Sharp SM-510 MCU (handheld LCD game) emulator/ tracker?

Hi there!

Well, in order to be totally authentic, you'd need to implement an SM-510 emulator, and write your own player. In that case you're looking at quite a bit of work, obviously. It's not impossible, though MAME has some SM-510 emulation code, and it's even BSD licensed, yay!
https://github.com/mamedev/mame/blob/ma … 10/sm510.h
And there is an SM-5 series assembler, written in Java:
https://web.archive.org/web/20160112051 … arpasm.zip
as well as an emulator, from the same guy, though I'm not sure how useful it is or if it even does sound:
https://web.archive.org/web/20160112051 … tchman.zip

The problem is that the SM-510 is slow af, so you're not going to get really advanced stuff out of it. However if I understand correctly it actually has 4 bit output so maybe that's enough to mix two voices.

I have yet to find a full instruction set of that thing, though. However, appearantly it's similar to the TMS-1100... hmmm... also no idea what this "melody module" thing is all about.

The other, slightly less authentic route would be to implement a generic piezo emulator, and write a player for that. As neither PFM nor pulse interleaving will work on an actual piezo, I'd go for a Squeeker-type player. See here  for a technical discussion. Basically you generate pulse waves with reasonably low duties (say, 10-25 %) and OR them together for the final output.

In any case, please keep me up to date about this project, and let me know if I can help in any way.

Don't know of anything ready-made as such, but a Squeeker type generator would be trivial to implement. What language is your game written in? Simple (if slightly unsafe) C++ example:

uint16_t suma = 0;
uint16_t fdiva = 0;
uint16_t sumb = 0;
uint16_t fdivb = 0;

int16_t generate_pcm_sample() {
    suma += fdiva;
    sumb += fdivb;
    return ((suma | sumb) < 0x2000) ? 0x7000 : 0;
}

You'd just call this repeatedly to fill your sound buffer.

On the other hand, why not simply use some ZX Spectrum music? With an engine like Huby, you'd get some pretty authentic sound.
Example: https://irrlichtproject.bandcamp.com/tr … ny-fingers
I'd even make a track for you, though we'd need to talk about the budget in case you're planning for a commercial or ad-supported release.

Or you could use Shiru's PCSPE VSTi and whip up something in FL or Ableton.

Ah ok. Yeah in that case you'd have to deal with HTML5 Audio API which might be slightly, err, unnerving

Just fyi, Beepola is by Chris Cowley, but yeah, it's great Good luck and please post the game here when it's finished!

As an alternative for Monotone, you can use my PCSPE VST plugin. It allows to create very complicated single channel music for actual PC Speaker, and you can use it with your favorite DAW. You can use some of my impulse responses to make it sound like a piezo as well.

Tamagotchi said to have a 6502 core inside. Bandai's LCD game is probably something along the lines of TMS1000.

It is sure possible to make some music routine for SM-510 that would sound more interesting than simple beeps. However, nothing has been done in this area yet, because this isn't some popular thing, it was reverse engineered and emulated just recently, and there is simply no development infrastructure yet. Like, you need an instruction set doc, an assembler, an emulator that allows to test your code, and you likely won't be able to run it on the original HW, as it uses mask ROM.

You rock so much, thank you Shiru!

I'm using PCSPE and FLstudio's arpegiator, because ChipArp messes with the pitch bend too much

Because of the arpegiator though, I can't be sure this would be playable by a piezo, although it sounds close enough. Maybe I should learn to use your 1-tracker

Played through your impulse responses (amazing work again).

Here's the first few measures of the Space Quest 3 intro. Do you think it sounds ok?

https://www.sendspace.com/file/spgkxk

I will absolutely do that <3 Thank you so much Shiru. Even if it isn't true emulation, I want to be true to the spirit of the thing

I'm going for more recent ones. Monophonic, to cut down cost, but maybe some cheap voice samples, and with enough space for programming at least one tune.

And two LCDs, like https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F988Y0d4wrY

Thanks for all your help!