I know, many of those news aren't exactly news but... while you are waiting for the next kernel exploit for ps4, following every release for Switch or hoping for an XBOX ONE hack you can miss what is happening in the huge world of older consoles so I decided to put together some "news"(from one week to one year old) for your reading pleasure.
Note: I usually put the price tag of the hardware because this is an information I like to know. I am no affiliate with anyone nor I do receive money from them.
Original Xbox
Probably the most powerful gaming system of his generation, and the least loved, it still has many dedicated fans.
Just because Nintendo forget about it, doesn't means that the nice cube is not in the heart of many gamers. Hardware development and software research are still going on.
While we are all waiting for a Dreamcast mini (no, it's not announced but you can dream
) you can still spend a lot of money for the ugly duckling of his generation:
The Playstation 2 is always under the light, with iso loaders, bluetooth adapters and an endless amount of homebrew...
Super Nintendo
The SD2SNES, the most powerful and expensive of the flashcarts available for this console received a massive hardware update (for the same price of $197). What it does it's not clear because a firmware supporting new features has to be released yet but it seems that Supergameboy emulation is now possible. The SD2SNES website is not updated so, sadly, it's unclear if this new revision is still open source like the old one (although BGA soldering is usually out of reach for most of hobbist).
Atari Jaguar
I still have wonderful memories of all time spent playing Alien vs Predator on my Jaguar, mostly because was one of the few really good games for this console. There is a new Jaguar flash cart in development, entering beta phase, with SD cart support. The first news is the price should be from GBP 150 and GBP 200. It may sound expensive but the second news is: iso loading for Jaguar CD optical disk emulation will be implemented. A JagCD unit costs almost the same price and it doesn't work as a flashcart. Do you want a cheaper option? DIY a repro cart or a Skunkboard.
Failed to fetch tweet https://twitter.com/TheRetroHQ/status/1091327454776569861
PCEngine
Never saw one of them in Europe, when it was released. Being a niche console everything is awful expensive and the newly released Flashcart+ODE+RGB combo released from Terraonion is no exception. The Super SD System 3 will give you cartridge emulation for rom loading, optical disk emulation for iso loading, arcade card emulation for better compatibility and a nice RGB out for the humble amount of $300. If you want to buy just an arcade card and a cd unit in Europe you can expect to spent almost the same price, plus add the cost for a flash cart so, not a bad deal if you have deep pockets.
https://shop.terraonion.com/en/pc-engine/12-super_sd_system_3-pc_engine.html
Sega Saturn
The Satiator, an SD card loader that plug in the FMV expansion port of a Sega Saturn is entering in beta stage, with a release planned in 2019. Still no word about pricing but expect to be expensive, around $200 probably. The other ODE option, the Rhea/Phoebe is cheaper...assuming you are able to order one.
https://www.patreon.com/posts/beta-is-entering-23201639
3DO
You probably read about this console in some "worst console of all time list". Anyway it has strong following in... Russia! And from Russia comes the only optical disk emulator for it. The news here is that last year the price for this card went silently down; from $165 to $95 for the cheapest option. Obviously my 3DO model needs the most expensive one...
http://3do-renovation.ru/How_to_buy.htm
OSSC
Want to connect your old RGB equipped console to a blazing new 4k lcd tv? Probably it doesn't have an RGB input so you need a scan converter. The Open Source Scan Converter has all his quality in the name and you can buy it for €180, in theory. The main seller of the device is relocating in Ireland (insert a random Brexit joke here) and stopped selling them but someone in China has a sweet spot for retrogamers and is selling the same identical unit for €140.
XBOX 360
Finally a little bit of love for this great console: a french dev wrote an utility to extract autodance movies. WTF it is? Simple! An easy way to embarass yourself while playing to Just Dance. If you have a supported game (Just Dance 4 and 2014-2019) and a Kinect you can record your.. erhm... performance and play them again but (fortunately) you cannot transfer them from your Xbox.
Until now.
If you have a jtag/rgh and a windows Pc you will find the utility here:
http://bidouillouzzz.blogspot.com/2019/01/juste-dance-autodance-extractor-pour.html (article in French but utility in english).
You do not care about Just Dance? Me neither but, at least, it's nice to know there are still people working on the X360.
Note: I usually put the price tag of the hardware because this is an information I like to know. I am no affiliate with anyone nor I do receive money from them.
Original Xbox
Probably the most powerful gaming system of his generation, and the least loved, it still has many dedicated fans.
- The grandfather of all video player / streaming app on console is XBMC, aka Kodi. Initially released on the original xbox many people worked on it. One of them is GCjohnson that is back to the scene ready to start again:
https://www.reddit.com/r/originalxb...troduction_original_xbmc_developer_from_2006/
- A good controller? Wireless maybe? Cheap also? Look no more! With the ogx360 you can connect a wireless Xbox 360 controller to your original xbox. Not enough? You can connect up to 4 wireless controller by adding more modules and there is beta support for wired controllers.
Just in case you are not impressed enough there is also support for Steel Battalion: you can emulate the gigantic controller with a chatpad.
Steel Battalion on OG Xbox using Wireless Xbox 360 controller with chatpad :D #ogx360
— Ryan (@Ryzee119) February 16, 2019
Bit more testing then I'll push to github! pic.twitter.com/QfY3CWRr2c
Last but not least: the project is open source!
https://github.com/Ryzee119/ogx360
- 128 megs ram expansion are not news but more and more people are doing it (useful for emulation and to play some chihiro roms). Have a look to https://www.ogxbox.com/forums or his companion facebook group https://www.facebook.com/OGXbox/ where you can buy a 128 megs modded mainboard for about $100.
Meanwhile... counterfeit xbox Samsung ram chips started appearing from your favorite china sellerhttps://www.ogxbox.com/forums/index...r-ram-installation/&tab=comments#comment-7538
- Modchips are not necessary for this old beast (unless you have a 1.6 revision) but still... people wants them. Xecuter 3 and SmartXX chips, now out of stock, can cost up to $100 each. What's the fuss about those modchip when you can softmod your console? Easy! LCD support!
Some time ago bennydiamond aka psyko_chewbacca released a new firmware for the inexpensive Aladdin modchip, adding multi nand images support and many other features (also available for a Tsop mod or as a XBE file). Last update for this project was about 1 year ago. https://assemblergames.com/threads/release-xblast-os-v0-56.68344/
He also released an entirely new modchip, the Xblast lite (cost was about $50, with LCD support) and the sad news is that the modchip is out of stock with no plan for a new run or to release the sources.
https://assemblergames.com/threads/xbox-fs-xblast-lite-v1-pre-edition.58923/page-3#post-983644
But... fear not! Someone is trying to clone the Xenium chip:
https://www.ogxbox.com/forums/index...cement-pcb-project/&tab=comments#comment-7543
And another two projects for Xbox modchips surfaced last year. One is an open source version of the Aladdin with support for Xblast OS, from Mikeaton aka Zeigren: https://www.ogxbox.com/forums/index.php?/topic/589-open-source-modchip/
And the other is a collection of designs, for different chips, still in early stages, from user one_eyed_monk:
https://assemblergames.com/threads/xbox-modchip-design-discussions.66612/page-3#post-966626
- Want to add an usb port to your xbox controller? Well, there is already one, it just doesn't have a standard connector. If you do not want to gut your precious duke controller and you cannot find a usb adapter to put in the memory card slot (because they are sold out) you can build one thanks again to the effort of Mikeaton aka Zeigren.
https://github.com/Zeigren/OXC
plus: you can power your box form the controller with a small mod
plus plus: on the same site you'll find an eeprom programmer to recover the hdd key
plus plus plus: everything is open source!
- It seems that no one is working on a digital2hdmi mod for the xbox but, meanwhile, if you cannot source a decent component cable (hint: you can gut an xbox 360 cable and reuse the original xbox connector) you can buy an internal hdmi mod from N64 freak (one of the maker of cpu-upgraded xboxes). It's 70 euro, for a component to hdmi converter. It looks much more professional than reusing a wii2hdmi and it has digital audio thru hdmi.
https://www.ogxbox.com/forums/index.php?/topic/996-internal-hdmi-mod-diy-sets/
Wants to have an open source external solution for component+spdif? Have a look at this:
https://gbatemp.net/threads/xbox-open-source-video-project.532879/
- The Xbox dev kit has 128 megs of ram, a serial interface for Kernel debugging and the optical disk emulator connected to a PC. The optical disk emulator is useless with all the hdd loaders, the 128 megs of ram are doable modding a standard 64megs motherboard. Ernegien aka xbox7887 build the last missing bit: a serial-usb device connected to the LPC port. Now you can do Kernel debugging without having to spend hundreds of ca$h for an original DevKit and, as I love, it's all open source:
https://github.com/XboxDev/serial-usb-adapter
Just because Nintendo forget about it, doesn't means that the nice cube is not in the heart of many gamers. Hardware development and software research are still going on.
- Sometimes new discoveries are made after the lifecycle of a console. User FIX94 found a way to softmod the gamecube and enable loading from an SD-memory card adapter using commercial games. He released exploits for 7 games in 2016 and added 4 more games last year. Want to play your isos, erhm homebrew? No need for a modchip, just built or buy an sd gecko and have one of the supported games.
https://www.gc-forever.com/forums/viewforum.php?f=39
- Using homebrew for loading isos is not your cup of tea? You prefer the hard...ware way? Use an Optical Disc Emulator (ODE). You can connect a Wiikeyfusion/Wasp or a Wode, initially launched for Wii, to a gamecube. Sadly those are out of stock and second hand units are sold for more than $100 each but this is not the news. The (good) news is that two parallel project are in development for creating a new ODE (with hardware audiostreaming support). The first one is from user Menerbeer and is in development since 2016 and some days ago the auctor wrote
https://www.gc-forever.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=3234&start=125#p43195
Amd the other is from user Streetwalker; it has a working prototype but
https://www.gc-forever.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=4105
The creators are still considering if release the sources or not, let's hope for another open source hardware!
- I think I've lost the count of how many hdmi gamecube adapter there are on the market. The good news is about the prices: they are going down and the cheapest adapter I can find is $75 but the chinese cloners still have to weigh in. I expect prices falling to $40 this year.
Failed to fetch tweet https://twitter.com/Insurrection33/status/1089253689053900808
While we are all waiting for a Dreamcast mini (no, it's not announced but you can dream
) you can still spend a lot of money for the ugly duckling of his generation:- When two talented devs meet you can expect something amazing. In our case Chriz2600 and Citrus3000psi game birth to the digital2hdmi adapterfor dreamcast called...DCHDMI. It received many firmware updates in the past months and it's available for preorders for a whopping sum of $150. Too expensive? You can build your own because the project is open source.
https://github.com/chriz2600/DreamcastHDMI
https://github.com/citrus3000psi/DCHDMI-Hardware
- There are two Optical Disk emulator from Dreamcast. One is very expensive and the other is very difficult to find because is always sold in limited numbers. At some point someone in China cloned the second one. The real news is that prices for cloned units are slowly but continuously going down. Now the cheapest unit is less than $65, postage included for Europe. I wouldn't be surprised if the price go down up to $50 in 2019.
- Update: I was wrong. Apparently there are at least 5 Optical Disk emulator for Dreamcast. There is USB-GDrom, GDEmu, DC-IO (not available but with a working prototype, based on the work of oZone and Cybdyne, the maker of PSIO), one homebrew with open source (but I wasn't able to find any clues if it works or not) and a new homebrew project. According to the author this one boots games but it's still in proto stage and it's very slow. You will find the last one here:
https://github.com/alang198/senior_project
The Playstation 2 is always under the light, with iso loaders, bluetooth adapters and an endless amount of homebrew...
- ...the only feature missing is a real digital2hdmi mod. Thanks again to the dedication of Chriz2600 and Citrus3000psi, the same minds behind the DCHDMI, such mod is in prototype stage already. Let's hope that is another open source project.
First #PS2HDMI firmware on prototype board and FFC is working! Needless to say: hardware designed by @citrus3000psi 😀 pic.twitter.com/DrHzF9xtDq
— chriz2600 (@chriz2600) December 23, 2018 - If you do not know what Retroarch is... you are probably on the wrong site. The port for Ps2 has been released. It started only with two cores (Nes and 2048) but every giant tree started from a small seed and more cores are added: picodrive is already working and gameboy is the next one.
https://twitter.com/fjtrujy
Super Nintendo
The SD2SNES, the most powerful and expensive of the flashcarts available for this console received a massive hardware update (for the same price of $197). What it does it's not clear because a firmware supporting new features has to be released yet but it seems that Supergameboy emulation is now possible. The SD2SNES website is not updated so, sadly, it's unclear if this new revision is still open source like the old one (although BGA soldering is usually out of reach for most of hobbist).
We going to release new generation #SD2SNES PRO soon this month. Device got massive hardware update and it opens perspective to new features. Most powerful SNES cart become even more powerful now! pic.twitter.com/3G7c9WYrV8
— krikzz (@krikzz) February 3, 2019
Atari Jaguar
I still have wonderful memories of all time spent playing Alien vs Predator on my Jaguar, mostly because was one of the few really good games for this console. There is a new Jaguar flash cart in development, entering beta phase, with SD cart support. The first news is the price should be from GBP 150 and GBP 200. It may sound expensive but the second news is: iso loading for Jaguar CD optical disk emulation will be implemented. A JagCD unit costs almost the same price and it doesn't work as a flashcart. Do you want a cheaper option? DIY a repro cart or a Skunkboard.
Failed to fetch tweet https://twitter.com/TheRetroHQ/status/1091327454776569861
PCEngine
Never saw one of them in Europe, when it was released. Being a niche console everything is awful expensive and the newly released Flashcart+ODE+RGB combo released from Terraonion is no exception. The Super SD System 3 will give you cartridge emulation for rom loading, optical disk emulation for iso loading, arcade card emulation for better compatibility and a nice RGB out for the humble amount of $300. If you want to buy just an arcade card and a cd unit in Europe you can expect to spent almost the same price, plus add the cost for a flash cart so, not a bad deal if you have deep pockets.
https://shop.terraonion.com/en/pc-engine/12-super_sd_system_3-pc_engine.html
Sega Saturn
The Satiator, an SD card loader that plug in the FMV expansion port of a Sega Saturn is entering in beta stage, with a release planned in 2019. Still no word about pricing but expect to be expensive, around $200 probably. The other ODE option, the Rhea/Phoebe is cheaper...assuming you are able to order one.
https://www.patreon.com/posts/beta-is-entering-23201639
3DO
You probably read about this console in some "worst console of all time list". Anyway it has strong following in... Russia! And from Russia comes the only optical disk emulator for it. The news here is that last year the price for this card went silently down; from $165 to $95 for the cheapest option. Obviously my 3DO model needs the most expensive one...
http://3do-renovation.ru/How_to_buy.htm
OSSC
Want to connect your old RGB equipped console to a blazing new 4k lcd tv? Probably it doesn't have an RGB input so you need a scan converter. The Open Source Scan Converter has all his quality in the name
and you can buy it for €180, in theory. The main seller of the device is relocating in Ireland (insert a random Brexit joke here) and stopped selling them but someone in China has a sweet spot for retrogamers and is selling the same identical unit for €140.XBOX 360
Finally a little bit of love for this great console: a french dev wrote an utility to extract autodance movies. WTF it is? Simple! An easy way to embarass yourself while playing to Just Dance. If you have a supported game (Just Dance 4 and 2014-2019) and a Kinect you can record your.. erhm... performance and play them again but (fortunately) you cannot transfer them from your Xbox.
Until now.
If you have a jtag/rgh and a windows Pc you will find the utility here:
http://bidouillouzzz.blogspot.com/2019/01/juste-dance-autodance-extractor-pour.html (article in French but utility in english).
You do not care about Just Dance? Me neither but, at least, it's nice to know there are still people working on the X360.
Last edited by contezero,
, Reason: More news!
