Dear Lifehacker,
I want to build an emulation station for retro gaming, but there are so many options! Custom PC, Raspberry Pi, Android tablet… Which is better? What are the pros and cons of each?
Truly,
not
Death N,
There are a billion devices out there, and if there’s a screen on them, there’s probably a video game emulator for it. But a few choice options exist, each with their pros and cons, so let’s review some of the best ones. The “best” depends on your budget, what you want to play, and what hardware you already have. Here are three solutions that suit three different types of players.
The best low-cost, low-power solution for 80s gaming: Raspberry Pi
Until recently, I was doing my emulation on a Sega Dreamcast. Then the Raspberry Pi came out and today it’s my must-have retro gaming station who plays everything that matters to me.
What I like about the Raspberry Pi is its cost ($35), the fact that it requires a variety of inputs, and the fact that it connects to a TV without any special cables. It’s also tiny which means it doesn’t waste a lot of space around my TV and if I want I can pack it up and take it to a friend’s house. You can also pack this Raspberry Pi in all kinds of cool case adapt your needs.
That said, the Raspberry Pi is still a DIY option. So, you’ll probably have to put up with a few setup issues, as well as the basic time it takes to get everything up and running. You also get what you pay for. For $35, you’re limited to emulation of older systems, and you won’t be able to play anything newer than a Super Nintendo game. For me, that’s fine, but if you’re looking to emulate newer systems (even just a Nintendo 64), the Raspberry Pi won’t suffice.
If you’re looking for something like the Raspberry Pi without the DIY aspect, the $99 OUYA is a solid alternative. You will still need to do some basic setup, and controller support is a bit sporadic, but it is one of the cheapest plug and play solutions.
The mid-cost, mid-power solution for portable gaming: a tablet
If you want a little more power than a Raspberry Pi, but don’t want to buy a real computer, a tablet…either Android or iPad– is a fantastic way to play old games. A tablet can be a portable gaming system or be hooked up to a TV, and it can emulate a ton of systems.
For Android, we like RetroArch because it contains a bunch of emulators, from the Nintendo Entertainment System all the way to the Playstation 1. Once that’s set up, you can plug in a controller, connect it to your TV, and have a portable media center with you all the time. iPad users can also use RetroArch but you need to jailbreak to use it. With the iPad, you can use a controller with all your games, not just your emulators, so with a bit of hacking you can turn it into a pretty powerful gaming machine. It is possible to run emulators on non-jailbroken iPad, but if you’re using it primarily for emulation, you’ll want to jailbreak.
Of course, tablets aren’t exactly profitable, and if you don’t plan on using them for anything other than emulation, it’s probably not worth it. They’re also not that powerful and although they emulate more systems than a Raspberry Pi, they still stop at the first Playstation era. Although a tablet is completely portable, playing games using touchscreen buttons is never fun, so chances are you’ll still want to take a controller with you wherever you go. . If you want something really portable, a hacked PSP can emulate just about anything a tablet can do, and they are quite cheap on Ebay.
The powerful and scalable solution for almost any game: PC or Mac
The low cost choices are great and all, but if you want a full emulator station, a PC or Mac is your best choice. You can emulate many more systems and even add special mods to older games to make them play better.
Obviously you can use any computer you have around the house for emulation or create your own media center for emulation and a ton more. Once you’re set up, all you need to do is get the software. Mac users can download OpenEmu to get all classic emulators in your app. Windows users should download each individually. That said, emulators almost always launch on PC and Mac first, and other platforms later, so you’ll always be up to speed with a computer.
No matter how you cut it, building a PC just for emulation is more expensive than most other options. If you already have a computer you want to use, that keeps the cost down, but you probably don’t want to leave it hooked up to your TV all day as a dedicated system.
It boils down to this: usually the “best” platform for an emulation is the one you already own (as long as it reads the systems you want). If you have a computer made within the last five or six years, it will work fine with all emulators. If you have a tablet, you can emulate most classic systems. If you don’t have either, the Raspberry Pi is cheap and easy to get started. Either way, you can build a dedicated emulation machine on the cheap and you won’t have to worry about having 20 old-school consoles hooked up to the TV.
Good luck,
pirate of life
