Retron 5 Review

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Noah981
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Joined: December 31st, 1969, 7:00 pm

Retron 5 Review

Postby Noah981 » June 9th, 2014, 8:52 pm

Sorry Vegas833, I didn't see your post and already sent it back to Amazon. I'm not sure why it was freezing up so much, so I wouldn't want to stick you with a lemon.

Overall, I realized that I play my classic systems more than my modern ones lately because I'm tired of things like load times, DLC, and especially firmware updates. I just want to put a game in and play. I have limited time to game with a busy work schedule and family.

Honestly, I think the industry is regressing. We are getting nickel and dimed left and right and having to beta test products that are sold as finished. The Retron 5 promised nearly 100% compatability and even was delayed, and still there are significant problems.

If you can secure the right classic controller adapters, you might be better off with an Ouya running emulators.

Tron1
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Joined: December 31st, 1969, 7:00 pm

Retron 5 Review

Postby Tron1 » June 13th, 2014, 9:45 pm

I asked one of my local video game stores if they were going to carry the Retron 5. The dude said that he's going to wait on the reviews since his customers weren't happy with the other Retrons he had sold in the past.  

HawgWyld1
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Retron 5 Review

Postby HawgWyld1 » June 16th, 2014, 7:14 pm

Got my Retron 5 in today. So far, so good. It's not perfect, but a lot of the issues people have mentioned (loading saves and such) seem to have been addressed with the latest firmware update and system software.

The main gripe I have about this system is that the controllers absolutely suck. I'm using my original dogbone NES, SNES and Genesis controllers with the system and they work fine. However, it seems you've got to use the wireless one to access system menus during gameplay and that is annoying. There may be a way to go about accessing those menus with regular controllers and I'll figure that out when I quit playing games long enough to read the manual.

Meanwhile, those old games look awesome upscaled to 720p. I may be looking at this thing through rose colored glasses because I don't have a CRT set anymore and the systems the Retron 5 emulate look awful on an HD set.

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scotland
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Re: Retron 5 Review

Postby scotland » May 21st, 2017, 10:57 am

I noticed Hyperkin has a $60 adapter for a Retron 5 to play Master System (and Master System cards if you care) and Game Gear games.

https://www.hyperkin.com/retron-5-3-in-1-adapter-for-game-gear-master-system-and-master-system-card-hyperkin.html

In other hyperkin news, the "Smartboy" which allows you to slip on a set of buttons on your mobile phone to play games may be coming soon.
http://www.8-bitcentral.com/blog/2017/smartBoyUSBc.html

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VideoGameCritic
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Re: Retron 5 Review

Postby VideoGameCritic » May 22nd, 2017, 9:11 pm

Love the idea of playing Game Gear on a TV, but I'm stilling hold out for this (which has been out of stock forever it seems):

http://www.play-asia.com/retro-freak-co ... /13/70ahih

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Rookie1
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Re: Retron 5 Review

Postby Rookie1 » May 23rd, 2017, 7:53 am

I just pre-ordered the Retron 1 HD. The R5 was a pile, but this has promise. Its 100% hardware based, so no emulation. And for the price, its a steal considering comparable consoles are super expensive.

https://www.amazon.com/Hyperkin-RetroN- ... s=retro+HD

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Atariboy
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Re: Retron 5 Review

Postby Atariboy » May 23rd, 2017, 2:57 pm

Haven't seen a NES-on-a-chip yet that could even output correctly over S-Video.,,

So if that new NES Retron is hardware based, it likely not only means that it's using an off the shelf NOAC chip with all the flaws that classic gamers have come to expect, but it also will have a poor quality video output if it's pulling a composite signal out of the NOAC chip to upscale through the Retron 1's internal scaling chip into "HD".

If that ends up correct, you'd be better off just plugging your original NES into your HDTV with composite cables. Same video output signal, higher build quality, fully accurate playback, and your HDTV's scaler is likely better than what the Retron 1 will get.

I'm afraid that the Retron 5 has left most pretty pessimistic with this one...

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Rookie1
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Re: Retron 5 Review

Postby Rookie1 » May 24th, 2017, 7:42 am

Atariboy wrote:Haven't seen a NES-on-a-chip yet that could even output correctly over S-Video.,,

So if that new NES Retron is hardware based, it likely not only means that it's using an off the shelf NOAC chip with all the flaws that classic gamers have come to expect, but it also will have a poor quality video output if it's pulling a composite signal out of the NOAC chip to upscale through the Retron 1's internal scaling chip into "HD".

If that ends up correct, you'd be better off just plugging your original NES into your HDTV with composite cables. Same video output signal, higher build quality, fully accurate playback, and your HDTV's scaler is likely better than what the Retron 1 will get.

I'm afraid that the Retron 5 has left most pretty pessimistic with this one...


Yeah, I have heard that critisism. For $40, ill take the risk and see what happens. Reading through the Q&A, Retron answers a lot of questions making the claim that it is lag free and will play everything without issue. Guess we will see.

When/if it ever comes back in stock, I will probably just get one of those AVS consoles.

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scotland
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Re: Retron 5 Review

Postby scotland » May 24th, 2017, 9:51 am

I was really considering dropping the $40 as well.

I am curious on the Retron 5 criticism that 'the R5 was a pile'. Is that the consensus opinion? Are other software emulators, like the Raspberry Pi held in the same contempt?

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Rookie1
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Re: Retron 5 Review

Postby Rookie1 » May 24th, 2017, 10:54 am

scotland wrote:I was really considering dropping the $40 as well.

I am curious on the Retron 5 criticism that 'the R5 was a pile'. Is that the consensus opinion? Are other software emulators, like the Raspberry Pi held in the same contempt?


The problems I had with it were the same as many, but the consensus would depend on where you go for it.

Mine self destructed. The sega slot stopped working, the pins ripped out of the NES slot. The controller died, then the majority of games just stopped working for it once I upgraded the OS, and when I tried to downgrade it bricked.

It was a good idea, and it looked beautiful on my flat screen. It was just a hunk of junk in terms of quality.


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