hoping to start psxdev as a hobby

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gh0stmusc
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hoping to start psxdev as a hobby

Post by gh0stmusc » June 18th, 2018, 3:30 pm

I am a android developer and I'm absolutely terrible at making games which is why I stick to mostly application software. But I have really wanted to try making things for the playstation 1 for awhile now just out of pure nostalgia for the system. Even if what I make isn't all that good I think it be fun. So if any body has recommendations on there preferred dev environment for this I would love to hear them. It is awesome to see a community people with a similar interest as me. So if you have any comments or tips or even if you just want to tell me its a bad idea feel free to reply what ever to this thread.

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Post by Yagotzirck » June 20th, 2018, 10:18 am

I don't mean to discourage you or anything but if you have a hard time making games for android, making them for the psx is probably going to be an even bigger challenge since unlike android, abstraction is pretty much nonexistent and you're forced to interact with the hardware at a low level even for the most basic operations.

With that said, if you want to give it a go you should start here:
http://www.psxdev.net/help/psyq_install.html
http://www.psxdev.net/help/psyq_hello_world.html

After that, you should familiarize yourself with the system by reading the documentation provided with psyq and playing around with the sample apps.
Again, it's not going to be a walk in the park, but if you keep going it can prove to be an interesting experience :)
Good luck

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Post by gwald » June 20th, 2018, 11:18 am

^^^ I agree with Yagotzirck, especially if you don't know C, compilers, linkers, memory map files etc. etc.
And it's still a big learning curve! even with the simpler Libgs/Net Yaroze stuff :ugeek:
I wrote my Net Yaroze development tips here
Saying that, it's a great way to learn console dev, learning hardware, learning non standard API's, etc, etc.
But I'd say most consoles now are PC or mobile based standards, so mute point... except for 3DS native development.. but yeah again, not for beginners :roll:

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Post by gh0stmusc » June 20th, 2018, 1:16 pm

I like challenges plus as something I am doing in my spare time there is no pressure to learn it fast like there is when you are actually using what you learn for work. When I said I was bad at making games I should have clarified that I'm bad at game design. I can copy other peoples games just fine but coming up with my own is the hard part. I've read through the psyq install stuff. What I was thinking about doing was writing code on my ubuntu laptop then compiling it inside a virtual machine running windows with psyq installed but I wasn't sure what the best way to do it was. for me the biggest challenge seems to be setting up a dev environment that isn't too complicated and with better flow. I like learning and this feels like an interesting learning opportunity. Also I think the yaroze is awesome and if I could get my hands on one I would totally do that too.

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Post by gwald » June 20th, 2018, 4:51 pm

Oh that's cool! welcome!
IMO, it's a great challenge, it's very old school, Computer Science!
You'll be a better programmer for it, for sure!
You don't need a yaroze, I used mostly no$psx & pcsxr (a lot quicker to debug via printf's), only using it now and then to test on hardware.
I also use linux, try using wine, old win32 should run fine on it.

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Post by Xavi92 » June 20th, 2018, 11:35 pm

I started out with PSX development with barely no knowledge about C programming and, after many years, coding for the PSX allowed me to get a job on the embedded SW development area. You shouldn't feel discouraged for what people might tell you if you dream about coding for the PSX.

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Post by Shadow » June 21st, 2018, 12:01 am

Xavi92 wrote: June 20th, 2018, 11:35 pm I started out with PSX development with barely no knowledge about C programming and, after many years, coding for the PSX allowed me to get a job on the embedded SW development area. You shouldn't feel discouraged for what people might tell you if you dream about coding for the PSX.
This post :clap
Development Console: SCPH-5502 with 8MB RAM, MM3 Modchip, PAL 60 Colour Modification (for NTSC), PSIO Switch Board, DB-9 breakout headers for both RGB and Serial output and an Xplorer with CAETLA 0.34.

PlayStation Development PC: Windows 98 SE, Pentium 3 at 400MHz, 128MB SDRAM, DTL-H2000, DTL-H2010, DTL-H201A, DTL-S2020 (with 4GB SCSI-2 HDD), 21" Sony G420, CD-R burner, 3.25" and 5.25" Floppy Diskette Drives, ZIP 100 Diskette Drive and an IBM Model M keyboard.

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Post by gh0stmusc » June 21st, 2018, 11:46 am

gwald wrote: June 20th, 2018, 4:51 pm I also use linux, try using wine, old win32 should run fine on it.
Have you had any luck with psyq running on wine? In general when I am learning new tech I get dev environment set up first because you don't want your workflow getting in the way of learning. Then I think my next goal is to just see how to put stuff on screen and get used to all the stuff the sdk. It is a very old sdk so and the documentation does look a little weird which I kinda of love badly documented tech because that's when you get to just write something and break things so you can see what is possible and what not to do. I like puzzles that's why I became a programmer. I get to solve puzzles all day for a living what job could be better than that. Writing code that can run on the original playstation is something that would make 12 year old me happy so that is the main motivation.

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Post by gwald » June 21st, 2018, 1:12 pm

Xavi92 wrote: June 20th, 2018, 11:35 pm I started out with PSX development with barely no knowledge about C programming and, after many years, coding for the PSX allowed me to get a job on the embedded SW development area. You shouldn't feel discouraged for what people might tell you if you dream about coding for the PSX.
I hightlighted some key words :lol:
I don't think anyone was being 'discouraging' here, just giving real advice.

It's not 1998, PC/mobile/web development is a lot easier now, even embedded development is 'child friendly'.
And C, even in embedded development its regarded as old.

Android developer, generally means java, which is what I do BTW but my schooling was very C/C++ focused, I learnt C on a sco unix dumb terminal (monochrome) :roll:
gh0stmusc wrote: June 21st, 2018, 11:46 am Have you had any luck with psyq running on wine?
Start with the winxp PSXDEV virtual machine, it's here somewhere.
Then if you want to dev in linux you can, this is how I do it:
run wine cmd,
Set up a batch file with env vars, test it, run it etc. (ie copy the build files from the vm and use it in wine with the the same structure- any demos should also compile in wine)
set up a makefile in that env, test it, run it etc.
Make a single batch file which does both.
Then link your IDE to run the batch ie wine cmd /k make.bat (eclipse via run->external tools)

But, I've never used psy-q, just stuck with my net yaroze stuff, but I've used win32 sdk's in wine with no problem.
I've used this method on borland, TTC, TDM compilers and retro stuff, the only problem I've seen is a converter using dot net.

If you're interested in gamedev, I'd recommend abstracting hardware (ie SDL and openGL).
As I mentioned on my blog I didn't do this (I was pretty noobish), but it pays dividend to know a standard and develop on native.
You'll also be able to port to anything easily!

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Post by Yagotzirck » June 22nd, 2018, 2:17 am

gwald wrote: June 21st, 2018, 1:12 pm I don't think anyone was being 'discouraging' here, just giving real advice.

It's not 1998, PC/mobile/web development is a lot easier now, even embedded development is 'child friendly'.
And C, even in embedded development its regarded as old.

Android developer, generally means java, which is what I do BTW but my schooling was very C/C++ focused, I learnt C on a sco unix dumb terminal (monochrome) :roll:
I couldn't have said it better myself :roll:
My intent was simply to warn him that he's gonna hit some walls at the beginning, even more so if his only programming background is Java/android, but in such a way to mean "It's perfectly normal, just don't give up and you'll be fine"; I think it would've been way worse if I told him that it was going to be a piece of cake, making him feel like a dumbass whenever he didn't manage to get his way around such "easy" stuff.

Like I said in my first reply to this thread I didn't mean to discourage anyone, and if I gave that impression then I'm sorry - nothing is impossible given enough time and dedication :)

gh0stmusc
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Post by gh0stmusc » June 22nd, 2018, 6:24 pm

I've tried using the PSXDEV virtual machine but could never get it running in virtual box and The only time I got it running was on a win 7 machine using the microsoft virtual machine software that isn't made anymore

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Post by Xavi92 » June 29th, 2018, 12:16 am

Why don't you try PSXSDK? It supports most modern platforms (Windows 7/8/10 via Cywgin, Linux, BSD...) and is an open-spurce project.
http://unhaut.x10host.com/psxsdk

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Post by Sblorgz » June 29th, 2018, 4:25 am

So does PSYQ if you configure it and use a recent make. You can even compile PSXSDK with the official toolchain if you change a few things around.

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