The Goal: System Card 4.0

[malducci]

 Oh - you made a thread for this 

 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    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).

[nat]

Great stuff there, malducci. Keep it up!

[Necromancer]

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.

[Kitsunexus]

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! ^___^

[Necromancer]

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.

[nectarsis]

ARISE FROM THE DEAD!!

Anything been worked on in the last year and a half+?

[shubibiman]

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.

[Tom]

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.

[SignOfZeta]

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.

[shubibiman]

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

[Arjak]

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...

[SignOfZeta]

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.

[shubibiman]

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.

[SignOfZeta]

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.

[nodtveidt]

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).