Skip to main content

YouTube engineer Ben Heck breaks down the fabled 'Nintendo PlayStation'

Ben Heck's Nintendo-Playstation Prototype Pt 1 Teardown
Hardware engineer and YouTube personality Ben Heck examines the inner workings of the Nintendo PlayStation in the latest episode of his web series The Ben Heck Show, which details the scrapped Super NES add-on’s specifications and capabilities as part of a comprehensive teardown.
Recommended Videos

Heck additionally announced plans to restore the hardware to working condition, potentially bringing the lost peripheral to life for the first time since it was initially announced more than 20 years ago.

Long thought lost to history and intercompany non-disclosure agreements, Sony’s original PlayStation was designed as a CD-ROM add-on for Nintendo’s 16-bit Super NES console. While plans for a public release were eventually canceled, a working prototype of the peripheral was recently discovered at a bankruptcy auction. Its new owners have since taken the unit on a worldwide tour in the hopes of finding out more about their discovery.

Heck’s examination reveals that the unearthed prototype was likely cobbled together using multiple shell casings, and video output was provided by a unique RF connection in addition to a standard A/V out port featured on retail Super NES, Nintendo 64, and GameCube units. Among other revelations, Heck found that CD-ROM data would have been loaded into RAM stored on an attached cartridge, which also handled regional lockout.

Specs-wise, Heck wasn’t impressed.

“Even if the system had come to fruition, it probably would have had [the same graphic capabilities] as the Super Nintendo,” Heck concludes. “Aside from corporate politics, it’s quite possible that one of the reasons this didn’t come to market is because it probably wouldn’t have been any better than the Sega CD, and possibly even a little worse.”

Heck notes that the discovered prototype is nonfunctional in its current state, and does not read or initialize inserted disc media. Heck will attempt to restore the console to working condition in a follow-up episode, in the hopes of eventually getting it to read an audio CD.

To date, no examples of disc-based Nintendo PlayStation games have surfaced in the collecting community, but a pair of enterprising programmers recently created Super Boss Gaiden, a SNES homebrew game that takes advantage of CD-ROM storage media. While the game functions in a Nintendo PlayStation-compatible emulator, it remains to be seen whether it is compatible with the actual Nintendo PlayStation hardware prototype.

Danny Cowan
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Danny’s passion for video games was ignited upon his first encounter with Nintendo’s Duck Hunt, and years later, he still…
Samsung’s new cloud service lets you play games without downloading them
A computer generated image of a Samsung phone with a gaming hub logo on it. It's surrounded by floating game iconography, like a controller, a die, and a car.

Samsung has a new way for Galaxy users to play games. The device manufacturer has been working on getting into the gaming space for a couple years, and its latest venture is a free mobile gaming platform that'll let you stream Android games through the cloud on a Galaxy device.

The program entered beta last year in the Gaming Hub, and is now available to the public. There will be 23 games available at launch, including Monopoly Go, Candy Crush Saga, and Honor of Kings. 

Read more
The best gacha games in 2024
Wuthering Waves character illustrations.

Whether you're familiar with or completely new to gacha games, there's a wide variety of options to choose from. From sci-fi to fantas, and even dress-up games, gacha appeals to a wide audience, and you're sure to find the right game for your taste.

But what does 2024 have to offer? While some of the best gacha titles have just been released this year, others are older and still widely popular. If you're looking for the best gacha game to get into, you should find what you're looking for in the list below.

Read more
How to stealth kill in Stalker 2
Key art for Stalker 2. A character in a lit-up gas mask and a gun on their back.

It won't take long before The Zone teaches you one very important tip for surviving in Stalker 2: Heart of Chornobyl, which is to avoid fighting whenever possible. You can only carry so many resources, and prolonged fights can leave you with almost nothing left. And that's if you even manage to survive. There are some fights you just can't get around, though, but going in guns blazing isn't the best strategy. There's a handy stealth kill mechanic in Stalker 2, but you won't find it in any of the tutorials.
How to stealth kill in Stalker 2

You have the ability to stealth kill right off the bat, though it is not something the game will ever explain or tell you. It works how you would think, but is tricky enough to pull off that you might not think it's possible even if you try the right thing.

Read more