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Retron 77 by Hyperkin

Posted: June 13th, 2017, 7:11 am
by scotland
Hyperkin announced an Atari 2600 cartridge playing 1080p HDMI out retro device called the Retron 77

Re: Retron 77 by Hyperkin

Posted: June 13th, 2017, 8:53 am
by pacman000
Heard about that. I'd be more interested if it played other late 70's/early 80's systems.

Re: Retron 77 by Hyperkin

Posted: June 14th, 2017, 1:35 am
by Breaker
I'm with you, pac. If this thing played Intellivision, Colecovision, & Odyssey 2 or something as well, I'd be all over it. The upgraded video alone isn't worth it for me.

Re: Retron 77 by Hyperkin

Posted: June 14th, 2017, 5:31 pm
by VideoGameCritic

Re: Retron 77 by Hyperkin

Posted: June 14th, 2017, 9:21 pm
by Rookie1
I dont get the fascination with playing atari games at 1080p. Will it really make that single pixel square or that purple blobby thing much better?

I am more interested in this Atari Box thing. I am actually pretty excited to see what that is.

Re: Retron 77 by Hyperkin

Posted: June 14th, 2017, 10:35 pm
by eneuman96
Rookie1 wrote:I dont get the fascination with playing atari games at 1080p. Will it really make that single pixel square or that purple blobby thing much better?


I don't think it's so much about the resolution as it's about being able to easily play Atari 2600 games on a modern TV, since doing so otherwise is kind of a pain in the ass. Even so, 1080p would still be a step up from the fairly blurry CRT display most people remember playing those games on.

Re: Retron 77 by Hyperkin

Posted: June 14th, 2017, 11:11 pm
by Atariboy
Yes, it will make the graphics look much better.

Even putting aside things like the appearance of HDMI only televisions and that many people just aren't able to get a 2600 working on their HDTV for one reason or another (Or discover that the set's internal scaler doesn't much like the 2600 or introduces significant lag), the sharpness and clarity of emulated 2600 games is a huge leap over everything except a RGB modded 2600.

1080p and higher are the television sets in our homes today. One way or another if you want to play 2600 games on such a display, the image has to be upscaled to match. Why should we not want a system that's able to supply a modern signal to it for hopefully the optimum experience on today's displays?

And then there are other neat things present here like USB controller support (And potentially, wireless controllers as a byproduct of that), save states, rewind functionality, etc. Looks like an interesting clone so far for the 2600 fan.

Re: Retron 77 by Hyperkin

Posted: June 15th, 2017, 1:13 pm
by Voor
Do we have a price yet?

Re: Retron 77 by Hyperkin

Posted: June 15th, 2017, 5:29 pm
by pacman000
Going through the thread at AtariAge, it looks like this will be $40 and will be based on the Stella emulator. Should play homebrew/harmony carts if it doesn't upset the Hyperkin's lawyers. Difficulty switches are part of the software, not hardware. (Wonder how that'll work.)

Not bad sounding, but I still want a Colecovision clone. :)

Re: Retron 77 by Hyperkin

Posted: June 15th, 2017, 5:38 pm
by pacman000
Some people are saying $80, also from AtariAge. Haven't got to the end of the thread yet. AtariAge can have long threads. :) At least this one's mostly civil. ;)