The Analogue Pocket's selection of openFPGA cores is growing all of the time, and this week, a core for Bandai's underrated WonderSwan handheld has just been released. The core in question has been ported by Adam Gastineau and is based on the work of FPGAzumSpass.
Designed by the late Gunpei Yokoi – who also created the Game & Watch line and Game Boy for Nintendo – the WonderSwan launched in Japan in 1999, two years after Yokoi's tragic death in a road traffic accident.
Sporting a 16-bit processor and a unique design which allowed it to be played in both landscape and portrait modes, the WonderSwan was intended to be a cheap and ultra-portable rival to the Game Boy. It was famously powered by a single AA battery – the initial monochrome version offered an impressive 40 hours of gameplay.
Initially launched with a monochrome screen, the WonderSwan would see two colour upgrades: the WonderSwan Color (2000) and SwanCrystal (2002). The console was supported heavily by Square, which, at this point, had experienced a very public falling out with Nintendo and wasn't producing software for the Game Boy or Game Boy Color.
The system sold 3.5 million units in its homeland during its lifespan but sadly never received a western release.
You can download the core here.
[source twitter.com]
Comments 15
YES! Gimme that Judgement Silversword!
Yes but will it support the DJ peripheral? This is actually exciting, Xi little and gunpey on the pocket.
I don't own an Analog Pocket and I don't know if I will anytime soon, but there's one immediately glaring problem...
How would the controls work?
One of the unique things about the WS(C) is that is has two sets of cursor buttons, designed to support either landscape or portrait orientation (different from any previous handheld... except MAYBE the Lynx. But I'm probably not alone is asking how many people have played a Lynx? Admittedly probably as few that actually owned a WSC, as I do.)
But back to the point... that dual cursor orientation allowed comfortable gameplay in either direction (as the other cursor keys could be used as gameplay buttons, something lacking in both the DS and the PSP. I hope it was some kind of patent issue and not just hardware design oversight.)
@KingMike Shouldn't be a huge challenge to include a screen rotation feature that remaps the controls accordingly.
Wonderswan, now there's an odd old handheld platform.
@Razieluigi The problem is, doesn't even HAVE enough buttons to remap?
Okay, looking at photos on Analog's site... technically yes, but in a layout that is probably impossible to reasonably play.
WS/C has X cursor keys X1-X4, Y cursor keys Y1-Y4, A, B, Start, and a Sound button to mute/unmute the audio.
Then again, I haven't played WSC as much, but I'll guess games were less likely to use A/B/Start in vertical mode since they'd be less reachable.
Analog Pocket technically has an equal amount of keys, if you want to count L and R on the back.
So the answer is... yes, you could play it about as badly as button-mode DS/PSP games where you'd have to hold your hands awkwardly vertically aligned, rather than horizontally spaced as we do when playing almost every other physical game controller ever created.
@Razieluigi Actually, let me just post a photo.
https://i.imgur.com/8IffpER.jpg
I would say WonderSwan is the N64 controller of portables: so unique it just won't play right on anything else.
@KingMike Yeah, I just don't think it matters for most games.
In vertical mode, the Analogue's d-pad and face buttons correspond 1:1 with the WSC, and the A & B buttons are inaccessible and not really used. In some odd case where they were, they could easily be mapped to L/R.
And in horizontal mode, same thing. The "extra" d-pad is either not used at all, or is used for ancillary functions that can likewise be mapped elsewhere.
Regardless, the core is coming, so I'm sure these things have been considered. His other cores on the Pocket are excellent.
Do they still sell Analogue Pockets? Their other consoles were super-limited releases.
@SonOfDracula They're still available. New Pocket orders are supposed to ship "sometime this year", but Analogue isn't great about keeping to any schedules (or informing their customers about it) so take their estimates with a grain of salt.
I wouldn't call their consoles "super-limited" but they do eventually stop manufacturing them. The Mega SG and Super NT are still available, although this is the final run of Super NTs.
@Razieluigi Good to know! If emulation ever picks up on it I may grab one. Right now the RG351V is already doing everything I want in a handheld.
@SonOfDracula Emulation is pretty extensive already via FPGA cores. Most classic consoles up through the NeoGeo are working really well, and there's a reasonable selection of arcade games that I hope keeps expanding.
It's the least user-friendly of Analogue's consoles so far, and I think they overcomplicated things with their half-baked "Analogue OS", but now that it's been opened up to external developers, it's a really nice device.
@Razieluigi Definitely worth a look. Can it handle arcade emus like Mushihimesama Futari? Are there cores for Saturn/PS1/Dreamcast?
@SonOfDracula I believe there's skepticism that the Pocket FPGA could handle PS1 or newer, so probably not.
But I'm not an expert on any of this stuff. People much smarter than me are busy porting cores to the device and have a better understanding of what it might be capable of.
@Razieluigi Interesting! Well, thanks for all the info!
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