when the pandora comes out, which devs will stay with the wiz an dwhich ones will move to the pandora? I would expect most to move to the pandora, but I cant really buy it because they're probably going to be sold out in a few days.

My theory, there will be some division amongst the two, but at the same time there will also be some who will dev for both. It'll be interesting to see who goes where I agree, but I'm guessing that it'll be split a little more evenly than anyone would guess (due to different devs having different preferences in what their handheld is like and can do...)

Agreed, the community is almost guaranteed to split.

With this forum covering all 3, I would expect some cross-platform devving to go on. But some (with the opengl option and faster speed) will probably just go the 'pandora way'.

Seeing how the basis for a good share of the devs environment is cross-platform portable code(using the likes of SDL and such) them both being healthily supported is almost a given.

Split? Yeah, I don't think so. Most devs do open source code, and even the ones who don't are liable to either dev for both or give the source to someone who will port it. Since both platforms use ARM it'll be easy to port a lot of things, with not very much complexity in the platform specific parts of either. Most things done for the Wiz will be easy to port to Pandora, and most things done for Pandora that wouldn't be easy to port to Wiz would have probably done been done for Wiz to begin with (if Pandora didn't exist).

Anything I currently write is written in Fenix, and there's guaranteed to be a runtime for both the Wiz and the Pandora.

When I have both systems, only time will tell which one stays in my handbag and that I guess will be the one I will primarily code for.

I wasn't meaning a split that way, I was more aiming at splitting the devs across the two platforms, not the projects... there will always be the ones who buy both, but some will choose one or the other and dev for it, simply based on some of the common purchase deciding questions: What can I afford? What do I want to play with? Where are my cohorts going to? etc.

I think what was misinterpreted was that I was talking devELOPERS and you were thinking devELOPMENT, or maybe it wasn't my comment that led to your *shrugs* not really sure... and on that note I do agree with what you are saying Exophase, two very similar platforms that will form two very like-minded communities... and with these new handhelds being added to the mix it'd be nice to see if the GP2X still retained some devs and some new devs flooded in...

^ WarmFluffyUK: heh, I still have a hard time deciding whether I'm grabbing the GP32, GP2X or Zodiac for an outing, although if it's gonna be > 5 hours I always take the GP32 And due to my rechargeable batteries getting killed off, I've been favoring the Zodiac, which is complete opposite of 6 months ago 'cause the rechargeables were still kicking and the zod's lithium was lasting 20 minutes

Ah I see, well to be honest I am going to get both systems.

Me too
I am such a consumer whore I have a shirt that says so!

What I meant by community is #gp2xdev (this is the legendary awesome community, not GP32x ) and I suspect that most people there will go one way or the other (or stay with the GP2X, which also seems a popular option) unless the other communities change their attitudes to donations radically. Projects will be ported between machines of course by other people, but developers don't like buying machines and there is a lot of politics that doesn't really leak through to GP32x.

As I need to get 3D game demos to show, I'm going to get a Pandora first... and then see what I can afford from there. I would like to get both, just because I like gadgets, but on that note, I still don't have a GP32, etc... so it's all about money and I suspect I'll only end up with Pandora, keeping my 2X. Or worst case, just being stuck with my 2X

This one?

No I don't think it is. As much as you seem to relish the idea of some drama like that, I just don't think this is the kind of place to do it.

The war of the niche handhelds. What a brilliant move for us that would be

We should all encourage and help devs on all open platforms because eventually it will help us, splits in the open community are exactly the kind of thing Sony/MS/Apple love and I don't doubt they are involved in some of it.

There may be devs who favour one platform over another but that doesn't mean they won't develop for the other one. A good example is zx-81. He favours the psp over the GP2X but still ports his excellent emus to GP2X and updates them as well

Nah, I'm just a little sore about all the abuse that has come my way over the last few months - I'm sure you understand .

The wiz and the Pandora are designed for completely different kinds of games, so of course there will be a split. Emulators, well that doesn't really matter.

any devs who want to say what they're gonna develop for?

Me already working on 3d game engine for Wiz that will be sufficent for wide range of game genres.

YAY! now how do i develop a game lol.

Despite wishful thinking, you're throwing two sharks into the same marketplace. Those sharks may be toothless and wear makeup, but they're still sharks, nonetheless; they will fight. I'm not sure what specific devs will move or not (no one is except them), but I'm hoping that the "war" between the Wiz and Pandora will hearken back to the Golden Age of the 16-bit era. Sure, Nintendo and Sega were at each other's throats for years, but it was a great time and each system was pushed to the limits due to the competition.

It's not really as you put it at all. Any game that runs well on Wiz should run well on Pandora too - I can't think of a single reason why this wouldn't hold true.

copy protections

Ah, so thats why my psp wont run .csos.
lol drag queen sharks.

Because the Wiz is made for simpler games, the Pandora has that keyboard and all thos extra keys.

And how would that stop it running Wiz programs?

Keyboard is an advantage mainly for usability and Amiga, etc emulation.

Games will more than likely use the gaming controls and should be easy to port between systems

I was actually on about the Wiz running pandora programs. It works both ways you know, it's not a one way relationship.

Not that i Dev much, but I plan on pure Pandora development.

My reasons:
1. I only have a limited amount of time, energy and money.
2. Hardware-wise, I can't see much advantage of the Wiz vs a GP2X / PSP.
3. In my closed source projects, I intend on pushing the hardware to it's limit.

However i agree, a community split is really not necessary. Both Scenes will benefit from each other, much like similar ones do at the moment.

Probably true for a large number of ports... however it'll be harder for CPU or FPU dependant applications and anything that uses the DSP or OpenGL ES 2.0. The Wiz -> Pandora port should be easier.

Competition breeds excellence. Seriously the #1 problem facing devices like the gp2x, the wiz, and the pandora is the almost total lack of knowledge in the general population that such devices even exist. The more devices that are made the greater the public awareness and....
The more handhelds will come into being to satisfy the market.

As long as the devices in question focus on open source software in a large part then no matter what device you buy you win. Fans of each device will work to port anything cool on one device to "their" chosen device and everyone wins.

I personally chose not to chose

I pre ordered the pandora. If the wiz was out now I'd have it also.

Think about this. Many popular emulators on the gp2x came from the psp scene, from the desktop ports and so on. The fact that one of them was primarily developed first only made it easier to get it on all the other applicable platforms.

Belthos

You cannot have everything...
Where would you put it???

The Wiz would seem attractive to devs who want to reach a larger audience based on its lower cost and wider availability. Assuming the next Pandora shipment isnt 10000's units.

So long as there's a good selection of "improved" GP2X emu/homebrew ports and the odd original title, I'll have my expectations met with Wiz. Anything more will be icing.

I think a lot of people are expecting very big things from Pandora.

It'll be interesting to be see just how much software will take full advantage of the Pandora's more powerful hardware. Will there be piles of original homebrews that absolutely-cant-be-done on the less powerful machines?
It'd suck to have all that often quoted horsepower, and never see anything that really shows off the machine's capabilities beyond a 99.999% accurate PS1 emulator and yet another Quake3 port.

Well, I'm having fun porting my Reword game to the higher resolution and colours of the Pandora at the moment. And the fact that touch screen should just work! As it uses SDL it's fairly straight forward, but it's still giving me clues and ideas on how to write new games and keep them portable.

I intend to keep deving for GP2X and Pandora and maybe even Wiz if I get one. I like the idea of the games being available on many platforms (as do my workmates who run Reword on their PC's) and even if I don't have access to that platform (F200 for example, making touchscreen development difficult) I still expect most things to get ported between machines by interested parties or the authors themselves. I just love the diversity, and not just the emulators (great as they are).

I don't see many devs just abandoning a platform. It's more of a challenge that way.

Our developers don't get paid, they do it for fun! And as such I think they will mainly develop for the system they think is more fun. This can be a personal thing as I reckon we will all have our personal favourites. I bet in 2 years time the GP2X will still be seeing new games written for it, which I think is rather neat!

The fun aspect is why we're all here in the first place, as we enjoy these little devices! I don't think it's going to be a war between them and I hope we will have a broad spectrum of developers still producing excellent software across the board for a long time yet.

Cheers GP, GPH, OpenPandora and all the devs. You guys have given us all a lot of fun

The whole idea of a scene split is silly.

Some people get all worked up over nothing. I recall people hating the Zodiac because they feared it would take devs away from the GP32 scene. That didn't really happen, and neither will it here.

There will be some devs who choose one device over the other, maybe just because they have limited money or prefer something smaller (Wiz) or something with more features (Pandora). But inevitably popular apps will get cross ported (when possible) and each device will have its unique qualities.

But I think both will have healthy dev scenes here. They're really very different devices, enough to consider buying both (I may get a Wiz too).

As Craig said earlier - let's not have any drama over these two devices co-existing. Surely the majority of people in this scene have matured beyond such nonsense by now.