Are there any systems nowadays which are geared towards\only play 2D games? How plausible would it be to make\manufacture your own 2D console? We have the technology now to make a 2D machine which would have almost no limitations, millions of colours, tons of RAM for animation and high resolution, progressive scan displays. Plus wireless controllers and online play now work great. What's stopping us? ....oh wait...money :shrug:
Unfortunately all companies are tied to 3D development ATM. When will they realize that 2D platformers are one of the greatest things on the gaming world?:banghead: As an example, they should be taking advantage of the "relationship" between Sega and Nintendo and make the greatest platformer of all times!
That looks awesome! The only thing is, a 360 is about $400, whereas a system made for 2D wouldn't need the 3 core IBM processor or the ATi graphics card. It seems like overkill, especially if a lot of that's going to be wasted and not used.
I wouldn't be absolute about this. Depends on how you render the frames. A 2D title could easily push the 360 to its limits if it had some heavy non-graphics computations to make. Take the following scenario for example: a 2D title, using plains (one-sided flat polygones- ie with a single Z-axis vector) and textured to look like sprites. Simple so far. Then add dynamic real time lights, shadows, depth of field, multiple effects to simulate parallax scrolling, a real-time rendered sky with random weather effects and the relevant physics to match (collisions etc) and you got yourself a busy environment that could sure use a push from powerful hardware. Add to this some 5.1 sound, very advanced branching systems for enemy AI and online co-op. As you see, the above scenario would make decent use of the 360's abilities and it is in no way 'overkill' to have such hardware for 2d.
Unfortunately neither the GBA or DS are consoles. The last 2D only consoles were dead a while ago now. In fact, the only arcade hardware I can think of that still has only 2D games coming out on it is Cave's SH3 board. (Actually, I think there is a new PGM game on the horizon or recently released). The Atomiswave is still around, but isn't 2D only, and the 2D on it sucks balls, although it definitely doesn't have to. Making your own 2D console is laughable at best (unless you're a millionairre). Your best bet is to program something on Windows yourself. You already have limitless RAM, and like a 2 billion person user base.
i think that making a 2d powerhorse console nowaday would be incredibly cheap... add to it VGA/Componenet/AV video output up to 1280x, a lot of VRAM, and a freely available Devkit and you've got something people would love to buy. 1 to 1 conversion of good 'ol 2d fighters a la KOF, street fighter VS etc etc along with classics like metal slug, puzzle bobble, magical drop etc... would be easy... something like a cheap NEO GEO CD properly made that _I_ would like... the only hope for such a thing would come from the people that made GP32...
In ye olde days, rather then use 2D graphics chips some companies used the CPU (or another CPU) to draw the screen. Most of the PIC projects that output a composite signal use two output ports (for video and sync) and some simple resistor networks and timing to draw the screen. Some of the olde CPM computers had a dedicated Z80 to draw a 56 or 80 column display using 74LS logic chips and. There is no reason why you couldn't use two fast CPUs to make a 2D console, one CPU to do all the game mechanics and the other to calculate what to draw and then just brute force a display via 3 DACs and some logic to do the timing signals. Although there would be hardware problems with timing, noise and signal strength so getting everything working would be a challenge. There are chips like the Marvell (formerly Intel) PXA300 which run at 624Mhz and has 2D acceleration on board. There have been a number of people that have made 8 bit computers with off the shelf parts so making a 16 or 32 bit machine would be a good step up.
how much doest that chip cost? i'm about to enter the videogame manufacturing businness also it's faster than a wii i guess anyway i think a console made for homebrewers would have a nice market share... like the gp32 did and would have made even better with more reasonable price (at launch it was COSTY!)
a chip's speed has nothing to do with the number of transistors and the type of gates it has, u know that Karsten u can have a Z80 clocked at 1Ghz and still drag !
To make a modern 2D console you only need a CPU, work RAM, IPL, framebuffer RAM, and a little sound sample RAM. I would use compact flash for configuration. A Pentium 4 at a reasonable clock would be sufficient at doing ALL the work. There is no need for a specialized "GPU" for 2D consoles anymore. The dev environment would also be a piece of cake This can be realized in around $200 of materials using a FPGA, even less if a soft CPU core or a hard PPC core is used in the FPGA. if this were to be produced in bulk the retail price could be down to around $100. If this were an arcade kit, not a console, even less! It's a bad idea to implement the render in software if you have the choice. If the system used a fixed resolution like 640x480x16bpp that would be ultra simple in hardware and compatible with most current arcade monitors and 480p TVs, it would also keep your CPU-time to more useful things. The feedback the system'd need would be little more than IRQ at Hblank and Vblank -easy! For sound, you really just need a small 16-bit FIFO and have your hardware empty it at 48khz + IRQ at each sample - also easy! Are you being facetious? It has everything to do with the number of transistors and type (well, the implementation) of gates!
The chip is designed specifically for mobile phones and PDAs so you can buy it for around $20 in bulk, even a single development board with 32MB RAM and 16MB of Flash Memory, USB interface, Win CE ROM and interfaces for display, sound and i/o can be picked up for around $110 in single units. I like the Z80, although the fastest Z80 was the eZ80 which could run at 50Mhz and address up to 16MB RAM...
How about MiniITX based PCs? They're small, quiet (often silent), have pretty powerful CPUs (500mhz - 1.5ghz VIA chips), upgradeable RAM, built in graphics and sound, TV output, USB for (wireless) controllers, optional Wifi, an established user base, piss easy development (everyone can code x86, even me ), an open OS (Linux FTW!), plus there are already limitless media players and emulators avaliable. With a custom BIOS and booting from compact flash, it could be a genuine console, no? MS did it with the Xbox
Consoles = uniformity and strict regulation concerning the standards. In short, they come with a Bible attached, preaching what you have to do, and to balance things, offer near 100% cross-compatibility and user-friendlyness. What you are describing is an open DIY platform, along the lines of "IBM compatible" computers back in the day.
