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How has this not been posted yet? Retro VGS


racerx

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Exactly my point. :)

 

At the same time, it's hard to convince them otherwise. The new generation of programmers are probably taught Java as their first language and are told memory management is hard, pointers are hard, and objects are God's gift to programming. If they weren't shielded from the most basic concepts of computing and learned C instead, we wouldn't have this.

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I've never been able to figure out this logic when the topic of emulation vs. real hardware comes up. I've heard it all and experienced it all and I just can't fathom how people still bash emulation like it's some kind of terrible experience in playing virtually the exact games we all love. It's not like these emulators are total junk, I've never encountered issues at all in games I've played for years and years. If anything, emulation makes things so much better because a lot of older system had serious design flaws.

 

Isolated to consoles, which this thread is obviously about.. ok yeah it's arguable.

 

Arcade games though, (especially pre-JAMMA) are a totally different story of course. Just saying. :)

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I've never been able to figure out this logic when the topic of emulation vs. real hardware comes up. I've heard it all and experienced it all and I just can't fathom how people still bash emulation like it's some kind of terrible experience in playing virtually the exact games we all love. It's not like these emulators are total junk, I've never encountered issues at all in games I've played for years and years. If anything, emulation makes things so much better because a lot of older system had serious design flaws. The video quality is much better on emulators, flicker can be taken out of the games, and dear God, getting games to work in a real NES is absolutely maddening. The controllers on certain systems sucked, sometimes there was no pause button, games that could have used a save system didn't have one. Emulation fixes more things than it wrecks. It's fine to have all the old systems, God knows I have a ton of that shit like everyone else here, but I just can't agree with anyone who acts like people who emulate have no idea what they're missing, like having to blow in carts and struggle to get the system to read the game only to have the cart freeze up in the middle of a long play session of a Nintendo game. Controller cords are too short. To me, the prospects of this is exactly why emulation is the way to go.

 

I'm definitely not singling you out (I don't care how anyone plays their games, I just am glad we're all enjoying them), but I've seen so many videos on youtube from collectors who think they're God's gift to gaming because they take the time to go to the second hand stores, flea markets, etc and someone playing off a rom doesn't go through any of this work to accomplish the same goal - to play video game x. In any area of life, we take the path of least resistance. You wouldn't make extra work for yourself to do at your job just for the sake of it, so why is it required that someone pillages thrift stores on a weekly or daily basis when you can cut right through the bullshit and get right to business? They're only video games, first and foremost. I just think it's an archaic way of thinking and this "experience" of retro gaming is an overstated crock that collectors use to justify themselves amassing old junk when someone asks "why the hell don't you just download the game?". The ritual of inserting a CD or a cartridge isn't that exciting. USB controller adapters are inexpensive. And while I have them, I never even use them. The convenience of a wireless, comfortable controller is just to high to worry about using an original.

 

Personally, I tend to collect physical copies of things harder to accomplish via emulation. Like the Bally Astrocade controllers, tabletop arcade units/handhelds or light gun games. Even that Atari 2600 paddle or racing games. Problem is half the time those peripherals don't work to begin with or they're simply undersupported. And I just don't have time to rebuy and rebuy these things so that they'll work for the 10 minutes they'll really get used. But hey, it's more power to anyone to collect what they enjoy and I certainly encourage it. But as someone who has all the classic systems and emulation devices, I can't sit quiet when someone says that a person like me isn't experiencing the game properly because they are playing a rom. It makes no difference to me because it's the game that creates the experience, not a controller or slipping a cart in a slot.

 

Great points! My discovery of emulation in the late 90s forestalled what could have been the beginning of my game collecting. As time has gone by into the current collector environment, I'm starting to lean back that direction. And if not emulation, than modern flash carts for playing on authentic hardware.

 

It's neeto to have original carts, particularly the manuals, but really I care more about playing the games than gaming the collector market. And I think SoCalMike is more interested in the latter.

Edited by Gentlegamer
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I've felt all along that there are some great new retro titles being made and I believe there are gamers who would enjoy having them on a cartridge. Yes, many of these great homebrew games are coming out on carts for original systems, but I have friends who grew up gaming on those classic consoles who I know still are retro gaming on their mobile devices, and have absolutely no idea that new games are still being made for them (original legacy systems). When I mention to them a NEW console that plays games like they enjoyed playing growing up they immediately love the idea of having a system like this. I believe there is a larger market for something like this above and beyond the niche collector market that exists here and on other classic gaming forums. We wanted to give developers the opportunity to reach people like my friends who have families and have no idea games are still being made for older systems. Giving these games additional "life" on a "new" system could open the market up and help all developers reach a market that before never existed. That is a really good thing! This was never meant as a replacement for the classic systems, but a new way to show a larger mass market that games like they love to play are still being made and there is a better way to play them than on glass touch screens. RVGS can bring these games to the forefront and out from just under the veil of forums like this.

 

I think you are seriously overestimating your target market. Asking a few friends and friends-of-friends if they'd want a product like this is a far cry from actual market research with huge sample numbers -- something companies pay *millions* for. What looks on the surface to be a goldmine may actually be the same twenty collectors buying multiples of everything. It's very easy to fall into the trap of myopically deducing that everyone thinks and feels like you do about old games or even gaming in general. Like it or not, the style of games we played in the past are the new disposable entertainment people whittle away at while waiting at the dentist. Just because people are playing these games on their phones doesn't mean they are willing to sit down in front of their TV with a controller and play them. We are talking about two very different animals here. I wouldn't use the homebrew developer community as a model either. Almost all homebrews I've seen are labours of love that probably lost money. Just because they are low print runs and sell for hundreds or thousands on the secondary market doesn't mean there's a viable market there either. If this practice was such a cash cow why doesn't every homebrew developer just hold back most of their run of the game and sell it on ebay for inflated prices?

 

Name dropping a bunch of developers means squat if there's no hardware for them to develop on. If you can't stick to a basic verbal agreement not to spill the beans about a company's involvement then you are setting yourself up in the future for some large monetary losses for breaking what will be legal NDA's. If this concept is as good as you say it is then it should be able to stand on it's own merits and not need propping up from Konami and the like. Remember, big console makers take a loss on the hardware to get market penetration and then make their money on software. Even then it takes years to see a return on investment. If you are in this for the long haul then it's going to be a very lean first few years. At some point you will hit saturation, where everyone who wanted an RVGS will have bought one and you will have an even steeper uphill battle to get the attention of the people who weren't interested in it in the first place. That, or you come up with new ways to get the same people who already bought the hardware to reinvest in it. Sony and Microsoft have entire divisions working day and night on this very problem, so why again should I take notice when you *say* you can do this better.

 

Do it better. Show me. Then we'll talk.

 

 

tl/dr: Don't put the cart(tridge) before the horse... er hardware.

Edited by rob_ocelot
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... I give Mike MAD props for coming back to talk to us. Says a lot about him.

 

I agree. I still think the RVGS was a total shitshow but at least Mike has the balls to come back and face the music. The song has played and now he's trying to write a new tune. He's lost a lot of credit in the video game world over this but if his product comes back bulletproof it won't matter if Hilter was marketing it, it will sell. If it sucks, well it will be wash, rinse, repeat of last time (aka another shitshow).

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Great points! My discovery of emulation in the late 90s forestalled what could have been the beginning of my game collecting. As time has gone by into the current collector environment, I'm starting to lean back that direction. And if not emulation, than modern flash carts for playing on authentic hardware.

 

It's neeto to have original carts, particularly the manuals, but really I care more about playing the games than gaming the collector market. And I think SoCalMike is more interested in the latter.

The modern flash carts are cool, but I always think of the negatives of, say, an NES compared to just using my Ouya. It's no fun struggling to get an NES to work and if I had all my consoles hooked up at once, there'd be no room for anything else. Not to mention the Ouya has the awesome resolution compared to RCA. I think why emulation is getting more and more accepted is because people are realizing just how impractical it is to own all of this shit plus DIY arcade projects are just too cool to not do. I'm also a modern gamer, so I have to have my PS3, PS4, 360, Xbox One and Wii U hooked up, plus a blu-ray player. Now factor in all my legacy consoles back to the Astrocade and you'll see why my Ouya needs to be my primary retro gaming device. That's 6 modern devices connected to my TV already.

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4) Fast forward to the present. Yes, we pulled the IGG campaign and agree it should have NEVER been turned on in the first place. Prior to pulling the campaign John took it upon himself to light up his famous table prototype video (without any heads up to Steve or myself). At first, Steve and I were taken by surprise, but his attempt at showing a prototype did garner some positive sentiment among the natives so I thought we dodged a bullet there. In the end, I think it did more harm than good and wish it never got posted. But John is a very good guy and very capable engineer. But somehow this product grew into a three headed monster with him at the hardware helm. And I am not saying this was all his fault. John did his best to engineer the machine Steve and I had envisioned from the start. It just got completely out of hand on many accounts and we all take the blame for that.

 

 

Beyond the lack of team dynamics or an established single portal for all your PR I'm more disturbed by the thinking and language on display. If this whole concept is as awesome as you keep telling us then why do phrases like "dodged a bullet there" even creep into the conversation? That is seat-of-your-pants talk not we-are-airtight-and-ready talk. That you even thought throwing this at us in a feeble attempt at assuage any fears over a lack of tangible hardware speaks volumes for your interpretation of what your core audience wanted or even who your target audience is. Whether John broke rank is immaterial, as you get to both grind him under the bus and then praise him for making the bus in the first place. Pretty much the same treatment Kevin got (IMO).

 

 

I was hesitating posting this cartoon because it hits the nail on the head so squarely but here goes...

 

tree-swing1-resized-600.jpg

 

 

Your fundraising campaign was your one and only shot of hosting Saturday Night Live and you blew it. You not only farted on the air, you had the gall to blame it on the cameraman and in the same breath asked Lorne Michaels if you could host the show again next week.

 

In an industry where first mistakes are usually fatal unless you have deep enough pockets to buffer the loss there's usually no second chances. You are going to have to work twice as hard and three times as long to get back the people who already had decided to support you.

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Having owned an extensive collection classic systems (much of which got destroyed) I know precisely the differences and advantages/disadvantages of emulation vs genuine hardware.

 

I'm well aware of the experience and annoyances of gaming via cartridge medium. To me, emulation provides a more hassle-free and elegant experience, I've tweaked the emus I use to near-perfection. I've got a dedicated computer and an awesome display for them and I don't experience the problems one has if doing emulation "right out of the box" without any setup, configuration, and organization.

 

A typical collector may spend time traveling around town and scanning through eBay. I spend my time adjusting configurations, hunting down bugs, setting options. It all comes out about the same.

 

The essence of the game and having fun is what's important here. And the data contained in a GameProgram cart is precisely the same a rom dump. Air-Sea Battle looks, sounds, and plays the same whether emulated or played on real hardware.

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I love how everyone went from being interested in this machine, to 60 pages of ripping on it, and Mike/Steve/John, to pull a complete 180 and start butt-groping their imaginary work again. The project got pulled, it should have died then and there... Sorry guys, but maybe if you had something other than a dream and promises that big name developers were working on a machine that didn't exist yet, maybe you wouldn't be stuck holding the molding to a dead console (that should also have stayed dead).

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Having owned an extensive collection classic systems (much of which got destroyed) I know precisely the differences and advantages/disadvantages of emulation vs genuine hardware.

 

I'm well aware of the experience and annoyances of gaming via cartridge medium. To me, emulation provides a more hassle-free and elegant experience, I've tweaked the emus I use to near-perfection. I've got a dedicated computer and an awesome display for them and I don't experience the problems one has if doing emulation "right out of the box" without any setup, configuration, and organization.

 

A typical collector may spend time traveling around town and scanning through eBay. I spend my time adjusting configurations, hunting down bugs, setting options. It all comes out about the same.

 

The essence of the game and having fun is what's important here. And the data contained in a GameProgram cart is precisely the same a rom dump. Air-Sea Battle looks, sounds, and plays the same whether emulated or played on real hardware.

 

You should interview yourself on video and post it on youtube. Or talk to a mirror for a little while, pretending that you are not actually looking at yourself.

 

And for the people who keep posting, stating they are not interested at all, why post at all? Isn't that like offering sugar to a forum full of diabetic users?

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And for the people who keep posting, stating they are not interested at all, why post at all? Isn't that like offering sugar to a forum full of diabetic users?

I hope people will move to this thread and keep it alive until the product is finished:

 

Poll: Interest in an FPGA Videogame System

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I've never been able to figure out this logic when the topic of emulation vs. real hardware comes up. I've heard it all and experienced it all and I just can't fathom how people still bash emulation like it's some kind of terrible experience in playing virtually the exact games we all love. It's not like these emulators are total junk, I've never encountered issues at all in games I've played for years and years. If anything, emulation makes things so much better because a lot of older system had serious design flaws. The video quality is much better on emulators, flicker can be taken out of the games, and dear God, getting games to work in a real NES is absolutely maddening. The controllers on certain systems sucked, sometimes there was no pause button, games that could have used a save system didn't have one. Emulation fixes more things than it wrecks. It's fine to have all the old systems, God knows I have a ton of that shit like everyone else here, but I just can't agree with anyone who acts like people who emulate have no idea what they're missing, like having to blow in carts and struggle to get the system to read the game only to have the cart freeze up in the middle of a long play session of a Nintendo game. Controller cords are too short. To me, the prospects of this is exactly why emulation is the way to go.

 

I'm definitely not singling you out (I don't care how anyone plays their games, I just am glad we're all enjoying them), but I've seen so many videos on youtube from collectors who think they're God's gift to gaming because they take the time to go to the second hand stores, flea markets, etc and someone playing off a rom doesn't go through any of this work to accomplish the same goal - to play video game x. In any area of life, we take the path of least resistance. You wouldn't make extra work for yourself to do at your job just for the sake of it, so why is it required that someone pillages thrift stores on a weekly or daily basis when you can cut right through the bullshit and get right to business? They're only video games, first and foremost. I just think it's an archaic way of thinking and this "experience" of retro gaming is an overstated crock that collectors use to justify themselves amassing old junk when someone asks "why the hell don't you just download the game?". The ritual of inserting a CD or a cartridge isn't that exciting. USB controller adapters are inexpensive. And while I have them, I never even use them. The convenience of a wireless, comfortable controller is just to high to worry about using an original.

 

Personally, I tend to collect physical copies of things harder to accomplish via emulation. Like the Bally Astrocade controllers, tabletop arcade units/handhelds or light gun games. Even that Atari 2600 paddle or racing games. Problem is half the time those peripherals don't work to begin with or they're simply undersupported. And I just don't have time to rebuy and rebuy these things so that they'll work for the 10 minutes they'll really get used. But hey, it's more power to anyone to collect what they enjoy and I certainly encourage it. But as someone who has all the classic systems and emulation devices, I can't sit quiet when someone says that a person like me isn't experiencing the game properly because they are playing a rom. It makes no difference to me because it's the game that creates the experience, not a controller or slipping a cart in a slot.

You bring some interesting points here. I might add, that due to scarcity, many games are completely out of reach. For this, I prefer gaming on the original system through a flash cart. It is the perfect balance IMO between the "authentic" experience and amassing tons and tons of expensive crap. If a game is unobtainable, no big deal, just throw it on a flash cart and enjoy it as it was meant to be played, on a real console and CRT, but without the fat wallet necessary to obtain the game. Cheap and common stuff I love to collect, but I am starting to question if I should really seek out every single freakking game that's good to play for a decent price. My backlog is already so vast, it would take years to play through all the games that I own. That's one of the reasons I focus so much on homebrew. I feel I am supporting the community while enjoying new games on old hardware. But the time may come soon enough that I have to let a lot of things go, and having a fully loaded flash cart for nearly every system I own is a means to this. I can let go of so much that I never play knowing I can just insert my flash cart and play it. But it's not "emulation" if I'm using original hardware, is it??? :P

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That you even thought throwing this at us in a feeble attempt at assuage any fears over a lack of tangible hardware speaks volumes for your interpretation of what your core audience wanted or even who your target audience is.

I just learned a new word! :D

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/assuage

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I love how everyone went from being interested in this machine, to 60 pages of ripping on it, and Mike/Steve/John, to pull a complete 180 and start butt-groping their imaginary work again. The project got pulled, it should have died then and there... Sorry guys, but maybe if you had something other than a dream and promises that big name developers were working on a machine that didn't exist yet, maybe you wouldn't be stuck holding the molding to a dead console (that should also have stayed dead).

Well put. ;-)

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Beyond the lack of team dynamics or an established single portal for all your PR I'm more disturbed by the thinking and language on display. If this whole concept is as awesome as you keep telling us then why do phrases like "dodged a bullet there" even creep into the conversation? That is seat-of-your-pants talk not we-are-airtight-and-ready talk. That you even thought throwing this at us in a feeble attempt at assuage any fears over a lack of tangible hardware speaks volumes for your interpretation of what your core audience wanted or even who your target audience is. Whether John broke rank is immaterial, as you get to both grind him under the bus and then praise him for making the bus in the first place. Pretty much the same treatment Kevin got (IMO).

 

I'm glad someone brought this up. I read the "apology" and found it to have several completely unnecessary, backhanded comments.

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That would require skill on the part of the developer. People want to write shit in BASIC or another hand-holding language, so they need a super fast console, to make a SNES style game. How many of the 150 "developers" could actually write a real SNES game?

 

The way I see it, what these devs are really asking for when supporting the Retro VGS idea, is a platform where their games will be exclusive cause Steam is probably oversaturated with these sorts of games atm. And I really don't think that is a problem you can solve with a console release. On the other hand, this "higher" barrier-to-entry for developing for older consoles might be a great arbitrary way of controlling overcrowding of games.

 

 

At the same time, it's hard to convince them otherwise. The new generation of programmers are probably taught Java as their first language and are told memory management is hard, pointers are hard, and objects are God's gift to programming. If they weren't shielded from the most basic concepts of computing and learned C instead, we wouldn't have this.

 

Yeah, agree totally. To be fair, I guess a lot of homebrew/Indie titles are 1 man shows, so the devs have to be both software developers and artists. So, while I'm not against the idea of middleware in general, I think we can safely rule it out of this particular niche as not making much sense. They have the place they deserve in modern gaming platforms. Your comment reminds me of an old article from Joel Spolsky:

 

http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/ThePerilsofJavaSchools.html

Edited by 001 Influence Device
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You bring some interesting points here. I might add, that due to scarcity, many games are completely out of reach. For this, I prefer gaming on the original system through a flash cart. It is the perfect balance IMO between the "authentic" experience and amassing tons and tons of expensive crap. If a game is unobtainable, no big deal, just throw it on a flash cart and enjoy it as it was meant to be played, on a real console and CRT, but without the fat wallet necessary to obtain the game. Cheap and common stuff I love to collect, but I am starting to question if I should really seek out every single freakking game that's good to play for a decent price. My backlog is already so vast, it would take years to play through all the games that I own. That's one of the reasons I focus so much on homebrew. I feel I am supporting the community while enjoying new games on old hardware. But the time may come soon enough that I have to let a lot of things go, and having a fully loaded flash cart for nearly every system I own is a means to this. I can let go of so much that I never play knowing I can just insert my flash cart and play it. But it's not "emulation" if I'm using original hardware, is it??? :P

 

Well, you are playing the real game on real hardware that way, so even the anti-emulation people can't dis you. But that's why I got into emulation, you mention the backlog. I could spend 5 grand on 1000 retro games I want to play, and I would have, but why when the devs aren't getting that money anyways? Emulating is a grey area and these collectors play that card, but in the end it don't mean shit. Stardust4ever might be a doctor, he might run the til at KFC, but at the end of the day if no more money goes to a dev from my fandom, it really doesn't matter if I stole it or paid it to some pawn shop fuck. You like the flash cart and the CRT, I like the Ouya and the HDTV. We're not at all different at the end of the day playing games. I just don't like the superiority complex that comes with rare games. And in this hobby, I am thankful for emulation because the doctor or the KFC counterperson can still play the Nintendo World Championship cart and it's all equal. I'm the kind of guy that doesn't want any game to go missed because of the lack of money or the lack of space. It's a fairy tale and the business people hate it, but I want every retro gamer to get their fix as long as they put as much as they can back into the hobby, even word of mouth helps. What shocked me most is so many big collectors aren't in the homebrew scene. You spent $1000 on the shittiest game made for the 2600, but you won't spend $30 on a homebrew? Something's wrong with you, not the gamers. I'm sorry.

 

If video games are art, and the collectors want you to believe every little detail matters, hence their negative stance on emulation where less than 1% is inaccurate... significantly less, then to rob anyone due to lack of money to experience this art means you aren't a real artist at all, nor do you believe in the media you love. This is why libraries have films and books for free. Because all the people in the world deserve to consume art created by those of the world. If they're not on board with this, they really don't want your preferred artform to succeed and I pity them. In high school they used the same Hamlet books for 20 years. And there were 60 students per year using those books. 1200 people got to experience 300 bucks worth of books. And this is in my small town, imagine in a metropolis. If you're going to be an artist, be an artist.

Edited by bretthorror
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You spent $1000 on the shittiest game made for the 2600, but you won't spend $30 on a homebrew? Something's wrong with you, not the gamers. I'm sorry.

Yeah, I don't get it either. Some people collect for their e-peen, ie if it is rare, it's worth pursuing, not because a game is good or worth playing. I own the NWC repro as well, translucent blue cartridge that plays identical to the original. Probably saved a good 5 grand at the time when I bought it to the tune of $55, more like ten grand now in today's economy. Then there are turds from a gameplay perspective like Air Raid and Stadium Events. I wouldn't even want a repro of one of those.

 

But there are gamers and there are shelf collectors. Really everyone in this retro collecting/gaming hobby is somewhere between the two extremes. Most gamers own games they've never played, and most collectors have picked up and played games at some point.

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