NEC-Hudson 32-Bit Prototype System circa 1992

[parallaxscroll]

NEC-HUDSON 32-bit IronMan aka Project Tetsujin, 1992
(forerunner of the PC-FX)










Also, here is a translated web article about Tetsujin and the changes that happened as it evolved into the PC-FX

Promising beginnings...


The "board' presented in 1992: let us note that the logos of pad NEC were changed into Hudson.



Extremely Nipponese success of the range PC-Engine , a console 8-bits surpuissante, Hudson Soft launches out at the end of 1990 in the development of a technology 32-bits. Approximately 2 years later, we are then in May 1992, a first prototype is introduced: It is here only about a "board' (together of components laid out on a chart). Composed of a central microprocessor HuC62320 (32-bits RISC, 10 Mips) and assisted by 5 coprocessors (management of the sound, input/output, pallet of colors, sprites and effects special like compression/decompression of the images), the in-house unit developed by Hudson terrace already the competition represented then by the consoles 16-bits and other computers. This level of design, the peripheral of storage (cartridge, CD-Rom...) and the manufacturer are not finalized yet. The project, then named Tetsujin (iron man), made strong impression in the specialized press. A probable marketing is announced for January or June 1994...











One of the graphic demonstrations consists in choosing, between these 4 tètes, a face starting and a face of arrival. The machine is then given the responsability to transform choice 1 into choice 2 through a whole series of incredibly fluid animations. Very impressive (it appears).









Quality of image, speed of posting, handling and animation of the objects 3d surfaces full: with these demonstrations, Hudson strikes a great blow.


Diagram of architecture of the Tetsujin project.


... with the radical changes

At the beginning of 1994, new revelation: The Tetsujin project was moulted in project FX. A manufacturer is now announced. It acts, obviously, of the indéboulonnable NEC, partner of Hudson since the PC-Engine via its branch NEC HE (NEC Home Entertainment). Contrary to the plan initially envisaged, the microprocessor is not any more HuC62320 but a NEC V810 definitely more powerful. This change, of appearance pain-killer, seals the destiny of the machine partly: The 3d is abandoned with the profit of the handling of video images in real time. But why thus such a transformation will you say to me?






Here the kind of images whose the magazines at that time satisfied us: They were supposed to show us the power of the architecture of the machine. With the passing, the joke can appear amusing. I deliver to you the comments of this great moment of journalism:
1) "this photograph illustrates well the possibilities of transparency offered by Alpha Channel (???) of the FX"
2) "the shot-them-up on the FX go décoiffer"
These photographs illustrate the plays Lords Of Thunder FX and Super Star Soldier FX, 2 engines which will unfortunately never be marketed.

Several factors are to be taken into account. The first: the raising of prices of the components managing the 3d Those proposed and developed by Hudson are being maintaining much more expensive. The second: Some of the design features of future Saturn de Sega start to circulate in the medium and cool our 2 small drainage canals somewhat (particularly those concerning the treatment of the 3d mappée). To finish: Semi-official advertisement by Sony of its arrival on the market of the consoles. It too is for NEC which forces Hudson to re-examine its copy. The engineers of the Nipponese tandem are now pressed by the duet Sega/Sony. By giving up the 3d, large problem is solved: Saving of time and saving in money. For the remainder of architecture, Hudson inflates the capacities of some of its components and NEC grafts a video system allowing a management bitmap except par. This change of orientation makes it possible cause a drop in drastiquement the cost of the future console. Result, Hudson and NEC ambitionnent to market the 32-bits the least expensive of the market. To finish, compatibility between the plays PC-Engine and those of the FX are unfortunately not on the agenda. Appointment in a few months...

http://translate.google.com/translat...3Doff%26sa%3DN

From what I gather, the gist of it is, Ironman /Tetsujin in 1992 was to continue being developed with the addition of 3D polygon graphics chips. This never happened, NEC & Hudson scrapped that plan. They instead added a faster CPU and upgraded the FMV capabilities with the PC-FX which was released in 1994.

[Frogacuda]

Interesting. I always thought the IronMan was more or less identical to the PC-FX in core spec, and that their big problem was releasing a spec developed in 1992 two years late.

[gameoverDude]

I think NEC may have been trying to let the PC-Engine ride a little longer. It was still doing fairly decent then. Still, they should've probably gotten the PC-FX out a little sooner while continuing support for the PCE, just like Sony did with PS2/PS1 and now does with PS3/PS2.

Too bad about Namco's 16-bit Super System which never materialized. It was supposedly going to be used as the PC-Engine 2. Reportedly comparable to Super Famicom, it likely would have had Mode 7 type effects and maybe even sprite S&R which the SF couldn't do. Sprite "scaling" and "rotation" on SF works just like the Genesis, unless the cartridge has certain add-on chips in it.

[parallaxscroll]

The Genesis had absolutely no hardware for scaling & rotation, so any games that did these things, did it completely through software.

The released Super Famicom / SNES did have *some* hardware for scaling backgrounds and doing some level of rotation, but it did not have sprite scaling. Originally the Super Famicom was to have a 10 MHz 68000 CPU and '3D' sprite manipulation hardware for extensive scaling & rotation and other tricks but this was scaled back, as the specs were finalized, into the limited form of scaling & rotation done via MODE 7.

The capability lost had to be put back in, with certain games, using the various DSP and CPU accelerator chips. For example, the scaling & rotation that Pilotwings and F-Zero did were done with DSPs. I'm not a tech-head so I cannot really explain what the SFC/SNES could and could not do precisely, or what the DSPs and CPUs in various carts allowed games to do that the base hardware couldn't. Maybe someone else can explain better than I can.

I did find an interesting usenet post on the subject:

The first batch of games for the Super Famicom were developed around
1988 and 1989. Popular Super Famicom titles, like F-Zero and Super Mario
World, were the most difficult for several reasons--if nothing else, the
Super Famicom hardware specifications changed in small ways at least
twice during the development project, requiring changes to existing
code. (Trivia tidbit: the original Super Famicom plans called for much
more extensive onboard 3D hardware--PilotWings was developed assuming
that this hardware would be present, and since this chip was scrapped
from the Super Famicom at the last minute, Nintendo was forced to
include this 3D chip on the PilotWings board in order to keep the game
on schedule.)

http://groups.google.com/group/rec.g...n&dmode=source

[YellerDog]

Couldn't they have just put the chip in the SNES once, reducing their manufacturing costs in the long run? Seems more practical than having to re-up for every game that needed it.

[gameoverDude]

That's why Out Run took 8 meg on Genesis as is- each object in the game had to be redrawn a few times at several sizes. If the Genesis did HWS&R, they could've done a better looking 4M version, or a truly awesome 8M one.

I like the original SF specs a lot better. Namco might have tried to bring out a version of Assault if the SF were like that. My guess is that they didn't see the released system as being able to do it decently (slowdown could've been a bitch).

The Genesis had absolutely no hardware for scaling & rotation, so any games that did these things, did it completely through software.

The released Super Famicom / SNES did have *some* hardware for scaling backgrounds and doing some level of rotation, but it did not have sprite scaling. Originally the Super Famicom was to have a 10 MHz 68000 CPU and '3D' sprite manipulation hardware for extensive scaling & rotation and other tricks but this was scaled back, as the specs were finalized, into the limited form of scaling & rotation done via MODE 7.

The capability lost had to be put back in, with certain games, using the various DSP and CPU accelerator chips. For example, the scaling & rotation that Pilotwings and F-Zero did were done with DSPs. I'm not a tech-head so I cannot really explain what the SFC/SNES could and could not do precisely, or what the DSPs and CPUs in various carts allowed games to do that the base hardware couldn't. Maybe someone else can explain better than I can.

I did find an interesting usenet post on the subject:



http://groups.google.com/group/rec.g...n&dmode=source

[Cheebs]

I'll take the SNES and Genesis hardware exactly as it was released. The $200 price tags made them what they were. Beefier hardware = higher price = lower distribution = we don't get the games we did.

[Frogacuda]

The released Super Famicom / SNES did have *some* hardware for scaling backgrounds and doing some level of rotation, but it did not have sprite scaling. Originally the Super Famicom was to have a 10 MHz 68000 CPU and '3D' sprite manipulation hardware for extensive scaling & rotation and other tricks but this was scaled back, as the specs were finalized, into the limited form of scaling & rotation done via MODE 7.

The capability lost had to be put back in, with certain games, using the various DSP and CPU accelerator chips. For example, the scaling & rotation that Pilotwings and F-Zero did were done with DSPs. I'm not a tech-head so I cannot really explain what the SFC/SNES could and could not do precisely, or what the DSPs and CPUs in various carts allowed games to do that the base hardware couldn't. Maybe someone else can explain better than I can.

I'm not sure this is true. I think the SNES did have sprite scaling, but not sprite rotation. What the DSPs were used for in games like Pilotwings and Mario Kart, were calculating the 3D positioning of objects, theoretical 3D vectors in and of themselves, even if displayed with sprites, as well as scaling a greater number of sprites at once.

F-Zero did not use a DSP. It was able to scale sprites handily since it didn't have that many objects on screen.

[Cheebs]

F-Zero did not use a DSP. It was able to scale sprites handily since it didn't have that many objects on screen.

Unless memory is failing me, F-Zero did not have scaling sprites. I remember F-Zero using the "jump to a different drawing of the object drawn at a different size" method. Like Rad Racer n' such. For the race craft anyway.



And I've always been under the belief that the SNES couldn't scale sprites without a chip or something, but I've got nothing to back that up. I thought it could only rotate/scale a mode 7 background layer, and sometimes that background layer was made small enough to look like a sprite (koopa bosses in SMW).

[Frogacuda]

Unless memory is failing me, F-Zero did not have scaling sprites. I remember F-Zero using the "jump to a different drawing of the object drawn at a different size" method. Like Rad Racer n' such. For the race craft anyway.

Looking at it again, you're right... and Pilotwings and Mario Kart do this as well, so that's not what the DSP is doing.