Inside old games machines, was: Re: Simulated CP/M-68K?

[Ethan Dicks]

On 6/18/07, Jim Leonard <trixter at oldskool.org> wrote:
> Martin Scott Goldberg wrote:
> > I, Robot (1983 - the first 3D/Polygonal game) used a 6809 with supporting
> > 2901 bit slice cpu's for graphics support.  The color vector Star Wars
> > also used the 6809.
>
> Surely they didn't use the 6809 for the 3D calculations, did they?  I
> know those games have a lot of optimization (fixed-point, no hidden-line
> removal, etc.) but they still seem a bit much for a 6809...

As mentioned further up in this thread, the Atari vector games had, in
effect, a vector math co-processor, the Analogue Vector Generator
(AVG) or "math box" built from 2901s to do the heavy lifting.  The
8-bit processor fed shapes to the AVG and sounds to the Pokey and
handled the yoke/joystick I/O.

-ethan