Homebrew Everdrive?

[c0nn0r]

Hey guys,
Can anyone confirm my assumption that if I had some EPROMS and a burner, as well as a romset I could make my own boot?

eg. Could I just re-flash teh romz each time I wanted to change out a game? I know it would be tedious, but perhaps I could use this to play homebrew on real hardware, or other games that I can't just get my hands on.
Obviously now NEO DEV-TEAM as their romz are encrypted.

This is possible right? This is how programmers originally tested their code on real hardware, amirite?

 

[Opethian]

nope

 

[skinny503]

It's more complicated then just swapping rom chips. Board revisions,mappers, special chips, ect all play a role. If your wanting to do a neo cart it gets about 10x harder then say a NES or genesis cart.

 

[HeavyMachineGoob]

As others said, you can't use EPROMs and sockets on some random boards to play any game, there's too many variables.

If you're just testing one game over and over with only one PROG and CHA board in mind, then yeah you could always test using the EPROM and socket method, but keep in mind the boards won't fit in the cart shell anymore.

 

[c0nn0r]

Good to know. Thanks everybody. I knew I'd get the straight dope from the pros here.

One thing that's still interesting to think about is the NG-DEV-TEAM's flash-able carts that they use for their releases. I know that they have a special encryption scheme that makes it impossible to just flash with a different romset, but I assume that if someone could crack the encryption we might have ourselves an Everdrive type flashcart for NEO?

 

[GohanX]

More likely, they design all their games for the same type of custom PCB that they use. So you could reflash the chips, but the only games you could use would be other NG Dev games.

 

[HeavyMachineGoob]

NG DT's boards are too specialized to be used for Everdrive-type purposes, they're only designed to work with NG DT games and I wouldn't be surprised if they use non-SNK mapping and bankswitching to get their games working.

I just don't understand the big demand for a NG flash cart. There's only 150 some games, a third of which are fighting games. Does one really need that many fighting games in easy access? These are arcade games too, short, challenging and often score driven. They're designed to be played over and over again. An Everdrive is the exact opposite of that. Why not just buy the few really great Neo Geo games there are instead of loading a flash cart up with over a hundred games you'll probably never even look at?

 

[Jonmkl]

Why not just buy the few really great Neo Geo games there are instead of loading a flash cart up with over a hundred games you'll probably never even look at?

I'd be interested in a Neo flash cart for a number of reasons. To extend the games immediately available in my cabinet without having to use a boot filled 161-in-1, that way my fourth slot can be switchable between a smaller list of 20 - 25 games that I actually do want to play, instead of over 100 I don't. To further open up the Neo home-brew scene and make it accessible to new developers. To denounce the evils of truth and love. To extend our reach to the stars above.

Oh and also to play SSVS :-P

 

[mikejmoffitt]

You could do it within a single board type. A more elegant but complicated solution would be to make a RAM cart and have other hardware rewrite it then reset the system.

 

[HeavyMachineGoob]

Make the flash cart like any other, put the FPGA brain on the PROG board, where it runs the "everdrive menu" code and accesses the SD card. From there, you'd arrange flash memory or RAM on the PROG and CHA boards for the game to be loaded and add a cable to connect the two boards together, so the FPGA can fill the CHA side. Mapping hardware could probably be patched in software or handled by the FPGA itself. Maybe add a decryption option? Might be too much for an FPGA.

 

[Danthor]

I would do terrible, unspeakable things for a proper Neo Geo everdrive.

 

[Dark Sakul]

I would do terrible, unspeakable things for a proper Neo Geo everdrive.

I agree

 

[xsq]

A flash cart would be nice since it might cool off some noobs that now spend incredible amounts of cash on bad or average game carts, some just to hoard them. It would also enable the poorer gamers (like myself) to play good roms of games otherwise unavailable to them because of the price/demand...

but on the large, I'm with HMG on this.

 

[andsuchisdeath]

I just don't understand the big demand for a NG flash cart. There's only 150 some games, a third of which are fighting games. Does one really need that many fighting games in easy access? These are arcade games too, short, challenging and often score driven. They're designed to be played over and over again. An Everdrive is the exact opposite of that. Why not just buy the few really great Neo Geo games there are instead of loading a flash cart up with over a hundred games you'll probably never even look at?

HMG is right. Everyone else can get ghosted.

EDIT: Anyone who disagrees can get ghosted.

 

[Jassin000]

The only thing HMG has right is the part when he says "I just don't understand the big demand"

From my point of view... I want Mark of Wolves, Bust a Move Again, Twinkle Star, Super Spy, and Magician Lord just to name a few.

Well based on what I've seen on EBay/Neostore/sales threads... I can expect to pay 500$ easy for the games I want. 500$!?! That is in addition to the money I've already dropped on Metal Slug 3, Ninja Combat and Fatal Fury Special. I'm no big timer or collector clearly, but for 500$ I better get every fucking game on the system end of story!

If we could just get a proper (like the MegaEverdrive on Genesis) Everdrive, I would pay 500$ for it, play the games/ROMs I wanted and love every minute of it.

 

[andsuchisdeath]

I'm no big timer or collector clearly, but for 500$ I better get every fucking game on the system end of story!

Then I guess you're "collecting" for the wrong system/hardware.

 

[KalessinDB]

On Krikzz's forums, he's said it's not completely outside the realm of possibility that he would try to create an NG Everdrive, but he's often repeated that the cost of making one would be "Soooo high... at least $500"

I've mentioned to him that in this hobby, that's not necessarily that high.

Those of you who would do terrible, unspeakable things for a true NG ED might want to register over there and make yourselves known. Not that I'm necessarily expecting one to happen any time soon, but let's be fair here, he's starting to get to the point where if he wants to keep challenging himself with new hardware, the options are getting limited.

 

[HeavyMachineGoob]

The only thing HMG has right is the part when he says "I just don't understand the big demand"

From my point of view... I want Mark of Wolves, Bust a Move Again, Twinkle Star, Super Spy, and Magician Lord just to name a few.

Well based on what I've seen on EBay/Neostore/sales threads... I can expect to pay 500$ easy for the games I want. 500$!?! That is in addition to the money I've already dropped on Metal Slug 3, Ninja Combat and Fatal Fury Special. I'm no big timer or collector clearly, but for 500$ I better get every fucking game on the system end of story!

If we could just get a proper (like the MegaEverdrive on Genesis) Everdrive, I would pay 500$ for it, play the games/ROMs I wanted and love every minute of it.

Geez, are MVS carts already that high? Isn't MOTW still around $100 or so? TSS being $200+ is a pain, but the same can be said of other consoles with fun but expensive titles. Most of the MVS library is relatively cheap still. A lot people say there are better fighters than SSVS and it's the most expensive MVS cart.

You're all perfectly welcome to pursue a NG Everdrive so you can play a few games without pages of hacks to sift through, but $500 is quite a bit more than your average multicart. Mind you, it's the most economical way to spend $500 in this hobby (compared to a Omega CMVS or Daedalus converter), but in some respects, it's hard to compete with a multicart at a fraction of the cost.

In all honesty, aren't the best games worth getting, even at a high cost? If you had a choice of buying one amazing game at $100 over 10 crummy and unremarkable games at $10 each, which would you rather do? I for one would rather get one game I'll play for a long time. I could have gotten a pile of average fighters for AES on the cheap, but instead I got MOTW at a significantly higher cost. Having played it for quite some time now, I made the better choice.

 

[vaillian]

its always funny to see how neo geo fans bash the Bootleg multicards but dreaming about a Flash card

 

[andsuchisdeath]

The only thing HMG has right is the part when he says "I just don't understand the big demand"

No. HMG has it all right.

You are wrong.