This project is a Chip 8 emulator written in Python 2.7. The original purpose of the project was to create a simple learning emulator that was well documented and coded in terms that were easy to understand. It was also an exercise to learn more about Python. The result is a simple command-line based Chip 8 emulator.
Please see the file called LICENSE.
Simply copy the source files to a directory of your choice. In addition to the source, you will need the following required software packages:
I strongly recommend creating a virtual environment using the virtualenv builder as well as the virtualenvwrapper tools. With these tools, you can easily create a virtual sandbox to install pygame and run the emulator in, without touching your master Python enviornment.
The command-line interface requires a single argument, which is the full path to a Chip 8 ROM:
python chip8/yac8e.py /path/to/rom/filename
This will start the emulator with the specified ROM. The emulator also
takes optional parameters. The -s switch will scale the size of the
window (the original size at 1x scale is 64 x 32):
python chip8/yac8e.py /path/to/rom/filename -s 10
The command above will scale the window so that it is 10 times the normal
size. You may also wish to experiment with the -d switch, which instructs
the emulator to add a delay to every operation that is executed. For example,
python chip8/yac8e.py /path/to/rom/filename -d 10
The command above will add a 10 ms delay to every opcode that is executed. This is useful for very fast computers (note that it is difficult to find information regarding opcode execution times, as such, I have not attempted any fancy timing mechanisms to ensure that instructions are executed in a set amount of time).
The file chip8/config.py contains several variables that can be changed to
customize the operation of the emulator. The most important one is the
KEY_MAPPINGS variable. The Chip 8 has 16 keys:
- The keys 0-9
- The letters A-F
The default configuration of the emulator will map the keypad numeric keys 0-9 to the keys 0-9, and the keyboard keys a-f onto A-F. If you wish to configure a different key-mapping, simply change the variable to reflect the mapping that you want. The pygame.key documentation contains a list of all the valid constants for keyboard key values.
The best documentation is in the code itself. Please feel free to examine the code and experiment with it.