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LGR Oddware - Creative 3DO Blaster (Patreon)

Published:
2020-05-18 14:42:10
Edited:
2020-05-19 18:34:43
Imported:
2021-03

Content

https://youtu.be/QWLVbiLf-SQ

Got quite the special item to share with you this time! One of my holy grail devices for the PC: the Creative Labs 3DO Blaster card from late 1994.

Yep, a proper 32-bit game console packed onto an ISA expansion card, which combined with a specific CD-ROM drive lets you play 3DO games within Windows 3.1! Absolutely bonkers to experience, just a rare treat in many respects. I've tried to buy one of these for a decade but always get outbid by a country mile. The last one I tried to purchase went for about $4,000 in the end, so uh, yeah. I still don't own one, but at least I can share the experience thanks to this unit generously on loan from LGR viewer Brandon!

Ended up being quite the lengthy episode too, I could've spent all day just screwing around playing games on this thing! And off-camera that's exactly what I did, heh. But yeah, got it down to half an hour of history, unboxing, setup, and demonstration.

I hope you enjoy, and have a good week!

Files

LGR Oddware - Creative 3DO Blaster

an LGR thing.

Comments

Anonymous

Brandon is such a nice guy. Never seen this before yet along in the box

Anonymous

That is awesome! I've never heard of that thing, and it was made by Creative too! I still own my Goldstar 3DO and I have very found memories of that console, even if I was the only one of my friends who owned one. It was way too ahead of its time, plus the price tag was just ridiculous...

moosemaimer

And I thought the Saturn card was weird... never even heard of this thing.

Anonymous

Holy cow. I've never seen one of these before. Didn't even knew this was a thing. A 3do inside a DOS PC? Ahh, dude. Those were the days. Weird days. Great video.

Anonymous

God this is exactly what I needed today Clint! I’ve been disassembling my T4900CT to remove the dreaded leaky battery of doom and have been watching LGR videos on the projector in the background.. might take a break and watch this. I love this sort of crazy early 90s thinking.. imagine getting a PS4 on a card today.. nope!

Anonymous

I second everyone else in that I had no idea this was a thing! Looking forward to watching this later!

Anonymous

I like how the overlay is the 3D0 output without any composite video artifacts. It's like having an RGB out on a 3D0 without modding. It has that proprietary CD-ROM interface that was common with sound cards before ATAPI IDE was a thing, too.

Anonymous

The overlay keying reminds me of the Creative DXR3 DVD decoder card I bought in the very early 2000s where the card used the same trick to overlay the DVD video you're playing on your VGA output.

Anonymous

I wonder if this card has some interface that allows the host to halt the 3D0, poke at it's state, change state, basically anything that homebrew developers could use to write their own games :)

Jason Wellband

"Surely this is some kinda 3d graphics card Creative put out.... Alrightey then...." :P It did make me giggle to see Solitaire on top of a game console though.

Anonymous

Plumbers don't wear ties, haha! Yes, I've tested that in Windows 3.1 and DOSBox-X :) It's surprising how much the PC version of the game is just a bunch of BMP and WAV files combined together as a game, though it's missing the video.

Mighty Jabba's Collection

When my Dad and I went to the Consumer Electronics Show in Chicago in the early 90s (he had wrangled us some press passes), the people at the 3DO booth were apparently very eager to recruit developers, since they tried to sell my Dad on the idea of developing for the 3DO. He was actually kind of interested until I explained what it would involve — he has no programming experience whatsoever. If you knew him, you would know how ludicrous the idea of him being a developer would be, but I think it explains the level of quality of some of the 3DO software. BTW there is a long black screen just before the 10 minute mark that may not be intentional

Anonymous

Between 9:38 and 9:48 in the video, there's just pitch blackness, nothing on screen. Not sure if it's intentional or some other visuals were meant to be there, but thought I'd let you know.

Headset Guy

I first heard of this when you mentioned it in your original 3DO review. I'm so happy that you were able to find one (even if just on loan) and make a video about it!

Anonymous

Maybe if people knew that they could steal the games by just copying discs this wouldve sold better!

Headset Guy

Say, does this work with the regular 3DO controllers? Did you test it?

Anonymous
>>37115139

The video comes out of the 3DO part of the board as composite, so you do get everything composite has to offer, including an interlaced signal.

Joon Choi

Happy Monday!

Anonymous
>>37115328

I wish. I own two of this card (one Japanese and not working), and spent significant time figuring out how they work. There's no way to do that but maybe something could have been built off of the video decoder interface.

Anonymous

A piece of urban legend that floats around with this board is that it requires the CR-563 specifically. It doesn't help that it says so on the box. I tested it with the CR-563, the CR-563B, and a 4X Reveal drive. It seems like it will work with any drive you throw at it, as long as it uses the Panasonic/Matsushita interface. Great video!

Steve Martin

Woof! I can't believe I took my minimum wage high school money combined with birthday money to blow $500 on a real 3DO system back in 1994!

Anonymous

Man it's so crazy how all the games look pretty fantastic, but that Doom version was given no love...great video Clint, thank you!

Anonymous

Did anyone else pause the video at the end to see if you could find Clint's long box version of Need for Speed? :)

Uncleawesome

Road Rash behind solitare was awesome!

Anonymous

Honestly, you could photoshop ANYTHING into some of the scenes for Plumbers don't wear ties, and it would not seem out of place.

Anonymous

Very neat. I had no idea this existed. As far as the VGA feature connector, I suspect you can use that instead of the external loopback connector. I don't think you need both.

Anonymous

Talk about an obscure piece of tech. I never would have thought the 3DO was popular enough to warrant having a dedicated PC card. Just the thought of playing 3DO Doom on a PC where you can get a superior version of Doom. The mind reels. Also, Lucienne's Quest is one of the more expensive 3DO games, so it's pretty cool you got to experience it.

Anonymous

Is one of your folders named Dickfart?? Respect.

LazyGameReviews
>>37121529

Both are indeed required, as indicated in the documentation! Without the loopback cable, if you plug a monitor into the VGA card all you see in the app is a blank screen. And if you plug the monitor directly into the 3DO Blaster itself, you only get footage from the card and nothing from the PC. According to the manual, the loopback is used for passing through video and the feature connector is used "for digital signals required to make the 3DO Blaster work." Not sure what exact digital signals but yeah :)

Anonymous

oh god, hearing that guy call every gaming device a Nintendo made me cringe

_Maki

I noticed the music of Doom was playing slower than usual. You also said that the cars drive slower in Need for Speed. Could it it have something to do with difference between PAL and NTSC? Since this card is from Germany, the "console" should run at 50 fps instead of 60, right?

LazyGameReviews
>>37122469

Nah, they're running at the same speed I get on my NTSC 3DO! Check out the race timer in the bottom left on Need For Speed, it's running at the correct pace. EA sped up the gameplay a bit in later ports. As for the music, it's Redbook CD audio, which doesn't slow down or speed up in different territories. It's just a totally different composition than the original Doom.

LazyGameReviews
>>37113538

That he is! Wait'll you see what else he sent along with this, there are some neat things to come.

LazyGameReviews
>>37116651

Yeah this has been a long time coming! Feels nice to finally check something like this off the to-do list :)

LazyGameReviews
>>37117157

This was a known fact back in the 90s too, from what I've read! But CD burners and blank media were absurdly expensive, making the whole prospect wildly cost prohibitive.

LazyGameReviews
>>37118770

Its programmer, Rebecca Heineman, has a fascinating video about it! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBbIil2HPSU

LazyGameReviews
>>37121781

I'm honestly not sure if it *was* popular enough, considering the tiny sales numbers! But those lucrative 3DO licensing deals, seems like everyone wanted a piece of that pie for a moment in time.

Anonymous

Nice! I was really hoping you'd do this someday. I remember reading about it in a old PC magazine back in the day and wondered if it ever worked as well they said it would. Guess it's time to find out!

Anonymous

Great timing! I was just reading about this card in one of my old computer magazines just a couple of weeks ago. Interesting to see it demonstrated.

Carey Brown

Whoof, this is another one of those obscure "Console on a card" things you've covered that I want now sooooo much, just like the Sega PC card you covered previously.

Anonymous

Excellent video. I never new this existed.

Anonymous

Man, I'd love to know what is in the dickfart folder on your computer :D

Kris Asick

That was very interesting with the Doom soundtrack being remastered for CD Audio there... Kinda reminds me of what they did for the original Descent when they brought it to the Mac. Know if there's any other versions of Doom out there that feature that remixed soundtrack? :o

LazyGameReviews
>>37127173

Wait'll you see the others I have to cover, haha. The early 90s were a weird and wild time for consoles on a card.

Honorary Octopus

How many of these console-on-a-cards were made for PCs back in the day? Between this and the Sega Saturn-on-a-card by Diamond, I'm curious if there was a market for that kind of stuff. Thank you for exposing me to yet another never imagined piece of hardware, Sir.

Exos
>>37129287

Now I want to see if those two cards can coexist in the same box and still work properly... IIRC wasn't there a few hybrid x86/ Genesis PCs that Sega made for a while? Though I don't think they were new enough to have the horsepower to run these cards support software properly.

Anonymous

Another wonderful video! I love it! I feel like this one will get lots of views. Such a rare piece of hardware.

Anonymous

Yesss!! So glad to see you made a video about this!! I dunno if you remember, but I was going to send you one a while back, but I’ve been having trouble locating where I put the CD-ROM drive that it requires. As you probably know (I haven’t watched the video yet), this requires an extremely specific CD-ROM drive to work. Anyhow, sorry I never got around to finding all the pieces to send this to you, but I’m glad to see that someone else beat me to it 😊

Alyxx the Rat

Man the 3DO was an amazingly weird system. Sad you didn't play Wolfenstein 3D as the 3DO version is actually one of my favourite ports of the game.

LazyGameReviews
>>37131371

Amusingly enough, I now have two CD-ROMs that work but no card to use them with. Would love to own the card itself still :)

Anonymous

So now we're getting the usual LGR Goodness in 4k resolution? We are not worthy, good sir

Anonymous

In the 90s you knew you were doing great if your PC was an endless expanse of ribbon cables.

Anonymous

How cow this is a rare gem! I'm so glad it's getting the LGR treatment!

Anonymous

He does.

Robert Butler

Ah, the Sentinel. As useless as ever. lmao.

Anonymous

I own the PC-FX/GA, and the 2 3DO Blasters. One I got from Taiwan and it needs to be recapped. It has the Japanese font IC. The other I paid too much for (but still under 1k), but is complete in box. I also have the Sega Teradrive and aside from outputting 15khz, boy is it sweet. Would like to find these development cards which are consoles on cards: Sony PSX DTL-H2000 (ISA) or DTL-H2500 (PCI) Sega Dreamcast NEC PowerVR ARC1/Sega Katana Set2 (same card, PCI) Nintendo SNES FX-2+ Development System (ISA) Philips CD-I i2m CD-I/PC 2.0 ISA or PCI card Here is a picture of my 486, with both the PC-FX/GA and the 3DO Blaster in use at the same time: https://i.imgur.com/yFNEILp.png

Anonymous

I love finding out about cool things I never knew existed.

Anonymous

Of all the boondoggles that came out of that weird "OMG MuLtImEdIa!!!" era, the 3DO Blaster probably takes the cake for being the silliest. I mean yeah, Diamond Edge 3D let you play a subset of Saturn games, but at least it's ALSO a graphics and sound card for PC games!

Jeremy Abel
>>37139313

wow, if you ever find those, I'm super interested in hearing more about them! You should def do a writeup or a video. I have some official SNES development software I can dig up, but it was def before the FX-2 was a thing.

Joon Choi

Finally got a chance to watch and loved the video. Absolutely had no idea the 3DO Blaster was a thing. I have to say that the 3DO version of Doom looks like an absolute dumpster fire with that tiny window box. Music sounds good though. :)

Anonymous

My cup of retro tea. I wish there was something like this for DOS that would run on a 286.

Anonymous

i wish we had these type of pci cards nowadays

Robert Butler

Honestly wish they had done more things like that with the PC, it could'a been so fun

avfusion

I had just read about this card in Fabien Sanglard's DOOM Black Book last night and thought how cool it'd be if you made an oddware on it. What a trip!

Anonymous

I remember seeing talk of them BITD (which was right before I joined the PC world), but gosh… …it's so 90's odd it's glorious. Such a strange bit of history - and of all folks, coming from Creative is quite a thing.

Anonymous

I never knew how much I wanted a transparent Solitaire until now. Seriously, how cool would it be to veg out with translucent cards over a YouTube or Netflix video?

Anonymous

Does the software work in Win 95? I wonder what would happen if you used an .iso file with CD virtualization software instead of a CD.

Anonymous

Can't wait to see this one! Coincidentally I fired up my 3DO this week on a whim. It was ahead of its time.

Anonymous

When I first stumbled on your channel many moons ago my personal wish list was you covering this and Microsoft Bob! Thanks for making this happen!

Anonymous

Is there any chance the "Freeze" feature actually does a one-shot image capture and skips the overlay, so you can take a Windows screenshot? That would have actually be the one useful thing this card could do - high-quality screenshots of 3DO games. Otherwise I love the addition of the 100% unrelated Aldus software that makes no use of the hardware at all. Shovelware at it's finest!