NEC ARM 32bit Arcade Cabinet and Console?

Extended Title
Can the first ARM CPU's along with Cd Rom's be used to skip the 16 bit consoles and jump to 32 bit? And can a company like NEC take advantage of that?


As we all know by 1987 Nintendo was becoming a power house here in the United States to add to the fact that they were forbidding developers to make games on other platforms, in a sense creating a monopoly, Sega is remembered for being the first worthy Challenger to the Nintendo juggernaut, however many people seem to forget the third and that is NEC.

NEC release there competitor to the NES in japan in 1987 the PC engine known here in the US as the Turbografix 16. The problem with the PC Engine was that it wasn’t a true 16 bit console thanks to its cpu. Well my proposal is that starting anywhere in the 1985-87 period instead of making a competitor console to the NES instead make an Arcade cabinet first then bring it over as console later on when the tech becomes cheap enough.

Narc the first arcade 32 bit game came out in 1988, along with the Arcade franchise Midway, NEC could use the opportunity in 85-87 to make an open or semi open arcade 32 bit platform for companies like Namco, Midway, SNK, Capcom, Sega and many others to make games and port games to their arcade platform. This way in 1990-1991 NEC could launch their Super Arcade Engine in Japan, America and Europe and basically have a large collection of Arcade type games at launch.

Well what of the spec of this arcade cabinet/console, well with arm chips big advantages was its price per performance, if you put 2 ARM2 cpu's in the cabinet each clocked as high as they can go witch I believe is 12mhz, now that’s a good amount of power but of course I want it to have more so when the 25mhz become available make that as the Super Arcade Cabinet and prep it up as console.

It sounds like a good idea right? The problem is how much is going to cost I don’t know the exact specifics but once it ready to be sold as a console it cant cost more that 300 dollars and to add to that is the fact that at launch for the console I want it to already have a 2x CD drive, memory card slots and ports for 6 controllers.

Is this reasonable or is it too ambitious. Would NEC have to join forces with Midway and or any other company in order to reduce cost on the system, how much of an open platform should it be and how could they appeal to companies like Sega, Capcom, or Snk to bring games to their system?

This Start to ambitious but can be done if: NEC cover his bases and plan a long term strategy with good partner(hudson was good but not enough and namco got cold feet, either they keep it or found sega or something). And i digress, PC engine did was '16-bit'(or Fourth Generation) thanks to his powerful cpu, can a 8-bit system run Street Figther II Championship Edition?.

What you propose in Arcade is a NEC-NAOMI(or Neogeo better done) and if they can push as the 'arcade unify' and propose low royalties if they done Arcade/Console cross release. that can be the selling point. But remember 80-90 is not 00's, arcade are in boom and there is a 'war' about trade secrets, so it's hard to do.

Maybe NEC got Atari Instead Jack tramiel?

Well the whole goal of this is just like your Player Two Start look at the pretty butterfly's and maybe see 32 bit consoles wars instead of 16 using cds, one thing that never made sense to me was the whole snes/snes cd combo why not just come out whit a stand alone snes cd right out of the box, I know Nintendo being Nintendo doesn't help but the r3000 cpu is significantly more expensive that the ARM2 yet they planed to sell the thing at a reasonable price. Sega is the one that is a unknown with the launch of their Mega drive in 88 would they delay it to make it more powerful or would it actual fall under the same fate as the PC Engine in otl.
And on that note since the launch of the console variant will use the 2nd variant hardware I plan to name the NEC console the Super Arcade Engine. Sounds catchy right?

flydeath said:

Well the whole goal of this is just like your Player Two Start look at the pretty butterfly's and maybe see 32 bit consoles wars instead of 16 using cds, one thing that never made sense to me was the whole snes/snes cd combo why not just come out whit a stand alone snes cd right out of the box, I know Nintendo being Nintendo doesn't help but the r3000 cpu is significantly more expensive that the ARM2 yet they planed to sell the thing at a reasonable price. Sega is the one that is a unknown with the launch of their Mega drive in 88 would they delay it to make it more powerful or would it actual fall under the same fate as the PC Engine in otl.
And on that note since the launch of the console variant will use the 2nd variant hardware I plan to name the NEC console the Super Arcade Engine. Sounds catchy right?

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So this was inpsired by my Collaborative timeline with RySenkari, i feel honoroed

The idea of leapfrog can work, but again more that bit where 2d and 3d power(sega did make so much damage with those bit wars, we will never recover with it) and PC engine was 2D level this competitor(SNES and genesis but 3DO was did leagues ahead thhose three). again cost for both hardware maker and developer must be factured.

About PTS stuff, ask about in in the thread but a quick answer: that was the strategy as otl, and even NEC do it with the turbo cd and later turbo duo both side pacific.

Ummm sega being in NEC position? would be a shame if sonic is loss but they can still be strong in arcade.

Avoid Hardware revision, that killed NEC otl in both sided pacific(as they never competed in europe). Just keep the 5,6 year generational console and will be fine.

so try to develop the idea, think his butterflies, how the rivals would react using logic and keep writting, that is how a tl can be done.

Nivek said:

So this was inpsired by my Collaborative timeline with RySenkari, i feel honoroed

The idea of leapfrog can work, but again more that bit where 2d and 3d power(sega did make so much damage with those bit wars, we will never recover with it) and PC engine was 2D level this competitor(SNES and genesis but 3DO was did leagues ahead thhose three). again cost for both hardware maker and developer must be factured.

About PTS stuff, ask about in in the thread but a quick answer: that was the strategy as otl, and even NEC do it with the turbo cd and later turbo duo both side pacific.

Ummm sega being in NEC position? would be a shame if sonic is loss but they can still be strong in arcade.

Avoid Hardware revision, that killed NEC otl in both sided pacific(as they never competed in europe). Just keep the 5,6 year generational console and will be fine.

so try to develop the idea, think his butterflies, how the rivals would react using logic and keep writting, that is how a tl can be done.

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Keep in mind this is all speculation especially on Sega, a three way war would be epic but I have no idea how they will use for a true 32 bit console, now on the hardware revision its for the arcade with its second iteration like the cps2 was for the 1, that by the way will be destined to be the console, NEC plan in this timeline was for it to be clocked at 25mhz per cpu. However I know those cpus don't exist in 85 and I believe weren't developed till 88 or 89.

Hence they're arcade board time line will be NEC Arcade Board at 12mhz cpus launched in 1986 and the NEC Super Arcade Board launched in 1989 with 25mhz cpus the Super Arcade Board being made into the Super Arcade Engine game console and released in 1991 or 1992 with a 2x cd rom and a price tag of 300 dollars.

flydeath said:

Keep in mind this is all speculation especially on Sega, a three way war would be epic but I have no idea how they will use for a true 32 bit console, now on the hardware revision its for the arcade with its second iteration like the cps2 was for the 1, that by the way will be destined to be the console, NEC plan in this timeline was for it to be clocked at 25mhz per cpu. However I know those cpus don't exist in 85 and I believe weren't developed till 88 or 89.

Hence they're arcade board time line will be NEC Arcade Board at 12mhz cpus launched in 1986 and the NEC Super Arcade Board launched in 1989 with 25mhz cpus the Super Arcade Board being made into the Super Arcade Engine game console and released in 1991 or 1992 with a 2x cd rom and a price tag of 300 dollars.

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Now We're talking clearly. Yeah some stuff make sense now, Sega is Sega, for good or for bad(but they can not be that bad as otl) investigate which were potential partnet and other and you will got ideas.

About your tech specs, wasn't that bad, looks in system-16 and other arcade page and think how would goes in price and other stuff.

That is nec first or second console, if first 1991, if not 1992 would be fine. remmeber nintendo released famicom in 1983 and was till 1990 released Super famicom.

So think now nintendo and sega will react, otl sega cd and failed snes-cd were product of NEC, thus that butterfly would ensue, maybe Nintendo did released snes-cd here or wait and make CD just right out the box for Super famicom? the same can be told for sega, and etc.

Nivek said:

Now We're talking clearly. Yeah some stuff make sense now, Sega is Sega, for good or for bad(but they can not be that bad as otl) investigate which were potential partnet and other and you will got ideas.

About your tech specs, wasn't that bad, looks in system-16 and other arcade page and think how would goes in price and other stuff.

That is nec first or second console, if first 1991, if not 1992 would be fine. remmeber nintendo released famicom in 1983 and was till 1990 released Super famicom.

So think now nintendo and sega will react, otl sega cd and failed snes-cd were product of NEC, thus that butterfly would ensue, maybe Nintendo did released snes-cd here or wait and make CD just right out the box for Super famicom? the same can be told for sega, and etc.

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That's exactly what I was aiming at, Namco system one launches in 1986 they are possibly the first that could benefit from this arcade venture, another company that would be interested especially timeline wise is the creators of Narc and Midway. Capcom cps1 launches in 1988 with its slew of arcade releases, if Capcom docent have to pay for the arcade boards and gets a good revenue they would support the system.

Though I have no idea on what SNK would do maybe they will look to Sega because of their background in making arcades and essentially make a Neo Geo that makes more sense than in otl. Thus the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis is butterflied away.

Hudson soft was approached in 1986 to make games for NEC. That definitely still happen in this timeline and of course they don't have to separate their attention and focus on making good games on NEC hardware.

Nintendo and Sony would definitely have a re do of their 1988 plan in pretty much 1989 when news of all the partnerships start to get around. It would pretty much be a replica on the Nintendo Sony plan in Player Two Start, because it makes sense however they would skip out on cartridges entirely and use the Cd format as well as a 33Mhz R3000 cpu without the 3d graphics card found in the ps1 of course.

flydeath said:

That's exactly what I was aiming at, Namco system one launches in 1986 they are possibly the first that could benefit from this arcade venture, another company that would be interested especially timeline wise is the creators of Narc and Midway. Capcom cps1 launches in 1988 with its slew of arcade releases, if Capcom docent have to pay for the arcade boards and gets a good revenue they would support the system.

Though I have no idea on what SNK would do maybe they will look to Sega because of their background in making arcades and essentially make a Neo Geo that makes more sense than in otl. Thus the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis is butterflied away.

Hudson soft was approached in 1986 to make games for NEC. That definitely still happen in this timeline and of course they don't have to separate their attention and focus on making good games on NEC hardware.

Nintendo and Sony would definitely have a re do of their 1988 plan in pretty much 1989 when news of all the partnerships start to get around. It would pretty much be a replica on the Nintendo Sony plan in Player Two Start, because it makes sense however they would skip out on cartridges entirely and use the Cd format as well as a 33Mhz R3000 cpu without the 3d graphics card found in the ps1 of course.

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Yeah, a 80's Naomi Under NEC can work if well done(obviously you need to pay money for the arcade cabinet but you saved R&D and got good system to work universally, like when Motorolla 68K become standard),

A delayed System-16 and Mega drive would make thing interesting, maybe sega released their console in 1990/1991 now with CD As standard? that would work for a while. SNK would benefit having a partner to share R&D and the cost and have more acess to a home version of he system.

Hudson Soft orignally appoached nintendo for using what would become PC Engine GPU, here they would be a third party.

if Nintendo did fell threatened with NEC, yeah they would push with Sony going for a CD console early, pushing Famicom as popular worlwide and meanwhile working ina CD 2D Console with basic 3d(like starfox and other, nothing advance but capable).

Keep pushing, your t have potential, do it.

in the late 80s / early 90s you've got fgully functioning ARM powered 32 bit dektop machines - the acorn Archimedes and subsequent An000 series

Nivek said:

Yeah, a 80's Naomi Under NEC can work if well done(obviously you need to pay money for the arcade cabinet but you saved R&D and got good system to work universally, like when Motorolla 68K become standard),

A delayed System-16 and Mega drive would make thing interesting, maybe sega released their console in 1990/1991 now with CD As standard? that would work for a while. SNK would benefit having a partner to share R&D and the cost and have more acess to a home version of he system.

Hudson Soft orignally appoached nintendo for using what would become PC Engine GPU, here they would be a third party.

if Nintendo did fell threatened with NEC, yeah they would push with Sony going for a CD console early, pushing Famicom as popular worlwide and meanwhile working ina CD 2D Console with basic 3d(like starfox and other, nothing advance but capable).

Keep pushing, your t have potential, do it.

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Note that the system 16 was the main reason for the SNK Sega partnership, however with sega's experience with making consoles its really no surprise the SNK joined in and if Sega joined in then it might convince Taito to join in as well.

IF the 3 do agree to come together to make an alliance than a Sega System 32 armed with any number of cpu types, should they jump on the ARM family should they use r3000 cpus, should they play into the pockets of NEC and by their own high end CPU's?

flydeath said:

Note that the system 16 was the main reason for the SNK Sega partnership, however with sega's experience with making consoles its really no surprise the SNK joined in and if Sega joined in then it might convince Taito to join in as well.

IF the 3 do agree to come together to make an alliance than a Sega System 32 armed with any number of cpu types, should they jump on the ARM family should they use r3000 cpus, should they play into the pockets of NEC and by their own high end CPU's?

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Yeah, the idea is making multiples NAOMI/Neo Geo of OTL as 'standard', NEC have one, Sega have one and other licensed it, that is how they play it, that can work for arcade side well.

Computer just look for the best one, didn't sega used the standard Motorolla one before using the models(intel based) and Naomi(Hitachi and PowerVR based) and now back to Intel+nvidia for their arcades. so between, maybe something IBM or other company, hardware is more what can run and how can run it at a good price, remember that

Nivek said:

Yeah, the idea is making multiples NAOMI/Neo Geo of OTL as 'standard', NEC have one, Sega have one and other licensed it, that is how they play it, that can work for arcade side well.

Computer just look for the best one, didn't sega used the standard Motorolla one before using the models(intel based) and Naomi(Hitachi and PowerVR based) and now back to Intel+nvidia for their arcades. so between, maybe something IBM or other company, hardware is more what can run and how can run it at a good price, remember that

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alright then the Intel 80386 is a good candidate, apparently AMD was trying to get rights to manufacture the 80386 when they finally did in 1991 they went on to produce millions of them, if the court case between Intel's and AMD had been settled earlier like say 1988 or 89 would we have seen it make it on to arcade board/console?
hmm decisions decisions decisions.

Another consideration is Intel's risc processor Intel i960 with apperantly also sold millions another good consideration.

flydeath said:

alright then the intel 80386 it is, apparently AMD was trying to get rights to manufacture the 80386 when they finally did in 1991 they went on to produce millions of them, if the court case between inlet and AMD had been settled earlier like say 1988 or 89 would we have seen it make it on to arcade board/console? hmm decisions decisions decisions.

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Or Intel just licensed it since day one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_80386 and avoid any legal drama.

Another consideration is Intel's risc processor Intel i960 with apperantly also sold millions another good consideration.
Which is stronger, which is better and more importart, which is cheaper for mass production? those are thing to consult about.

The NEC P.C. Engine/TurboGrafix 16 was basically a Hudson design for what was originally going to be the followup to the Nintendo Famicom. Then Nintendo developed the MMC series of mapping chips, and reneged on the deal. NEC bought it, had Hudson remove the backward compatibility with the Famicom/Nintendo Entertainment System, and Voila! Like the Famicom, the CPU wasn't a straight implementation of the 65C02; it also had six channels of Wavetable synthesis attached, although two of the cannels can be used together at the same tome for FM synthesis.

Any NEC-based 32 bit system would have used its V series of chips (V60 was where the fork off of x86 became permanent) and the PC 88/93/98 graphics chipset, resembling an early version of the PC-FX. And as far as I can see, the only two games NEC actually wrote were Keith Courage in Alpha Zones, Alien Crush, Devil's Crush, and World Class Baseball. All the rest of the "first person" titles were from Hudson.

Kalvan said:

The NEC P.C. Engine/TurboGrafix 16 was basically a Hudson design for what was originally going to be the followup to the Nintendo Famicom. Then Nintendo developed the MMC series of mapping chips, and reneged on the deal. NEC bought it, had Hudson remove the backward compatibility with the Famicom/Nintendo Entertainment System, and Voila! Like the Famicom, the CPU wasn't a straight implementation of the 65C02; it also had six channels of Wavetable synthesis attached, although two of the cannels can be used together at the same tome for FM synthesis.

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Source of it? the MMC were independt of Hudson or any sucessor console as nintendo was pushing first the dysk system for famicom, i heard hudson wanted to sell advance graphics chip but nintendo say: no thanks.

Kalvan said:

The NEC P.C. Engine/TurboGrafix 16 was basically a Hudson design for what was originally going to be the followup to the Nintendo Famicom. Then Nintendo developed the MMC series of mapping chips, and reneged on the deal. NEC bought it, had Hudson remove the backward compatibility with the Famicom/Nintendo Entertainment System, and Voila! Like the Famicom, the CPU wasn't a straight implementation of the 65C02; it also had six channels of Wavetable synthesis attached, although two of the cannels can be used together at the same tome for FM synthesis.

Any NEC-based 32 bit system would have used its V series of chips (V60 was where the fork off of x86 became permanent) and the PC 88/93/98 graphics chipset, resembling an early version of the PC-FX. And as far as I can see, the only two games NEC actually wrote were Keith Courage in Alpha Zones, Alien Crush, Devil's Crush, and World Class Baseball. All the rest of the "first person" titles were from Hudson.

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The problem with the V series cpu is that they cost hundreds of dollars, well that's fine for a arcade cabinet it isn't for a console hence the cheaper ARM. However thank you about about NEC EGC Enhance Graphics Charger that could work well with the system. Apparently the DSP enhancement chips on the super Nintendo were based on a an early NEC graphics chip.

flydeath said:

The problem with the V series cpu is that they cost hundreds of dollars, well that's fine for a arcade cabinet it isn't for a console hence the cheaper ARM. However thank you about about NEC EGC Enhance Graphics Charger that could work well with the system. Apparently the DSP enhancement chips on the super Nintendo were based on a an early NEC graphics chip.

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Interesting specially the last part, will need to read about it. some other ideas which are you plans?

Nivek said:

Interesting specially the last part, will need to read about it. some other ideas which are you plans?

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http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/225466/stalled_engine_the_turbografx16_.php

been reading up this article, turns out Hudson soft was the one that preached the idea of a console to NEC, another interesting tidbit is NEC pc technology in particular its 2d graphics processor in the 1980s were real good and could easily help improve an already good idea.

I've decided on the AMD Am386 chip ruining at 40 mhz is what the Sega alliance will use. The AMD case gets settled early, by 1987 earliest.

flydeath said:

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/225466/stalled_engine_the_turbografx16_.php

been reading up this article, turns out Hudson soft was the one that preached the idea of a console to NEC, another interesting tidbit is NEC pc technology in particular its 2d graphics processor in the 1980s were real good and could easily help improve an already good idea.

I've decided on the AMD Am386 chip ruining at 40 mhz is what the Sega alliance will use. The AMD case gets settled early, by 1987 earliest.

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Yeah that is why i told you but NEC did was interested into the juicy market nintendo have so they got greenlight to hudson, so they would ask Hudson being their first party studio?

That is for their Arcade? which year? that stuff was 1991 otl, if was early still will be a beast, hope a more simple version for console or would cost as much as 400 bucks at cheapest.

Well butterflies for AMD would be interesting and yeah would use sega, so NEC use Intel ARM and Sega AMD? so Nintendo...the otl ps1 chips?

Nivek said:

Yeah that is why i told you but NEC did was interested into the juicy market nintendo have so they got greenlight to hudson, so they would ask Hudson being their first party studio?

That is for their Arcade? which year? that stuff was 1991 otl, if was early still will be a beast, hope a more simple version for console or would cost as much as 400 bucks at cheapest.

Well butterflies for AMD would be interesting and yeah would use sega, so NEC use Intel ARM and Sega AMD? so Nintendo...the otl ps1 chips?

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NEC will actually buy a licences for the ARM chips and actually continue joint development for future Arcade and console releases. Nintendo is going to ask Sony to create a graphics chip for the SNES, it would be something akin to super fx2 chip only with more code usability and the benefit of having a r3000 cpu to run alongside it.