Just Getting Started with PSX Development – Looking for Beginner Advice

[getawaycar]

Hi all,

I'm completely new to PSX development and just starting to explore how the original PlayStation works under the hood. I've always been fascinated by retro console architecture, and the PS1 seems like a great system to learn about low-level programming, MIPS assembly, and game development workflows.

So far, I’ve been:
Reading through the Net Yaroze and PSXSDK docs
Looking into how to set up a working toolchain for compiling and testing

If anyone has tips for: Advice on learning MIPS for PlayStation specifically

I’d really appreciate the help!
Thanks, and excited to be part of this community.

[MasterLink]

The downloads section here has the MIPS instruction set PDF for the R3000A, which is the same ISA as used in the PSX.

It's quite lengthy, but it's a good start to get familiar with it.

[scphscpe]

In general, if you are familiar with assembly for at least 1 CPU architecture then learning a new one is very simple. But if you have zero experience then MIPS is the best starting point because it's super simple, I'd say it's the most true RISC architecture out there. It has some quirks though, like delay slots, but you'll get used to them eventually. Best way to learn any assembly is to write your own code and study someone's existing, or just decompile some games with tools such as Ghidra and see how they work.

[MottZilla]

I would think one of the bigger draws of doing PSX development is that you *don't* have to do any assembly and can make your game entirely in C. You could make something with some MIPS assembly though I suppose. I find that knowledge is more important if you're trying to debug something maybe, or more realistically if you are trying to hack something. Like doing a mod or translation of a game.

As far as learning MIPS stuff I'm sure there are plenty of resources that would come up on google, even PSX specific stuff.