I was talking to one of my coworker and this discussion came by. We know that Capcom will make Megaman 9 to look like a nes game, which is cool but it's not the real thing. So what if a new real nes game would come out?
It could be distributed in an emulated form trough wiiWare, Xbox arcade and Sony psn store for the people that don't have the hardware anymore BUT for the one that do, the game could be produced on a real cart.
If the idea would take off, I could see many possibilities coming like producing hardware again, continuing some franchise that never had any sequels, providing a way for home brew game to be published etc. Many possibilities indeed.
The interest in retro gaming and simpler games is becoming bigger and bigger so I think there could be a market for it.
Since the nesdev community really enjoy the nes, I would like to have your thoughts on the subject. It may only be a dream from someone that always wanted to produce software on the previous generation of console but who knows were a simple idea could go.
Like this game? [url]Sokandura -
http://smouch.net/lol/[url]
Back during the 'Plug'n'Play' fad, there really where new NES games being produced.
I know a lot of those were NOAC based but I wonder if many of them would run on an actual NES since they were designed for the flawed hardware. I think I remember people saying they tryed something they made on a famiclone and it worked but could not get it to run on the real thing but I could be wrong.
Maybe some day I might dump one and try to run it on the powerpac although I may be too stupid to firure out the addresses on a glob top conneted to a differint glob top when I don't know the pinout of ether.
anyway I would definatly buy new NES games if they were produced and I am going to buy megaman 9 when it comes out.
Only if they produced a cartridge. I'm not interested in paying for a ROM file.
If they produced an actual NES game and sold it exclusivly emulated, it was a fun game and whatever encryption they use could be removed, that would also make me happy to as we could make are own.
NES Games are still made in China.
Even if most of them are pirated copies of existing games, or Rom Hacks of Duck Hunt where you shoot Osama bin Laden, there are also original games still made.
So the work people are doing here and the games sold
here doesn't count as real NES games?
Apparently the products on retrousb.com aren't sold in enough quantity to make it onto the radar, or they lack an EAN/UPC, or whatever.
Depends on the game.
Neotoxin? Yes. Another crappy, boring minigame? No.
Oh, and Not The Common Dose, the link doesn't work. I can't connect to smouch.net.
dXtr wrote:
So the work people are doing here and the games sold
here doesn't count as real NES games?
Sorry if it was interpreted the wrong way. My comment was related to Mega man 9 which is not a real nes game but just wants to look like one on purpose. I think since Capcom took the risk to release a game that way, it will be interesting to see how well it sell.
Of course the ones you mentioned are real nes game, that would be an insult to say otherwise. But one of my dream, if I can ever make it happen, is that I would love if those games could have more exposure and become common again. If possible, not only the nes, but on any platform that people still have an interest in it.
If you can "revive" some of those platform in the eye of the public and create interest, maybe you could motivate some bigger company to create some product again.
I see some people prefer the real thing (and I do), but the reason to be able to distribute it on a channel like WiiWare or xbox arcade is to create exposure for the product.
I have some ideas on my mind, don't know if I will be able to realize them or not, but it good to see opinions from everybody.
Yeah, I agree it would be cool. But in some ways I kind of see some of it already happening with this (to me annoying*) retro fad.
* Mostly because it makes it more expensive for me to buy games ^_^
dXtr wrote:
Yeah, I agree it would be cool. But in some ways I kind of see some of it already happening with this (to me annoying*) retro fad.
* Mostly because it makes it more expensive for me to buy games ^_^
I agree with this... I find it annoying too. 5 years ago I could buy a Gradius II for 1000 yen at Akihabara. Now you're lucky if you can get it at 3500 yen. Recently with the retro things that many people seems to have taking an interest in (especially the pokemon generation that wants to buy them all...) many carts that were at an acceptable price became higher.
If I could revive a platform, it wouldn't for shooting out "retro is cool again!": I just want games to be made again for the platform I like. And if it could become viable, I would love to republish some game to make them available again at an acceptable price and in good condition. But that part, I guess I'm just dreaming..
dXtr wrote:
Yeah, I agree it would be cool. But in some ways I kind of see some of it already happening with this (to me annoying*) retro fad.
* Mostly because it makes it more expensive for me to buy games ^_^
Couldn't agree more with that !
Also, the who can tell how good the games sold at retrozone work since you can't download ROM from them ? Who would risk spending more than $25 for a game that have high chances to be complete crap ? And what is the point to buy NESnake $25+port when I can make it for about a tenth of that price (not counting the initial investisment of an EPROM programmer) ?
Also, I prefer games being released free and emulated (allowing anyone to build their own cartridges) than to have them paying (until I can find it at my local game stores which most likely won't be the case).
Bregalad wrote:
Also, I prefer games being released free and emulated (allowing anyone to build their own cartridges) than to have them paying (until I can find it at my local game stores which most likely won't be the case).
What should a game programmer or game artist do to feed his family?
tepples wrote:
What should a game programmer or game artist do to feed his family?
Realize that retro game programming is a hobby and find something else for money! =)
And of course, only release a game every 5 years, if that!
If you release a game every 5 years and manage to sell 100 copies of it, then you have to sell those copies arround $2500 in order to get a somewhat decent salary to feed a humble family.
I'll let you tie your conclusions.
Quote:
And what is the point to buy NESnake $25+port when I can make it for about a tenth of that price (not counting the initial investisment of an EPROM programmer) ?
To support the developer. Why should I spend $50-$70 on one game when I can take a 3 hour drive to Mexico and get a stack of bootlegs for a fraction of the cost?
While I agree that anyone trying to make a living off nes development needs to stop and think for moment, I see nothing wrong with people suppporting someone within the community.
I release my stuff for free and eventually would like to get all the sources out, but thats not to say others have to. After all time is money
It's not any random game. I like Konami and Capcom titles, and ya, Nintendo too. My answer is YES, of course. Nothing better than a cartridge, its hard plastic case, the manual and the retro feel...
I never said there was something wrong to support someone in the communauty, just that it's ridiculous to sell games at a relatively high price without letting the people know how the game plays and hope it will sell. Anyone would try the game emulated first and buy if they really like it so they can get the extra material and a hard copy of the game.
Also, I bet the high price goes to the material, not to the guy putting it together (can't be cheaper since the material is bough in small quantities). It would probably give more work to the guy rather than supporting him.
they could always do a demo version.........
I'm reading over this entire thread and to start off, I am developing a commercial NES game with some friends.
Honestly, I'm not surprised by these responses because we're in NESdev forums and not NintendoAge or NESWorld. This forum consists of intelligent to highly intelligent developers and hackers who have little to no need for a consumer copy of products that they would more or less rather play on an emulator and dissect with hex editors, debuggers, and disassemblers when the game loses its OOB, hands-on interest or charm.
Let's just say that I'm not interested in trying to make commercial games for money. I have a regular job -- and I seriously suggest anyone trying to make money off such a niche market should do the same.
The reason that we're trying to produce a hardware copy of the game is to try to up the standards of NES development to that of the AtariAge realm in which people come together in a community to share somewhat of a physical glamour of their products. Products that could be sold at classic gaming expos or online to these niche collectors. It's a very humble form of making your skills known and most importantly: It allows others to dream to produce games in the same light.
A new flood of quality, commercial NES games.
Even the simplest NES homebrew would most likely qualify for a commercial Atari game on gameplay merits alone so it's hard to compare the two very different scenes. Anyways, Atari games were developed in 100s of man-hours, where NES games could take 1000s; that's why you don't see more commercial quality games, not because of something in the water.
Yeah, I think you have a pretty good point there. The NES homebrew scene is sometimes compared to the Atari one. And the reason Atarti indeed does get more action is because the games are so much simpler, and many NES homebrews already released are in fact comparable to Atari games.
However, when one thinks of a "NES game", different games come to mind, much more complex than the typical "1-screen puzzle game". And very often, programmers who start working on such complex projects abandon them at some point for various reasons: lack of motivation, the long time it takes, incompetence, whatever. If they had started simpler projects instead, they'd probably finish them, and there'd be a greater number of released NES homebrews.
This is a pretty reasonable explanation of why it doesn't make much sense comparing the Atari scene to the NES scene.
B00daW wrote:
Let's just say that I'm not interested in trying to make commercial games for money. I have a regular job -- and I seriously suggest anyone trying to make money off such a niche market should do the same.
I see your point. My intention, or dream if we can call it this way, is to be able to see products for the previous generation of console. Since I'm a developer, not a business guy, my motivation has never been money in the first place. But if it would work, and new articles would come for those once dead consoles, you do need money to make at least the project go on, create new software and at least survive along the way.
But I would prefer if bigger company could get back an interest in it. But in today's market where no risk is taken, I don't thing any of them would do it.
This is only partially on-topic, but considering the massive popularity of "TV plug n' play" games, I am very surprised a
licensed NES clone with built-in games hasn't been released. Imagine something like an old-school NES controller with AV cables, plastered with Mega Man artwork, containing the original 6 games (basically a much higher-quality Famiclone). They could release different models for different game series. You
know something like that would require virtually no effort and sell like hotcakes, and it's been done officially before (see: Genesis clones, Atari Flashback 2), so why hasn't the NES received this treatment? I know that VC exists, and maybe that's why, but not everyone wants/can afford a Wii...
(aside from that, it might give us hardware hackers a new source for improved NOACs
)
Ever heard of the Atari Flashback? That was a licensed Nes-on-a-chip console.
Well, yeah. I meant "licensed by Nintendo"...they had nothing to do with the Flashback's development.
It's true. We've been working on this game for around 6 months now and we're still only at around alpha stage 5. (Unfortunately, I cannot and WILL NOT give any more information about the game and especially NO teasers or spoilers. Spoilers spoil a game.)
We're working diligently and slowly at this project while trying to remain active yet passive enough to allow for personal business between the three of us.
As for tips for a good development team:
1.) A three man team is ideal.
For us, we have a coder, musician, and artist. Instead of doing a one man project, this allows for people to collaborate on which ideas are good or bad very quickly and add different spins on the game and original design.
2.) This really helps for distribution of wealth in the end.
3.) Work and responsibilities aren't as ambiguous.
--
As for cons, time is definitely still a factor. It takes more time to communicate between 3 people than it does to be by yourself; but once communicated, work speed increases.
Anyway, all that really matters is keeping your team motivated by good design, effort, reliability, fun, and trust. Money is only an additional incentive. Money doesn't make a good team.
Though only slightly on topic, a three man team sounds good, but I myself would have split it up differently. I can't imagine why anyone would have fun doing nothing but coding. I would have probably split it up where everyone does a little programming. But whatever works for you I suppose.
It's definitely not always fun. For the most part our team gets along and really likes working with each other.
I'm fortunate to work with such wonderful people.
B00daW wrote:
It's definitely not always fun. For the most part our team gets along and really likes working with each other.
I'm fortunate to work with such wonderful people.
I know it's off topic but Just out of curiosity, are you coding has a hobby only or your daily jobs include some kind of coding?
Hobby only. I'm a piss poor coder. I'll have more time to do it more and practice when I finally get my own business up and running -- fingers crossed.
To be honest, I don't really ever want to do coding for a living unless I was working for myself or contracted to people I would want to work with on my own accord on projects that I like.
It's hard for me to figure that I've made money out of NES development. While I've had profitable releases, I've always put it all back into my NESdev bookkeeping (which now even has it's own savings account, I throw maybe a quarter of my modest income into it - so much for retirement
). I operated on a shoe-string budget, did a lot of miserly bargain-hunting, and for many years my nights were marathon sessions of NES experiments and diving into all kinds of technical subjects. But I was broke. Now I do the 40 hours a week thing, saving up that money, knowing I'll get it back after I put it into some crazy NES projects..
So that's my story for why you should support the new, independent NES developers of the world. Because we need money to operate with. Especially me. But I don't help myself by making all this priceless stuff and not having it ready for sale.
Memblers: Thanks for the account of your commercial NES development interest. It gives me more hope.
--
Slightly unrelated, and not to take away from Memblers's genuine words.
As for new products that I'm awaiting:
1.) Expansion slot mod cart (or kit -- kinda ghetto) for expansion sound on the NES.
2.) Possibly a dongle cart for the NES with expansion audio chips in an FPGA... Possibly controlled by an external dip slider? This could make development and production cheaper and allow NES musicians (like myself) to have more accurate means to sound and music production.
Edit: Well, maybe not a dip slider, because there are those crazy-ass multichip NSFs. I really wouldn't know how someone would be able to logic map the requests to init the different chips though. Possible or not?
Ideas or comments?
For game authors, like me, I mainly see this as a hobby that can maybe give somebody some pocket change but not really anything that'd be in high demand. If the game is of decent quality I'd consider getting it. The target audience is obviously going to be NES collectors and not your average consumer.
This is partly educational for me too.
It's kinda nice to see myself writing programs that aren't dull school projects. If only making things in C++ were so easy...
Banshaku wrote:
I was talking to one of my coworker and this discussion came by. We know that Capcom will make Megaman 9 to look like a nes game, which is cool but it's not the real thing. So what if a new real nes game would come out?
It could be distributed in an emulated form trough wiiWare, Xbox arcade and Sony psn store for the people that don't have the hardware anymore BUT for the one that do, the game could be produced on a real cart.
If the idea would take off, I could see many possibilities coming like producing hardware again, continuing some franchise that never had any sequels, providing a way for home brew game to be published etc. Many possibilities indeed.
The interest in retro gaming and simpler games is becoming bigger and bigger so I think there could be a market for it.
Since the nesdev community really enjoy the nes, I would like to have your thoughts on the subject. It may only be a dream from someone that always wanted to produce software on the previous generation of console but who knows were a simple idea could go.
for the C-64 they came out with the "DTV"; and for Atari 2600 they came out with the "Atari Zero" (?)
which were both self-contained systems in a joystick that plug directly into the tv.