Pico-8 Virtual Fantasy Console is an idealized constrained modern day game maker

This is one of my most favorite inventions within the past 5 years that still sticks out. I think it's ingenious and a great gateway to game development for anyone, be it a hobbyist or professional.

I've spent a ton of time trying to get into game development only to get stuck in researching the many frameworks, programs, and even the idea of making my own engine. Pico-8 just packs everything you need in it including code editor, mapper, pixel editor, sound editor, etc. so you can focus on making the game instead of figuring out your tech stack. Highly recommend it and well worth the money ($15)

I love the idea of using Pico-8 as a platform for prototyping simple games. It forces you to simplify your code and focus on perfecting the limited functionality you can support.

Celeste is a great game. If I remember correctly you can actually play the pico-8 version within the newer version.

I'd love a PICO-16: a fantasy console almost-but-not-quite like a GBA, extended in some ways (e.g. resolution, sound channels) and reduced in others (e.g. palette, maximum ROM size.)

There are tons of these little "retro console" devices lately—the Bittboy, LDK-game, etc.—that people just treat as emulation devices, when they actually have hidden potential for running native game software as well, with more power than you can get out of them through an emulator. (They're actually usually as powerful as the original PSP, but only have the GPU capabilities of the GBA, making these consoles into a sort of unique alternate-history blend of 2001-2004 era gaming.)

But no games are being written directly for these devices, because they're all slightly-differently specced: different screen-sizes; different amounts of RAM; etc.

A hypothetical PICO-16 "platform", in my mind, would basically be an abstraction over the cross-section of native capabilities of these devices (with maybe some additional tasteful constraints on top), while still allowing to take advantage of the full hardware in a way you can't by just e.g. writing SNES or GBA homebrew.

Maybe the "platform" could even come in a few separate "profiles", where games could be either targeted to a specific minimum profile, or could respec themselves to the highest profile supported (sort of like how Z-Machine games work in detecting the VM's multimedia capabilities.) Take it far enough and PICO-8 could just be the base PICO-16 profile!

You can use Pico 8 with Atom: https://www.lexaloffle.com/bbs/?tid=3440

this might be childish wishful thinking, but I'd love to make something like that but with a physical console also. Share the software created between the physical console and the fantasy console, maybe allow alternate software evolutions (imagine an internet that diverges with something other than html).

It's a fun little daydream at least