (logic gates versus microcode) is irrelevant to the end result: replicating the original hardware experience. Setting efficiency aside, there is absolutely nothing an FPGA can do that cannot be done in software.

Retr0gamer

It's all fine and dandy to have the SH-2 chip emulated in FPGA.

The issue is you also have 2 very unique VDP chips to simulate as well.

That shouldn't be an issue if people get the chip schematics.

The real issue is how the data bus between the two CPUs and the two VDP units work. And once you simulate that a lot of the complex games rely on the timing of this data reaching each chip so you've to simulate that as well.

Once you add any kind of parallelisation things become a lot more complex, although with FPGA if you've got schematics is could make it a lot easier.

The Last Bandit

He's phrased that very well and almost glosses over the critical part "Setting efficiency aside", to be anyway useful apart for academic research you can't really set aside efficiency and he dumbs down the the programming aspects.

I'd also argue that FPGA are simulators rather than emulators, subtle differences but different none-the-less.

Emulators aim to accurately model the external observable behaviour of the target, in this case a CPU, how it does it internally is irrelevant so long as the outward behaviour is correct.

Simulators model the internal workings & state of the target so that external behaviour is accurate.

Ya FPGA are also programmed through code (Verilog or VHDL), but the result of this (called a bitstream) is used to reconfigured the FPGA into whatever logic device you've create. A FPGA is basically (but not really) billions of unconnected logic gates and your bitstream tells the FPGA how to connect these gates up to make up logic you want to run and from then on its more or less the same as running native silicon. The quality of the simulation depends on how accurately the VHDL code models the target device.

Doing the same in C, C++ and running on a general purpose CPU is going to be so much more inefficient, when OS's, compilers etc have taken their toll hence why you need a powerful CPU to accurate emulate a 66C816 CPU.

In the case of the SNES, ya both can produce the exact same result , but it depends on what you want do next. Are you sitting at home want to play SNES and happen to own a decent PC or are you developing a consumer product to accurately play SNES games ( Super NT) ?

The Last Bandit

Retr0gamer wrote: »

It's all fine and dandy to have the SH-2 chip emulated in FPGA.

The issue is you also have 2 very unique VDP chips to simulate as well.

That shouldn't be an issue if people get the chip schematics.

The real issue is how the data bus between the two CPUs and the two VDP units work. And once you simulate that a lot of the complex games rely on the timing of this data reaching each chip so you've to simulate that as well.

Once you add any kind of parallelisation things become a lot more complex, although with FPGA if you've got schematics is could make it a lot easier.

FPGA are by design parallel, clock comes in and everything ticks along, its not like a CPU where individual instructions are processed in sequence - this is biggest mindf%^k when software engineers look at FPGA, its completely alien.

The VDP's are digital logic so can be implemented as well (bugs and all), buses are just wires, once the device models are timings are correct its all tickey-boo

Problem is, this costs a buttload of money to do so can't see it happening. Decapping chips and reverse engineering them is incredibly time consuming, if the design docs are available then its a lot easier and chances are this video processor were designed using VHDL anyway.

But, there's no money to be paid so nobody cares

True story: Project I worked on years ago, one of the guys has tasked with moving one of the ASICs to a FPGA to cut costs, which he did and also fixed a few bugs he found along the way. What he didn't know was that these bugs are 'known' issues and had software workarounds in place... cue much head scratching when the software fell to pieces with the new chips in place...

deadl0ck

Cake of Tremendous Power wrote: »

Maybe I'm late to the party with this one but have ye heard of Fightcade before?
It seems like a great idea, enabling online multiplayer for games emulated by Final Burn Alpha.
https://play.fightcade.com/
As is tradition, roms aren't included in the download

So I just discovered this last night - I played through Knights of the Round with a guy from the Retro Asylum discord channel - it works great

[Deleted User]

Does anyone know the story with this type of Mega Drive Rom? It's an old Scene release of Sonic 3 with a split game file. No idea how to get it to play or even join the files

Inviere

Rename it Sonic 3.zip and see if it loads?

[Deleted User]

No joy, No Archive Found error when I try. I'm trying to find info on what Standards were used for the Mega Drive but very little out there it seems

Inviere

Cake of Tremendous Power wrote: »

No joy, No Archive Found error when I try. I'm trying to find info on what Standards were used for the Mega Drive but very little out there it seems

What emulator are you trying it on?