Our New Machine, Pandora

[Exophase]

First of all, the only people who are suggesting NDS are people who don't realize that it isn't possible on the craiginator at good speeds.

And on what basis do you make that claim? It might be powerful enough to emulate DS at full speed (if someone's serious about doing a fast emulator), if "good speeds" is something below that for you then even more likely. I really shouldn't say things like that because it generates a lot of false hype but to say that it "isn't possible" is much too short sighted.

Second, we haven't talked about PS2 emulation at all. Third, adding N64 emulation isn't to make it compete, but to add a whole library of games that a lot of people other than you and DaveC like. And Finally, craig is trying very hard to make sure that he DOESN'T infringe any copyrights with the design, and if you're talking about emulation, then that'd be a pointless argument, because emulation was a very big part of the GP2X, too.

-God Ginrai

It's not like craig is picking and choosing what all these platforms he wants emulated for launch. If a new emulator happens it'll be because a dev wanted to do it. Likewise, if a dev wants to do one then craig probably won't be able to stop him/her.

Marketing wasn't the only issue. Lack of games. Bad timing - the PSP came out to too long after, and the DS was released just before if I remember rightly - could be wrong though. A small number of people had issues with the analogue - once configured, I found it to be a million times better that the effort on the GP2X.

Zodiac was out a solid year before DS's release date.

It's was a shame as it was/still is one of the best looking handhelds out there.Very slick and professional looking. And having played Terminatior and tomb raider on the unit, shows how sweet games could on it.

I wonder is Craigix has got any commercial developers on board to create original contect for the machine. I wonder if he has spoken tot the various guys that worked on the various Zodiac games, to see if they will port or develop for Project Bumble Bee?

Given how popular those games probably were (not very) I'd be surprised if craig personally invests money in attracting commercial devs. Besides, ports of Zodiac games would be kinda weak on a platform like this. If people want to sell games for this I'm sure they can go that route on their own.

 

[Vilmos]

It's was a shame as it was/still is one of the best looking handhelds out there.Very slick and professional looking. And having played Terminatior and tomb raider on the unit, shows how sweet games could on it.

I wonder is Craigix has got any commercial developers on board to create original contect for the machine. I wonder if he has spoken tot the various guys that worked on the various Zodiac games, to see if they will port or develop for Project Bumble Bee?

Given how popular those games probably were (not very) I'd be surprised if craig personally invests money in attracting commercial devs. Besides, ports of Zodiac games would be kinda weak on a platform like this. If people want to sell games for this I'm sure they can go that route on their own.


Seeing as Tomb Raider and Terminator were never finished and released for Zodiac their commercial popularity was zero and can't really be considered.

As for devving on the new unit I'm planning on giving it a whirl.

 

[seubz]

Hello everyone,
This post is mainly aimed at the "Craiginator" designers.

I'm new to this forum and I've been following this thread for quite a while. I don't really know where to post that, but I wanted to say that I was offering my help for developing drivers for the device, if help is needed obviously. I'm working in a firm which designs Windows CE and Linux BSPs, and so far I've mainly worked with ARM architectures. Even though the target for your project is different, reading datasheets and developing drivers in C/C++ is universal So if you guys need some help, feel free to contact me !

Cheers,
Sébastien.

 

[God Ginrai]

First of all, the only people who are suggesting NDS are people who don't realize that it isn't possible on the craiginator at good speeds.

And on what basis do you make that claim? It might be powerful enough to emulate DS at full speed (if someone's serious about doing a fast emulator), if "good speeds" is something below that for you then even more likely. I really shouldn't say things like that because it generates a lot of false hype but to say that it "isn't possible" is much too short sighted.


2 things. First, Fullspeed DS emulation (with DS commercial roms) isn't even working on the PC yet last I checked, so yes, I can pretty confidently say that if a pc can't pull it off as of yet, there is not much of a chance for one to be made for a handheld. Second I made that claim because the improbability renders it as what the GP2X community sees as "impossible." If you have issues with my claim, then I'd like to know why you didn't think N64 was possible on the 2X. I was just operating under that mentality so that false hope WON'T be generated.

Second, we haven't talked about PS2 emulation at all. Third, adding N64 emulation isn't to make it compete, but to add a whole library of games that a lot of people other than you and DaveC like. And Finally, craig is trying very hard to make sure that he DOESN'T infringe any copyrights with the design, and if you're talking about emulation, then that'd be a pointless argument, because emulation was a very big part of the GP2X, too.

-God Ginrai

It's not like craig is picking and choosing what all these platforms he wants emulated for launch. If a new emulator happens it'll be because a dev wanted to do it. Likewise, if a dev wants to do one then craig probably won't be able to stop him/her.


I don't understand what you're saying with that response, could you please rephrase it?

-God Ginrai

 

[Orkie]

I can pretty confidently say that if a pc can't pull it off as of yet, there is not much of a chance for one to be made for a handheld.

A PC could do it - the raw power is there, it's just a question of optimising the emulators. I don't know how much of a difference it makes in reality, but I would've thought translating ARM to ARM would result in less opcodes being used on the 'host' computer for each emulated opcode than running an emulator on a different instruction set entirely.

 

[God Ginrai]

I can pretty confidently say that if a pc can't pull it off as of yet, there is not much of a chance for one to be made for a handheld.

A PC could do it - the raw power is there, it's just a question of optimising the emulators. I don't know how much of a difference it makes in reality, but I would've thought translating ARM to ARM would result in less opcodes being used on the 'host' computer for each emulated opcode than running an emulator on a different instruction set entirely.


That's true, but the ARM processors aren't the only things the DS has in it. Oh, and I'm sure the PC has the power to emulate the PS2 as well, but that doesn't mean we see it emulated even at playable speeds.

-God Ginrai

 

[Orkie]

http://forums.ngemu.com/pcsx2-official-for...y-computer.html

I know perfectly well what is in a DS and to me, it doesn't seem to be that much of an improvement over the GBA other than the 3D support and the fact there are two graphics setups.

 

[PoisonedV]

When did this start being called the bumble bee project? (someone said that in an earlier post)
I think craig should make his own publishing thing with it, so more people could make commercial games without having to set it up all yourselves... That might attract more people, too, For some reason, normal people are drawn to PAYING for their games! They either don't like homebrew, or don't want to deal with emulators (my friend sold his GP2X on ebay in like 2 weeks, lol.)

 

[Exophase]

2 things. First, Fullspeed DS emulation (with DS commercial roms) isn't even working on the PC yet last I checked, so yes, I can pretty confidently say that if a pc can't pull it off as of yet, there is not much of a chance for one to be made for a handheld.

The performance of DS emulators on PC is not indicative of their potential. I know with certainty that existing DS emulators, like a majority of GBA emulators, are not at all efficient. One of the biggest things they all lack are dynamic recompilers.

Second I made that claim because the improbability renders it as what the GP2X community sees as "impossible." If you have issues with my claim, then I'd like to know why you didn't think N64 was possible on the 2X. I was just operating under that mentality so that false hope WON'T be generated.

The biggest reason N64 isn't possible on GP2X because N64 has an FPU and GP2X doesn't. Software FPU emulation is very slow. The next biggest reason is because there's no hardware acceleration. Finally, the GP2X is just not very fast. If you compare Nintendo DS to N64 the DS's raw CPU power is at best only marginally greater (if the TCM is properly utilized and the second CPU is utilized well, which in commercial games it isn't really), and the video power is only somewhat more demanding as well. The upcoming device, on the other hand, will likely be much more powerful than GP2X (if OMAP3430 is selected than perhaps 4x more CPU power than GP2X using single core), will likely have FPU (SIMD even) and will definitely have 3D acceleration.

I think that the problem with your assertions about emulators is that they're not really grounded in any technical basis.

I don't understand what you're saying with that response, could you please rephrase it?

What I'm saying is that the emulators that'll be out for the device have little to do with anything craig does.

 

[God Ginrai]

When did this start being called the bumble bee project? (someone said that in an earlier post)
I think craig should make his own publishing thing with it, so more people could make commercial games without having to set it up all yourselves... That might attract more people, too, For some reason, normal people are drawn to PAYING for their games! They either don't like homebrew, or don't want to deal with emulators (my friend sold his GP2X on ebay in like 2 weeks, lol.)

It has been called Project Bumblebee for a while now, the name Craiginator came after. As for the thing about paying, No offense to homebrewers, but MOST homebrew games do not have the quality that commercial games, so why would someone want to pay for something that feels like a normal homebrew game. I think if craig made it so anyone could make commercial games, then it would most likely kill the Craiginator, because obviously people would want to take the route that makes more money, but the people who purchase the Craiginator would be the people who would rather have free homebrew and emulation.

EDIT:

2 things. First, Fullspeed DS emulation (with DS commercial roms) isn't even working on the PC yet last I checked, so yes, I can pretty confidently say that if a pc can't pull it off as of yet, there is not much of a chance for one to be made for a handheld.

The performance of DS emulators on PC is not indicative of their potential. I know with certainty that existing DS emulators, like a majority of GBA emulators, are not at all efficient. One of the biggest things they all lack are dynamic recompilers.

Second I made that claim because the improbability renders it as what the GP2X community sees as "impossible." If you have issues with my claim, then I'd like to know why you didn't think N64 was possible on the 2X. I was just operating under that mentality so that false hope WON'T be generated.

The biggest reason N64 isn't possible on GP2X because N64 has an FPU and GP2X doesn't. Software FPU emulation is very slow. The next biggest reason is because there's no hardware acceleration. Finally, the GP2X is just not very fast. If you compare Nintendo DS to N64 the DS's raw CPU power is at best only marginally greater (if the TCM is properly utilized and the second CPU is utilized well, which in commercial games it isn't really), and the video power is only somewhat more demanding as well. The upcoming device, on the other hand, will likely be much more powerful than GP2X (if OMAP3430 is selected than perhaps 4x more CPU power than GP2X using single core), will likely have FPU (SIMD even) and will definitely have 3D acceleration.


As for the DS, I don't know, maybe with Dynamic recompilation we can get good speeds with a DS emu, I just don't think fullspeed is possible.

As for N64 on the GP2X, with efficient coding, the emulator could have been made, but it would've been mainly a POC, just like the one for the PSP.

I don't understand what you're saying with that response, could you please rephrase it?

What I'm saying is that the emulators that'll be out for the device have little to do with anything craig does.

Ah, ok. Well, I wasn't saying that craig was having any say in the emus, when I was talking about craig, I was talking about how he was trying not to infringe any copyrights hardware-wise. I mentioned the emulators, because I was taking into consideration that he didn't mean hardware infringements, and meant software infringements through emus.

-God Ginrai

 

[PoisonedV]

Hmm, I guess thats right... I have found a lot of really good games though, the only thing I would say the reason I wouldn't buy a majority of them is the playing time... I think all games should have a lot of playing time, and possibly include a level editor if they want to be anywhere near commercial...

 

[Alex.]

Right, but they're not commercial. They don't even try to seem commercial. That's the whole point of homebrew. If some can take it one step further and go commercial, then why not make it easier for them to get their work out there?

 

[craigix]

Hello everyone, sorry this took so long.

Here is the analogue pad.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i26UXJOTkTk

-Craig

 

[Eolair]

Nice! That looks really good. Seems to be high quality and I like the low profile

I'm curious about the surface material though. It looks too smooth because you're thumb is slipping. Are you going to add something for better grip? Like a surface pattern maybe?

 

[apgunner]

Wheres the prototype of the whole unit i thought it was gonna be out soon?

 

[God Ginrai]

Right, but they're not commercial. They don't even try to seem commercial. That's the whole point of homebrew. If some can take it one step further and go commercial, then why not make it easier for them to get their work out there?

Because that would result in a lot of games that are pay, that weren't made very well.

Hello everyone, sorry this took so long.

Here is the analogue pad.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i26UXJOTkTk

-Craig



Nice. Btw, is that a stick click I see in the second vid?

-God Ginrai

 

[sam fisher]

Hello everyone, sorry this took so long.

Here is the analogue pad.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i26UXJOTkTk

-Craig


Awesome.

 

[Firefox]

That looks really nice! I can well imagine sliding it around with my thumb while the rest of that hand is holding the console.

 

[PoisonedV]

Will that be set in on the console, in like a dimple? Otherwise, it would seem too... short...

 

[MWeston]

Nice! That looks really good. Seems to be high quality and I like the low profile

I'm curious about the surface material though. It looks too smooth because you're thumb is slipping. Are you going to add something for better grip? Like a surface pattern maybe?

Those videos are of a dev kit for the analog controller. The newer parts actually have a very nice rubber grip on the surface and it would be very hard to slip off of it unless your fingers are very sweaty.

In the video, my thumb isn't slipping off. I am quickly lifting my thumb to show how it recoils back to the center position quickly.

Oh, and the stick does have a center click, plus it spins like a scroll feature.