Homebrew. What does the word conjure for you? Novice coders? Quality indie releases? Free stuff? Community? Any of these answers would be correct. Sometimes awesome, sometimes hilariously crap, homebrew is a petri dish of dedication, obsession, and talent, and the GP32X scene has the entire spectrum covered. So let’s take a look at some of the stuff being cooked up under our own roof.
Why are pirate games so cool? They just aarrrrrgh (sorry). Such is the setting of Wandor, the Wario inspired game being captained by Foxblock. Wandor, the game’s namesake and protagonist, is one member of a small crew of pirates; a “simple minded guy, solving puzzles with his fists rather than his brain.” Visually, the game is already taking shape nicely thanks to the talents of dragons_slayer (PandoraPanic contributor), but Foxblock is seeking assistance with coding. If you’re at home on the seven C++’s (sorry), follow the links below to see how you can help. WIP video after the break.
After nigh on a year of sweat, tears and beer, Viridior, JavaJake and the rest of the Gentoo Pandora team have restructured, repurposed and renamed their project Neuvoo. (Newbie tangent: What’s Gentoo? It’s a linux distro which, if your geek-fu is strong, you can install instead of Angstrom). The new broader focus will see other platforms join Pandora on their target list (think Beagleboard, Touchbook), giving their code more fields to frolic in, and its users a wider range of software. In addition, they’ll be bending over backwards to make sure you don’t need “I compile source code for breakfast” printed on your t-shirt to get in the door, with a binary repo in the works so you won’t miss out on the Pandora apps your Angstrom friends are using. Bravo.
Remember Alf? He’s back, in pog form. Remember PandoraPanic? It never left. The WarioWare-inspired community project has been bubbling away in the background for the past year, absorbing new talent and minigames along the way. Recent developments include some retrolicious 16 bit graphics from Dragons_Slayer, and a WIP gameplay video from Rockthesmurf. Ubiquitous porting machine Pickle even has his hat in the ring.
posted by: PlopperZ
Andrewe1 has been hard at work on his embroidery machine making some very nice Pandora and Wiz softcases. He plans to sell some in small quantities, assuming he gets permission from GPH and the Pandora team.
These are just prototypes he whipped up in a day, and he’s looking for input, so post in that thread (source link) if you’ve got any ideas!
More pics and Wiz case after the break.
Another video, and another huge thanks to Pickle for keeping the cameras rolling. Today he brings us Super Mario War, the fan-made multiplayer plumber stomper that struggled on the GP2X but looks just ace on Pandora. If you’d like to try it out, chances are it’s already been ported to a platform near you.
Are you old enough to remember The Great Giana Sisters? They were the controversial counterpart to Super Mario Bros, back in the days when people managed their household budget on a Commodore 64. So legendary is this game, that a band of GP32X gurus have been working for years on an unofficial sequel, called Giana’s Return. It recently went beta on the Wiz, and as far as old school platforming goes, it’s about as good as it gets. And guess who already has it running on Pandora?
Thanks Esn for the tip.
You’ve seen it on Engadget, Crunchgear, Hackaday, and the rest. But what those guys don’t know is that we saw it first on GP32X. Yay us. For those who came in late, the snega2usb is a USB interface for SNES and MegaDrive/Genesis carts, allowing to you run your own games in an emulator (on PC, or Pandora) direct from the cartridge! But packed with science and magic as it is, the one thing it lacks is a good, snappy name. So creator Matthias_H has put the call out for a new moniker, with the best suggestion winning a snega2usb prototype!
If you’d like to enter, visit the snega2usb blog and submit your entry via email. Please do not post your suggestions in the comments below; they will be ruled out instantly. Get2it!
Some time last week, a fellow by the name of Bobbens quietly slipped into the Pandora wiki and added an entry to the Projects Under Development page. The project is NAEV, which (to borrow the remainder of the sentence) is “a 2d action/rpg space game that combines elements from the action, rpg and simulation genres.” There’s no official mention of this one on the forums yet, so it should come as a nice surprise to those who have requested it in the past. If you haven’t heard of NAEV before, here’s the good news: It’s already a well established multi-platform project, which means you can check it on out now.
Here’s an interesting project. Every month or three, the idea of a “Pandora phone” raises its head in the forums. Each time around, the idea attracts responses from “sure, in theory” to “good god man, why?!” This time around, though, someone’s asking the right question: Why not? That someone is jb0yx, and the project is Pandaphone. He aims to bring full cellphone functionality to Pandora with the help of an external cell modem, offering the following features:
- GPRS/EDGE/3G data connectivity
- Voice based cellular calls
- SMS messaging
- Access to phonebooks stored on SIM card
- BlueTooth connectivity for calls and voice command
It’s all looking more viable than you might think, with a range of off-the-shelf hardware and open source software just waiting to be prodded into compliance. And no, you won’t be expected to hold Pandora against your face like our friend pictured above. Read more and follow progress in the Pandaphone thread.
Got a burning need to know where your fellow Pandorians hang their hats? Of course you do. B-ZaR has answered the call by whipping up a Google map for all and sundry to leave their mark. You don’t have to advertise your home address or anything; a suburb, state, princedom or local jazz hall is more than enough to pinpoint which piece of Pangea you’re floating on. The instructions go like this:
1. Click the map link below
2. Click the Edit button on the left
3. Right-click on your location
4. Add location
5. Add your name/nickname/alias, and a snappy text description if desired
The Pandora People Map | Forum discussion
Oh, forgot to say: A Google account is required if you want to add yourself to the map. If you’re not into the Google thing, hit up the forum link and ask a friendly GP32Xer to help you out.
These game developer types, I tell you. While we’re patiently waiting for updates on the as-yet-unnamed Space RTS, Keaft and his merry band of resource miners are sitting around playing board games. Which might sound a lot like procrastination, were it not a board game they’d created themselves to help flesh out their Pandora-bound RTS. Between these lounge room sessions and the 3D renders being produced by Kaze0110 (pics above, video after break), the project certainly seems to have kicked it up a notch or two. Now with a sharper focus on project requirements, Keaft is once again putting the call out to y’all:
Now that we are coming to the close of new ideas, we need your help. We have a lot of solid stuff here, but we are going to need people that can program under the administration of dflemstr. We are going to need some artists under the direction of Kaze0110 should he want help. We are going to need an Audio Technician/Composer (used to have one, but his computer died). Any help that the community can contribute will be greatly appreciated and bring us one step closer to an awesome game.
New Space RTS forums have been set up, and you’re invited to sign up and get involved. (That’s probably one place you’ll want to be come beta time, wink wink). Discussion will remain active on GP32X of course, along with the project wiki.
Itching to know which of your DOS favourites will be playable on Pandora? Got an hour to kill? Let’s get to it. Pickle says:
Anyone can get an idea if something will run. From initial tests it appears the pandora does between 2000-3000 cycles. Try your game and see how many cycles it takes. If its more than 3000, expect it to be slow.
Yes, even running DOSBox on your PC/Mac/Penguin will give you a fair indication. As Pickle puts it, “a cycle is a cycle”. To simulate the Pandora DOSBox experience, just go into your DOSBox settings and cap the cycles at say, 3000. Then fire up your lost loves, see how well they run, and don’t be shy about reporting back with your findings. If you’re DOSBox deprived, name your favourites in the comments and someone just might test them for you.
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