- Emulate each instruction in software, as CopyNES's debugger does.
- Execute the instruction, but use Game Genie-like circuitry to hijack the next instruction's opcode to 0 and the IRQ vector to the debugger's reentry point.
various questions about flash carts
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- For making cartridges of your Super NES games, see Reproduction.
Stepping is possible on the NES, but raster effects wouldn't be possible while stepping. There are two ways to go about it:
Really it comes down to having more power in an emulator. Even the XBox 360 development kit does not come close to exposing the type of information we get out of emulators. We are able to see all of the contents of VRAM in a nice visual representation, and we get to single-step the GPU (or PPU in our case). That's something that no modern console is capable of.
Developing in an emulator is always going to give you more control and more insight while at the same time having inaccuracies. This trade-off is common to all platforms.
The debate between emulator versus hardware is senseless. You need both for your development cycle and we should be looking for the best ways to do both. If you ignore emulators you loose the benefits they bring at debugging time. If you never test on hardware you are most likely going to rob yourself of the opportunity to release on a cartridge.
Developing in an emulator is always going to give you more control and more insight while at the same time having inaccuracies. This trade-off is common to all platforms.
The debate between emulator versus hardware is senseless. You need both for your development cycle and we should be looking for the best ways to do both. If you ignore emulators you loose the benefits they bring at debugging time. If you never test on hardware you are most likely going to rob yourself of the opportunity to release on a cartridge.
Tepples ninja'ed me 
And some developers *cough cough* only have NoAC FamiClones to develop on and hate toasters.tepples wrote:Another problem with doing a bunch of debugging directly on the NES is the fact that a lot of people here appear to have their NES and PC in separate rooms. Most desktop PC monitors aren't TVs and thus don't have composite video input.
Still, if you are serious about NES development you should have an original system to test your software on, even if you don't use that system for playing. Buying a NES is neither hard nor expensive, especially if you live in the US. If you want to support clone systems as well, that's fine, but you can't forget that what you're doing is primarily NES development.qbradq wrote:And some developers *cough cough* only have NoAC FamiClones to develop on and hate toasters.