In the 80's we made a 'nanocontroller' to take care of some stuff that days microcontrollers could not handle speedwise. It basically had 3 instructions 'jump if', 'set bit' and 'clear bit'. It did a lot of simplification of a state machine design previously done with 74 logic chips. It worked together with a 8086 and reduced the chip count dramatically. Today the choice is CPLD or uC, more fun if you are not intereted in nitty-gritty details, less if you are.

Have fun,

Erik

PS the 'why the interest' was to undrstand the question, not to reject it.