What do you recommend?

For game programming? C++.

For lower-level development I'd say use C.

So C for the console and C++ for the games.

Here's how it should go.



@Moonheart08 - Don't advertise your job offerings on a separate job thread.

Thanks I appreciate the advice. I do web coding but not computer programming.

I posted rather lengthy reply earlier but it looks like something went wrong cos it ain't here (stupid proxies).

Anyways basically I said it'd be a good idea figuring out what you'd need to do with this console, i.e. what instructions you can execute, what kinds of numbers you're working with, how the OS is going to use these and how it works with peripherals etc.

Building this console like a specialised PC and loading a specific UNIX kernal might be a great idea. You can just buy most parts of the shelf and most UNIX versions are free to use as you please (note I said UNIX, not Linux). Find a graphics and sound library to plug into it or something, and then you're pretty much just writing programs for a PC.

I'd also suggest making a TINY prototype first, get hold of a Raspberry Pi or something and either make your own OS or strip out one that comes with it, or find a better UNIX system to run for what you need. Then you can add/remove any features you want, make the OS really lean and mean. (I love optimising stuffs)

I am guessing nobody would like to either help me make a prototype or help me step by step?

Google a 32 bit processor that's supported by UNIX on Google. Figure out if it supports the needs of the console. I highly recommend you looking on the internet on how parts fit together, and how you can program the machine. You can prototype hardware based off of that, and then update this topic with the new information about the console. Hopefully that will bring in more programmers.

Something cheap you might want to experiment with is the Intel Pentium 3, which should be more than enough for what you want to do. Not to mention they're fairly cheap to purchase (~20-30 bucks).

Controllers are something you should render as well, as a controller can make or break a console. They are arguably the most important thing about your console, as they are the only means for the user to interact with the game. A bad controller == bad console. So, spend a generous amount of time on designing the controller.

Well, i had the task of finding an appropriate processor for an embedded system.
When you design such a system you need to take into account the support you get.

I'd say that currently the most common processor (used in most smarthphones) is the ARM processor. You can easily get a linux system for that (yes like raspberry pi). So you don't need to spend years for the hardware development.

The decision whethe to use C or C++ depends on the amount of memory you want to use. Starting with 16 MB you may use C++

I am guessing nobody would like to either help me make a prototype or help me step by step?

what kind of help do you need?

fayt84 wrote:
I am guessing nobody would like to either help me make a prototype or help me step by step?

Well the problem is that you've asked for a programmer and we don't know what it is we're needing to program. If you're asking for us to basically build the entire software of the console then I doubt many people will be up for this huge task, mostly because of its complexity, the time required, and also we've been asked to do this job without knowing much showing that not a lot of thought has been put into the project before hand.

Like I said previously, I am not a programmer. I've finally learned that I do need C++ programmers. It seems Lumpkin and Coder know a good deal about it. So I am hoping they can either help me figure out what is needed or join the team.

If I need to use a current OS, that's fine. Now I need to figure out what is needed to start up the system and load files from a flashdrive and run it. The game it's self would take care of the controls for the game.

Since I've been ranting long enough, I suppose I could take a look myself for ya. I'm going to give a few assumptions before hand though.

I'm gonna try and find what I think would be a suitable UNIX system and tamper with it to firstly automatically detect a memory device being inserted, then check if it contains a startup.lnch (or some random file sort) which will then load the file into memory and execute the game (or possible other things that could be put on the file).

I'll see to making my own file-format style to do with the instructions to the system and how all the data should be stored on the memory unit.

It may take a while, I'll try keep you updated on how it's going and any other ideas/questions/requirements I have.

fayt84 wrote:
It seems Lumpkin and Coder know a good deal about it.

So that shows how illusive things could be: Lumpkin is a 13 years old kid who knows like nothing about the things he's talking about.

Rather listen to SatsumaBenji. What he says sounds very interesting.

You're mixing very different aspects of developing: Hardware, System/OS, and games/software. This should be considered separately.

Now I need to figure out what is needed to start up the system and load files from a flashdrive and run it.

As said before the rasberry pi is the way to go. What you need is a case with slots for the flashdrive, usb port, and hdmi. Do you think of a display?

What about TCP/IP, wireless lan -> web?

Yea, I totally know nothing even though I've been doing my research on stuff like this for a long, long time.

You're saying that what I'm saying is wrong and don't listen to me when I'm actually agreeing with Satsuma. Satsuma said you prototype with the Pi, not build the entire thing off of it.

Thanks Satsuma. I'll also do some more research

@coder: you need to watch the threads more. true fredbill lumpkin was a cocky jerk when he first joined trying to convince us math is just formulas, but he has now grown into a great programmer. he is actually learning and becoming knowledgable about this kind of thing. @ satsuma: you could grab freebsd and then just edit the kernel to check for that on startup. shouldnt be too hard to do

coder777 wrote:
Lumpkin is a 13 years old kid who knows like nothing about the things he's talking about.

Honestly I'm amazed that Lumpkin wasn't a little offended by that (or at least credit to him for not raging XD )
I know Lumpkin's not been here too long but in my opinion he joined us (as far as I saw) already having with a great knowledge of C++ and Mathematics, and while with us rapidly progressed even further. Although if there's anything that's been gained it's not knowledge, but wisdom.

Lumpkin wrote:
Satsuma said you prototype with the Pi, not build the entire thing off of it.

Indeed I did, and with good reason. The pi is amazingly simple, powerful, supports everything a PC can, and is cheap. By chance I just got a model B for Christmas and I was planning on making a "macro-laptop" or a wireless controlled robot from it. But using it to prototype a new gaming console design sounds like an great opportunity for me to learn about the UNIX system, and get to develop a possible future gaming system. Sounds awesome don't it?
(admittedly just working on this as a hobby and education rather than anything else at the moment, don't count your chickens right?)

DTSCode wrote:
you could grab freebsd and then just edit the kernel to check for that on startup. shouldnt be too hard to do

That was exactly what I intended to try and do, the longest part of this for me would be familiarising myself with the kernal and simply finding out how I can "crack in" and edit it.

@SatsumaBenji
My concern was to take the focus away from Lumpkins Intel Pentium 3 and stuff (which would lead to nothing) and move it to the raspberry pi.

Lumpkin wrote:
You're saying that what I'm saying is wrong and don't listen to me when I'm actually agreeing with Satsuma.

Read your own post from Jan 8, 2014 at 6:04am after SatsumaBenji post from Jan 7, 2014 at 7:03pm

Right, downloading the latest standard Debian Wheezy OS and I'm gonna be doing 2 things with that.

I'll be dual booting my PC running this UNIX system so I can develop for the UNIX environment and test little things out more easily. And this is also the same OS that runs on the PI so I can test things on that too.

To be honest I think the Debian Wheezy distribution could be all you need to run on your console, the main difference between consoles and PCs is just the interface. PCs have a windowing environment with a desktop and application windows to do many different things, whereas consoles have a starting menu and then dedicate the entire screen to your running content.


By the way I have a question on how you'd prefer to be running the games (just curious). Would you prefer to use something like the slightly older systems like PS2 and Gamecube where once the game is loaded all the OS "shuts down" and lets the game completely handle the system until a reset button is pressed.
Or would you prefer the more modern (and slightly less efficient but much safer) method of having the OS running in the background like an Xbox360 or Wii, where while in the game you're able to hit a home button which will bring up a menu from the OS to do things outside of the game.

For the sake of keeping it retro, reset would be better and easier to do. Plus all games would have an end game option.

But I don't know about just stopping a data stream from a flashdrive, such as when you eject it without safely removing it, it could cause data loss. Perhaps a simple option of (Remove Game), where it shuts down the game and then you can change games.