Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Gaming
  3. Videos

YouTube engineer Ben Heck breaks down the fabled 'Nintendo PlayStation'

Danny Cowan
By
Ben Heck's Nintendo-Playstation Prototype Pt 1 Teardown
Hardware engineer and YouTube personality Ben Heck examines the inner workings of the Nintendo PlayStation in the latest episode of his web series The Ben Heck Show, which details the scrapped Super NES add-on’s specifications and capabilities as part of a comprehensive teardown.
Recommended Videos

Heck additionally announced plans to restore the hardware to working condition, potentially bringing the lost peripheral to life for the first time since it was initially announced more than 20 years ago.

Related

Long thought lost to history and intercompany non-disclosure agreements, Sony’s original PlayStation was designed as a CD-ROM add-on for Nintendo’s 16-bit Super NES console. While plans for a public release were eventually canceled, a working prototype of the peripheral was recently discovered at a bankruptcy auction. Its new owners have since taken the unit on a worldwide tour in the hopes of finding out more about their discovery.

Heck’s examination reveals that the unearthed prototype was likely cobbled together using multiple shell casings, and video output was provided by a unique RF connection in addition to a standard A/V out port featured on retail Super NES, Nintendo 64, and GameCube units. Among other revelations, Heck found that CD-ROM data would have been loaded into RAM stored on an attached cartridge, which also handled regional lockout.

Specs-wise, Heck wasn’t impressed.

“Even if the system had come to fruition, it probably would have had [the same graphic capabilities] as the Super Nintendo,” Heck concludes. “Aside from corporate politics, it’s quite possible that one of the reasons this didn’t come to market is because it probably wouldn’t have been any better than the Sega CD, and possibly even a little worse.”

Heck notes that the discovered prototype is nonfunctional in its current state, and does not read or initialize inserted disc media. Heck will attempt to restore the console to working condition in a follow-up episode, in the hopes of eventually getting it to read an audio CD.

To date, no examples of disc-based Nintendo PlayStation games have surfaced in the collecting community, but a pair of enterprising programmers recently created Super Boss Gaiden, a SNES homebrew game that takes advantage of CD-ROM storage media. While the game functions in a Nintendo PlayStation-compatible emulator, it remains to be seen whether it is compatible with the actual Nintendo PlayStation hardware prototype.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Danny Cowan
Danny Cowan
Contributor
Danny’s passion for video games was ignited upon his first encounter with Nintendo’s Duck Hunt, and years later, he still…
How to increase your approval rating in Manor Lords
A medieval market in Manor Lords.

Building your population in Manor Lords is one thing, but making sure they want to stick around and continue to grow is the real challenge. You could have the ideal design for a village, or the perfect tactical mind for conquering the entire map, but if your approval rating is too low, you won't survive your first winter.

Happy people are the grease that makes your kingdom an efficient machine, but what is it that people value? It can be hard to tell at times why your approval rating isn't going up, or worse going down while playing your first few games. We've zoomed in on all our citizens to learn exactly what you need to do to increase your approval rating.

Read more
Is Manor Lords multiplayer or co-op?
A medieval market in Manor Lords.

You can easily lose hours designing your village and appeasing your citizens in Manor Lords all by yourself. There are so many different avenues to achieve victory, but the only competition or help you can normally find is in the form of NPCs. Other factions around the map can be helpful or harmful depending on how you play, but what if you wanted to team up with a friend to combine resources, or perhaps compete to see who can crush the other first? Many strategy and city builders thrive on multiplayer components, but does Manor Lords offer those same modes? Make sure you know the answer before making your purchase if that's your intention.
Is there multiplayer or co-op in Manor Lords?
To cut to the chase, the answer is no. Manor Lords is a purely single-player experience through and through. There are no cooperative or competitive modes in the game at all, so there's no way to interact with anyone else either on PC or console. This game was just released out of early access, and there is plenty of content on the way, however, we regret to inform you that multiplayer is not in the plans for the time being.

One developer took to the Steam forums to release an FAQ on the game. One question specifically asked if there is any multiplayer or cooperative gameplay in the game. The response said that "he focus is on a refined single-player experience, with no multiplayer or cooperative modes planned at the moment."

Read more
All console commands and cheats for Fallout: New Vegas
The courier holding a gun with a welcome sign in the background in Fallout: New Vegas key art.

From the moment you begin your adventure in Fallout: New Vegas, you've already cheated death. Your first playthrough of the game should be done as the developers intended, though maybe with a couple of mods to make the experience a little smoother, but nothing that breaks the game. That said, it's been over a decade since the game came out, so odds are you've already played through the intended way at least once. This is when you can have some fun tinkering with the game and play using console commands and cheats if you're on the PC version of the game. There are a ton of commands you can input to manipulate your character, the world, objects, and more. Here's a full rundown of all the cheats there are and how to activate them.
How to enter console commands
Opening up the command console to type in your cheats is just a single keystroke away. While in the game (not paused), hit the ~ key located below your escape key. This will remove your HUD and bring up the prompt to type in any of the below cheats.
All Fallout: New Vegas console commands and cheats

Because there are so many console commands, we're going to break them down into general categories to make it easier for you to find what you're looking for based on what you want to do.
Faction and reputation cheats
addreputation <form id> <variable> <amount> -- Increases your reputation with a faction.

Read more