Gyruss for Intellivision? Seriously?

[+DZ-Jay]

Its certainly possible to design such a cart. Although the CP1610's multiplexed address/data bus does kinda get in the way so you can't just force a NOP onto the data bus while the cart CPU is off doing the heavy computational stuff (like 2600 Melody carts do).

 

I was thinking something like the System Changer: where the entire system is on the board, and you just send the video output to the Master Component. The game could run on emulation or on a different architecture.

 

-dZ.

[GroovyBee]

I was thinking something like the System Changer: where the entire system is on the board, and you just send the video output to the Master Component. The game could run on emulation or on a different architecture.

 

Gotcha! You might as well make the whole thing standalone in that scenario. No need to tack on some 70s tech . There are homebrew 2600 games available that are making good use of the ARM processor in the Melody carts. I don't have a problem with those games, it all adds to the hobby. If the same sort of technology was available and cheap enough back in the day I'm sure we'd have seen the big boys using it.

[+DZ-Jay]

 

Gotcha! You might as well make the whole thing standalone in that scenario. No need to tack on some 70s tech . There are homebrew 2600 games available that are making good use of the ARM processor in the Melody carts. I don't have a problem with those games, it all adds to the hobby. If the same sort of technology was available and cheap enough back in the day I'm sure we'd have seen the big boys using it.

 

Yah, I know. That's what all these threads lead to.

 

I like the idea of expanding the capabilities of the machine, but seeing that the biggest limiting factor is the colors and MOBs, then we're talking about pretty much replacing the system while keeping the 1970s CPU only for the sake of its "charm."

 

About the only practical enhancement I can think of at the moment is to re-create something like the ECS on a cartridge, so that you could plug in a USB keyboard or even MIDI. The extra sound channels would be nice too.

[GroovyBee]

About the only practical enhancement I can think of at the moment is to re-create something like the ECS on a cartridge, so that you could plug in a USB keyboard or even MIDI. The extra sound channels would be nice too.

 

I can think of several Inty hardware enhancements apart from AV mods . Hopefully they'll see the light of day in the coming months.

 

Adding arithmetic functionality like multiply and divide (found in intvnut's JLP cart) that execute far, far quicker than their CP1610 code equivalents is a good move. The only other thing really lacking at "instruction level" is BCD conversion/arithmetic for scores etc. However, BCD conversion isn't such a speed issue in games because you don't update the score all that often. It'd be on the "nice to have" list.

 

When you start wanting BLITTER functionality the world is your oyster.

[+DZ-Jay]

I can think of several Inty hardware enhancements apart from AV mods . Hopefully they'll see the light of day in the coming months.

 

Adding arithmetic functionality like multiply and divide (found in intvnut's JLP cart) that execute far, far quicker than their CP1610 code equivalents is a good move. The only other thing really lacking at "instruction level" is BCD conversion/arithmetic for scores etc. However, BCD conversion isn't such a speed issue in games because you don't update the score all that often. It'd be on the "nice to have" list.

 

When you start wanting BLITTER functionality the world is your oyster.

 

Well, shows you how little imagination I have. For some reason I was only thinking of A/V mods. Shoot! Now you got me on that path, I can dream of endless enhancements that I could use!

 

-dZ.

[HunterZero]

Sounds like an Inty FX chip! With more processing power you could do some other tricks like squeezing more colours out of the system by colour switching or sound multiplexing.

 

- J