Yeah and the PowerPak alone is an extra $135 expense that you wouldn't have to make with a stripped down NT Mini.  

Even if you take the cores out of the equation, simply having built in NES rom loading would be a killer app. 

 

But you have to look at who he primarily aimed it at. Collectors with substantial cart collections. Remember the AVS started as a mod for the toploader. He's not looking to corner the NES clone market (keep in mind Hyperkin, et al pick up the all the casuals and johnny-come-latelies.)

The powerpak costs like a hundred bucks tho.

The same can be said for both NT Mini and Super NT, yet a good portion of users are simply loading roms vs using their actual carts.

 

A good portion, but probably not all. Again, though, Bunnyboy was aiming at a market largely reflected by Nintendoage. Most of the updates were posted here, feedback taken from here. The Scoreboard, as unused as it is, is a Nintendoage exclusive feature. That's his market.

With 4K TVs ruling the roost, the need for 1080p IMO is becoming increasingly irrelevant if both it and 720p scale up with integers.


 

There is no consumer 4K display that scales 720p or 1080p via nearest neighbor scaling, so 1080p does have benefits on a 4K display over 720p.   They might both be integer scales, but with how 4K displays actually handle lower resolution content, 720p is noticeably softer than 1080p on a 4K display. 
 

Fair enough, but I wager 90% can't tell a difference anyway.

At any rate, it would have been really easy for Analogue to market a plastic NT mini alongside their Super NT, or release an NES NT first. The fact that they haven't suggests to me that they're not really interested in that market right now, if ever.

 

They simply doubled down on the Super NT.   They probably didn't have the man power to have both a Super NT and stripped down NT Mini releasing at the same time frame.   

Remember its Kevtris alone designing the PCBs and working on bugs.   He can only do so much at once.  Though, it looks like he's about finished fixing Super NT bugs, so pretty soon he can work on the next project. 
 

But there would have been some announcement, or some inkling of it. Or the NES version would have been first (almost all other releases of this type get the NES one first, since that's the older demographic.) I just don't see it coming out in a time that would worry bunnyboy's production of the AVS. We don't even know if he plans a third run.

Marketingwise, it just doesn't make sense to trot out another version of the AVS "just because."
But the stripped down NT mini wouldn't need much. The aluminum NT mini already exists. What further mods are needed?

From what I can tell, Kevtris is eyeing the N64, though he admits that will be a bear.

 

Well, they recently said that the current NT Mini is very difficult to manufacture and they don't have any current plans to make another run, so there is that. 

"Nt mini is an incredibly difficult and time consuming product to manufacture. We're currently focused on Super Nt and we don't have the manpower to produce another run at this time. Nt mini unfortunately requires a borderline unreasonable amount of oversight from our best people. We appreciate your understanding and please know we're bummed we can't make it available at this time, too."
 

And to me, if the stripped down Mini is in the pipe, or even on the conceptual phase, there would be a "stay tuned for a new development from Analogue!" Not crickets.
 

I think if it was the only option out there it would’ve been a huge success. I know I would’ve purchased it. Because of the lack of what it does vs the competition, there are other options out there, which is good for the hobby.
 

Well, they did announce an external DAC that they said will be compatible with Super NT and "Future Systems".   They recently said they are in the prototype stage.   I mean, if they have an external DAC then the need for a console with built in analog inputs would no longer be necessary.  Just make it HDMI only and sell the DAC to people who care about Analog out. 

Future systems could mean anything (like N64.) It just seems strange to me that someone would inquire about future NT minis and get a sad trombone response if something was planned. There's no need to be secretive, it's a system they already released.

Plus, it makes much more sense to me for Analogue to go after the next big thing (again, N64.) Because Nintendo's most likely going to release one at some point. Why bother with a saturated NES clone market when the fresh unsatisfied market is the one begging for a proper clone?

 

This is what I just never understand. The 1080p resolution is obviously a higher quality resolution than 720p, which means the pixels will be even clearer. It’s similar to saying that 1080p is going to have a sharper picture than 4K.
 

Analogue likes to play their cards close to their chests.  They announce new consoles about 4 - 5 months before release date.   If they have something planned for early 2019 then we won't know what it is until like September/October. 

Also, N64 ain't happening anytime soon.   Kevtris has already stated this.  The FPGA needed would be too costly and it would be incredibly difficult to do it himself, especially in the time frame Analogue expects.  You just couldn't make that happen within a year or two.  Not without a huge team of highly skilled people who know how to work on FPGAs. 

There's playing cards close to the chest, and there's when you got nothing. The pessimistic response up there tells me they got nothing. A simple "stay tuned" will still keep the cards close.

Again, there's no reason to be that secretive. When they say there's nothing planned, I take it at face value.
 

Its quite simple, with the Super NT out they are simply giving it all their focus right now.  And I don't blame them, they are already almost sold out of their 2nd batch.  

Also, I'm about 99% confident the Sega Genesis is next.   

I don't buy that. It's not like they needed a full marketing blast, just a simple statement. When they say nothing in response to that, I have to believe there isn't anything on the table.

That's reasonable.

Though given Analogue's boutique approach to consoles, the NT Mini Plastic edition is still aways off, if ever. I don't think Bunnyboy needs to fear anything.  

 

If an HDMI Genesis came out I might actually start to care about the Genesis.

It does have a good amount of shooters.  
 

Here is a quote from Kevtris you might find interesting.  It was actually posted a few months before he started work on the Super NT.

""I have done 16 bit dev, like completing the SNES audio hardware (SPC) and making a standalone core/player for it which I will be releasing btw.   But no actual system yet.  I kind of wanted to do Genesis first because it looks very simple compared to SNES.  TG-16 looks super simple too but the 7MHz bandwidth on the RAM is just a bit too fast right now for my RAM hardware.  I almost need two SDRAMs / DDR1 chips and "Double pump' them to get around the latency issues.  Genesis' big problem is the 68K.  Once I write my own 68K core it will open up neoego, genesis, super a'can and lots of other things.  I have SMS done, so that gives me a lot of the requisite parts for a genesis.  It just need 1 more video mode, a 68K, and FM audio which I am a veteran at.   

 I was thinking to speed along development of genesis FM audio, I could make a GYM player to get it all debugged and ready to go so I can just drop it in.  That was kind of the idea with SNES.  Having the SPC part done before everything else means I can just drop it in and not worry about audio at all, which is super nice.  Just one less thing to worry about."
 

Hopefully shipping on the Genesis NT isn't like $60 or something.

I know there's no interest in a SNES clone, but I'd like to see some sort of follow up from RetroUSB.

A Genesis one would be great, at the same time it would most likely drive up prices on the games. Collecting for Genesis is still fairly reasonable with the exception of a few games.