ArcadeRacingCENTRAL

"No, the Casino was an original idea from my imagination. Any similarity is a coincidence."

A pretty galling statement. I don't see any coincidence here. The monitor and lights are nigh-on carbon copies.

Cheers for the review! Just a bit of a nitpick, though...

"Now, it's fair to say that not all of the bundled games are worth your attention or time, but despite a few bum notes, the vast majority are decent."

It's a shame that there's no mention of all the actual games on the cart here, that way I could decide this for myself

For those interested:

• 8 Eyes
• Brave Battle Saga
• Canon: Legend of the New Gods
• Dorke and Ymp
• Drakkhen
• Dragon View
• Exploding Fist
• The Humans
• The Immortal
• Iron Commando
• Jim Power: The Lost Dimensions
• Magic Girl
• Nightshade
• Power Piggs of the Dark Age
• Power Punch II
• Radical Rex
• Switchblade
• Tinhead
• Top Racer
• Water Margin: A Tale of Clouds and Wind

I think time has proven that it was most definitely a Final Fantasy movie. It was its own thing, just like every subsequent game. This one was militaristic sci-fi, and all the games have had their own setting; steam punk, dark fantasy, high fantasy, time-travel.

I think the movie would have worked better with better characterisation, because the basic plot was fine.

I did love the movie though, and that Lara Fabian song was great!

Talk about a series that needs a comeback!!!

Lucky there are indie devs willing to keep this particular candle burning; hat TXR-inspired game Night Runners is shaping up super nicely

@RadioHedgeFund I used to be a d-pad die hard too until I discovered BallisticNG. Before it even hit Steam and was buried in the WipeoutZone forums, people had healthy debates on d-pad vs analog. It took me a while to learn, but yeah, analog is my preference now. I still love the d-pad controls though, they've always been super playable that way

Also, Wipeout 64 has very different controls to the main games. The physics are a bit different, maybe that's why you don't get along with it either? EDIT: Or you do... I should learn to read properly

@RadioHedgeFund Not quite - Saturn 2097 and Wip3out both have analog stick control. There's also NegCon support for the first two PSX titles, so really, there's been analog options since the beginning

@RadioHedgeFund

Yeah, pretty much! I played that game for years on end. When Pulse came out, I was kinda disappointed in it.

There are some amazing PSP iso hacks for both.

One for Pure that includes all the DLC content, and another for Pulse which includes ALL THE PURE CONTENT. Insane, and unarguably the best versions of both, since you can either play them on real hardware, or emulate

It warms my heart to see 2097 and Wip3out in the top two spots, but Wip3out SE is the version of the third game I'm seeing instead of the vanilla version.

I'd also put 64 waaaay up at third, just above WipEout in my fourth, Pure in my fifth spot and and the Omega collection in my sixth.

Everything else can go underneath

Wow, it looks pretty stunning! Loving the colour and design, and the boss sprites are pretty enormous too!

That music is pretty terrible though. It sounds like a really bad amiga game, which bizarre percussion panning. And every track has that grating pipe lead instrument.

One to play on mute, I think

AC IV Black Flag for SURE! I loved my Wii U, and it was one of the first games I got with it. Ended up grabbing it on PC, Xbox 360 and Xbox One too, eventually

@cyxceven Yep, I hope the whole entire original trilogy leaks

Looking forward to this! I ended up getting a Powkiddy RGB10Max3 Pro to compliment my RGB30 recently. It feels great, but sadly I got a dud screen out of the box, so I'm waiting on a replacement screen at the moment. I got it mostly for PSP and Dreamcast, and also for multiplayer.

The Retroid Pocket 4 Pro might be my first Android handheld console though... I've been waiting for something with the Retroid aesthetic that can handle PS2 and Gamecube well, so I might get this for myself as a birthday present next year.

Then I'm done with buying handhelds... everything I want to emulate will be fully covered

@-wc- I just don't think they had much identity initially. I didn't like the gameplay in the first game, and the second game didn't grab me either. I feel like Tekken 3 was when it found it's groove and became a series to be absolutely mentioned in the same breath as Virtua Fighter 2. I felt the same way about Soul Edge... Calibur changed that series forever.

I wish it was simple brand loyalty to SEGA, but I really dig the PSX at the time too, so I can't blame my teenage brain, haha.

Don't take me too seriously, I'm not very good at fighters, but I love them all the same, haha! Hell, I still love the first couple of Toshinden games to this day, although I think that's more because of the character designs and stellar music, if I'm being honest

@Ryu_Niiyama Yeah, it's a great game, and it is still gorgeous

What I love about the VF series is that you can go all the way back to the first game and still have an experience that is fantastic. They nailed it right from off, which was an astounding achievement, considering it was the first 3D fighter out there! VF1 is just pure arcade goodness, and VF2 is just as brilliant now as it was on release. The same goes for 3 and mostly 4. 5 is timeless also.

I didn't like Tekken until Tekken 3, and I stopped caring about the series after Dark Resurrection.

@-wc- I was a SEGA kid, and owned a Saturn, and therefore, lots of Saturn Magazines ( ) , so I knew the Dreamcast was coming well in advance. Man, the hype, haha! It was very, very real.

Amazing launch too, there were so many games at release, making choices was HARD.

@-wc- Agreed! The Dreamcast was the first console I purchased with my own hard earned money.

I remember back when just standing in Electronics Boutique, ogling the Sonic Adventure demo. And then SoulCalibur started to play and my jaw hit the floor. I'd never seen anything like it, and neither had anybody else. That's what made it so special. It made VF3 look a generation behind, and that's saying something, because VF3 was the gold standard!

@-wc- I have two games like that, haha; the Saturn port of SEGA Rally Championship and SoulCalibur on the Dreamcast.

I love Demons of Asteborg. It's a great game that plays really, really well. I do wish the audio (including the amazing SavagedRegime OST) were in this one too, as I really don't get along with roguelikes like Astebros, but what's there is great, just not as refined as Astebros, unfortunately.

RecalBox comes with the Astebros demo, and I really tried to give it a shot, but yeah, the roguelike nature of it is incredibly off putting to me.

@UK_Kev You can use analog controls with pretty much any emulator these days, so give it a try if you want!

It took me a while to come around to Wip3out, but when I did, it quickly became my favourite, just piping out 2097 to the post.

To be honest, I really loved Pure when I got it at the PSP launch, but I am not really a fan of the floaty controls these days. The controls are FANTASTIC, they're just not for me. The Pure vibe though, is brilliant. I love its' style, it's got it's own thing going on. Pulse, not so much... never got along with that one for some reason.

@UK_Kev The original games did have analog control. Neg-con support for the first two, but Wip3out had full dual-shock support.
The digital controls are great, but the analog control options for the original trilogy are superlative.

@UK_Kev Respectfully completely disagree. The control system of the earlier WipEout trilogy was and is still amazing. Pure is great, but I don't revisit it nearly as often as the older titles.

Although gameplay-wise, BallisticNG outdoes both kinds of WipEout, since it has refined and contains each style of gameplay.

I'll be getting the CD pack as a Christmas gift for myself... I've had this on my wishlist since he announced it.

I've got the the previous remastered releases too, but this one looks to sound even better.

I looooove WipEout and Tim Wright, a more perfect pairing there never was.

@BulkSlash I'm genuinely curious to as what the ROM size would be in that particular case, haha!

I mean the Road Rash games legit scaled its sprites, but in software, so it was super slow. But yeah, having lots of versions of the sprites to smooth out the steps in between appearances would be killer to see somebody tackle!

I'm equally excited, for sure. Finally - a homebrew racing game!!!

I would love to see more. Raster, Mode 7 style, all the styles

And in relation to the nonsense above, didn't somebody create a homebrew port of Sonic for the SNES to prove that it could be done for that system? Hmmmm. I thought that was a great technical achievement, personally.

What is with people in the comments sections here crapping on any homebrew effort that attempts to push the hardware? All of this stuff should be celebrated.

@-wc- Yeah, I think I'm gonna want one of those FunnyPlaying things too eventually. I actually like the kit form, and enjoy putting stuff together as long as it's not ridiculously difficult to do.

I will wait until the bugs are sorted and the firmware is better, and also when the other handhelds are playable on it

@bobathefett So you're discounting all the additional processors NES carts had which ran on the original hardware. SuperFX and SuperFX2, all which ran on and enhanced the original hardware. Right.

This will only require a flashcart because it's the easiest way to run rom files on legit hardware. Just because it's new technology doesn't discount it. This IS playing on original hardware. Using these carts to play roms on original hardware is legit - the hardware doesn't know any different.

Anyways, agree to disagree or whatever, I don't care.

I said hardware a lot.

@bobathefett Sigh.

@bobathefett My mistake on the video editing software thing.

I hope you'll also eat humble pie when you're proven wrong.

@bobathefett Gabriel Pyron is a scene legend, and you can go out and download his stuff and run them all on stock hardware. He's been doing these large sprite tests for a while now. Seriously, you should educate yourself and actually follow his work and the scene if you're interested. Blanket statements like 'it can't be done' will make you look a little silly when it comes out working on real hardware.

Also, it's not 'clearly running with emulation', because he's got video editing software in the background of that vid, likely capturing from his own hardware.

@BobaTheFett It says in the very first paragraph that it's running on stock hardware, not via emulation

Pyron is a wizard and totally legit. Can't wait to see where this goes, almost purely for the sheer spectacle of it.

One of my favourite Atari games... been putting some time into the 7800 version... it's great!

Daveis a great guy. Wish him the absolute best!!! Which reminds me, I gotta finish off my Dead of the Brain ReMix for submission!

Started making my way through it today. I'm not usually into visual novels games, but I like the heavy 90s favour and atmosphere of this one. Recommended!!!

Haha! Cosmic timing and al that; I am almost finished up an arrangement of one of the tracks from the FM Towns version! Saw it on a YouTube video and instantly became enamored with the art and the music.

I've been wanting to give the PC-98 version a spin, but I'm not having much luck with my emulator, so I might give this a go!

Dracula is my favourite book of all time (along with the novelization of the Buffy The Vampire Slayer movie ), and the 1992 film is tied with Blade Runner as my favourite film of all-time. So this is very, very cool for me. Awesome to see something legit tied to the legacy.

EDIT: Since the whole 'Stokerverse' is a thing, I assume it takes place in the exact universe as 'The Last Voyage of the Demeter'? This game is all about Harker's escape, and the movie is the Demeter's voyage to Whitby. That would be neat!

I've downloaded the demos for this, Dragonhym and Zephyr's Pass to give them all a go today.

Also, the GB/GBC scene is just exploding right now, and I'm totally here for it. In particular, it's great seeing what people can do with the colour palette for the system. I always felt most Japanese developers back in the day were, by and large, very conservative with their use of colour on the system. At least in comparison to companies like Way Forward and VD-dev.

EDIT: Yeah, this is totally legit. Loving the demo. It goes for about 5 minutes, but it's pretty spectacular. Great visuals, music and gameplay. Shot right to the top of my 'wants' list!

I would have jumped at this, but given the chip, it's under-powered for Saturn and Dreamcast. If it could play the entire SEGA home catalogue flawlessly, I'd be on it. Super happy the form factor exists though! Here's hoping for a revision down the line

I love the GBC. I didn't even mind some of Nintendo's own games on it - somewhat strangely, I don't buy Nintendo systems for Nintendo games.

I've been pumping it on my RGB30 since I got it. Lots of V-Rally, Wacky Races, Game And Watch Gallery 3, any and all Looney Tunes/Tiny Toons games and a lot of rom hacks, colour hacks and new indie games. Such a great system with loads of memories attached!

I think people get too stuck on semantics on the internet.

All I know is that I would have loved an Analog Pocket, and I would have loaded it full of ROMS and FPGA cores, since I sold off my cart collection years ago, but a combination of price and wait time led me to getting a handheld emulation machine. And the RGB30 fit the bill perfectly.

At the end of the day, no matter what you're playing on, all the options we have play these games really well, and that's what matters to me.

I got mine a couple of weeks back, and I'm absolutely enamored with it. It is indeed amazing for handheld emulation. SNES I bump up to 8:7 and it looks great without looking squished. All 4:3 content, I bump up to 5:7 to claim back some more screen real estate, and again, they look great without looking squashed.

I'm not sure what he meant in the review about PS1 not playing all that well, it really does. But only at native resolution. If you use the double-res setting in RetroArch on the default core, then it plays well, but the sound skips a bit. You'll get the flawless performance at native res from the default core though.

I also found the buttons really great, not at all cheap feeling. They look it, but they don't feel cheap in-game. I also found with some higher thumb grips, the analog sticks work super well, with a better range of motion than I expected from the 'Nintendo Switch-style' descriptor people tend to lump on them. Build quality is pretty fantastic on my black unit too. I thought the plastic would feel cheap, but it doesn't. It feels more solid than any of the GBA models ever felt to me, at any rate.

My only issue so far is battery life. Even the 6 hours quoted here seems generous in comparison to mine. It drains too fast for my liking. I usually turn Wi-Fi off and bring it down to 50% brightness, which still looks good, but I'm seriously considering just getting a mini power bank and taping it to the back of the unit to play for much longer sessions and to crank up the brightness just a tad.

The screen is a superstar though, and is absolutely perfect for all the LCD shaders I have applied to my handheld systems. If they release a model with the same resolution, but OLED, man, I'd get another in a heartbeat!

I absolutely love the RGB30, and I'd absolutely recommend it for anybody on a budget, and even then, it'll be worth picking up just for the screen, especially at this price. I'd only ever consider getting either an upgraded model, or an additional system with widescreen for those other systems. I think I'll wait for a linux machine that can play PS2 and Gamecube perfectly though, before I splurge on another.

It'll be fine, they won't get sued or anything that dramatic. Before all the official work, Kaiser was creating builds of games - like Doom 64 - that required you add your own rom/data files. So they could very well do the work to build the container to run the improved versions, but then require you to add your own game files from your own collection. I don't think there's anything illegal about that if they're not selling the actual game, which they won't be. They're paying people to create the builds, not charging for the finished product.

I say good on them. I'd definitely be interested in supporting them with this endeavor should it come to pass

I had no idea this existed on the PSX! Cheers for the head's up! Literally just got my PowKiddy RGB30 today, and I've been loading up my SD card with games, so it goes without saying that this is going on there too.

I wonder what the controls are like? This appeals to me more than jumping back into DOSBOX and wrestling the controls of the game that way

@RupeeClock I just purchased the Powkiddy RGB30! This will be my first emulation handheld that isn't Raspberry Pi based! I have a RetroFlag GPI unit with a Pi Zero 2 W in it. I love the actual unit, but the screen is pretty horrid. So I'm eagerly awaiting this unit and the fantastic screen it seems to have. That aspect ratio is perfect for what I want it for, and I can deal with the bezels for other systems. The price was excellent too... with some discounts, it was around $140 AU with a 32gb card included.

Super pumped!!!

I'd buy it. I saw a hands-on with the hardware on YouTube just today, and it looks fantastic. Over 200 games on the thing, and you can add more via SD card.

The Atari 50 has whet my appetite for more, and the front end on this looks just as slick.

Good price too!

Great news! Although, I do hope the controls are fixed in these ports. The auto-centering of the character and reticle in original was a definite pain in the A.

@RupeeClock I saw the Retro Game Corps video on this yesterday, and I've gotta say, I am SUPER tempted! That screen looks amazing, and the price is right in the sweet spot.

@Damo I can't say I've heard anything negative about them myself. I got the three volumes for next to nothing years ago and gave them a crack - they're right up there with my faves on the Saturn. I've actually wondered why nobody ever mentions them these days. Give them a go, they emulate well!

This list is SERIOUSLY lacking Mobile Suit Gundam Side Story: Blue Destiny on the SEGA Saturn.

The three episodic volumes played together make for a fantastic game. Awesome graphics, sound and brilliant controls.

I really, really love the form factors of the SN30 Pro and the Pro 2, but I find the input lag to be a hindrance; if it's all you play with then you won't notice, but if you switch controllers regularly, then the input lag tends to stick out, at least to me.

I got the Bluetooth Ultimate controller on release, and it is a darn sight better on the lag front. Bluetooth Mode is great, the hall sensor sticks are sublime and the 2.4ghz mode on Switch and PC is flawless. I wish it was made out of the same materials as the Pro 2, but it still feels great in the hand.

That being said, I wish that 8bitDo would just bite the bullet and release a 2.4ghz variant of the Pro 2; now THAT would be my Ultimate controller!

Fantastic news! I remember reading about Rocket Jockey in Next Generation magazine and roughly remember liking a demo of the game.

Obsidian, I have never heard of. But the Thomas Dolby soundtrack has my interest levels rising

This has been on my Steam wishlist for aaaaaaaages. Really hanging to give it a go!

Funny, I literally just booted this up on the Xbox 360 for another playthrough yesterday!

Great news, can't wait to give it a whirl