Over the next few weeks we plan to roll out a couple of updated emulators. We're looking at Gens-GS to replace our current version of Gens and VBA-M to replace VBA. Now, for the most part they are just like the older versions. However, one large difference is that they are still alive as projects. Because of this bugs are addressed and fixed. This is something we can't handle with our own staff for the moment.
Gens-GS works a lot better with Windows Vista for instance. We also plan to take out a few of the games that we couldn't get working with Gens to see if the issues we ran into have been fixed. Since it's still under development we may actually be able to have a little back and forth with the developers. Because it's based on Gens we shouldn't run into any problems with what works now. It also supports 32x and Sega-CD, so we are also good to go there. I still have to do some testing, but it's probably a go.
With VBA-M I am hoping we will see some dead bugs. At the moment a number of Pokemon games don't work with VBA. Again, we simply don't have the time and manpower to fix these issues ourselves yet. In time we hope to really offer something more than just games, but for the moment games is what we've got. Even if we have the same bugs as before there is at least the chance of improvement with a living project. Again, since it almost certainly won't introduce any new bugs it's almost a no brainer.
This may not seem as exciting as new systems, but it's important. We want to offer perfect emulation for every game ever sold to the public. We're not there yet and that is why minor updates are actually a major deal.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Monday, March 29, 2010
Wrapping it up
I know my last few posts have been related to the N64, but it's what's happening right now. The final test install had a few little problems, but they seem to be worked out now. Lord willing, Thursday morning we will wrap the beta up. Things have gone very well. We are going to have to pull a few of the games down, but in time we may be able to get them back up again.
In order to move from beta to live I have to do a few things. I need to update the N64 system from TEST to N64 in the database. I need to pull down those games that don't work just right. I've got to update the version number and test the auto update to make sure everything is working in that regard. I also have to put together the pages for the website to display the N64 selection. (We still need a writeup and screen shot for that.) That should tie up most of the loose ends.
So, hopefully my next post concerning the N64 will be about the launch and a few other little details. On the Wednesday post I actually plan on touching some updates we are considering. There are a few updates for the emulators we use and what have you.
That's it for the moment!
In order to move from beta to live I have to do a few things. I need to update the N64 system from TEST to N64 in the database. I need to pull down those games that don't work just right. I've got to update the version number and test the auto update to make sure everything is working in that regard. I also have to put together the pages for the website to display the N64 selection. (We still need a writeup and screen shot for that.) That should tie up most of the loose ends.
So, hopefully my next post concerning the N64 will be about the launch and a few other little details. On the Wednesday post I actually plan on touching some updates we are considering. There are a few updates for the emulators we use and what have you.
That's it for the moment!
Friday, March 26, 2010
The Final Test
Well... The second test... I hope that it is the final one, however. I just put up the second version of our N64 Beta install. It includes what should be the correct default settings for the games. It also allows the user to change the controller settings from within the CC Browser. Lord willing, with the feedback we get we should be able to put together the real install by next Friday.
Should we manage to do that we will launch the N64 officially next Friday, April 2nd. We are very excited about this. It's been something that we have wanted to do for years and now it's so close we can reach out and touch it. As soon as we get it up and running we'll be looking at adding more games.
Matthias over at http://www.retrode.org/wordpress/ is already working on adding N64 support for the Retrode. In point of fact he has made major progress already. If we have the ability to read N64 games with the Retrode it will greatly simplify the process of getting new games up. The easier it is the faster we can do it.
Of course, there are still the monetary considerations, but we plan to invest what we can into new N64 games. We know there are a lot of games people want that we don't have yet, but you have to take these things one step at a time. Either way, progress is progress. I hope to be announcing the launch of the N64 next Friday!
Should we manage to do that we will launch the N64 officially next Friday, April 2nd. We are very excited about this. It's been something that we have wanted to do for years and now it's so close we can reach out and touch it. As soon as we get it up and running we'll be looking at adding more games.
Matthias over at http://www.retrode.org/wordpress/ is already working on adding N64 support for the Retrode. In point of fact he has made major progress already. If we have the ability to read N64 games with the Retrode it will greatly simplify the process of getting new games up. The easier it is the faster we can do it.
Of course, there are still the monetary considerations, but we plan to invest what we can into new N64 games. We know there are a lot of games people want that we don't have yet, but you have to take these things one step at a time. Either way, progress is progress. I hope to be announcing the launch of the N64 next Friday!
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
More And More
I am hoping that we are going to be able to start adding games to the site at a little higher rate. Those of you that have been with us since the beginning know that we're a bit off from our “Golden Period”. At one time we were putting up so many new games is was hard to keep track. Then we hit out slow point. For around a year we put up very little and even now we only manage to add five new games a week. So, what's the hold up?
Money... Big surprise eh? Money seems to be a very common problem at the moment. However, I am very happy to say that things are looking up for us again. Lord willing, in the next couple of months things should really begin moving forward again. I would like to add at least as many N64 games a month as we are adding GBA games now. Five a week adds up to over two hundred and fifty a year. That would mean in about a year and half we would fill out the N64.
There are so many games we have to add. When you look at our list is seems very complete at first glace, but it needs so much more. It's true that the SNES and Genesis are very close to complete. However, you might say we only have a sample of the Atari 2600 games that were produced. The GB, GBC and GBA need a good many titles before they are complete. (Some of the games will actually need updates made to the emulators before they will run, but that is not true of most of the games we don't have.) We have a little over half of the NES games released in the US. (I know it's hard to believe when you look at our list, but there were a lot of NES games!)
Really I am hoping to kick off a new golden period next month. I hope to get a load of N64 games and start putting them up along with the GBA games we add. I also want to start getting the TG-16 games we need in order to launch that system. That's all we're waiting on at the moment. The TG-16 stuff is actually commented out of the current CC browser code. All I need to do is un-comment it and it's ready to go. Of course there isn't much point when you only have a couple of games. Still, that's what I hope to work on in April.
So many games, so little time...
Money... Big surprise eh? Money seems to be a very common problem at the moment. However, I am very happy to say that things are looking up for us again. Lord willing, in the next couple of months things should really begin moving forward again. I would like to add at least as many N64 games a month as we are adding GBA games now. Five a week adds up to over two hundred and fifty a year. That would mean in about a year and half we would fill out the N64.
There are so many games we have to add. When you look at our list is seems very complete at first glace, but it needs so much more. It's true that the SNES and Genesis are very close to complete. However, you might say we only have a sample of the Atari 2600 games that were produced. The GB, GBC and GBA need a good many titles before they are complete. (Some of the games will actually need updates made to the emulators before they will run, but that is not true of most of the games we don't have.) We have a little over half of the NES games released in the US. (I know it's hard to believe when you look at our list, but there were a lot of NES games!)
Really I am hoping to kick off a new golden period next month. I hope to get a load of N64 games and start putting them up along with the GBA games we add. I also want to start getting the TG-16 games we need in order to launch that system. That's all we're waiting on at the moment. The TG-16 stuff is actually commented out of the current CC browser code. All I need to do is un-comment it and it's ready to go. Of course there isn't much point when you only have a couple of games. Still, that's what I hope to work on in April.
So many games, so little time...
Monday, March 22, 2010
Some New Hardware
We got a new toy last week that I haven't had time to try out yet. It's a neat little device that allows you to connect SNES and Genesis cartridges to your USB port pretty much like a thumb drive. The game actually pops up under My Computer in windows. So you can play your games on an emulator directly off the cart. It's called a Retrode and you can get one here:
http://www.retrode.org/wordpress/
Now, you may be wondering why we would want one since we already have our own hardware for reading carts. First, it's awesome! That's a good reason to support any small business like this. The Retrode is actually produced by one guy. We love to support small businesses because we like to see things like this grow. It's a good product and we want to support it. Second, our hardware for the SNES and Genesis is getting older. It still uses a LTP port. USB is a nice upgrade. The Retrode is also much more compact and can be thrown into a desk drawer. Plus, there were some games we had a lot of trouble with using our old setup. As we are considering adding some Super Famicom and Megadrive games getting a Retrode seemed like a good idea.
I've actually talked with (e-mailed back and forth...) with the creator of the thing. I am trying to convince him to make an N64 adapter for it. As I said before our N64 hardware is a real mess. I would love to replace it with something like this. Just being able to plug it up to the USB port and read the data off the cart... The idea almost brings tears to my eyes.
We are actually going to try to build a TG-16 adapter for it. I feel certain that we will be able to. That will make launching the TG-16 a little easier. Well, it will make it less bulky anyway. It's a fairly strait forward system really. The HuCards are fairly easy to read. Still, never overlook being able to throw the hardware in a drawer when you are done!
Either way, I thought it was something you guys would be interested in.
http://www.retrode.org/wordpress/
Now, you may be wondering why we would want one since we already have our own hardware for reading carts. First, it's awesome! That's a good reason to support any small business like this. The Retrode is actually produced by one guy. We love to support small businesses because we like to see things like this grow. It's a good product and we want to support it. Second, our hardware for the SNES and Genesis is getting older. It still uses a LTP port. USB is a nice upgrade. The Retrode is also much more compact and can be thrown into a desk drawer. Plus, there were some games we had a lot of trouble with using our old setup. As we are considering adding some Super Famicom and Megadrive games getting a Retrode seemed like a good idea.
I've actually talked with (e-mailed back and forth...) with the creator of the thing. I am trying to convince him to make an N64 adapter for it. As I said before our N64 hardware is a real mess. I would love to replace it with something like this. Just being able to plug it up to the USB port and read the data off the cart... The idea almost brings tears to my eyes.
We are actually going to try to build a TG-16 adapter for it. I feel certain that we will be able to. That will make launching the TG-16 a little easier. Well, it will make it less bulky anyway. It's a fairly strait forward system really. The HuCards are fairly easy to read. Still, never overlook being able to throw the hardware in a drawer when you are done!
Either way, I thought it was something you guys would be interested in.
Friday, March 19, 2010
A Little Progress
Well it was a busy week, but I'm happy to say I've made some progress. I am a little later than usual getting this post up, like I said... busy.
I got the N64 reading hardware up and running, thank the Lord. It was a pain, but it's done now. I am going to wait until after launch to put up any new games. We've got enough to deal with at the moment. I'm considering adding N64 games once a month rather than once a week. The INI file that 1964 uses may have to be updated for certain games. I don't want to do that more than once a month.
I also made some progress on the N64 controller settings. It's not done, but it's moving along. I hope to finish it this week. If all goes well we should have the new Beta build up next Friday. I would probably have gotten it done already, but I had some personal things I had to take care of this week. (The weather turned warm and so I had to finish some things I had been putting off all winter.)
That's it for this post.
I got the N64 reading hardware up and running, thank the Lord. It was a pain, but it's done now. I am going to wait until after launch to put up any new games. We've got enough to deal with at the moment. I'm considering adding N64 games once a month rather than once a week. The INI file that 1964 uses may have to be updated for certain games. I don't want to do that more than once a month.
I also made some progress on the N64 controller settings. It's not done, but it's moving along. I hope to finish it this week. If all goes well we should have the new Beta build up next Friday. I would probably have gotten it done already, but I had some personal things I had to take care of this week. (The weather turned warm and so I had to finish some things I had been putting off all winter.)
That's it for this post.
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Opening Up - Part 2
Really I feel like we need to develop our own emulators from scratch. Why? It's a long story and I'll go into it later. For the moment just believe that I have good reasons. I actually started several years ago. I developed a CPU core for the Sally 6502. That is the CPU of the Atari 2600. I actually designed it to be a completely stand alone piece of software. You can not only use it for an Atari 2600 emulator but for any system that used a 6502, the NES for example. It would actually need a bit of tweaking to work for the NES, but the changes could be implemented with a series of “switches” that way the same CPU core could be used for the Atari 2600 and NES.
The idea is to develop each piece separately and then assemble those pieces together into a working emulator. Once we have a perfected 6502 it shouldn't need to be redeveloped ever again. It may need to be updated in time and translated from one language to another, but most of the work would only need to be done once. Another advantage of developing this way is that all the core development can be cross platform. The CPU core itself doesn't need anything that isn't standard C++. Since it's standard it's cross platform.
The input and output could also be developed with porting in mind. I actually have a very full idea of how I want it all to work. I'll lay out here later. The real point of all this is that we need developers to help us get this off the ground. We intend to open the source code for the CPU core I've already developed and then start a number of other open source projects to complete our own series of emulators. That way anyone who helps us is also helping the emulation community. It's another way that Console Classix will be giving to the classic gaming community. Even if our actual code contributions are small we should be able to help orchestrate something awesome.
One top of any emulator projects we may have I might open the source code for the browser itself. I would like to see what additions the community could come up with. It might also be interesting if we provided potential developers with the software library we use to allow emulators to connect to our server and retrieve games. I would love to see a NES emulator loading games from CC on an iPhone!
As you can see, we have a lot to do. This isn't really a complete list. This is just a look at a few things we need help with. There is just too much for us to do. We need more help. Lord willing, we'll get it.
The idea is to develop each piece separately and then assemble those pieces together into a working emulator. Once we have a perfected 6502 it shouldn't need to be redeveloped ever again. It may need to be updated in time and translated from one language to another, but most of the work would only need to be done once. Another advantage of developing this way is that all the core development can be cross platform. The CPU core itself doesn't need anything that isn't standard C++. Since it's standard it's cross platform.
The input and output could also be developed with porting in mind. I actually have a very full idea of how I want it all to work. I'll lay out here later. The real point of all this is that we need developers to help us get this off the ground. We intend to open the source code for the CPU core I've already developed and then start a number of other open source projects to complete our own series of emulators. That way anyone who helps us is also helping the emulation community. It's another way that Console Classix will be giving to the classic gaming community. Even if our actual code contributions are small we should be able to help orchestrate something awesome.
One top of any emulator projects we may have I might open the source code for the browser itself. I would like to see what additions the community could come up with. It might also be interesting if we provided potential developers with the software library we use to allow emulators to connect to our server and retrieve games. I would love to see a NES emulator loading games from CC on an iPhone!
As you can see, we have a lot to do. This isn't really a complete list. This is just a look at a few things we need help with. There is just too much for us to do. We need more help. Lord willing, we'll get it.
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