gamebuino mega

[Drakker]

We still haven't reached the limits of the current Gamebuino, but let's see what we have:

• A pretty damn good CPU. Everyone seems surprised by how much we can do with it.
• Good connectivity through ports, that has yet to be exploited.
• Multiplayer, although few people have more than one Gamebuino or friends with Gamebuinos.
• Great battery life.
• A screen that works in any type of illumination.
• Pretty decent speaker.

Now let's see what is limited or could need improvement:

• RAM, it is extremely limited, although when used well it does the job.
• PROGMEM/flash, it turns out, is not that large, code space is limited.
• Easy access to storage, but that is mostly due to the limited RAM and PROGMEM area. The storage itself is more than large enough with 2gb SD cards.
• Screen has very low resolution.
• Screen is monochrome, and faking gray is not working so well.

Let's think of great features to have:

• Some type of wireless connectivity.
• Grayscale screen.
• Color screen.
• Backlight (although I tend to think it would be a drawback, we couldn't play in the sun).
• More buttons.
• Wrap around case, to protect the Gamebuino from rain and other hazards.

So, my priorities would be:

• RAM, lots of it. It would help with many things (storage access, higher resolution/color screen, connectivity, etc.)
• A lot more code space/PROGMEM/Flash, although a huge amount of RAM could allow us to dispense with that if we had a lot of RAM and could fit whole games into memory instead.
• Higher resolution grayscale or color screen. 4 or 16 colors would be good enough, if such a screen exists. A resolution of 96x96 or more would be great. With the current screen, the 84 pixels horizontally are good enough, its the 48 pixels high that is limiting. I would prefer a reflective screen, as opposed to a backlit screen, as it is better on the battery and works great in the sun. Although, I doubt such a screen exists and would be available at a good price. Maybe there's a stash of old recycled Gameboy Color or Gameboy Advance screens somewhere?
• Wrap-around case, as I said earlier, to protect the Gamebuino better form the hazards of life.
• More buttons, shoulder buttons would be great, maybe more than two buttons on the right.

Also, I am not overly concerned with the CPU architecture the Gamebuino 2 uses. I'll adapt to whatever you use. If having a lot of RAM means moving away from AT* chips, so be it. I am not overly concerned with direct code portability either, although most of it can probably be handled through the Gamebuino libraries anyway.

[treflip]

Not that thought out but (besides more ram):
I would love to be able to wifi(ftp/ssh) into the wiki and download games onto my gamebuino with no computer involved. That would be fun!

I really like the oled screens too
and I installed a 500mah battery from my rc stuff to pretty much let me play forever!

Something that would be really nice is a small volume control knob... like GBA SP has (slider).

<$50 is my price point for buying something to play with... without thinking much. Above that makes me hesitant to purchase without thinking it through better.

Monochrome at least so the GBO matches Ti-calc's stuff (84/89/v200)...

I do like the L/R buttons too if there's room for them.

That's my list from the top of my head.

[erico]

make sure you have next gamebuino with a color clash! Not one there was, but a new one, genuine.

[NicK]

Just two words for you Erico - Nirvana Engine!

They're now doing Spectrum games with without colour clash - albeit with reduced pixel count.

For me the over-riding thing that needs improving is the screen resolution. That's it.

[erico]

I see.
There is a charm and uniqueness to color clash and its hardwares. Overcoming it is not a point for me.

I could like more memory, but current gear seems possible to go around its own limitations.
I´d say let´s see what people can come up with what there is first, people can fly...just give them time.

[Drakker]

I just found out about another Arduino platform with a console shield called the Tinyduino (https://tiny-circuits.com/products/tiny-duino.html). Not much to see, and the layout leaves a lot to be desired, but it is really small. The interesting part is that they sell the screen as a tiny shield: https://tiny-circuits.com/tinyscreen.html. At 25$ a pop it is quite expensive, but it comes pre-assembled on a shield. It is probably available stand alone, and I bet it's quite a lot cheaper. Its full color and has a 96x64 resolution. It looks quite small though, about 2cm, but it might still be a good display for the Gamebuino mega.

[adekto]

seen it aswel, but its just to small and if coloar might be beter of with older color lcd's from celphone (also not to expensive)

so if you havent seen the old arduboy is back
i still think the 128x64 black and white lcd's or oled's would be a beter fit for gamebuino

[erico]

Could be but I guess we would need more memory for such screen?

It would be funky if, let´s say, Gamebuino mega would come capable of doing 16 fixed colors.
A Palette from Pixel Joint contests would be really superb, Like Dawbringer´s palette.

[Jerom]

A Palette from Pixel Joint contests would be really superb, Like Dawbringer´s palette.

I would LOVE to see that...
I use this kind of custom palettes (or a tool like Color Ramp Creator) on my gameboy emulators or personal games using a limited number of colors.

[erico]

Then we are on the same boat, I kind of do similar with photoshop on my preferable games.
Trying to get games to look good on the restriction of Gamebuino is an awesome time-eater of mine.
I also enjoy the cpc/c64/coco II/apple II restrictions so to extend it there.
I have a file in photoshop I tweaked to push visual files into some of those restricions...

Thanks for the tool didn´t know about that.

Let you know, never, EVER, let me into an art store, I will sell my soul to acquire just about everything, even things I don´t need.