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Retro consoles and how they worked

10 videos, 2 h 11

10 videos on the machines themselves. What was inside an NES, a Game Boy or a PlayStation, and what those chips could and could not do.

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01
NES Hardware Explained
NesHacker
The simplest complete tour of a console's parts. Good grounding for everything after.
02
NES Graphics Explained
NesHacker
Why NES sprites and backgrounds look exactly the way they do.
03
The Insane Engineering of the Gameboy
Real Engineering
How a cheap grey handheld outlasted better-specced rivals, from an engineering view.
04
How Graphics worked on the Nintendo Game Boy | MVG
Modern Vintage Gamer
The tile and sprite system behind every Game Boy screen you remember.
05
How Graphics worked on the Super NES | MVG
Modern Vintage Gamer
Mode 7, layers, and the tricks that made SNES games look expensive.
06
Graphics & Palettes - Super Nintendo Entertainment System Features Pt. 01
Retro Game Mechanics Explained
The technical version, register by register, if the overview left you curious.
07
How the Sega Genesis / MegaDrive Worked
Retro48K
Sega's side of the 16-bit war, and why its games sound and move differently.
08
Why PlayStation 1 Graphics Warped and Wobbled so much | MVG
Modern Vintage Gamer
Explains the wobble everyone remembers, and the missing hardware behind it.
09
Why the limitations of the N64 and PS1 mattered
Modern Vintage Gamer
Compares two rival machines by what each one made hard for developers.
10
Game Boy Advance: Incredible tech on just 2 AA Batteries
Modern Vintage Gamer
What Nintendo fitted into a handheld running on 2 batteries, and the trade-offs.