Piplay (formally pimame) kick starter for R-pi & BeagleBone Black

[Locke141]

There is a kick starter to help improve Pi-play, a gaming/emulation optimized operating system for the Raspberry Pi.

I kicked in and thought some here may be interested. It runs for 8 more days.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1985705009/pimame

Here is the developers web site:
http://blog.sheasilverman.com/raspberry-pi-emulation/[/url

Update: They added optical theme support to the menu.


[url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=zFrehsUkW9k]https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=zFrehsUkW9k

Update 2: So with a little more then two days lest the kick starter is now $446 from its stretch goal of $10,000 to port to BeagleBone Black.

[nadcraker]

What kinds of games is the Raspberry Pi suited for? Can it play 90's era games or just the classics?

[Locke141]

Depends,

I am down loading piplay now so have not tried Mame on it yet. But looks like Mame is mostly classics.

The developer wrote that on Gengeo (Neo Geo emulator) he has "King of Fighters 98 is running at 60fps. It looks lovely."..."King of Fighters 98, Metal Slug X, and Samurai Shodown 2 at full speed with no issues"

Its not going to play every thing but I would say it does a lot for a $35 credit card size computer.

http://blog.sheasilverman.com/raspberry-pi-emulation/

List of emulation/ports:

MAME
Neo Geo
Quake 3 Arena
MESS
Cave Story
Raspbian Binaries
Quake II
Descent
PCSX – Playstation Emulator
PCSX_ReARMed – A Better Playstation Emulator
AdvanceMAME Debs (with Sound)
PCSX_ReARMed
Nintendo 64

[wirenut]

I just backed it.  Thanks for the link!

[stan2323]

I backed it.  I hope he makes it to $10,000.  I want this ported to the BeagleBone Black.  I want to see what it can do.

[sharpfork]

I backed it.  I hope he makes it to $10,000.  I want this ported to the BeagleBone Black.  I want to see what it can do.

The BeagleBone Black is hardware worth putting some energy into.  RasPi= meh.  I'll back it regardless.

[Locke141]

Pi=Cheep fun little thing to play with or to make a hand held.

BeagleBone Black= better hardware.

[kahlid74]

I'm one of the biggest kickstarter whores out there but this one just doesn't make sense to me.  There are already encoders and gamepad/joystick support enough to where I'm not 100% what the purpose of this kickstarter actually is.  Not really sure what he's trying to do there.   

[Locke141]

He made an OS for the pi that comes with all the video game emulators a pi can handle. It does 99% of the work .

The kick starter is to improve support.   

[yotsuya]

I'm one of the biggest kickstarter whores out there but this one just doesn't make sense to me.  There are already encoders and gamepad/joystick support enough to where I'm not 100% what the purpose of this kickstarter actually is.  Not really sure what he's trying to do there.   

I'm kind of in agreement with you there.

[pbj]

Nothing spends like someone else's money.

 

[keilmillerjr]

I backed it.  I hope he makes it to $10,000.  I want this ported to the BeagleBone Black.  I want to see what it can do.

The BeagleBone Black is hardware worth putting some energy into.  RasPi= meh.  I'll back it regardless.

Agreed. The beagle bone black hardware is much more attractive than the raspberry pi. I plan on picking up one soon for one of my projects.

[Locke141]

(Sorry for  the spelling/grammar. I'm on my phone and have dyslexia. I'll fix it up latter)

Well then, some good news for all of you pi haters. The stretch goal to port to the BBB has been met.

As for some of the other reasonable concerns.

Yes, most of the work was done by him and others before he started the champagne. But it being open scores he was and is given it all away for free. He was only looking for for $2,500 from small donation. The R-pi community is huge and piplay has it's own not small community with in the larger world of ip. This wouldn't have made it very far if it was a BBB project.

The pi is slow and the hardware is not very impressive but that's not the point. It's cheep, small, hacking friendly, and is trying to get young people to learn about computing. The best way to no that is by having lots of different interesting protects around to try.

[ark_ader]

The Pi was supposed to introduce programming to the UK schools, that we're pushing ICT to its students.

I haven't seen too many schools adopting the Pi, but the spirit was there for the A model that supposed to be like a USB key.  Priced so any child could afford a computer that was more than a console.

Now I see this kick starter and it sends a message to the organizers of the Pi, that it was a waste of time.  I think this a classic example of a bad idea, then the kids should be learning to code and not distracted by playing console games.  Nice that the guy has a project, but unless he is teaching the youngsters how to code emulators, this is an incredible waste of resources.

[Locke141]

There are literally thousands of well documented projects to do on the R-pi. If the R-pi was just for learning scratch and python you could do that with a CD. There would be no point of making a physical computer.

This is just one more project. There are others on how to control the temp of brewing beer, making an Asterisk server (BPX phone), making a weather station, putting a weather balloon + GPS + camera & R-pi near space.

There is a hole magazine dedicated to projects you can do with a R-Pi. The point is having lots of fun options, leads to lots of opportunities to learn. Motivations + challenge = learning. Experimentation is the best path to deep learning.           

If say you wanted to install pi play, you would need to learn how to use DD in command line. If you want to use the GPIO's to interface to the controls, you may need to remap the GPIO.

It's just another peace of the puzzle.

[Generic Eric]

What kinds of games is the Raspberry Pi suited for? Can it play 90's era games or just the classics?

Superhexagon.

[SavannahLion]

The Pi was supposed to introduce programming to the UK schools, that we're pushing ICT to its students.

I haven't seen too many schools adopting the Pi, but the spirit was there for the A model that supposed to be like a USB key.  Priced so any child could afford a computer that was more than a console.

Now I see this kick starter and it sends a message to the organizers of the Pi, that it was a waste of time.  I think this a classic example of a bad idea, then the kids should be learning to code and not distracted by playing console games.  Nice that the guy has a project, but unless he is teaching the youngsters how to code emulators, this is an incredible waste of resources.

I rather think the Pi is somewhat positioned wrong. It's a noble cause but relatively few kids in first world countries have little interest in understanding the underpinnings of what makes their precious Smart phones work. Worse yet, there are precious few parents who understand the same. To many parents, their annoying iPad is nothing more than magic accompanied with a hefty share of Voodoo and a spicing of terrorism. Some even go so far as to believe the ---That which is odiferous and causeth plants to grow--- that hacking is wrong, illegal, and supports terrorist activities.

Heaven forbid should little Johnny get a computer without a precious case in the mail.

[ark_ader]

The USB key version (pictured below) would be portable enough to carry around to a friends house.  The current iteration looks like it would stab you in the leg (at least leave marks) if you carried around in your pocket.  This is one of the reasons why the Pi wasn't adopted by the schools as it needed a case.  Also schools were not given the priority to purchase the units first.  It immediately became the modder platform for low powered projects.  Now we have to suffer through the adoption of previous console ports, just because it is there.

The only decent product for mainstream business use if the ability to use it as a thin client, not an arcade machine.   




Now this device totally kicks the Pi's arse and is similarly priced, plays arcade games fluidly, has a case and can boot Linux too.

[SavannahLion]

I think the group didn't initially give schools priority buy was because there was virtually nothing out there. It's fine if you want to push a new product onto schools but most schools don't have a budget for any sort of internal support much less any sort of external support contracts. I think the group was trying to bulk up the community (ala Arduino) so the teachers and students have someone to turn to.

Which kind of leads me to my next point. I can't vouch for the rest of the world, but schools up to the High School level state side are practically being spoon fed the curriculum. It's kind of embarrassing really but I digress, Pi isn't going to be a part of any school, at all, if it doesn't make it into the curriculum (or that whole Obama  gets  ). I would imagine that the group was hoping to get enough market penetration that more schools might take notice. I dunno, I'm just guessing.

That whole ---That which is odiferous and causeth plants to grow--- with the NDA and the ---fouled up beyond all recognition--- up boot sequence might have something to do with it. That would be a stretch, but if a product markets itself as a student worthy product where they can get into the nuts and bolts but proceeds to hide some of it away, I would look elsewhere.

But yeah, a shell is necessary, at least a clear one. In college, we beat the ---steaming pile of meadow muffin--- out of the 68HC11 boards just by moving them around. I think the hardware class spent half their time soldering those poor boards back together so the software class can hammer away at them.

[yotsuya]

Which kind of leads me to my next point. I can't vouch for the rest of the world, but schools up to the High School level state side are practically being spoon fed the curriculum. It's kind of embarrassing really but I digress, Pi isn't going to be a part of any school, at all, if it doesn't make it into the curriculum (or that whole Obama  gets  ). I would imagine that the group was hoping to get enough market penetration that more schools might take notice. I dunno, I'm just guessing.

I've been in education since 1996. This stuff has been going on WELL before someone got elected in 2008.

[ark_ader]

I think the group didn't initially give schools priority buy was because there was virtually nothing out there. It's fine if you want to push a new product onto schools but most schools don't have a budget for any sort of internal support much less any sort of external support contracts. I think the group was trying to bulk up the community (ala Arduino) so the teachers and students have someone to turn to.

Which kind of leads me to my next point. I can't vouch for the rest of the world, but schools up to the High School level state side are practically being spoon fed the curriculum. It's kind of embarrassing really but I digress, Pi isn't going to be a part of any school, at all, if it doesn't make it into the curriculum (or that whole Obama  gets  ). I would imagine that the group was hoping to get enough market penetration that more schools might take notice. I dunno, I'm just guessing.

That whole ---That which is odiferous and causeth plants to grow--- with the NDA and the ---fouled up beyond all recognition--- up boot sequence might have something to do with it. That would be a stretch, but if a product markets itself as a student worthy product where they can get into the nuts and bolts but proceeds to hide some of it away, I would look elsewhere.

But yeah, a shell is necessary, at least a clear one. In college, we beat the ---steaming pile of meadow muffin--- out of the 68HC11 boards just by moving them around. I think the hardware class spent half their time soldering those poor boards back together so the software class can hammer away at them.

Sorry I was referencing the UK school system.  The US 6-12 grade is pretty dire when it comes to computing and mathematics, and doesn't worth mentioning in this scenario.  UK schools was supposed to have PIs instead of ICT.  The raspberry Pi is a UK product.

[Locke141]

I'll start by saying I work in education, I am an early adopter of the R-pi, and I have seen Eben Upton (the founder of the R-pi foundation) speak and got to chat with him and his wife Liz for a bit after.

The Wikipedia entry the story starts on a later point in the story then I am going to recap here. The Raspberry Pi project was the idea of Eben when he was working at Cambridge. He noticed many of the incoming computer science (C.S.) students had never programed. The idea of the Raspberry pi was to make a run of boards to give to incoming students to motivate them to learn Python. The short version is they were going to try to fund the small project by R-pi's on line. They received a huge number of orders and the mission changed. 

There are lots of schools in the U.K. that do use the R-pi in ICT classes, the foundations runs free trains for teachers, the R-pi is also used by lots of people for non school projects and that great! There are thousand of people all over the world making, learning, and teach with the R-pi. The more fun,interesting, exciting things there are to try on a R-pi, the more likely kids are going to want to get one and try a project themselves.

I have a MK802. It is faster then a R-pi but still slow and is less hack able. Speed is the the point.   

   

 
   

[kahlid74]

There are use cases for RaspberryPi.  There were many more when it first came out.  BB and Arduino have since gotten more competitive but the RaspberryPi still has a nice price point.  I use two RaspberryPi's in my house; one for pool automation (Automatic testing of ORD{Chlorine} and pH) and one for the furnace in the house with a PiFace for SSR control.

He made an OS for the pi that comes with all the video game emulators a pi can handle. It does 99% of the work .

The kick starter is to improve support.   

For me, Kickstarter's purpose isn't that.  If he wants support he needs to work on a big DONATE button for his website.  Either way I've rolled emulators on Pi and it's very underwhelming.  To each their own!

[Locke141]

There are use cases for RaspberryPi.  There were many more when it first came out.  BB and Arduino have since gotten more competitive but the RaspberryPi still has a nice price point.  I use two RaspberryPi's in my house; one for pool automation (Automatic testing of ORD{Chlorine} and pH) and one for the furnace in the house with a PiFace for SSR control.

He made an OS for the pi that comes with all the video game emulators a pi can handle. It does 99% of the work .

The kick starter is to improve support.   

For me, Kickstarter's purpose isn't that.  If he wants support he needs to work on a big DONATE button for his website.  Either way I've rolled emulators on Pi and it's very underwhelming.  To each their own!

All good points.

R-pi is not and will not be a great, or even a good, options for the vast majority of projects here. Out side of Micro cabs I can't think of any. It does not mean it's a bad idea to get people interested. 

Indiegogo my have been a better setting for this kind of thing.

I think the more things people do with the R-pi the more likely kids will pick one up and learn something.

 

 

[nitrogen_widget]

I've been playing around with my PI.
Right now it's a toss-up between a custom linux distro on a p3 or my pi for my vertical classics cab.
both can boot off SD card, the p3 will have a few fans.

The PI does really well with older games & i've seen on the forums it handles capcom & neogeo stuff well also.
The PI also has the option to wire the controls directly to it's in/out pins and emulate  keyboard presses.

Front ends on the PI are not as cool. There are two main front ends are emulationstation & advance menu.
Right now Emulationstation has had bug that renders it not usable in the vertical orientation for almost a yr & every time I compile Advance menu I boot into a black screen.

I have installed wah!cade on my PI but it ran way too slow even with the basic 640x480 layout so i've moved on from that.
Definitely a learning curve compared to Linux & Windows.

as for the beaglebone black....well, if i'm going to pay that much more for a tiny PC I might as well get an Atom or Amd E-series setup for a few bucks more.

[SavannahLion]

Which kind of leads me to my next point. I can't vouch for the rest of the world, but schools up to the High School level state side are practically being spoon fed the curriculum. It's kind of embarrassing really but I digress, Pi isn't going to be a part of any school, at all, if it doesn't make it into the curriculum (or that whole Obama  gets  ). I would imagine that the group was hoping to get enough market penetration that more schools might take notice. I dunno, I'm just guessing.

I've been in education since 1996. This stuff has been going on WELL before someone got elected in 2008.

I'm aware of that. I was dumped into the standard school system when the state decided to pull funding on an "accelerated"  program. For nearly three years I essentially repeated everything that was done the previous year. But I digress, I'm referring to the new step program or whatever they want to call it in educators attempt to have U.S. kids education match the rest of the world.