The MiSTer system uses an FPGA (FPGA stands for Field Programmable Gate Array) chip to reprogram itself via hardware into different chips used on older computer and console systems, generally providing a more true to the original hardware experience than software emulation, and allowing us to better preserve and understand these systems. At the heart of the MiSTer system (so named for Amiga and Atari ST systems) is the DE10-Nano board by Terasic. Until recently, it was thought impossible for technical reasons that the system would be able to support a core for the N64 hardware, despite already being able to run Sony PlayStation and Sega Saturn games.
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To our amazement, Robert Peip, AKA FPGAzumSpass, announced that he was working on an N64 core, and in June, Robert said that it would be extremely optimistic to have one game playable by Christmas.
MiSTer aficionados closely followed the development of the core via various YouTube channels and in the official MiSTer Discord server. It carried on with amazing speed, and the first retail game that became playable was Namco Museum, in July, months ahead of schedule.
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Robert announced on December 9th that TLB (Translation Lookaside Buffer) was fully implemented and that all retail release N64 games now boot on this core for the MiSTer FPGA system.
What a way to underpromise and over-deliver, and treat us with a Christmas miracle of sorts. It seems that what he really meant to say was “all retail games but one playable by Christmas,” since that is what we now have. Fandom Pulse was able to verify that the final few games did, in fact, boot and that the only game not really playable at this time is Get Force Gemini, though other games do still have glitches, and the core is not available in the official MiSTer repository yet.
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If you’d like to try out the core, simply add these 2 lines to the end of /media/fat/downloader.ini:
[n64_dev]
db_url = https://raw.githubusercontent.com/RobertPeip/Mister64/db/db.json.zip
Note that at the time of this writing, you will need the unstable MiSTer main for the latest version of this N64 core to work.
What do you think about being able to play Nintendo 64 games on the MiSTer FPGA system? Leave a comment!
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