Hello everybody!
It is a tough challenge, but I am trying to be concise.
PREAMBLE (just to give an idea of how concise I am going to be...)
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It is years now that I am working on a hand-held device, whose foremost
aim has always been... pure FUN.
Now it has grown so much that I think it is about time to share this fun
with the world.
Currently, its only tangible implementation is an emulator for the classic
Amigas - I *love* the Amiga - and that is why I am posting here.
I am searching for enthusiast M68k coders who want to have some real fun
programming a really cool piece of "hardware" (obviously this is just my
humble - and biased - opinion).
Of course I would be glad of knowing of happy users, too - there is little
point in having a platform without users, right?
Lastly, I will not slam the door in the face of any company interested in
pulling out a real piece of hardware
- but, frankly, I do not even dare
to dream of this as a real-world possibility. A more sensible one would be
the development of emulators for other platforms - welcome as well, of
course
Let's have a look at what I am offering, without diving into technical
details - there are large .guides for that and I want to concentrate on
the fun part here.
WHAT IT IS ALL ABOUT
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The device is named "MOM" and can be looked at as yet another GameBoy-like
console.
Why does it exist?
Simple: I wanted to have *fun* =)
Both developing it and developing _for_ it.
I wanted a device which was easy and funny to hardware-hit; I wanted a
device which was as much coder-oriented as possible, but still powerful
and flexible. So in 1998 (or maybe even 1 year before) I came up with some
design sketches and since then I never stopped working at this project...
... if only I could have worked on it constantly, the release date would
have come much before! - it is quite late, indeed.
I see I am getting lost, despite my initial promise.
Sorry, I just can not resist.
Among its features you can find:
- an MC68030 CPU
- a video architecture entirely based around the concept of extremely
flexible and powerful sprites (scalable, flippable, etc.)
For a complete overview of the system I strongly advice to read the
"MOM - developer's manual" and watch the "deMOMstration", an application
that actually runs on the device itself and that shows some of its key
features.
RELEASE/DISTRIBUTION INFORMATION
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I am releasing it only now because:
- finally both the general design and the emulator are in a very
advanced stage
- finally the emulator has been tested on 060 (totally developed on a
humble - yet loyal - 030)
- finally there is a little application (the "deMOMstration" mentioned
above) which *visually* illustrates many features of the device - so
you do not have to wade through large technical manuals (that do exist)
to get the idea: all you have to do is spending 10 minutes of your life
sitting & watching
- finally I have some free time to dedicate to potential requests - I got
my Computer Science degree just a few weeks ago and so I will be free
in the near future (ooops! this is now outdated by far, as I lazily
spent the last 2 months happily doing a lot of other unrelated
activities :p)
The distribution packages (just ~500 kb in all) include:
- MOM developer material: documentation, includes, tools, etc.
- MOMiga: MOM emulator for the Amiga
- MOS: an OS for MOM (comprehensive of development stuff)
- deMOMstration: MOM+MOS application that shows some of the key features
of MOM
- MEMOU: MOM+MOS (little) game
To get everything to work, it is enough to unpack the archives, CD in
the directory chosen and launch the script "go_d" to see deMOMstration
or "go_M" to play MEMOU.
No writes to HD will occur (unless you explicitly specify to save the
memory card to HD).
The whole package is e-mailware: if you use it, you *must* send me an
e-mail.
Any _commercial_ use or product based on any or all of its parts is
strictly *prohibited* if not explicitly authorized by a written agreement
with me.
IMPORTANT NOTES ABOUT THE EMULATOR (MOMiga)
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- it requires an Amiga with at least a 030, AGA and native graphics
output - i.e. redirection through scandoublers or graphic-cards is
likely to produce bad visuals (this is due to the fact that it uses
SHRES screens)
- only rather old versions have been tested on 040 - I have no clue
whether it still works on that CPU, but it should
- it has not been tested on NTSC machines and some parts do not take into
account NTSC timings - yet, it should work anyway
- it is a very complex piece of code: I did my very best to make it as
clean as possible and actually it works perfectly on my machine and on
some 060-equipped Amigas that 2 friends (hello, Timo & Richard!) used
for beta-testing - but beware of patches! Some (combination?) of them
could cause problems (in which case, it should be enough to reboot
without startup-sequence and run it after just SetPatch)!
- it can *not* work on UAE because it requires an MMU, which AFAIK is not
emulated yet
HOW CAN YOU PUT YOUR HANDS ON IT?
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Simply surf to
http://saimobvq.interfree.it/MOM/index.html and download
all the archives.
There you will find also a lot of other interesting information.
For comments, requests of clarification, flames and anything else, write
to saimobvq@interfree.it .
SUMMARY OF AREAS OF INTEREST
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- development of applications (which I use to call "cartridges")
- development of emulators for other platforms
- development of some specific parts of MOS (for now just data packing
and .mod replay routines (and maybe IEEE math routines))
- adaptation of include files for more programming languages
- porting of support tools to other platforms
- betatesting
- development of the real device
If you are a developer and want to start a MOM project, choose the 4-byte
ID that will mark all of your productions: this way I can make an official
and public list of developers.
Despite the focus of this section is on development, the most important
role is played by... users! The more, the happier I am.
Of course, I do not expect many users to be attracted right now that there
is only a simple game and a technical presentation.
Anybody willing to help me create a user base?
WANT TO KNOW MORE?
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Well, then why don't you have a look at the deMOMstration?
Seriously, believe me: it is worth a thousand words.
Thanks for reading this far.
Best regards,
saimo
P.S. I am searching for a job...
As you may imagine, I would love to develop for a hand-held device...
not to mention that working with a good team on a GameBoy or GP32
title would make me sooo happy...
... any offers?
