Researchers at Kitten Labs have shown that it is entirely possible to turn a simple TP-Link WiFi router into a gaming PC. In fact, after a few days of tinkering and installing a Linux version, these experts managed to run the cult game GTA Vice City perfectly.
Photo credit: Kitten Labs
Taking old games and trying to make them run on anything and everything has become an essential practice in recent years. For example, we no longer count them unlikely havens of fatethe father of FPS, released in 1995.
In the past, we have mentioned on numerous occasions the exploits of several hackers to transfer the title of “Id Software” to inappropriate devices such as an exercise bike screen, a TI-83 calculator, Windows notepad, a keyboard key, etc. as of late a connected toothbrush!
But this time the focus is not on Doom, but on a certain GTA Vice City, a cult sequel to the Rockstar Games saga. In fact, researchers at Kitten Labs have shown that with a little skill and technology, this is entirely possible transform an old TP-Link WiFi router into a gaming PC able to rotate the title. Explanations.
GTA Vice City on a router, that's possible
These experts initially set their sights on it the TP-Link TL-WDR4900 WiFi router (published in 2013). Kitten Labs members appreciated it for its good performance and chose it primarily because of its NXP-Freescale QorlQ P1014 processor, which is actually a PowerPC e500v2 32-bit SoC.
Of course, the performance of the router is not everything. Since there was no slot compatible with GPUs for PC, it was necessary to use tricks Install an eGPU. After adding a miniPCIe connection, the teams started a version of Debian Linux with additional kernel modules enabled (required to support AMD graphics drivers).
After a first failed experience with a Radeon RX 570, Kitten Labs resorted to one old Radeon HD 7470 with a former pilot. First step validated, the system starts working. The only thing left was to get a version of GTA Vice City that runs on Linux/PowerPC. They then decided to do so a reverse-engineered version of the title called ReVC (whose files are publicly accessible).
After experiencing various issues when launching the game (graphics corruption, crashing when interacting with NPCs, etc.), after a few months they managed to get the title running perfectly. You can see the entire process in the video in the article.
Source: KittenLabs