# Analogue Pocket announced; can play a variety of handheld systems' games through FPGA



## Zense (Oct 16, 2019)

This is pretty nice, though, I wish there was one in the form factor of the GBA or GBA SP. Also, I don't think Analogue have made any controllers or hardware that are supposed to feel comfortable holding in your hands for hours, so that will be intersting to see. I mean, they're great on all things aesthetics and looks, but what about ergonomics? It will be intersting to find out. Like the edges on that thing seem a bit too sharp, imo.


----------



## Axido (Oct 16, 2019)

I'd buy one if it featured save file dumping and restoring as well. Any words on that matter?


----------



## Deleted User (Oct 16, 2019)

I've never given the Mega SG or Super NT a try, but I think I might go ahead with this, well, that is if it gets a price drop. I don't think I'll be able to afford another triple digit console next year, with the PS5 and Scarlet.


----------



## Flame (Oct 16, 2019)

*shows forearm*

inject me with some good FPGA Gameboy console doctor...


2020 here i come.


----------



## Reploid (Oct 16, 2019)

I can play gameboy on every handheld device I own. Does humanity really need another device for that?


----------



## Deleted User (Oct 16, 2019)

Reploid said:


> I can play gameboy on every handheld device I own. Does humanity really need another device for that?


Yes, we do.


----------



## FAST6191 (Oct 16, 2019)

Assuming baseline competence as far as the simulation and buttons then it is all in the screen for me, and most of these replications/revisits/recreations have been woefully poor (they usually just seem to crowbar either a phone screen they found in their electronics vendor or on rare occasion the cheapest and nastiest replacements they can find). I have never met a non multiple algorithm I care to see, much less one that would do and work in real time on a device like this, so we will go with multiples for the purposes of my contemplations here. Would be nice to see something but if all they want to give us is nearest neighbour then I am more than OK with that.

They say
1600x1440 at a fairly high DPI (can't be bothered to figure out the resulting size right now)
Systems mentioned in the OP
Game Boy, to Color, 
http://bgb.bircd.org/pandocs.htm#gameboytechnicaldata
Resolution   - 160x144

to Advanced. The addition of a d in advanced does not speak to much care but still GBA)
 Display      240x160 pixels 
http://problemkaputt.de/gbatek.htm#gbatechnicaldata

 or even Game Gear
Resolution: 160 x 144 pixels
https://segaretro.org/Sega_Game_Gear#Technical_specifications

Atari Lynx,
- Resolution: 160 x 102
https://atariage.com/Lynx/history.html

 and Neo Geo Pocket Color
RESOLUTION 160x152
http://www.captainwilliams.co.uk/gaming/ngpc/ngpc.php

Ignoring pixel aspect ratio for now

So for the GB/GBC that is a clean 10x multiplier for a complete fill. I dare not speak the supergameboy's name but if they did want to give me SGB mode bomberman then I might lose some objectivity/cynicism.

For the GBA that is a clean 9x multiplier vertically, 6.6666666666666 horizontally. In that case doing a 6x multiplier (rounding down) vertically that gives 960 pixels or 66.6666666...% screen fill vertically and not quite there horizontally. Not looking great.

For gamegear then same as GB/GBC then (a 10x scale).  I should also note the gamegear can play master system games ( https://segaretro.org/Sega_Master_System/Technical_specifications says "Screen resolutions: 256x192 and 256x224. PAL/SECAM also supports 256x240. Overscan resolution: 342x262 (NTSC), 342x313 (PAL) Scanlines: 262 (NTSC), 313 (PAL)" but we will have to wait and see what goes here for that one, and frankly I don't know how it handled it normally -- I played a few on one back in the day and it was great* but this was before I understood much of anything here -- it would be maybe 2 years before I took up emulation in earnest, and longer before ROM hacking/programming enough to do much here).
*that cart acting as a sun visor action... mind blown.
Edit I am told the GG pixel aspect ratio changes the game a bit here and its ratio is a bit different as a result. Take what I said above with a pinch of salt in that case.

For the Lynx then for horizontal fill (160 pixels like the others mentioned for 10x multiplier) then better part of 71% vertical.

For NGPC then we can't do full 10x horizontal without vertical cropping. Going with 9x then 95% vertical fill, 90% horizontal.


So anyway clearly a GB/GBC and GG focus from the screen side of things, does not mean the rest will be an afterthought but does dampen my enthusiasm a bit.


----------



## Sonic Angel Knight (Oct 16, 2019)

Chary said:


> The Pocket will feature a 3.5" screen in a case similar to that of a Game Boy Color. The LCD has a resolution of 1600x1440, and offers a ppi of 615.


Wait, don't you need a bigger screen to have HD?


----------



## Lazyboss (Oct 16, 2019)

$199.99?
This is a joke right? Tell me it's just a joke


----------



## Sakitoshi (Oct 16, 2019)

They are trying too hard with this one.
That resolution is a 10 times bigger, which is good, but totally overkill and unnecessary unless they are trying to do gba too, but is unlikely.
Even there 240x160 doesn't scale perfectly to 1600x1440 without black borders.

They likely decided to use such resolution to be able to use shaders or a similar filtering technique, but nothing beats native resolution.


----------



## Clydefrosch (Oct 16, 2019)

let me guess.
sound quality will vary, screen tearing will be included free of charge and the buttons seem too close to one another to be comfortable


----------



## FAST6191 (Oct 16, 2019)

Sakitoshi said:


> They are trying too hard with this one.
> That resolution is a 10 times bigger, which is good, but totally overkill and unnecessary unless they are trying to do gba too, but is unlikely.
> Even there 240x160 doesn't scale perfectly to 1600x1440 without black borders.
> 
> They likely decided to use such resolution to be able to use shaders or a similar filtering technique, but nothing beats native resolution.


If it is a clean multiple then it does not matter as you can't tell. It is when things start to get stretched that problems appear.

As for why then I imagine most screen vendors for this size of screen (you have two main fields here -- small devices for embedded screens and large ones for TVs and laptops) are only doing this kind of DPI. That said if they are doing a custom size like this (I can't imagine anybody else is doing anything like this aspect ratio for it to be an off the shelf effort) I don't know why they went for that one rather than a multiple of the GBA (which had perfectly acceptable GB/GBC support) or 10x the common 4:3 home consoles.


----------



## ut2k4master (Oct 16, 2019)

Clydefrosch said:


> let me guess.
> sound quality will vary, screen tearing will be included free of charge and the buttons seem too close to one another to be comfortable


guess youve never heard of analogue before


----------



## Issac (Oct 16, 2019)

Dang, I wish I could afford this :o


----------



## ChibiMofo (Oct 16, 2019)

Lazyboss said:


> $199.99?
> This is a joke right? Tell me it's just a joke



This isn't some Raspberry PI inside a 3D printed case. This is a FPGA solution using their own custom chips. The joke is you expecting it to cost less. 

You want some Chinese crap running various emulators of varying degrees of quality then go ahead and save some money. You want a quality product that actually works, pay extra. But please don't suggest the price is ludicrous.


----------



## WD_GASTER2 (Oct 16, 2019)

Damn. This is a guaranteed buy from me. Thanks for the news!


----------



## ghjfdtg (Oct 16, 2019)

*sees price and closes browser tab*


----------



## FAST6191 (Oct 16, 2019)

1MiinMofo said:


> This isn't some Raspberry PI inside a 3D printed case. This is a FPGA solution using their own custom chips. The joke is you expecting it to cost less.
> 
> You want some Chinese crap running various emulators of varying degrees of quality then go ahead and save some money. You want a quality product that actually works, pay extra. But please don't suggest the price is ludicrous.



While I don't disagree that a FPGA of suitable potency + screen + nice switches + battery means price heads up that way I also have to wonder if FPGA is overkill for this sort of thing, especially for a handheld where battery life matters. At this point I would more be expecting custom chips to be made, even if they in turn are just someone sending their FPGA code to a fab and having them create one from that (we might have even seen a few of those in flash cart and such world already for some things). Depending upon batch size* you could probably even get it comparable to the bad screen worse emulation handheld set and blow them out of the water.

*while the GBA is fairly interesting as these things go it is still 1990s tech and about 74K transistors if a search is to be believed. Should not be too taxing for some of the custom chip fabs out there. Even if they want to go further and wind in a bunch of the others on there, which are fairly closely related -- the GG Z80 and GB/GBC custom 8080 are not that far apart and the rest... eh, though I will admit I have not played much with the TLCS family).


----------



## Sakitoshi (Oct 16, 2019)

FAST6191 said:


> If it is a clean multiple then it does not matter as you can't tell. It is when things start to get stretched that problems appear.
> 
> As for why then I imagine most screen vendors for this size of screen (you have two main fields here -- small devices for embedded screens and large ones for TVs and laptops) are only doing this kind of DPI. That said if they are doing a custom size like this (I can't imagine anybody else is doing anything like this aspect ratio for it to be an off the shelf effort) I don't know why they went for that one rather than a multiple of the GBA (which had perfectly acceptable GB/GBC support) or 10x the common 4:3 home consoles.


I can tell, the image will be clean sure, but I'll see subpixels, is not the same.

That's what I was thinking too. maybe nobody has the equipment to do such a low res screen anymore so they are forced to use a very high res screen to achieve as close to the same result as possible. with such high dpi is less likely to see the subpixels, but you can still tell.


----------



## FAST6191 (Oct 16, 2019)

Sakitoshi said:


> I can tell, the image will be clean sure, but I'll see subpixels, is not the same.
> 
> That's what I was thinking too. maybe nobody has the equipment to do such a low res screen anymore so they are forced to use a very high res screen to achieve as close to the same result as possible. with such high dpi is less likely to see the subpixels, but you can still tell.



Assuming they don't smoke all the crack and somehow make lag/ghosting with nearest neighbour scaling (for others playing along then for a 2x scale you copy the pixel to make a 4x4 grid of the same pixel, which is why you want clean multiple scaling) and the pixel aspect ratio is suitable then unless the subpixels have a different colour or are dead then I would say you see them in the same way someone with oxygen free copper hears better sound.


----------



## Rahkeesh (Oct 16, 2019)

At that high a resolution on a tiny screen, with a half-decent interpolation like retroarch's "sharp bilinear", you aren't going to need to stick to integer scaling. You can also get some very accurate filters to recreate the quirks of each display type. The individual dot matrix on your gameboys, the scratchy grid on your gameboy advance, etc. It really comes down to how much effort they put into the display scaling software to take advantage of this display.

Also waiting to find if this has an SD card slot like every other analogue console, and the inevitable jailbreak that will follow to use it. Bringing over at least some 8-bit home console cores doesn't seem out of the question either.


----------



## PICTOCHAT (Oct 16, 2019)

Will there be multiplayer capabilities?


----------



## AkikoKumagara (Oct 16, 2019)

Reploid said:


> I can play gameboy on every handheld device I own. Does humanity really need another device for that?


The difference is every other handheld device you own that you do this on which isn't a GameBoy is using software emulation. FPGAs create a perfect clone of the hardware so it'll play exactly like the original consoles, while including the modern benefits the system adds.


----------



## cearp (Oct 16, 2019)

I was waiting for the email from them today - it will be an instant buy for me and I personally never do instant buys.

I hope this gets 'jailbroken' like their other stuff


----------



## AkikoKumagara (Oct 16, 2019)

Sakitoshi said:


> They are trying too hard with this one.
> That resolution is a 10 times bigger, which is good, but totally overkill and unnecessary unless they are trying to do gba too, but is unlikely.
> Even there 240x160 doesn't scale perfectly to 1600x1440 without black borders.
> 
> They likely decided to use such resolution to be able to use shaders or a similar filtering technique, but nothing beats native resolution.



It supports GBA out of the box.


----------



## cearp (Oct 16, 2019)

PICTOCHAT said:


> Will there be multiplayer capabilities?


yes I think it said there is a link port


----------



## Sakitoshi (Oct 16, 2019)

FAST6191 said:


> Assuming they don't smoke all the crack and somehow make lag/ghosting with nearest neighbour scaling (for others playing along then for a 2x scale you copy the pixel to make a 4x4 grid of the same pixel, which is why you want clean multiple scaling) and the pixel aspect ratio is suitable then unless the subpixels have a different colour or are dead then I would say you see them in the same way someone with oxygen free copper hears better sound.


the ghosting is totally replicable to a believable extent, gambatte has an option called frame mixing that does just that and is very accurate (I have a gameboy light to compare).
the thing with the subpixels is not that the color reproduction between pixels may fail, is that having two or more subpixels represent a single pixel doesn't look the same.

look at this quick example of what happens when you represent pure colors with subpixels compared to native resolution.


 
at the left we have subpixels and to the right a single pixel.
a red sprite would show evenly lit as opposed to have a space between pixels like the good old gameboy color/advance display it.

thinking more about it this could benefit gameboy mono if they leave an intentional row of subpixels off between gameboy pixels, displaying things as blocks like the monochromatic screen does.
but gameboy color will look different.


----------



## cearp (Oct 16, 2019)

Axido said:


> I'd buy one if it featured save file dumping and restoring as well. Any words on that matter?


haha we just found out about this today.
the supernt though can dump stuff, not sure about mega sg.
this thing probably will be able to, plus you can see that they made it dev friendly, so... yeah I think lots of things will be possible for it.

although if you really just want to dump and restore gb/a carts, you can buy cheap devices to do that.


----------



## smilodon (Oct 16, 2019)

I can see this unit becoming a good choice for chiptune artists, it is even DAC compatible.


----------



## matthi321 (Oct 16, 2019)

its cool but defintly overpriced


----------



## Clydefrosch (Oct 16, 2019)

Sophie-bear said:


> The difference is every other handheld device you own that you do this on which isn't a GameBoy is using software emulation. FPGAs create a perfect clone of the hardware so it'll play exactly like the original consoles, while including the modern benefits the system adds.


i mean i get that argument.
but who can honestly tell the difference between a good emulator and the original? also, if someone demands the original, do they want accurate ghosting too?

really, once crackling and screen tearing are off the table, 99.5% of the entire potential market for this is satisfied.


----------



## SpiffyJUNIOR (Oct 16, 2019)

Lazyboss said:


> $199.99?
> This is a joke right? Tell me it's just a joke


bUt It'S hArDwArE aCcUrAtE


----------



## Naendow (Oct 16, 2019)

Well, the price is pretty heavy. But it seems to be a great handheld. I'll think about it.
Edit: Well, I've just seen that it can't play ROMs. I can play my physical games on original consoles. I'll just stay with my GPD XD+ then.


----------



## AkikoKumagara (Oct 16, 2019)

Clydefrosch said:


> i mean i get that argument.
> but who can honestly tell the difference between a good emulator and the original? also, if someone demands the original, do they want accurate ghosting too?
> 
> really, once crackling and screen tearing are off the table, 99.5% of the entire potential market for this is satisfied.


The people who don't care about accuracy aren't the market the device is going for.


----------



## calagan (Oct 16, 2019)

matthi321 said:


> its cool but defintly overpriced


Comparing this device's insane resolution with the Switch's  720p display, and looking at Analogue's other products, I find the the $199 price tag surprisingly low.


----------



## Naendow (Oct 16, 2019)

Yea the screens resolution is great you're right. But for this price I also want some more features and not only the ability to play original games. I'd love to play Pokemon hacks on such a device, which I just can't do. And that is pretty bad if you think about the price.


----------



## DKB (Oct 16, 2019)

Switch Mini, which undoubtedly will be hacked in the future. Costs 200 dollars, and will be able to emulate all of these games plus far beyond what this thing will be able to do. It can also play Switch games. The machine looks nice, but honestly I don't know why they keep making these devices.


----------



## Veho (Oct 16, 2019)

And when you're not gaming, it can mine bitcoins


----------



## Harsky (Oct 16, 2019)

Naendow said:


> Yea the screens resolution is great you're right. But for this price I also want some more features and not only the ability to play original games. I'd love to play Pokemon hacks on such a device, which I just can't do. And that is pretty bad if you think about the price.


If the Super NT and Mini NT are anything to go by, a jailbroken firmware could be released that allows roms to be running off the SD card.


----------



## retrofan_k (Oct 16, 2019)

Here's hoping a core is released for Mister instead.


----------



## DeoNaught (Oct 16, 2019)

cearp said:


> I was waiting for the email from them today - it will be an instant buy for me and I personally never do instant buys.
> 
> I hope this gets 'jailbroken' like their other stuff


Well they are opening it, so it has a second fpga for homebrew n stuff, you could probably run additional cores on that.




matthi321 said:


> its cool but defintly overpriced


I'm just curious, what's a proper price for this if $200 is over priced? Like, Yeah for what it is, you can get a Gba for $40 on amazon and play Gba games on that. 
It's a Niche product for sure, but it's a niche people have. I've been wanting to play my Gba games, but I'm getting tired of a non backlight screen (which getting one is like $40 to $60), And the AA batteries are a slight hassle. 
I personally kinda want one, $200 isn't too much, because USB-C Implementation costs alot, custom FPGAs also cost a lot (just developing on them costs shits ton of money), 1080p screen is also really neat. Accuracy isn't needed, but it sure is a plus. I don't know if I'll ever use tv output(I barely use it for my switch as is), but it's a nice feature to have. It can also work with actual Gba's due to having a link port.

I personally think $200 is a good price, having actually developing hardware, and buying high quality parts even for something just for GBA emulation does cost alot


----------



## Naendow (Oct 16, 2019)

Harsky said:


> If the Super NT and Mini NT are anything to go by, a jailbroken firmware could be released that allows roms to be running off the SD card.


That would be a reason for me to think about the device. As long as this does not happen, not interested. If I buy a device for this price, then I want a few basic features like ROM loading and a dumping.


----------



## Sakitoshi (Oct 16, 2019)

now that I can sit down to read the whole thing I noticed they also are going to support gba, lynx and game gear

@FAST6191 don't be deceived by the game gear resolution, the screen of that system is 4:3 (or close to it).
so if they really want to recreate the system as accurately as they claim, then they need to account for that.

if we whip out the calculator then...
(144/3)*4 = 192
192*8 = 1536

not a bad number, the black bars would be minimal.


----------



## Xanthe (Oct 16, 2019)

This looks similar to the PGS kickstarter. The PGS ended up being fake and a scam.

I sincerely hope this project does not have the same fate.


----------



## Naendow (Oct 16, 2019)

Analogue has a good reputation. I am pretty sure it is not a scam or similar.


----------



## TVL (Oct 16, 2019)

I would most likely get this if there were cores released for all common consoles from the 8-bit and 16-bit era as well. Otherwise pass.


----------



## AkikoKumagara (Oct 16, 2019)

Xanthe said:


> This looks similar to the PGS kickstarter. The PGS ended up being fake and a scam.
> 
> I sincerely hope this project does not have the same fate.


Lol, this is nothing like that. This is from a reputable company that has already produced multiple FPGA-powered consoles, such as the Super NT.


----------



## Deleted User (Oct 16, 2019)

So it's an unfoldable GBA SP minus the link port for twice the launch price of the GBA.

Will it support color palettes for GB games? And is there SGB support?


----------



## AkikoKumagara (Oct 16, 2019)

Snugglevixen said:


> So it's an unfoldable GBA SP minus the link port for twice the launch price of the GBA.
> 
> Will it support color palettes for GB games? And is there SGB support?


It has a link port.


----------



## graeme122 (Oct 16, 2019)

"No emulation" lol good one.


----------



## Deleted User (Oct 16, 2019)

Ah, didn't see that, it's camouflaged on the black model photos.

Still, is there a reason to buy one over an SP?

I see there's no mention of the infra-red port, so unfortunately there's still no all in one solution for full GBA and GBC compatablity.

Apparently the GBA does have infra red headers, so if someone can figure out where to solder one to, I'll happily mod my GBA.


----------



## Rahkeesh (Oct 16, 2019)

My eyes suck and I need a bigger, clearer screen. Love the GBA library but there is no way I can play it on original hardware, 3DS injects run well but the scaling is terrible. This is the only solution so far that pairs running like real hardware with a great display.

Once you add in a decent flashcart for your GBA the price isn't quite as different anymore. Apparently this does have an SD slot so I assume it will be hacked in short order. Hell they are even inviting devs to develop for the FPGA here so we are going to see additional systems down the road too. (wonderswan?)


----------



## AkikoKumagara (Oct 16, 2019)

graeme122 said:


> "No emulation" lol good one.


It's not emulation in the sense that something like mGBA is, which is what's probably meant by that statement. Instead, the FPGA would be programmed to exactly (or as near as possible) copy the hardware and functions of the machine(s) they base it on. It's more or less a hardware clone that doesn't rely on software emulation to copy the functionality of the consoles it plays. You could make the argument that an FPGA is a kind of emulation, but it's not the kind we think of when we think of game emulators.


----------



## the_randomizer (Oct 17, 2019)

Reploid said:


> I can play gameboy on every handheld device I own. Does humanity really need another device for that?



One that doesn't use the POS emulators most Chinese devices have on them, yes.


----------



## Sakitoshi (Oct 17, 2019)

the_randomizer said:


> One that doesn't use the POS emulators most Chinese devices have on them, yes.


Then use the good ones and avoid chinese devices??
And is not like fpga solutions aren't emulation.
Fpga emulate through hardware rather than software.


----------



## Godofcheese (Oct 17, 2019)

200 buckeroooos
I need a sugardaddy.


----------



## the_randomizer (Oct 17, 2019)

Sakitoshi said:


> Then use the good ones and avoid chinese devices??
> And is not like fpga solutions aren't emulation.
> Fpga emulate through hardware rather than software.



It's still more accurate than most other emulators. And it's not really emulation but simulation.
What are the "good ones" that don't cost a fortune?


----------



## JavaScribe (Oct 17, 2019)

It's interesting that there's a company making such a high-quality retro device. That thing looks slick (and solid), and making a custom chip to run all of those games without emulation certainly shows dedication to creating a high-quality option. The upscaling is probably way overkill for most of those games, though I say that on conjecture, being too young to have played any.

One thing that makes games great is when they are made to look great on the technology of the time.


----------



## Sakitoshi (Oct 17, 2019)

the_randomizer said:


> It's still more accurate than most other emulators. And it's not really emulation but simulation.
> What are the "good ones" that don't cost a fortune?


Oh, I was talking about using good emulators. I'm not in the know of those devices.
But one that looks promising that popped up recently is the retro game 350. Is quite powerful for the price but don't know which specific emulators run and is still chinese though.

You are right about fpga. I just wanted to raise awareness about the fact that the whole "not emulation" is false.


----------



## Rahkeesh (Oct 17, 2019)

Its a huge struggle to get the timing down on software emulators, especially on mobile CPUs. Its not just input lag but variable input lag that makes your timing sloppy, and these old games weren't built with the kind of timing tolerances that modern ones are. That's the huge edge of FPGA beyond insane accuracy, absolutely zero latency in the console itself.


----------



## sarkwalvein (Oct 17, 2019)

It's dangerous to go alone. Take this.


----------



## the_randomizer (Oct 17, 2019)

Sakitoshi said:


> Oh, I was talking about using good emulators. I'm not in the know of those devices.
> But one that looks promising that popped up recently is the retro game 350. Is quite powerful for the price but don't know which specific emulators run and is still chinese though.
> 
> You are right about fpga. I just wanted to raise awareness about the fact that the whole "not emulation" is false.



I mean, I just... eh, those Chinese devices often have spotty firmware as well, and can really impact performance. With FPGA systems, there's no OS, no overhead and minimal lag.


----------



## raxadian (Oct 17, 2019)

Considering the GBA support was included in most Nintendo DS systems and GBA games were included in  the Ambassador program for the 3DS... 

Yeah, looks like they want to get sued.

Because Nintendo no longer cares about Gameboy and GB Color games, but GBA? They made remakes of a few of those games.


----------



## Godofcheese (Oct 17, 2019)

raxadian said:


> Considering the GBA support was included in most Nintendo DS systems and GBA games were included in  the Ambassador program for the 3DS...
> 
> Yeah, looks like they want to get sued.
> 
> Because Nintendo no longer cares about Gameboy and GB Color games, but GBA? They made remakes of a few of those games.



Are third party consoles illegal? ^^
Don't they fall into the same gray zone like emulators
if they don't use anything Nintendo owns, It's chill.


----------



## Sakitoshi (Oct 17, 2019)

the_randomizer said:


> I mean, I just... eh, those Chinese devices often have spotty firmware as well, and can really impact performance. With FPGA systems, there's no OS, no overhead and minimal lag.


well, that's kind of a moot point because for most of those devices there are community efforts to make them better ironing out all the issues and do improve the poor performance of the stock system.
my mayor concern is that up until now those portable retro consoles (including more costly and complicated solutions like building portable rpi's) have terrible battery life (3 hours maximum? even the old 3ds lasts longer while running more complex games) and spotty emulation in the sense that the more advanced systems (snes with chip fx and even gba in some devices) depend on frameskip to achieve full speed, frameskip makes everything unplayable.
I'm not a freak for accuracy as long as the games run as they should for a casual run, accuracy without speed is worthless.
the psp has been a solid choice for years because of the aforementioned shortcomings, right now having a new 3ds or vita can land you the same results of owning one of those chinese things with the added benefit of better battery life and being able to enjoy their own library of games. and it was really a no brainer since most people (here at least) would already have or want to own a 3ds or vita.

fpga does have the upper hand there like you mentioned, but we are paying premium for that, so is good to take that into consideration when comparing the 2 options.
so, we can say that you get what you pay for?

as for myself, right now I do have the means to play all the classic handhelds I care about (I have a gb light, a gba classic, an sp and 2 micros, along with my new 3ds, psp and vita), so I don't really care much about those portable retro consoles.
though I have to admit that the analogue pocket looks very sweet, but after asking myself if I need one the answer is a rotund no for what I already said.
as a sidenote I also think they screwed up by using the snes button layout instead of the gameboy layout like all the handhelds the thing will play.



Godofcheese said:


> Are third party consoles illegal? ^^
> Don't they fall into the same gray zone like emulators
> if they don't use anything Nintendo owns, It's chill.


they are not as long as the project don't use a single chip of the original hardware.


----------



## Pleng (Oct 17, 2019)

DKB said:


> honestly I don't know why they keep making these devices.



Because people keep buying them.


----------



## anthony_link (Oct 17, 2019)

It looks kinda uncomfortable.


----------



## raxadian (Oct 17, 2019)

Godofcheese said:


> Are third party consoles illegal? ^^
> Don't they fall into the same gray zone like emulators
> if they don't use anything Nintendo owns, It's chill.



Considering the only reason you can legally make hardware clones of the Sega Genesis or the Super Nintendo is because the rights expired?

Nintendo could sue them if they still have he rights for the GBA.

And considering is only a few years since Nintendo lost the patent of the Super Nintendo hardware, because it expired, they probably do.  

And let's not talk about the patent for software since the GBA did have an operating system...

Is not even a case of if Nintendo can win or not, just the fact they have more money and lawyers that the company making the Analogue Pocket.


----------



## Godofcheese (Oct 17, 2019)

raxadian said:


> Considering the only reason you can legally make hardware clones of the Sega Genesis or the Super Nintendo is because the rights expired?
> 
> Nintendo could sue them if they still have he rights for the GBA.
> 
> ...



Third party units exist for those systems because of the lack of copy protection I think

If modern consoles weren't super secure there would be third party units for them too, I'm sure of it
(it's illegal to circumvent drm tho)


----------



## cearp (Oct 17, 2019)

DeoNaught said:


> Well they are opening it, so it has a second fpga for homebrew n stuff, you could probably run additional cores on that.


yeah but what I mean is, their last 2, maybe 3 consoles, have received hacks that let you play roms from the micro sd card.
and when I say received hacks, the community thinks it's from the guy/team who actually makes the device - not by an actual 'hacker' etc.
it's a separate jailbreak fw that doesn't come shipped, possibly for legal reasons.

so, it's not really about the 2nd fpga.
but still that is crazy we have a 2nd one... hopefully it's good enough/compatible with other cores for fpgas that the mista team have created:
https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/Main_MiSTer/wiki


----------



## J-Machine (Oct 17, 2019)

raxadian said:


> Considering the only reason you can legally make hardware clones of the Sega Genesis or the Super Nintendo is because the rights expired?
> 
> Nintendo could sue them if they still have he rights for the GBA.
> 
> ...


in america, where this company is located, reverse engineering was protected via court decision. That's what this is. reverse engineering using an fpga chip. So long as they don't include the original bios files they are golden. 

as an aside... Are people forgetting this is a competant music device. the price alone just for that application it has is justified.


----------



## Chopsuey (Oct 17, 2019)

finally a Gameboy styled Device with the Shoulderbutons where there belong to be !

i whish it would have enough power to emulate a few better Systems, but anyway, it lookls like a pretty cool device.


----------



## AkikoKumagara (Oct 17, 2019)

DKB said:


> The machine looks nice, but honestly I don't know why they keep making these devices.


Fact is nothing like this has ever been made before. If you're comparing this to the likes of those Chinese emulation handhelds (even the halfway decent ones), you're way off-base on what this product is.
The fact that you're comparing Switch being able to play the games via software emulation assures me that you're making that kind of comparison. Software emulation is incapable of the things FPGA can manage. Watch some videos where Kevtris explains what an FPGA can do and maybe you'll understand why these things are the future of retro gaming, and why they're going to allow you to continue to enjoy your classic games long past the time when the original hardware can no longer do it. Here's some stuff I dug up to start with.


----------



## LoggerMan (Oct 17, 2019)

i rememebr thinking that the DSi XL was the ideal Gameboy emulator, because it's massive pixels were about the same size a GB pixels anyway.


----------



## Bladexdsl (Oct 17, 2019)

$200 lol who the fuck is going to buy this trash just to play carts!


----------



## sarkwalvein (Oct 17, 2019)

Bladexdsl said:


> $200 lol who the fuck is going to buy this trash just to play carts!


Well, it's either that or... I think you could get an N2DS for $50 that could potentially emulate all of that. Not FPGA accurate™ though, and you will miss the 16384x10800 resolution on 3.5" /s


----------



## FAST6191 (Oct 17, 2019)

JavaScribe said:


> It's interesting that there's a company making such a high-quality retro device. That thing looks slick (and solid), and making a custom chip to run all of those games without emulation certainly shows dedication to creating a high-quality option. The upscaling is probably way overkill for most of those games, though I say that on conjecture, being too young to have played any.
> 
> One thing that makes games great is when they are made to look great on the technology of the time.



To be a pedant I have to note that this is not a custom chip but a FPGA which is a programmable chip (or class of such things). The distinction becomes more important as mere mortals (or at least electrical engineers without a corporation backing them) can have their own custom chips with considerable transistor counts burned in silicon these days in fairly small batch numbers (I don't know if we are quite in the hundreds yet but a thousand or so would work). I am expecting to see more of that in the years to come, somewhat amusingly the easiest in to such a field is to take your FPGA design* and turn it directly into a chip. Will also mean both the replacement part and the quality of fakes/repros will shoot through the roof, and that is before we get into improvements, but enough of that for now.

*FPGA stands for field programmable gate array, and if all chips are is an arrangement of transistors (the gate of a transistor being an important concept within it) then yeah. Not the most efficient way to make a chip (either as an FGPA or straight converting) but if it takes all the right inputs and spits out all the right outputs in the right amount of time and uses an amount of power that people can live with then so many people will argue the toss.



raxadian said:


> Considering the only reason you can legally make hardware clones of the Sega Genesis or the Super Nintendo is because the rights expired?
> 
> Nintendo could sue them if they still have he rights for the GBA.
> 
> ...



Three main classes of rights here
1) Trademarks. These are essentially infinite but are more concerned with the name and logos. Some companies tried to include their trademarked logo in the code and thus get around things that way but were smacked down, others will press the logo into plastic or try to include the logo in the function (there is a reason fashion houses have their logo as a clasp on their bags and it is not because it looks cool).
2) Copyright. Length is probably north of 100 years at this point (or if you prefer we just started getting works from the 1920s become copyright free -- https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/publicdomainday/2019/ ). Hard to copyright an arrangement of off the shelf chips. The BIOS files might be copyrighted but there are ways around those, and also the GBA did not have an operating system of any real note -- the BIOS is as about as close as it comes there and you don't have to interact with it, it does not run all the time or really do anything like a hand off to run the games, and when you do speak to it then it functions basically as a built in programming library ( http://problemkaputt.de/gbatek.htm#biosfunctions ).
3) Patents. Length varies a bit depending upon field and follow on patents (you tend to be given a few years to file additional patents that might use another which don't then conflict with yourself, part of the reason we had some troubles figuring out when the NES dpad patent ended) but the term (aka length) of the patent is around 20 years for most places and what you might have heard. Also tends to be a novel and unique invention, which is not an arrangement of chips. Some places do patents for software as well (most notably for this discussion the US and Japan) but other places (basically everywhere else) consider the very notion of software patents as completely opposed to the idea of patents (software is maths and you can't patent maths) and thus an abomination.

Assuming they don't use the name gameboy or suggest they are endorsed by Nintendo (repeat for other companies on the list) then no worries there. For copyright then other than the BIOS you can't copyright an arrangement of chips (the ARM7TDMI of the GBA is... well an ARM chip you could probably get a million dropped off to your door in a few days if you wanted, the z80 is also popular for decades now...) or arrangement of memory and this is also one of the reasons we can have emulators (the courts have considered other things). You do occasionally hear of individual game trademarks expiring but I doubt any of the companies concerned here (or their successors) will allow the main console ones to lapse any time soon.

There are a few other types of protections that could apply at some level (called different things in different places but design rights and registered designs act as lesser versions of some of those) but nothing likely to bother it here as they are usually reserved for shapes and colour schemes.

Nintendo probably could do the we have enough money to tie you up in court thing (assuming Analogue care to be based somewhere that will listen -- there is a reason various flavours of China, Russia and Eastern Europe are often bases for a lot of these) but them having clear cut legal basis for this is a different matter entirely. Assuming there is not some quirk of the DMCA (which I doubt as there are a dozen devices that would otherwise qualify) then best I could see happen there is they have some kind of weird physical patent for an aspect of it -- one of the flash cart makers for the DS said something once about Nintendo having a patent on the plastic spacers between the cart pins for the DS which is why they did not have them on their DS flash cart, however I don't know if that is true (never looked) and thin plastic spacers are hard to make in plastic (or at least it is far easier to have a blank spot) so that could just as easily be the reason.


----------



## Bullseye (Oct 17, 2019)

How would this one be better than a 3DS playing GBA injects? Or the GB/GBC injects from VC?

Edit: or where could it be better and by how much?


----------



## Skelletonike (Oct 17, 2019)

I need one of these... I wonder about taxes and customs though.. Hopefully they can also ship from within the EU.


----------



## genxor (Oct 17, 2019)

I wonder how warm it could get. Looks nice!


----------



## Rahkeesh (Oct 17, 2019)

Bullseye said:


> How would this one be better than a 3DS playing GBA injects? Or the GB/GBC injects from VC?
> 
> Edit: or where could it be better and by how much?



3DS has a comparatively trash screen that can't be well scaled to, and it has to emulate GB/GBC rather than playing "natively" like GBA, meaning additional input lag and incompatibilities.


----------



## Bullseye (Oct 17, 2019)

Rahkeesh said:


> 3DS has a comparatively trash screen that can't be well scaled to, and it has to emulate GB/GBC rather than playing "natively" like GBA, meaning additional input lag and incompatibilities.



Agreed that the screen is not the best (it never was with the original GB and GBC) but how much input lag are we talking about between VC and original?


----------



## cearp (Oct 17, 2019)

Bladexdsl said:


> $200 lol who the fuck is going to buy this trash just to play carts!


Some people spend close to that to mod their gameboys as it is.
Get a custom metal housing, backlight, rechargable battery... that all adds up.
Plus the labor $ that you pay if you want someone to do it for you/buy premodded?
Have a look at these ebay items:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/202792601405 - £120
https://www.ebay.com/itm/113859031621 - £160
https://www.ebay.com/itm/274011854976 - $215
https://www.ebay.com/itm/273946143337 - AU$350
https://www.ebay.com/itm/153682486808 - $468

Now, this brand new device Analogue are selling is fantastic value.
(Fantastic value to the right person! If you are not into gameboys, or gaming for that matter, sure, it's dumb to spend your money on it.)
- it plays all gameboy games virtually perfectly due to the guy/team reverse engineering the real hardware
- it accepts real carts
- a real link port
- rechargable battery
- amazing screen
- it has not 1 but 2 FPGAs. I'm not sure which ones, but FPGAs are not cheap chips due to their nature. With the 2nd one they are letting us do what we want with, e.g. supporting some other game consoles virtually perfectly as well!
If you buy the separate dock, you can even connect it to your tv, and it has a DAC so you can get perfect audio out of your games/synthesizers.
It's really a phenomenal system, and 'sad to say' but I know that Nintendo wouldn't have made a 'Gameboy Classic' as cool or as good as this. You can't even play carts in the SNES Classic... it's really just a fun little cash grab.
But Analogue make things for the enthusiasts.


----------



## zxr750j (Oct 17, 2019)

I've got a really nice FPGA lying around, my passme


----------



## Xalusc (Oct 17, 2019)

Chary said:


> from Game Boy, to Color, to Advanced, or even Game Gear, Atari Lynx, and Neo Geo Pocket Color


That's cool and all, but how about WonderSwan?


----------



## SuperDan (Oct 17, 2019)

$200 .. No chance .. I'm out


----------



## FAST6191 (Oct 17, 2019)

Bullseye said:


> How would this one be better than a 3DS playing GBA injects? Or the GB/GBC injects from VC?
> 
> Edit: or where could it be better and by how much?


For most purposes and most games until you hit speedrun territory (possibly even tool assisted speedrun) I imagine it would be good enough, give or take the screen scaling and general quality. The GBA is reasonably potent compared to the older consoles with similar looking games but at the same time not all that tricky to emulate -- unlike many other systems of the time there is only one core in one CPU to emulate, the memory handling is fairly basic, and cartridges themselves don't add anything to the mix, or if you prefer there is a reasonable chance you could play the entire GBA library more than well enough to say you did with the emulator made about the time the GBA hit North America (the pre Japanese release emulators might be a bigger ask).

I don't really have too many games to stress test this sort of thing though (at least not in the style of https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011...-3ghz-quest-to-build-a-perfect-snes-emulator/ and https://web.archive.org/web/2014112...index.php?title=SNES_games_with_special_chips ).
Most times we are more concerned with anti piracy and similar such things ( https://gbatemp.net/threads/buying-a-gba-flash-cart-in-2013.341203/page-18#post-4756995 ). Still the Golden Sun audio is a fairly notable torture test for emulators, and the game called payback can tax emulators fairly heavily. If you want to try to find some of the old GBA slot supercard compatibility lists you might get something that struggles with low speed devices (the main one went offline years ago and https://web.archive.org/web/2008030...mans.joskeonline.com/supercardsite/index.php/ is limited. https://web.archive.org/web/2009050...pocketheaven.com:80/?system=gba&section=patch has a few for another similarly tricky cart), and the supercard DSTwo GBA emulator list might be of interest here as well ( https://wiki.gbatemp.net/wiki/DSTWO_GBA_Emulator_Compatibility ).
https://mgba.io/tag/emulation/ has a few interesting articles which might yield some games with some quirks you can test.


----------



## PatrickD85 (Oct 17, 2019)

Cool little device though but ... well I am pretty content with all the available options already.
Sure wish though that Nintendo would do something when it comes to their GB, GBC, GBA library on Nintendo Switch Online. But that is a story for a different day / time I guess...


----------



## cearp (Oct 17, 2019)

Xalusc said:


> That's cool and all, but how about WonderSwan?


possible theoretically, but I don't see a wonderswan fpga core https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/Main_MiSTer/wiki, so I don't think anyone has made it.
but if it was made, and it worked with the analogue pocket's fpga, sure, that's exactly the sort of thing analogue want us to do


----------



## SG854 (Oct 17, 2019)

Sophie-bear said:


> Fact is nothing like this has ever been made before. If you're comparing this to the likes of those Chinese emulation handhelds (even the halfway decent ones), you're way off-base on what this product is.
> The fact that you're comparing Switch being able to play the games via software emulation assures me that you're making that kind of comparison. Software emulation is incapable of the things FPGA can manage. Watch some videos where Kevtris explains what an FPGA can do and maybe you'll understand why these things are the future of retro gaming, and why they're going to allow you to continue to enjoy your classic games long past the time when the original hardware can no longer do it. Here's some stuff I dug up to start with.



Are they really? I prefer using the Higan Cycle Accurate Emulator over the Nintendo Switch's Emulator. Run that in retroarch's with it's run ahead feature and you can have input lag that's better then original hardware. 

Right now FPGA's are expensive and I would consider them a viable option for myself when the price goes down. I can see them as the future for Nintendo's mini series of consoles. That's the route Nintendo should go down when they become cheaper. But there is no difference between hardware simulation and software emulation. It depends on how good the developer is for both solutions.


----------



## spotanjo3 (Oct 17, 2019)

No thanks. I will stick with homebrew on the go with Switch. It is priceless to me!


----------



## sarkwalvein (Oct 17, 2019)

azoreseuropa said:


> No thanks. I will stick with homebrew on the go with Switch. It is priceless to me!


If hackable (hoping someday) to be honest the Switch Lite looks like a perfect portable emulation machine to be honest.
And that is also $200.

PS: it seems obvious that I am not such a perfect-emulation 0-lag advocate.


----------



## cybrian (Oct 18, 2019)

Chary said:


> View attachment 182887​
> Analogue is a company that has been taking retro video game consoles, and adapting them to use in the modern day, by providing a system that can play oldschool 90's game cartridges in 1080p, without any emulation. Previously, they've created the Analogue Mega Sg and the Super NT, "perfected" variations of the Sega Genesis and the Super Nintendo, respectively. Now, Analogue is taking on a new front: handheld gaming, with the announcement of the Analogue Pocket. This new system will play nearly any handheld game you can throw at it, from Game Boy, to Color, to Advanced, or even Game Gear, Atari Lynx, and Neo Geo Pocket Color; over 2,780 different games are compatible through two FPGA chips.
> 
> The Pocket will feature a 3.5" screen in a case similar to that of a Game Boy Color. The LCD has a resolution of 1600x1440, and offfers a ppi of 615. It will also have a function for those who wish to create music using game's soundfonts through a built-in synthesizer called Nanoloop.
> ...


The one thing that’s sexiest to me about this is the screen. It sounds too good to be true and until I see one it is, but Analogue has made pretty hard-to-believe things in the past.

It probably sounds too high a resolution to be useful, but I can argue that its super high DPI and large area are perfect for recreating the subpixel layouts of specific screens. Like, the actual geometry and layout of the pixels in the screen of a Game Boy, or a Game Boy Color, or what have you. You can draw gaps in between the pixels. A filter can do all this in hardware on the FPGA.

Hell, you could easily even emulate some dust and scratches on the lens if you’re on the crazy side and want something a little too authentic.

Is this useful? Well, Analogue’s traditionally marketed themselves based on the accuracy of their products as a niche for the sort of hardcore retro gamers that might collect Sony CRTs.

Personally, I think that at this DPI, with appropriate filtering and scaling a GBC screen will look better than it could on virtually anything else. I might buy one, even if it costs the same as an Xbox One, because if nothing else it’s an insanely high resolution screen that fits in my pocket.


----------



## the_randomizer (Oct 18, 2019)

Godofcheese said:


> Are third party consoles illegal? ^^
> Don't they fall into the same gray zone like emulators
> if they don't use anything Nintendo owns, It's chill.



Yes because emulators are illegal. Oh wait, not they're not, look up copyright law please, like Sony v. Connectix and Sony v. Bleem! where Sony lost on all lawsuits. 
FPGA is an approximation of hardware, not emulation, so yeah, Nintendo can't do jack.


----------



## darkdev (Oct 18, 2019)

It just lacks the HuCard support.
I wonder if the Master System adapter (Master Gear) will work out of the box.


----------



## J-Machine (Oct 18, 2019)

darkdev said:


> It just lacks the HuCard support.
> I wonder if the Master System adapter (Master Gear) will work out of the box.


it will need a cartridge adaptor for anything not GB/gbc/gba. these things get a jail broken firmware fast though possibly in a month after release it will


----------



## darkdev (Oct 18, 2019)

Indeed I'm talking about the "master system - game gear adapter" on its game gear cartridge adapter


----------



## Godofcheese (Oct 18, 2019)

the_randomizer said:


> Yes because emulators are illegal. Oh wait, not they're not, look up copyright law please, like Sony v. Connectix and Sony v. Bleem! where Sony lost on all lawsuits.
> FPGA is an approximation of hardware, not emulation, so yeah, Nintendo can't do jack.



What, I never said that they were.
Fucking hell man


----------



## chaoskagami (Oct 18, 2019)

> Pocket is designed for FPGA development. We added a second dedicated FPGA just for developers to develop & port their own cores.



Sold. I needed something to replace my dead DE0-nano with. I wonder what FPGA it uses, though. Because, you know? I. Hate. VHDL. Verilog or death.


----------



## peteruk (Oct 18, 2019)

I really fancy one of these, watched Spawn Wave's video and it looks a beaut tbh


----------



## MetoMeto (Oct 18, 2019)

Nothing compare to original, but this is nice...but still... its soulless :3


----------



## FateForWindows (Oct 18, 2019)

Just to clarify, they aren't using their own custom FPGAs, though this should've been pretty clear already. The main FPGA is a Cyclone 10 while the secondary one is a Cyclone V.


----------



## LoggerMan (Oct 18, 2019)

Is this like cycle accurate hardware emilation, will it play games exactly like i remember it, glitches and all? The sprites will flicker at the exact same places they used to?


----------



## ut2k4master (Oct 18, 2019)

LoggerMan said:


> Is this like cycle accurate hardware emilation, will it play games exactly like i remember it, glitches and all? The sprites will flicker at the exact same places they used to?


yes


----------



## sarkwalvein (Oct 18, 2019)

LoggerMan said:


> Is this like cycle accurate hardware emilation, will it play games exactly like i remember it, glitches and all? The sprites will flicker at the exact same places they used to?


If tbe FPGAs are programmed correctly, yes.


----------



## WesMods (Oct 18, 2019)

Chary said:


> View attachment 182887​
> Analogue is a company that has been taking retro video game consoles, and adapting them to use in the modern day, by providing a system that can play oldschool 90's game cartridges in 1080p, without any emulation. Previously, they've created the Analogue Mega Sg and the Super NT, "perfected" variations of the Sega Genesis and the Super Nintendo, respectively. Now, Analogue is taking on a new front: handheld gaming, with the announcement of the Analogue Pocket. This new system will play nearly any handheld game you can throw at it, from Game Boy, to Color, to Advanced, or even Game Gear, Atari Lynx, and Neo Geo Pocket Color; over 2,780 different games are compatible through two FPGA chips.
> 
> The Pocket will feature a 3.5" screen in a case similar to that of a Game Boy Color. The LCD has a resolution of 1600x1440, and offfers a ppi of 615. It will also have a function for those who wish to create music using game's soundfonts through a built-in synthesizer called Nanoloop.
> ...


If paying $199 for another amazing product from Analogue is too much for you then you are a cheap ass. Of all the things that end up costing $199 or more in my life I would drop it on this in a heartbeat. Looks beautiful and will be 100% buying at least 2 of these day 1. I already have the Analogue NT and SuperNT and adore them both and have been dreaming that one day they would make something like this! CANNOT WAIT!!!


----------



## Pipistrele (Oct 19, 2019)

There is certainly appeal to their home consoles (a painless way to have authentic gameplay with high video/audio quality on modern TV), but this product leaves me mildly puzzled - for authenticity, original handhelds are still sturdy as brick and cheap as dirt, and for all the convenience options, homebrew scene already provided us with close-to-perfect emulation on DS/3DS/PSP. I mean, I can see it as an option for those who don't want to mess around with AAA batteries, but not for $199. That screen resolution is also a needless overkill, considering the hardware it's aimed to imitate.


----------



## Rahkeesh (Oct 19, 2019)

Wait the *secondary* FPGA is the same one that powers the Super NT?

We're going to see 16-bit home consoles eventually, aren't we?


Pipistrele said:


> There is certainly appeal to their home consoles (a painless way to have close-to-perfect gameplay with high video/audio quality on modern TV), but this product leaves me mildly puzzled - for authentic experience, original handhelds are still sturdy as brick and cheap as dirt, and for all the convenience options, homebrew scene already provided us with great emulation on DS/3DS/PSP.



After a jailbreak this will be both at once. This is approaching a portable Mister.

When you start shelling out for screen mods on OG hardware you are already in this price range anyway. That alone is going to make this an appealing option for enthusiasts.


----------



## rich333 (Oct 20, 2019)

so if this is jail-broken and the secondary cyclone v fpga can be programed to run nes/snes and md/sms off sd this could be the ultimate retro gaming device as a home console with dock & portable.... 

could even use usb adapters to use original controllers via the usb ports on the dock. but the 8bitdo wireless are pretty good anyway


----------



## Baromo (Oct 21, 2019)

Sorry if I sound dumb but if I understood well, there may be a possibility in the future that this device will be able to read roms from the sd card, correct? 
Let's say that if I want to play Pokémon games (and roms hacks) on my sd card, do you think there will be RTC support? Like what we can have with an emulator on pc or smartphone?


----------



## osaka35 (Oct 21, 2019)

Definitely interested in this. Will wait for the reviews, but i'll start saving now. Exciting.


----------



## AkikoKumagara (Oct 21, 2019)

Baromo said:


> Sorry if I sound dumb but if I understood well, there may be a possibility in the future that this device will be able to read roms from the sd card, correct?
> Let's say that if I want to play Pokémon games (and roms hacks) on my sd card, do you think there will be RTC support? Like what we can have with an emulator on pc or smartphone?



To your first question, I'd say the answer is somewhere between most likely and almost definitely. As for RTC support, I wouldn't know.


----------



## Rahkeesh (Oct 21, 2019)

The first jailbreak out of the gate probably won't support special cartridge chips like RTC, since the system is built around you having actual carts. But we would probably see it down the road, as the Mega SG and Super NT have had chip support added to their jailbreaks.


----------



## the_randomizer (Oct 21, 2019)

Rahkeesh said:


> The first jailbreak out of the gate probably won't support special cartridge chips like RTC, since the system is built around you having actual carts. But we would probably see it down the road, as the Mega SG and Super NT have had chip support added to their jailbreaks.



Sadly, no SA-1 or Super FX support though


----------



## Rahkeesh (Oct 21, 2019)

Well yeah but, I don't think an RTC is too crazy. I think gyro's about as far as the gameboy family goes, but there probably won't be any gyro in the system to even use.


----------



## ParzivalWolfram (Oct 21, 2019)

Yeah, okay, this might be cool and all, but if you're gonna splurge on one of these you could either get a good flashcart for one of the real systems or get an N3DS or Switch (assuming they're under $200 for working hackable ones yet) and have way more benefits to it over the real thing or this thing like save states, fast forward and rewind, screen filters, other games and utilities...


----------



## Redhorse (Oct 22, 2019)

I just recently got a pocketgo [instead of GBA flash cart for my GB Micro] and love it, but this being dock-able is sexy as hell.


----------



## NachoBlzzy (Oct 22, 2019)

I find it really hard to believe that it will emulate all of these devices perfectly but I am a sucker so will probably try it out


----------



## chaoskagami (Oct 22, 2019)

ParzivalWolfram said:


> if you're gonna splurge on one of these you could either get a good flashcart for one of the real systems



This takes original cartridges. Do you see what I'm getting at here? A flashcart is a cartridge. The idea is that this replaces the gameboy, not the flashcart.



Rahkeesh said:


> The first jailbreak out of the gate probably won't support special cartridge chips like RTC, since the system is built around you having actual carts. But we would probably see it down the road, as the Mega SG and Super NT have had chip support added to their jailbreaks.



I'm more interested in seeing RISC-V and a Linux kernel running on that second FPGA, personally. Yes, I'm probably weird.


----------



## FAST6191 (Oct 22, 2019)

NachoBlzzy said:


> I find it really hard to believe that it will emulate all of these devices perfectly but I am a sucker so will probably try it out


Most of those devices mentioned used common chips (the Z80 was the ARM of its day really) that we know all the data for, probably even have transistor level diagrams derived from uncapped chips for. Being so old then such things are relatively easy to recreate on today's FPGAs, though you don't even need to go that far and instead we have full CPU manuals + lists of what happens when you do unexpected operations (some games used such functionality) that you can produce a simulation for quite happily. It is not a trivial thing and sticking an FPGA in a project is not a magic bullet that will render you 1:1 hardware accurate with no effort but these guys have previously demonstrated they know what they are doing, and it is not an unreasonable thing (you can probably find a bunch of kids coming out of university that are capable of performing at this level.

At this point if you want to argue things about the accuracy of the simulation you will have to figure out what are acceptable deviations within manufacture of either the chips themselves or what was used for the consoles in question -- two examples you might have heard of before are a bit later in gaming history but look at the variation in the memory speed of the original xbox ( https://web.archive.org/web/2010061...n_the_Xbox_Security_System#RAM_Initialization ), and we also have the endless fun thanks to smash brothers of those gamecube controllers that are something of a technical quirk but have a predictable latency window compared to some other batches. I don't know what we would argue for the consoles mentioned ( http://www.herbertweixelbaum.com/comparison.htm is kind of relevant, a while back I saw some people measure the clock speeds of the various things to play gameboy advance games and the differences there, https://mgba.io/2017/05/29/holy-grail-bugs/ could probably generate a test or two here, and while it is for the SNES then https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011...-3ghz-quest-to-build-a-perfect-snes-emulator/ also highlights a few things that might be worth considering, https://www.gc-forever.com/wiki/index.php?title=Game_Boy_Interface/High-Fidelity_Edition if we must do stuff with latency).

Anyway I know I mentioned z80 above but if it was not that then around the same time it was probably the 6502. For an example of the sorts of things people are playing with there


and a related topic
https://trixter.oldskool.org/2015/04/07/8088-mph-we-break-all-your-emulators/

If this all sounds quite ridiculous then yeah it kind of is, however if accuracy is your fetish then it will do well.


----------



## NachoBlzzy (Oct 22, 2019)

FAST6191 said:


> Most of those devices mentioned used common chips (the Z80 was the ARM of its day really) that we know all the data for, probably even have transistor level diagrams derived from uncapped chips for. Being so old then such things are relatively easy to recreate on today's FPGAs, though you don't even need to go that far and instead we have full CPU manuals + lists of what happens when you do unexpected operations (some games used such functionality) that you can produce a simulation for quite happily. It is not a trivial thing and sticking an FPGA in a project is not a magic bullet that will render you 1:1 hardware accurate with no effort but these guys have previously demonstrated they know what they are doing, and it is not an unreasonable thing (you can probably find a bunch of kids coming out of university that are capable of performing at this level.
> 
> At this point if you want to argue things about the accuracy of the simulation you will have to figure out what are acceptable deviations within manufacture of either the chips themselves or what was used for the consoles in question -- two examples you might have heard of before are a bit later in gaming history but look at the variation in the memory speed of the original xbox ( https://web.archive.org/web/2010061...n_the_Xbox_Security_System#RAM_Initialization ), and we also have the endless fun thanks to smash brothers of those gamecube controllers that are something of a technical quirk but have a predictable latency window compared to some other batches. I don't know what we would argue for the consoles mentioned ( http://www.herbertweixelbaum.com/comparison.htm is kind of relevant, a while back I saw some people measure the clock speeds of the various things to play gameboy advance games and the differences there, https://mgba.io/2017/05/29/holy-grail-bugs/ could probably generate a test or two here, and while it is for the SNES then https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011...-3ghz-quest-to-build-a-perfect-snes-emulator/ also highlights a few things that might be worth considering, https://www.gc-forever.com/wiki/index.php?title=Game_Boy_Interface/High-Fidelity_Edition if we must do stuff with latency).
> 
> ...





FAST6191 said:


> Most of those devices mentioned used common chips (the Z80 was the ARM of its day really) that we know all the data for, probably even have transistor level diagrams derived from uncapped chips for. Being so old then such things are relatively easy to recreate on today's FPGAs, though you don't even need to go that far and instead we have full CPU manuals + lists of what happens when you do unexpected operations (some games used such functionality) that you can produce a simulation for quite happily. It is not a trivial thing and sticking an FPGA in a project is not a magic bullet that will render you 1:1 hardware accurate with no effort but these guys have previously demonstrated they know what they are doing, and it is not an unreasonable thing (you can probably find a bunch of kids coming out of university that are capable of performing at this level.
> 
> At this point if you want to argue things about the accuracy of the simulation you will have to figure out what are acceptable deviations within manufacture of either the chips themselves or what was used for the consoles in question -- two examples you might have heard of before are a bit later in gaming history but look at the variation in the memory speed of the original xbox ( https://web.archive.org/web/2010061...n_the_Xbox_Security_System#RAM_Initialization ), and we also have the endless fun thanks to smash brothers of those gamecube controllers that are something of a technical quirk but have a predictable latency window compared to some other batches. I don't know what we would argue for the consoles mentioned ( http://www.herbertweixelbaum.com/comparison.htm is kind of relevant, a while back I saw some people measure the clock speeds of the various things to play gameboy advance games and the differences there, https://mgba.io/2017/05/29/holy-grail-bugs/ could probably generate a test or two here, and while it is for the SNES then https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011...-3ghz-quest-to-build-a-perfect-snes-emulator/ also highlights a few things that might be worth considering, https://www.gc-forever.com/wiki/index.php?title=Game_Boy_Interface/High-Fidelity_Edition if we must do stuff with latency).
> 
> ...






That sounds actually somewhat believable now that you explained it. Would it be possible to increase the speed of the gameplay for some of the longer rpg's?


----------



## ParzivalWolfram (Oct 23, 2019)

FAST6191 said:


> Most of those devices mentioned used common chips (the Z80 was the ARM of its day really) that we know all the data for, probably even have transistor level diagrams derived from uncapped chips for. Being so old then such things are relatively easy to recreate on today's FPGAs, though you don't even need to go that far and instead we have full CPU manuals + lists of what happens when you do unexpected operations (some games used such functionality) that you can produce a simulation for quite happily. It is not a trivial thing and sticking an FPGA in a project is not a magic bullet that will render you 1:1 hardware accurate with no effort but these guys have previously demonstrated they know what they are doing, and it is not an unreasonable thing (you can probably find a bunch of kids coming out of university that are capable of performing at this level.
> 
> At this point if you want to argue things about the accuracy of the simulation you will have to figure out what are acceptable deviations within manufacture of either the chips themselves or what was used for the consoles in question -- two examples you might have heard of before are a bit later in gaming history but look at the variation in the memory speed of the original xbox ( https://web.archive.org/web/2010061...n_the_Xbox_Security_System#RAM_Initialization ), and we also have the endless fun thanks to smash brothers of those gamecube controllers that are something of a technical quirk but have a predictable latency window compared to some other batches. I don't know what we would argue for the consoles mentioned ( http://www.herbertweixelbaum.com/comparison.htm is kind of relevant, a while back I saw some people measure the clock speeds of the various things to play gameboy advance games and the differences there, https://mgba.io/2017/05/29/holy-grail-bugs/ could probably generate a test or two here, and while it is for the SNES then https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011...-3ghz-quest-to-build-a-perfect-snes-emulator/ also highlights a few things that might be worth considering, https://www.gc-forever.com/wiki/index.php?title=Game_Boy_Interface/High-Fidelity_Edition if we must do stuff with latency).
> 
> ...



please keep in mind, for accurate posting, the Gameboy and Gameboy Color were a modded Z80 (GBz80) and a Sharp clone of such, respective. We don't have 100% accurate emulation of either console, either. Not much issue with the actual post, just a footnote.


----------



## cashboxz01 (Oct 23, 2019)

These are the same kids who compared an iPod nano to a cheap Chinese mp4 player and said "but I paid $20 for something that looks the same and plays the same music"


----------



## ParzivalWolfram (Oct 23, 2019)

cashboxz01 said:


> These are the same kids who compared an iPod nano to a cheap Chinese mp4 player and said "but I paid $20 for something that looks the same and plays the same music"



but like

video and non-proprietary shit

and also sound quality may not dip at all between them depending on several factors

bad analogy


----------



## mario5555 (Oct 23, 2019)

> This new system will play nearly any handheld game you can throw at it, from Game Boy, to Color, to Advanced, or even Game Gear, Atari Lynx, and Neo Geo Pocket Color; over 2,780 different games are compatible through two FPGA chips.





Xalusc said:


> That's cool and all, but how about WonderSwan?



I skimmed all 7 pages and only saw 3 or 4 posts mention anything about this, but this but white elephant in the room everyone is missing is this....

Not all of the cartridges have the same *PIN OUTS* so unless they are going to create some kind of *frankenstein monster* of an adapter how do they intend to *support ALL of these systems*?!?

They can get away with the GB/GBC/GBA because they all used similar pin outs.  But I just looked at the Lynx and NGPC (which had a split pin out) so if they did an adapter, it would have to have a GB end adapter with at least 2-3 pin outs for the three different styles of boards for the different systems.

If the GB form factor is already flush with the back of this thing, then those games are going to be sticking out over the top.

I appreciate the enthusiasm of some of the people interested in this thing, but I think they need to think ahead (same with Analogue) before this thing turns into an overpriced "enthusiast" device in need of euthanasia because it wasn't well thought out before being released.


----------



## zfreeman (Oct 23, 2019)

"Pocket works with cartridge adapters for other handheld systems, too. Like Game Gear. Neo Geo Pocket Color. Atari Lynx & more."
https://www.analogue.co/pocket/


----------



## AkikoKumagara (Oct 23, 2019)

mario5555 said:


> They can get away with the GB/GBC/GBA because they all used similar pin outs.  But I just looked at the Lynx and NGPC (which had a split pin out) so if they did an adapter, it would have to have a GB end adapter with at least 2-3 pin outs for the three different styles of boards for the different systems.
> 
> If the GB form factor is already flush with the back of this thing, then those games are going to be sticking out over the top.



We already know it's using adapters (a different one for each additional non-Game Boy system). That's not even a big deal. I believe it's conjecture to assume that these adapters will make these carts "stick out over the top". Every one of these carts are smaller than an original Game Boy cartridge, and can be adapted accordingly to fit the console in a way that is both functional and looks good. Analogue is pretty good about making things look good and function well.


----------



## xxNathanxx (Oct 23, 2019)

cashboxz01 said:


> These are the same kids who compared an iPod nano to a cheap Chinese mp4 player and said "but I paid $20 for something that looks the same and plays the same music"


A higher price alone doesn't mean a thing, and the saying about fools and their money will always remain relevant. As you mention mp3 players, some cost a fortune, others you literally got for free with a bag of chips. However, some of the greatest mp3 players of all time were pretty cheap, and could do a whole lot more than their super expensive counterparts. Even more, they could do the same things a whole lot better.
Analogue can basically ask whatever they want for their products because they know their target audience will buy them anyway (and also because they have no competition) . Of course, as a niche company, they wouldn't be in this position if their products didn't actually work well.


----------



## mezz0 (Oct 23, 2019)

Cool! might pick this up when it's released.
Pre-order, nah I don't think so.. Chances are good this will go sideways somehow..
ie what do nintendo etc think of their game hardware being 'ported' into an fpga so people can play roms ?!
I'm sure their legal dept will have something to say about this.

Would be awesome if they released their verilog or whatever code, so we can tinker ourselves with cheaper store bought fpga's.


----------



## FAST6191 (Oct 23, 2019)

mezz0 said:


> Cool! might pick this up when it's released.
> Pre-order, nah I don't think so.. Chances are good this will go sideways somehow..
> ie what do nintendo etc think of their game hardware being 'ported' into an fpga so people can play roms ?!
> I'm sure their legal dept will have something to say about this.
> ...



It is not their hardware. Also https://github.com/trun/fpgaboy has been around for about a decade at this point.



NachoBlzzy said:


> That sounds actually somewhat believable now that you explained it. Would it be possible to increase the speed of the gameplay for some of the longer rpg's?



I can imagine some kind of "overclock" (overclock is perhaps not the best term but I will use it pending something better) being a possibility, even more so if they also control the sound, cart read and screen stuff to prevent some issues there. Whether it will be there from day 0 is a different matter.


----------



## ParzivalWolfram (Oct 24, 2019)

mario5555 said:


> I skimmed all 7 pages and only saw 3 or 4 posts mention anything about this, but this but white elephant in the room everyone is missing is this....
> 
> Not all of the cartridges have the same *PIN OUTS* so unless they are going to create some kind of *frankenstein monster* of an adapter how do they intend to *support ALL of these systems*?!?
> 
> ...


have you considered that they may have a cart slot controller? Therefore, it would handle each system individually?


----------



## codezer0 (Oct 24, 2019)

Analogue does have a great rep for their consoles and such. But yeah, these prices hurt to think about. Especially when one considers that, you could pick up a working gba for around $40, or an sp for $60; a working game gear would still be around $60, and a second-hand PSP would be $70 locally. Or $160 for a PS Vita.

Also as their first handheld arrangement? This doesn't appear to be comfortable at all.

Gonna be a hard pass at this time, unless some third party endeavors to make a mold or case to give it a more friendly grip.


----------



## wonkeytonk (Jul 27, 2020)

Can it link up GBA-GC or NGP-DC?


----------



## FAST6191 (Jul 27, 2020)

wonkeytonk said:


> Can it link up GBA-GC or NGP-DC?


I don't think it is out yet, or if it is then I have not seen any testing.

Still if it is a full simulation of the GBA then I can see scope to emulate the link port at all the right rates, voltages and timings (all of which can be tricky -- even flash carts and ROM hacks have trouble with this one) and behave like a GBA for the purposes of fishing out a save or checking a given cart is there.

Whether it will have such a port, and it might need an adapter (GBA link port is not really a common port, and if they are going to do GB/GBC and anything else that gets harder, far easier to do a breakout port and make adapters) is a different matter.

Never heard of the neogeo pocket to dreamcast stuff before this ( https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/ngpc/916527-neo-geo-pocket-color/faqs/8656 ) though I imagine the same things apply as far as latency/dropped packets and adapters or not.


----------



## Intrepidis (Jul 27, 2020)

According to VG247 the pre-orders will open next week.
Does anyone know whether this will have filters to upscale the graphics to silky smooth goodness?


----------



## cashboxz01 (Jul 27, 2020)

The base console price is fair, but all the upsells crap are a ripoff.

The cables/fast charger and all cables can be found on Ali/Amazon for a fraction of the cost
There's nothing special about those cart adapters, and they can easily be cloned
As long as the dock doesn't have it's own FPGA in it, that dock isn't worth any more than $20 to the end consumer
Personally speaking, I see no point of this other than form factor, as I bought an IPS v2 GBC with custom UV printed shell and have an everdrive clone. I can easily transfer save files to my retropie via samba when I want to play on a TV.

Even better than the this or my GBC is my Vita which has an OLED display and games just look so much better on it.


----------



## lordelan (Mar 1, 2022)

cashboxz01 said:


> As long as the dock doesn't have it's own FPGA in it, that dock isn't worth any more than $20 to the end consumer


The dock has bluetooth. Analogue has partnered up with 8BitDo (once again) to ensure compatibility with their controllers. Other controllers (like PS4) are supported too among many USB controllers. Thus that is something that sets it apart from the usual USB-C-Hub/Dock.

However I too don't see a reason to buy that expensive dock as I'm not interested in playing my GB games on the TV (and if so I could use my Switch). I want it because of its fantastic screen that has 10x the pixel density of the original GB. Why would I throw this away by docking it?


----------

