The Atomiswave is a custom arcade board develop by Sammy corporation, it is based on the Naomi board created by Sega. The Atomiswave arcade platform is seen by many as a spiritual successor to the Neo Geo MVS, being a collaboration between Sammy, SNK, and Sega. What is very interesting is that the Atomiswave and the Sega Dreamcast are closely similar!
So how can these games be run on a Dreamcast System? Well thanks to Megavolt85 who converted a large amount of atomiswave games to be able to work on the Dreamcast hardware including the Terraonion and the gdmenu board, however GDEmu users might need to set “image_tests=0” in the gdemu.ini. As for Terraonion users they should have no problems of just putting the image on there setup and booting it up. The Atomiswave library is small but the games look amazing and should be included in everyone library especially if you are a hardcore Arcade gamer.
Specifications:
- CPU: Hitachi SH-4 32-bit RISC CPU 200 MHz
- Rated performance: 360 MIPS/1.4 GFLOPS
- Graphics processor: PowerVR 2 100 MHz
- Polygon Performance: 3 to 5 million polygons/sec
- Rendering speed: 500 M pixels/sec
Additional features: bump mapping, fog, alpha-blending (transparency), mipmapping (polygon-texture auto switch), tri-*linear filtering, anti-aliasing, environment mapping, and specular effect
Sound processor: ARM7 Yamaha AICA (with internal 32-bit RISC CPU, 64 channel ADPCM) 45 MHz
- Memory
- System: 16MB
- Graphics: 16MB
- Sound: 8MB
- Storage media: ROM board
- Here is a list of games that were made for the Arcade Board:
- Animal Basket
- Demolish Fist
- Dirty Pigskin Football
- Dolphin Blue
- Extreme Hunting
- Extreme Hunting 2
- Faster Than Speed
- Fist of the North Star
- Guilty Gear Isuka
- Guilty Gear X Ver. 1.5
- King of Fighters NeoWave, The
- King of Fighters XI, The
- Knights Of Valour: The Seven Spirits
- Maximum Speed
- Metal Slug 6
- Neo-Geo Battle Coliseum
- Ranger Mission
- Rumble Fish 2, The
- Rumble Fish, The
- Salary Man Kintaro
- Samurai Shodown VI
- Sports Shooting USA
- Victory Furlong Horse Racing
Due to respect of the developers we cannot list the roms here for download but if you do a google search of Atomiswave ports for the Dreamcast you should be able to find what you are looking for as well as directions to run them on your setup.
Other ways to play Atomiswave:
Bar the Dreamcast, Atomiswave is by far the easiest of hardware in the family to get running at home. Let’s delve into the options available to you hardcore Sega and SNK fans.
1: Consolised Atomiswave
This is by far the easiest option for those of you yet to delve into the world of arcade gaming. Like the consolised MVS consoles, these have been modded by enthusiasts to work like any regular console; simply plug the power cable in, connect it to your television, plug in an arcade stick and you’re ready to go. Due to the nature of modded hardware, there is no set standard, so when going this route be sure to find one that does everything you need. The system has a VGA connection as default but most modders add at least one of the following: component, RGB, S-Video and/or a dedicated stereo out. For control inputs, the most common solution is to add two connectors for Neo Geo AES/CD controllers/sticks, so remember to factor that into your budget as well. All in all, it’s a nice easy option for the arcade noob prepared to pay a premium. But these things are not cheap. Don’t say I didn’t warn you!
2: JAMMA arcade cabinet
Playing Atomiswave on a regular JAMMA cabinet is a far simpler task compared to the Naomi as the system uses the standard JAMMA pinout, allowing you to simply plug the JAMMA harness (included in any JAMMA arcade cabinet) to the system without any fuss such as I/O converters and the like. For those with cabinets that support VGA and JAMMA, such as the Sega Blast City or Net City, you have the option of connecting your arcade monitor in VGA, utilizing the Atomiswave’s 31khz mode.
3: Supergun
For those of you without the space for a full sized cabinet, buying a supergun is the route I recommend. Superguns are built to play and test arcade boards on regular consumer televisions. Any JAMMA super gun will work just fine with the Atomiswave and will probably cost less than the consolised system mentioned above. Why limit yourself to one piece of arcade hardware when for roughly the same price you can use one of these bad boys to play practically any JAMMA system or motherboard ever made?
4: Naomi hacks
Two well known modders/bootleggers/hackers (whatever you want to call them) in the arcade scene, ArcadeModBios and Darksoft, have been working on porting the Atomiswave library to the Naomi. The project is ongoing so not all games are supported, but thus far over twenty titles have been converted including the unreleased ‘Sushi Bar,’ making this the only way to play that game on (practically) original hardware. Custom built Naomi multicarts have been made but by far the most convenient way to play these games is to use a flashcard reader or the Net Booting solution.
5: Emulate
As always, the cheapest and most practical way for most of you out there to play the system exclusives is to simply use emulation. I haven’t tried emulating the system myself, but have heard Demul, Makaron and Null DC all do a good job of running either original Atomiswave roms or the converted Naomi roms mentioned above.
Was you able to get Atomiswave games running on your setup? Please let us know @hackinformer.com on Twitter