Atari Jaguar Development

[walker7]

Does anyone know where any Atari Jaguar development kits are? Also, could you give us some sample pieces of code for the Jaguar, such as a joypad-reading subroutine?

[Deleted]

This guy seems to have stuff:
www.hillsoftware.com/downloads/index.html

Most interesting is a LiveCD for Linux Jag dev.

This site seems to have the source for a Jag joypad tester:
www.mdgames.de/jag_eng.htm

[3vix6]

I would check the Atariage forums, there's been some pretty cool developments like the "Skunkbox" and the "JagCF".

You can also use some of the carts like "Protector SE" or BattleSphere as bypass carts so that one could use the JagCD as a medium to run the apps you create. There are only a few carts that do this though and I would probably ask around the forums.

[3vix6]

Back in the day people would use Alpine boards (2mb and 4mb) development kits were for both PC and Atari systems. The thing about these is that they're EXTREMELY hard to find and now there are better methods to run programs on actual hardware.

[oompa loompa]

It's probably just me, but I wouldn't go anywhere near development for the Jaguar . Too many different processors to program for. Yea, I don't have any resources

[Tom Maneiro]

Ah, these were the gold ages. Back then, consoles had a CPU, a primitive GPU, and another CPU plus some spare ICs for sound. Then, someone decided that, for the next "version", they should slap one or two additional CPUs (and, while we're there, let's add another GPU and a 68K for no good reason - i'm looking at you, $ega $aturn!). You wanted hell? There you have - no need to call Satan

Now, console makers just put an ARM or PPC core, an bleeding-edge or el-cheapo ATi/nVidia GPU, a cheap audio codec, and it's done.

Back to the Jaguar... How much difficult is to get homebrew code running there? I've heard that Jaguar carts and CDs use some weird crypto stuff... I suppose that noone make Jaguar flashcarts these days...

[TheMVRules]

Jaguar sucks anyway.

[Syniphas]

PROCESSORS FOR EVERYONE


No seriously, the Jaguar and Saturn were the pinnacle of game development challenge, it might be fun trying to program for those beasts if you're up for some brain exercises.

[oompa loompa]

But but programming for the Jaguar is so hard . I'm getting lazy too . Doing development for the N64 or PSX would be better these days

[Deleted]

They didn't name two of the Jaguar CPU's Tom & Jerry for nothing It's not all that bad though, comparable to the 32X in terms of difficulty and features.

I'd recommend using The Removers Library.

[jlf65]

Jun 11, 2010 16:36:49 GMT -5 @moon said:

They didn't name two of the Jaguar CPU's Tom & Jerry for nothing It's not all that bad though, comparable to the 32X in terms of difficulty and features.

I'd recommend using The Removers Library.

Actually, having worked on the 32X, I'd say it's much easier than the Jaguar. It's also less powerful with fewer features. The more straightforward design of the 32X helps make it easier - also being able to use the latest gcc for the processors helps as well. What most folks don't get about the 32X is there's no drawing hardware. Other than being able to do short fills, the "SuperVDP" is nothing more than a frame buffer. One of the SH2 CPUs draws everything via software. Similarly, the sound is just a simple stereo PWM channel that can be set via interrupt by the CPU, or via DMA.

I looked at working on the Jaguar, but the architecture makes me shudder.

Oh, and if you want to do some N64 programming (like me), I'd suggest using libdragon.

[mdk137]

Programming for Saturn is not difficult. Except that the programmer must be a genius ;D . For the remains of the mortals a solution exists: an interpreter of the language LUA. The interpreter can be acquired here:

www.policeofficersmith.de/

Sorry my english.

[3vix6]

Jun 11, 2010 3:46:25 GMT -5 Tom Maneiro said:

Ah, these were the gold ages. Back then, consoles had a CPU, a primitive GPU, and another CPU plus some spare ICs for sound. Then, someone decided that, for the next "version", they should slap one or two additional CPUs (and, while we're there, let's add another GPU and a 68K for no good reason - i'm looking at you, $ega $aturn!)

You sure you weren't talking about the Jaguar? There was a 68000 present in the Jaguar to make developers feel a bit more comfortable with the mess they were about to dive into. :-)

[oompa loompa]

Jun 12, 2010 23:42:28 GMT -5 3vix6 said:

Jun 11, 2010 3:46:25 GMT -5 Tom Maneiro said:

Ah, these were the gold ages. Back then, consoles had a CPU, a primitive GPU, and another CPU plus some spare ICs for sound. Then, someone decided that, for the next "version", they should slap one or two additional CPUs (and, while we're there, let's add another GPU and a 68K for no good reason - i'm looking at you, $ega $aturn!)

You sure you weren't talking about the Jaguar? There was a 68000 present in the Jaguar to make developers feel a bit more comfortable with the mess they were about to dive into. :-)

It's still a bit cumbersome to program, regardless of the processor because the programmer has to think out how to allocate which processes for each CPU. I mean, I do agree that a console that has multiple processors does have more potential than a console that only has a single processor, but getting to that point is a hard task . The most recent example I guess is the XBOX 360 vs the PS3

Thumbs up for the 68000 . If it were a PowerPC architecture, then forget it

[3vix6]

Well.. I heard that's not the real pain in the butt about the Jaguar.

I heard that it has REALLY bad framebuffer bugs that makes it much more challenging to program than it should be.