Anyone who has dabbled in the world of emulation will know that it's something of a double-edged sword.
Yes, you can have entire libraries of games at your fingertips, but sometimes, too much choice can be a headache; how many times have you fired up an emulator only to spend more time scrolling through lists of ROMs than actually playing something?
The lack of physical media when it comes to emulation is a problem, not just because it drowns us in choice but also because it detaches us from the games we want to play – hence the fact that even today, people still love collecting original carts and discs purely to have a tangible, physical object to reach for when they fancy a gaming session.
Thankfully, the MiSTer FPGA community has devised an ingenious solution to this quandary, and it uses Near-Field Communication (NFC) technology to mimic the act of loading up physical media on your MiSTer.
Developer Wizzo has created a script for MiSTer that allows you to use NFC cards and tags to boot up certain titles automatically. The process is disarmingly simple; you download the dedicated TapTo smartphone app, connect it to your MiSTer (you'll need to be on the same WiFi network) and scan your game database.
Then, you can select a game and write a command to an NFC card, which will then boot up said game when tapped on an NFC reader connected to your MiSTer. You can even load a game and the smartphone app will display it as 'now playing', allowing you to write the command to a card without having to browse the database.
The £25 / $32 NFC reader we were kindly sent by Wizzo was designed alongside Tim Wilsie, and is a compact, 3D-printed unit that connects to the MiSTer via USB-A to USB-C cable – but you can presumably use other NFC readers, although some degree of configuration may be required to get it talking to the MiSTer itself (there's a handy Wiki here which takes you through this process and everything else to do with TapTo).
Once you've set up pathways for various games (you can even create a command that randomly selects a game for a particular system), you've effectively got a collection you can physically browse, which not only saves time but also gives the whole process an 'old school' feel.
In fact, some people have even placed NFC tags inside their game boxes and cartridges so they can still experience the feeling of pulling a title off the shelf and playing it on the MiSTer – a truly ingenious mix of old and new.
Furthermore, it's possible to get custom stickers to place on your NFC cards, making them look even more authentic. We were sent a selection of blank stickers by Wizzo, as well as some shiny variants from Ariel Aces – these really lend the NFC cards that additional level of classiness and make the TapTo system feel more 'official', for sure.
To us, TapTo seems like the ideal way to link software with FPGA hardware – which, as we know, already gives the closest possible experience to the real thing without actually being the real thing.
Sure, you could argue that it's a solution in search of a problem for some users – if you're more selective with your ROM library, you can avoid being crippled by choice, and dropping into the MiSTer UI to boot a game literally takes seconds – but there's no denying that it's a cool feeling to pick out a card, peruse the box art and tap it on the reader to instantly load your game.
In a world that's becoming less and less tactile when it comes to video games, TapTo is the perfect way to maintain that physical connection – and is yet another example of how the MiSTer community is evolving and expanding in new and interesting ways.