We are happy to announce that the latest release of AmigaVision/MegaAGS is available!

AmigaVision is the ultimate, open source Amiga setup for MiSTer and Analogue Pocket FPGAs, emulators, and real hardware.

This is a major update with a lot of new features, especially on the MiSTer side — as always, definitely make sure you do a full reinstall to make the most of the exciting new capabilities instead of just dropping in a new HDF file. Your customizations, save files and favorites will of course remain intact with your separate Saves: HDF file.

Full installation details are in the documentation section of the AmigaVision site, as well as the included ReadMe file.

On MiSTer, it is especially important to update the [Amiga] section in MiSTer.ini, as there are significant changes in this release.

📺 Dynamic Pixel Aspect Ratio

We care deeply about preserving the correct aspect ratio for all games. That means going beyond just NTSC and PAL, and ensuring that the Pixel Aspect Ratio (PAR) is also correct. Pixels on the Amiga were close to square (16:15) in PAL resolutions on a CRT, but quite tall on NTSC displays (5:6). Additionally, when we apply a 5×PAL or 6×PAL Dynamic Crop, 1:1 gives us great results that are near indistinguishable from the original PAR at those sizes, while modernizing the output to fit 16:9 displays.

This release completely reworks how this is handled, so you no longer have to interact with the MiSTer OSD menu to switch in certain cases like what we informally refer to as “Jim Sachs mode” — NTSC, tall pixels at 5:6 PAR, seen in e.g. Defender of the Crown. Most emulators and captures get this wrong and use 1:1 pixels instead, so we built an implementation that handles all the variants correctly on MiSTer:

  • PAL title, 50Hz: PAL, 16:15 PAR at 4×, 1:1 PAR at 5× and 6×
  • PAL title, 60Hz: PAL60, 1:1 PAR at 5×
  • NTSC title, 60Hz: NTSC, 1:1 PAR at 5×
  • “World” title, 60Hz: NTSC, 1:1 PAR at 5×
  • “Sachs NTSC” title, 60Hz: NTSC, 5:6 PAR at 5×

All these align to the 1080p/4K 16:9 pixel grid while having the correct Pixel Aspect Ratio, so you will not get any shimmering or non-integer pixels.

On the MiSTer side of things, always, always run the AmigaVision setup in the 40:27 aspect ratio that we supply to ensure that this is handled correctly. This is what AmigaVision sets as the default as long as you copy over the supplied config file and have the correct MiSTer.ini definition for the core.

The Original aspect ratio supplied by the core should not be used. The Full Screen aspect ratio is only used for 6×PAL on 16:9 widescreen displays.

Make absolutely sure that you update your MiSTer.ini settings for the core according to the documentation! It should look like this:

[Amiga
+Amiga500
+Amiga500HD
+Amiga600HD]
video_mode_ntsc=8 
video_mode_pal=9
vscale_mode=0
vsync_adjust=1 
custom_aspect_ratio_1=40:27
bootscreen=0

🎮 Analogue Pocket FPGA Support

Take AmigaVision on the go! We have worked with the developer that ported the Amiga core to the Analogue Pocket FPGA handheld to ensure that AmigaVision has the correct scaler settings, and overall delivers the AmigaVision experience you know and expect.

AmigaVision on the Analogue Pocket

The new Amiga core on the Analogue Pocket — released earlier today, so make sure you have the latest version — supports HDF disk images and has mouse emulation, an on-screen virtual keyboard, and support for analog joysticks for mouse input in docked mode.

⭐️ Favorites Support

It’s here! Probably our #1 requested feature for the launcher, you can now mark games and demos as favorites, and they will show up in a “Favorites” category at the top of the launcher.

These favorites are stored on the Saves: HDF, so they will persist across upgrades, just like your save files and other customizations.

You can add an entry to your favorites by pressing Tab on the keyboard, or by using the tertiary button on your gamepad/joystick, aka. the “Yellow” button in CD32 parlance. Doing the same inside the Favorites section will remove the entry from your favorites.

🇺🇳 Non-English Games Included & Categorized

For our fellow French baguettes, German schnitzels, Norwegian nordbaggar and the rest of our wonderful non-English speaking users, we have for the first time included localized configurations for games, as well as full metadata for multi-language games in their own dedicated category.

We currently have game configurations for:

  • 🇭🇷 Croatian
  • 🇨🇿 Czech
  • 🇩🇰 Danish
  • 🇳🇱 Dutch
  • 🇫🇮 Finnish
  • 🇺🇳 Fremen
  • 🇫🇷 French
  • 🇩🇪 German
  • 🇬🇷 Greek
  • 🇭🇺 Hungarian
  • 🇮🇹 Italian
  • 🇯🇵 Japanese
  • 🇳🇴 Norwegian
  • 🇵🇱 Polish
  • 🇪🇸 Spanish
  • 🇸🇪 Swedish

Play the original French language version of Cruise for a Corpse, aka. Croisière pour un Cadavre today! And wouldn’t you like to try the only game on the Amiga that was translated to Fremen, the language used in the Dune novels and movies? (No, it was not the game “Dune” nor “Dune 2”)

💾 Real Hardware Support

The previous release used an upstream tool that unfortunately had been updated with changes to disk geometry handling that broke compatibility with real hardware. We are happy to announce that we found the bug (and reported it), and a build of the latest AmigaVision image should again work on real hardware like the Amiga CD32, Amiga 1200 and Amiga 4000.

We have instructions for how to install AmigaVision on real hardware in our documentation.

👩‍💻 Official Emulator Support

It has always been possible to run AmigaVision on emulators, but we now include a setup for FS-UAE, a great Amiga emulator that runs on Windows, macOS and Linux. This is still a work in progress, suggestions, improvements and comments are welcome.

We have instructions for how to install AmigaVision on emulators in our documentation.

🖼️ Updates to the Demo Scene Section

  • More 5×PAL Dynamic Crop settings included.
  • Dedicated “Slide Show” category.

🍳 Miscellaneous Other Fixes

  • All game and demo titles are now capitalized according to AP Style rules.

🛠️ Help Us Improve AmigaVision

If you find any bugs or settings that need improvements, file a ticket on the AmigaVision web site.

AmigaVision is an open source project, and we welcome contributions from the community. GitHub Pull Requests are very welcome!

You can follow us on Mastodon, Twitter or via RSS, and updates will be posted when new releases happen.

Enjoy the best of what the Amiga platform has to offer!