A question for those who "obtain" dev kits...

[Mark30001]

I know many people around these forums go about purchasing various console development kits via eBay or other sources. Those may include XBOX or Gamecube development kits.

I was just wondering what most of you guys do with your development kits? Do you buy only to keep in a gaming collection, or do you all develop on them?

Anyone have any work-in-progress projects?

Me, I mostly collect as a "museum" for my site. I plan on developing when time permits.

[mairsil]

I was just wondering what most of you guys do with your development kits? Do you buy only to keep in a gaming collection, or do you all develop on them?

Both. :nod:
Work: http://mouse.pouncingkitten.com/office/office-desk.jpg
Play: http://mouse.pouncingkitten.com/arcade/new-machine-finished-internal.jpg



Anyone have any work-in-progress projects?
Just the one...:icon_bigg

[babu]

a little bit of both. but motstly for experimental programming use.

[kammedo]

Well, actually I buyed a Ultra64 dev kit (for the N64), mainly for the fact that I am very intresting in experiencing a dev kit and of course collecting it. Sadly, my time is way too short to permit me to investigate on it too long so no projects are planned for now :/

[f_bohmann]

i actually do work on them, allthough i did not spend too much time finishing something on the dreamcast. still working on a ps2 demo and some psp game. :)

[Borman]

I plan on Deving on mine, its just an issue of time really

[liquitt]

both, it looks nice and i like to do some experimental stuff with it :)

[marshallh]

I'm not using an official devkit per se, but a Doctor V64 for testing my code on the real thing. I got the devkit from a member here. :icon_bigg

I'm working on a N64 remake of Alley Cat (was originally CGA for DOS)
http://img220.imageshack.us/img220/2189/dl7wx2.png

That is the tool I wrote in VB to help me edit vertex colors :)

[Mark30001]

I'm not using an official devkit per se, but a Doctor V64 for testing my code on the real thing. I got the devkit from a member here. :icon_bigg

I'm working on a N64 remake of Alley Cat (was originally CGA for DOS)
http://img220.imageshack.us/img220/2189/dl7wx2.png

That is the tool I wrote in VB to help me edit vertex colors :)

Interesting! To be honest I thought the Doctor V64 and etc were only made to backup carts to ROMs and nothing else! I guess we learn everyday! :)

[marshallh]

Well, that's actually pretty much correct. The Doctor can backup/play back roms either from a computer via parallel, or read from a CD. It also plays Video CDs (precursor to DVD, apparently popular in Asia).

I use it for testing framebuffer effects and other things that emulators don't work with well. I want to make sure my stuff runs on both emulators and the real N64, so I test using Project64 and the V64. The V64 doesn't actually do any development work, the compiler I use (PsyQ) produces a .bin binary file which I have to then append a header, pad to nearest megabit size, byteswap, and then CRC.

Getting the DOS compilers and sound tools to work under XP is a pain. The 8.3 filename restrictions are still there (ick). :)

[Barc0de]

Specifically on gamecube devkits, GDEVs (unmodded) arent bad for doing some Wii games basic things, apart from the new controller interface. Anyone who got a GDEV, could be said to own a lower clock speed Wii devkit for a reasonable price. Even Virtual Console developers could benefit from secretly owning a GDEV to my understanding.

[Calpis]

I plan on doing something with mine when I learn something </sarcasm>

[cdoty]

I've always used copiers/cheat devices to do console development. Sporting Clays was developed using Action Replay on the PSX and Saturn and a V64jr on the N64. The Defender of the Crown demo for the Gameboy Color was done with a Gameboy flash cart. Most of my early Genesis/SNES development was done with a romulator ISA board.

I usually like to use an official SDK, if I can find one. (I've only used them on the PSX, Saturn, and N-64).

[Gamefan]

So how does one learn to program for these dev boxes? Is it just VB or another type of code?

GAMEFAN

[virtual alan]

Paperweights I am afraid I have to admit!

[zappenduster]

i think earlier assembler was the way to go later c or c++ dont know how far .net and such thing got on the gaming front ms made some huge noise on there xna around the xbox 360 release

[Barc0de]

in modern consoles (heavy) asm only comes in when you want to do something very unique. Companies provide tools to make the programming as friendly as possible (except for nintendo maybe:P )

Every console developer has to have some basic technical knowledge above and beyond your standard programming (algorithm)skills.

But beyond handling I/O and sequences etc, programming is always programming. That said, obviously C is a robust and suggested language for most platforms. C++ and the other variations have also been adopted lately.