Genesis Emulator for IPOD

[Troopermanaic]

Hey I was wondering if anyone got a Genesis emulator to work on a 5th gen IPOD with ROCKBOX. If you do then can you tell me how to do it? All I want to do is play sonic on the go and I dont feel like carrying anything else then an IPOD with me.

[Chronon]

We ask that you search the forums before posting.  No one with the skill and interest has tried it yet.  I'm also not sure what the performance would be like on a lot of the targets.  

Bear in mind that Rockbox is a jukebox replacement firmware.  It's aimed at providing superior audio features (many codecs, crossfeed, crossfade, parametric EQ, replaygain, etc.).  Most of the core developers aim to improve the performance of the core and focus on audio/playback related functionality.  Something like this is only likely to happen if some people step forward and volunteer to do it.

[Troopermanaic]

I could only guess that this is becomeing more popular because of the fact that all my friends have it and they always reccomend rockbox to people. There is a genesis emulator but I cant figure out how to get it to work, Its at this site  http://ipodlinux.org/IGens  and I cannot figure out how to get it to work with Rockbox. The only way that I could possibly figure it out is without rockbox and I definataly dont want to delete it.

[Chronon]

That isn't Rockbox.  The URL should tell you that it's a program for iPodLinux.  

These forums are for discussing Rockbox.  Please read the forum guidelines and consult the wiki and manual if you would like to learn more about Rockbox.  

[markun]

I started a wiki page (almost nothing to see there right now) to help with the porting of game console emulators:

http://www.rockbox.org/twiki/bin/view/Main/ConsoleEmulators

Perhaps it's better to collect links to other emulators and have discussions about ports there.

(EDIT: should the thread be locked again?)

[Chronon]

I suppose it can stay open provided further discussion is restricted to developing a Rockbox plugin.

[LambdaCalculus]

I doubt a Genesis emulator would work. We would have to emulate quite a few chips, including, but not limited to:

* 68000 CPU running at approx. 8 MHz
* Z80 CPU running at 3.58 MHz
* YM2612 FM chip, which provides the bulk of the audio work

There's another chip in the system that's used for the sound system, but I don't remember what it is off the top of my head. Not to mention the fact that playing anything of this sort on an iPod will be an excersice in frustration... but can you imagine playing games that require 6 buttons? *BLEEP* that!

The only players that COULD do it MAY be the Coldfire targets, provided someone can run a virtual 68K session on top of the Coldfire (which is mostly 68K-compatible, instruction wise). But this is all speculation.

[Sanek]

Not to mention the fact that playing anything of this sort on an iPod will be an excersice in frustration... but can you imagine playing games that require 6 buttons? *BLEEP* that!

Its not that bad really, try it with rockboy - setup up, down, left, right, make button A in top left corner (move the wheel a little for it to register), button B in top right corner, use bottom left for start, bottom right for select and the middle button for menu (if there is such a button in gameboy).

When you play, you don't actually have to press any of those buttons on the ipod wheel, just need to touch it and it will get activated. Finished Prince of Persia under rockboy, you really do get used to the keys pretty fast.

[LambdaCalculus]

Okay, for argument's sake, let's say someone writes a Genesis emulator, and then I want to watch you try and play something like Streets of Rage or Sonic the Hedgehog, or any high action game for that matter with the scroll wheel. Then we'll talk more about "not that bad, really".

Rockboy is "not that bad, really" because the Game Boy only has four buttons: A, B, Select, Start. You can map them to the corners of the scroll wheel, but it's still unintuitive to play platform games on them. For example, I can play Tetris with no problems, but a game like, say, Mega Man will give me a lot of problems, because I try to move and keep on brushing the corners, making Mega Man jump when I don't want to and constantly throwing myself into pits. In my opinion, the only DAP with a workable button configuration for Rockboy is the iriver H300.

[Rob]

Okay, for argument's sake, let's say someone writes a Genesis emulator, and then I want to watch you try and play something like Streets of Rage or Sonic the Hedgehog, or any high action game for that matter with the scroll wheel. Then we'll talk more about "not that bad, really".

Rockboy is "not that bad, really" because the Game Boy only has four buttons: A, B, Select, Start. You can map them to the corners of the scroll wheel, but it's still unintuitive to play platform games on them. For example, I can play Tetris with no problems, but a game like, say, Mega Man will give me a lot of problems, because I try to move and keep on brushing the corners, making Mega Man jump when I don't want to and constantly throwing myself into pits. In my opinion, the only DAP with a workable button configuration for Rockboy is the iriver H300.

The h300 works better than most, though from my experience it's not entirely suited - due to how close circle and A+B buttons are (become buttons A and B) are to the direction keys, you end up pressing the wrong ones, especially on high action games and racers. Though on something like pokemon, that isn't fast paced, it works perfectly.

In my opinion the next console to port, if any, is the NES - it's very similar in power to the gameboy, and has the exact same buttons, meaning it won't get any more akward than it already is.

[LambdaCalculus]

In my opinion the next console to port, if any, is the NES - it's very similar in power to the gameboy, and has the exact same buttons, meaning it won't get any more akward than it already is.

I'm working on an NES plugin; however, my partner-in-hacking on this project is busy with school right now, so the best I can do with it is just minimal amounts of coding here and there.

Here's the forum thread about the NES plugin: http://forums.rockbox.org/index.php?topic=11843.0

And please understand that this is going to take time to be completed, or even be submitted to Flyspray. So let the coders code, and the Rockboxers... err... rock.  

[Rob]

In my opinion the next console to port, if any, is the NES - it's very similar in power to the gameboy, and has the exact same buttons, meaning it won't get any more akward than it already is.

I'm working on an NES plugin; however, my partner-in-hacking on this project is busy with school right now, so the best I can do with it is just minimal amounts of coding here and there.

Here's the forum thread about the NES plugin: http://forums.rockbox.org/index.php?topic=11843.0

And please understand that this is going to take time to be completed, or even be submitted to Flyspray. So let the coders code, and the Rockboxers... err... rock.  

Excellent, I've always wanted to play the old NES classics on the go

Good luck, I hope you get it finished. I'd help, but I don't not a great coder and I have way to much schoolwork at the moment =/

[Chronon]

I updated the wiki page with a link to another site that provides a rough list of the Genesis hardware.

[Troopermanaic]

well I guess thats too bad well anyway one will eventually be made and if not then thats ok because tecnically I dont need it but I really want it

[brarei200]

Well Zacaj is porting Dgen to the iPods currently on the iPod Linux forums. He saids it's expected to run 70% without sound and then if he adds frameskip...about 75-85% my guess are. I would think that Rockbox could port a different emulator under the license or what ever it is.  After Zacaj done with his 7 projects ask him for pointers on help/to help develop. Don't interrupt him though he's working on Genesis Atari 2600 and a whole bunch of good stuff. Thank you and havea nice day