Chip8 Emulator, written in Rust

A set of ROMs run on this emulator (The maze, "IBM", and "Chip8" are pictures, while "Space Invaders" and "Tetris" are playable).

What is it?

• CHIP-8, is an interpreted programming language, that was designed for the COSMAC VIP and Telmac computers.
• The programs are run on a CHIP-8 virtual machine, which each of the respective computers implemented.
• This project then, is really an emulator for the virtual machine.

Why I'd build this? (spoiler: to learn)

• There's nothing new here, not much value other than it being a learning experience for myself both in exploring the architecture of older computers, and Rust as a programming language.
• The CHIP-8 VM is arguably the best entry point for building an emulator, as it consists of a minimal instruction set, and an extensive set of resources to learn from.

Features

• This emulator is capable of running a handful of the most popular ROMs. I've personally tested Pong, Tetris, Space Invaders and a few others, all of which can be found here.

Installation

  $ git clone https://github.com/paarthmadan/chip8.git && cd chip8
  $ cargo install --path .

Usage

  chip8 0.1.0
  A CHIP-8 VM emulator.

  USAGE:
      chip8 [OPTIONS] <PATH_TO_ROM>

  FLAGS:
      -h, --help       Prints help information
      -V, --version    Prints version information

  OPTIONS:
      -c, --clock-rate <clock-rate>     [default: 250]
      -s, --symbol <symbol>             [default: █]

  ARGS:
      <PATH_TO_ROM>    

What's Left?

• Custom colours and output symbol
• Scale "hardware" display (apply a linear scale on the display matrix)
• Refactor to opt for idiomatic Rust
• Custom clock rate
• Add terminate path
• Handle finished execution

Resources

To build this project I relied heavily on this Cowgod's CHIP-8 spec. I later learned that there are some minor inconsistencies and errors, so in the latter half of the project I relied on mattmik's resource.