evietron Posted April 27, 2022 Share Posted April 27, 2022 For those who don't already know, my BackBit Pro cartridge will play games from a MicroSD card on over a dozen vintage machines. A number of people reached out to me recently asking if I could add support for the Intellivision, so... I bought & restored an Intellivision II, learned a little CP1610, read up on decles and made it happen. You can load ROM and BIN files from the built-in file browser. To use BIN+CFG, put them through a tool like BIN2ROM. It will be possible to add support for titles that need RAM or bank switching (with a firmware update). You can place a pre-order at store.backbit.io if you are so inclined. They would be available right now if it wasn't for the chip shortage. Although, if you already have a BackBit Pro cartridge, all you have to do is order the adapter. 21 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+fdr4prez Posted April 27, 2022 Share Posted April 27, 2022 Wow, that is great. Thanks for the hard work Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+JasonlikesINTV Posted April 27, 2022 Share Posted April 27, 2022 So this is some sort of thingamajig? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+fdr4prez Posted April 27, 2022 Share Posted April 27, 2022 14 minutes ago, JasonlikesINTV said: So this is some sort of thingamajig? No, this is a thingamabob Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnPCAE Posted April 27, 2022 Share Posted April 27, 2022 Oh, heck yes! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sinjinhawke Posted April 27, 2022 Share Posted April 27, 2022 (edited) That is quite the versatile cartridge. Edited April 27, 2022 by Sinjinhawke Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+cjherr Posted April 27, 2022 Share Posted April 27, 2022 Very nice. Preorder placed. I'm eager to see it in action. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+cmadruga Posted April 27, 2022 Share Posted April 27, 2022 @evietron Does it, or will it support JLP functions like hardware acceleration and flash storage? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yell0w_lantern Posted April 27, 2022 Share Posted April 27, 2022 You are utterly amazing! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wolfy62 Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 This looks really cool,thanks for your efforts in producing this!?? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
evietron Posted April 28, 2022 Author Share Posted April 28, 2022 9 hours ago, cmadruga said: @evietron Does it, or will it support JLP functions like hardware acceleration and flash storage? Is this for new development or to support existing games? How many current titles use JLP? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+cmadruga Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 19 minutes ago, evietron said: Is this for new development or to support existing games? How many current titles use JLP? I was thinking primarily for development, but I like to think it could also support a limited (but hopefully growing in the future) number of JLP enabled games distributed digitally. To be fair, the number of JLP enabled games compared with the total number of releases is quite small. I don't have an exact count, maybe others could chime in. However, the most recent JLP game released digitally was The Sorrow of Gadhlan' Tur, which actually won a Game of the Year award. Given the shortage of JLP carts, it could not be released physically. And because LTO Flash carts are also sold out, those not fortunate enough to own one were limited to experiencing it through emulation. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Lathe26 Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 Just to extend/echo what others have said: JLP are one type of board used for new homebrew games. JLP boards are designed to hold a single game and provide extra features beyond just RAM and ROM. One feature is extra CPU instructions for accelerating games that take advantage of them (i.e., these extra CPU instructions take advantage of the top 6 bits of 16-bit words that the CP1610 CPU does not use in its 10-bit instructions). It also provides other features such as FLASH storage. My understanding is that the multi-cart called the LTO FLASH also supports JLP features (both the LTO FLASH and JLP boards were designed by the same person). None of the original 125 games (i.e., non-homebrew) use JLP features since those games predate the JLP boards by a few decades. At this point, I don't know how many games take advantage of the extra JLP features. Perhaps @Rev, @Games For Your Intellivision, and other developers and game producers can help give estimates. The main reason folks are asking about JLP boards is that there are several recent exciting games ready to ship that have been written using the JLP features. Unfortunately there is a shortage of JLP boards so these games have stuck either being unreleased or released only digitally (i.e., no physical releases with cartridges, boxes, manuals, etc). @evietron, feel free to message me if you prefer to take discussing the more technical aspects offline (rather than clutter up this announcement thread). 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Lathe26 Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 Also, placed my order for the BackBit + Intellivision adapter. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BBWW Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 Placed my order...these will be cool. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Games For Your Intellivision Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 Off the top of my head, the following titles require JLP cartridges: Match 5 The Lost Caves of Kroz Boulder Dash Hover Bovver Steamroller Miner 2049er Ninja Odyssey TNT Cowboy A-F Defender of the Crown Star Mercenary Cat Attack Infiltrator Robot Army The Pandora Incident Rick Dynamite A Tale of Dragons and Swords Klax Wizard of Wor Fantasy Cosmic Avenger Omega Race Fubar It is more than a handful of titles. 10 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
evietron Posted April 29, 2022 Author Share Posted April 29, 2022 On 4/28/2022 at 11:57 AM, Games For Your Intellivision said: Off the top of my head, the following titles require JLP cartridges: It is more than a handful of titles. Do those titles require just bank switching and/or ROM, or do they use FLASH, random number generation, and multiply/divide acceleration? In general, I'm not inclined to support "acceleration" features, as those don't maintain the spirit of classic gaming. But bank switching ROMs were common back in the day, and make sense to support. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+videofx Posted April 30, 2022 Share Posted April 30, 2022 Also, placed my order for the BackBit + Intellivision adapter. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
imstarryeyed Posted April 30, 2022 Share Posted April 30, 2022 I have bought and use Evie's Commodore 64, Vic 20 and Sega Genesis devices and I can vouch she is an excellent engineer, very responsive to requests and has awesome customer service. I will definitely buy the Intellivision product soon myself. I just wanted to share my experience with her products when I found this thread. 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Games For Your Intellivision Posted May 1, 2022 Share Posted May 1, 2022 On 4/30/2022 at 5:59 AM, evietron said: Do those titles require just bank switching and/or ROM, or do they use FLASH, random number generation, and multiply/divide acceleration? In general, I'm not inclined to support "acceleration" features, as those don't maintain the spirit of classic gaming. But bank switching ROMs were common back in the day, and make sense to support. The JLP cartridge has RAM support and Flash RAM support in addition to bank switching. When INTVnut returns, he can probably let you know the technical details. Regardless of the 'spirit of classic gaming', if you want your cartridge to be able to run programs that exist for the system, it would be wise to include the math routines if possible. I believe that FUBAR is the only game that currently uses them as it allowed him to run at the speed he needed. He can fill you in (Mike H.) as I believe that he is in this thread. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1980gamer Posted May 3, 2022 Share Posted May 3, 2022 I think Space Patrol may use faster math routines also? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Lathe26 Posted May 3, 2022 Share Posted May 3, 2022 2 hours ago, 1980gamer said: I think Space Patrol may use faster math routines also? I think Space Patrol pre-dates JLP boards by several years, so that seems unlikely. I could be wrong, though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1980gamer Posted May 3, 2022 Share Posted May 3, 2022 6 hours ago, Lathe26 said: I think Space Patrol pre-dates JLP boards by several years, so that seems unlikely. I could be wrong, though. Hmm, Maybe. I thought this was the game that "created" the new routines? Maybe it was done via software? As you say that was a 2007-08-ish release. 15 years ago is a long time ago to remember the details. I do remember talk about squeezing every ounce of performance out of the Intellivision. By the way.. A great game! I loved the TI99 version of Moon Patrol and this was certainly inspired by that version of the game. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mr_me Posted May 3, 2022 Share Posted May 3, 2022 Space Patrol runs fine with Bliss and Nostalgia emulators. Those old emulators don't emulate hardware acceleration, as far as I know. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+-^CrossBow^- Posted May 3, 2022 Share Posted May 3, 2022 Just placed my order for a few things as well. Thanks for posting about this! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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