Don't say it couldn't be done, as this 'programmer' has done it, with a bit of modding and hacking!

You own some SNES cartridges, but you only have NES console, well no problem, as you can now run SNES games on your original NES!

Tom Murphy, aka Tom7, has found a way to manipulate NES cartridges so that they can truly outperform what would usually be expected from them. Tom hacks the circuit boards of these cartridges, equipping them with Raspberry Pi 3 mini-computers. The Pi plays host to a number of SNES ROMs which are all filtered through a special program, translating the necessary data into something the NES can read and essentially display on a TV.

If you want to see all of this happening in action, check out the video below. The idea starts to take shape at around 5:40, and if you skip ahead to 16:12, you'll see Tom placing the finished NES cartridge into the system, allowing the NES to play the SNES classic Super Mario World. This is some kind of Back To The Future-style wizardry that goes well over our heads, but it's pretty amazing to see.
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This isn't the only interesting project that Tom7 has created, though. A few years back he created a computer program that could learn how to play NES games on its own, with just tiny amount of instruction from the player. Somehow, though, seeing Super Mario World be played on a NES just seems even more crazy. We're all used to Virtual Console, where retro games are played on newer systems, but reversing that is very interesting indeed.

I want to see Super Mario Odyssey for the newest console, the Nintendo Switch, running on my NES console, or better yet the NES Classic Mini, to prove you don't need the latest shit!



Source: MaxConsole

 

[GhostLatte]

I would orally pleasure this guy to thank him. no homo

 

[Kioku]

Talk about clickbait... Made it sound native....

 

[Xzi]

Talk about clickbait... Made it sound native....

It is native hardware outputting the picture. Can't really expect an 8-bit console to run 16-bit games without some sort of workaround.

 

[Kioku]

It is native hardware outputting the picture. Can't really expect an 8-bit console to run 16-bit games without some mods/tweaks.

Without some middle man computer doing the grunt work. Meh. It's a one-off with the "wow" factor. Still, leaves me questioning why it hasn't been done before.

 

[Xzi]

Without some middle man computer doing the grunt work. Meh.

All it's doing is sending a signal that the NES can accept as valid, much like any cartridge.

 

[Kioku]

All it's doing is sending a signal that the NES can accept as valid, much like any cartridge.

So, it's outputting video from the raspi through the NES... Again... MEH

 

[Xzi]

So, it's outputting video from the raspi through the NES... Again... MEH

No, the NES is what outputs. It's reading the Raspi like a NES cart, and he's doing some magic programmer fuckery to make NES approximate the image and display additional colors, which he notes the NES is capable of natively. I suggest watching the video in the OP, was pretty interesting.

 

[KingVamp]

this is the ultimate weapon of those who cry switch port for every performance-intensive game and be used as proof that it will be able to run.

Nintendo Switch Expansion Pak and enhanced carts confirmed.

 

[Nimrod-002]

ingenuity : 10/10
practicality : 1/10

 

[SirNapkin1334]

So, what you’re really doing is emulating the games on an RPi3 and then running the display signal through an NES? I wouldn’t really call that “running SNES games on NES” since you’re essentially running them on the RPi.

 

[Deleted User]

So... basically, Super FX chips, but on crack?

Jokes aside, this is really cool to see. I've always wondered how much we can augment the capabilities of older systems using modern hardware. I'd love to see a SNES Cart pushing out fully-fleshed PS2-Quality 3D Models using the same technique.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Interestingly this showed up in my YouTube recommendations only minutes before it was posted here. I wonder if YouTube started recommending this video to everyone at the same time.
A pretty impressive feat, I consider it something akin to the special chips on SNES since it's getting help from extra hardware but still has to work within a lot of the limitations of the console it's running on, but even more impressive because of how much more limited the NES is, and he still managed to output images that shouldn't be possible on a NES, with Super Mario World actually looking really close to how it did on the SNES albeit with a lot of graphical glitches. Now, if he managed to get sound working in the SNES emulator, that would be even more impressive. I think that should be doable (since you can do voice samples on NES anything should be possible), but the quality wouldn't be much worth speaking of, it should be recognizable though.

 

[Apache Thunder]

Now you just have to add game streaming and I can finally realize my dream of playing Breath of the Wild on an NES.....


... I don't know how I will be able to play the game with just 2 buttons and a d-pad, but I'll manage.

 

[ScarletDreamz]

China did it first:

 

[Deleted User]

Now there is hope that we can one day run ps3 games on the ps4.

 

[Deleted User]

it runs on the pi, not the nes... the nes here is just a graphics-thing. all the brains of this is in the rpi...

 

[Xzi]

Now there is hope that we can one day run ps3 games on the ps4.

I hope so too, but PS3 has a very different architecture from other modern consoles. Sony shot themselves in the foot on that one.

 

[Foxi4]

One one hand this isn't particularly impressive because the NES obviously isn't running the ROM, the RPi does that. On the other, it's actually kind of amazing if you know a little bit about how the NES handles graphics. That system was not designed to receive or display what's effectively a stream of raster images. In fact, there are strict limitations on what the NES can and cannot display, regardless of whether it has memory for it or not because of how it uses banks and palettes. The "wrapper" is the impressive part here - anyone can run a ROM on a Pi, not everyone can stream video to a NES. Is it useful though? No, it's super silly and has no real life application, chances are that this is just a vanity project made for giggles - the NES lacks the capacity to properly display the stream anyways or the buttons necessary to play the games, using this solution would be an exercise in frustration when there are readily available alternatives.

 

[The Catboy]

It is native hardware outputting the picture. Can't really expect an 8-bit console to run 16-bit games without some sort of workaround.

But it's still clickbait. He made it sound like you could slap a SNES game into a NES and call it a day, which simply isn't the case. It's an interesting project, but the title is still clickbait nonetheless.

 

[Xzi]

He made it sound like you could slap a SNES game into a NES and call it a day, which simply isn't the case.

Anybody with the slightest bit of tech knowledge should know that wouldn't be possible, even before clicking on this topic. If it was called "PSX games running on SNES" I certainly wouldn't think the methodology was jamming a disc in SNES's cartridge slot. The title is fine, that is indeed a SNES game being output (run) by a NES. Not caring for the methodology is a separate issue.