I get that. Boy, do I get that.

Setting up the Retropie thing is like, a half hour, tops, not including time spent downloading roms/etc.

Download image. Flash image to SD card and insert into Pi. Hook up to TV and gamepad/keyboard. Go through the like, 3 step installer that just configures a few things. Follow the screenshot-provided guide on sending roms over the network, or even just use a USB stick which it'll happily prep for you. Configure buttons and themes to taste (or not at all). Done.

BTW, haven't followed the scene lately, but have things got better with N64 emu? I know its a funky machine, but I remember emulation being plug-in hell.

I have tried Project 64 on 10 and didn't notice any problems other than Resident Evil 2 but it ran better than it did previously. My son had a smile from ear to ear playing Pokemon Snap. Also, I found a USB N64 controller at a ultra-discount store that helps tie it all in together. I vaguely remember the plug-in thing. I certainly didn't have to mess with that last time around but I can't say I tried out a lot of games either.

Am I doing this right?

Dang, that was fast.

It's a question. Is that all I need?

Last time I tried it on my phone it was really just plug-and-play. The hardest thing was rearranging the controlls to something I like. But all in all playing those games on a touchscreen is just a pain in the ass so I don't bother anymore.
Pokemon on a GameBoy emulator was nice, though.

More or less. Obviously you need a screen and appropriate cable (you can still get composite video through the 3.5mm audio jack) and input devices but I think it's safe to assume you have all of those things. I second Matty's suggestion of using RetroPie, but there are alternatives (like recalbox or running the Raspbian OS and just installing any emulators you want).

Awesome, thanks. Yeah I have HDMI cables, monitor/TV, keyboards/mice/etc. I did add some USB controller. I know it works with XBOX/PS controllers but I don't like their d-pads. (the non-analog ones)

And for what it's worth, here is a complete walkthrough. The video is 18 minutes long. The longest parts of the process are writing the image and the first boot. Take those out of the equation and it's literally a 5-10 minute job.



I would also recommend Etcher in place of w32diskimager for no real reason other than it's prettier and I accidentally burned a raspberry pi image onto my 2TB music drive once. Even though it was totally my fault w32diskimager is getting the blame. Any disk imaging tool should work fine.

I'll be doing it from linux so in the written instructions it was some cli commands. At this point I'm more worried about a clean place to find roms. (legal ones,.... of course. Although I already own every game I want to emulate; sitting in boxes in my attic).

Etcher's available for Linux too, just sayin'.

Looks complicated... easier to type dd.

I prefer DD.

You don't find that to be too much?

Well, Dungeons & Dragons fans are known to be quite fond of hentai.

Retropie is the best. I am just apparently a dunce who always downloads tons of ROMS in other languages.

So just out of curiosity, what was the dd reference and how is the RetroPi coming?

I just used dd to install the operating system onto the sd card. It worked fine and didn't require me to install anything. The RetroPie thing is just ok. There's enough input lag that playing Super Mario World is a tad bit annoying. I may try again later. Zelda III is working out perfectly; I'm at Turtle Rock and having a blast. I was really enjoying Super Metroid until I got to a boss and accidentally hit some buttons together which caused the emulator to load a savegame, and then when I did it again I accidentally hit start&select at the same time (trying to switch to missiles) which exited me out of the game. Given that you can only save at certain points in that game, it got really annoying losing my spot twice. I wonder if there's a way to change the button-combinations to activate those special features?

Playing NES games isn't quite as great for me. I had recently replayed Dragon Warriors I-IV on iphone and despite the stupid non-old-english translations, the updated graphics were nice and I don't feel the need to replay those again. Same with the mario games -- I'd rather play them on Mario All Stars with better graphics. I may play Zelda I over (but I've played that recently on my DS using the GBA slot). So there aren't really a lot of NES games I just have to play, unlike SNES games. Which is actually sort of funny because the NES classic is what made me want to try this thing out in the first place.

I'm sure there's a Save State feature that will let you save the game whenever you want. Mario All Stars makes it kind of hard to go back to the original versions although the only one of those games I played the original version of was the first one. I don't remember trying too many Mario games on emulation. I still just use the cartridges in the SNES (All Stars, World, Yoshi's Island) when I want but that's not too often.

I was asking about dd because I don't know the abbreviation. Seems that google might not be too helpful on that one.

dd is just a Linux command to copy data from a file (or device, same difference in Linux) to another file. It's usually used to read or write drive images. In this case to write the Raspberry Pi image to an SD card.

I'm waiting for the coming Nintendocalypse, which will result in Nintendo selling all of their games on Steam. I'm keeping an eye on the Switch for my daughter, but she enjoys enough games on Steam that it may not be necessary.

We just unplugged the wii u because it hasn't been used in a year and we needed the HDMI port for a.... DVD player. Yeah, I said it.

Nintendo will screw up porting games to Steam -- they'll require always-on internet, ****ty region locks, and crappy DRM.

Damn, Nintendo wants to do this season pass nonsense with Zelda as well. I currently don't have an English source, but I guess the video is in English: https://www.golem.de/news/the-legend-of-zelda-breath-of-the-wild-bekommt-mehr-inhalte-1702-126189.html

So stupid. Just release a sequel using the same engine and assets and I'll happily pay again. But stupid DLC is stupid.

Why are Season Passes even a thing? How have things gotten to this point.

Season Pass? More like, it's the season to pass. Get this instead:

https://www.unrealengine.com/marketplace/fat-unicorn

DLC = price discrimination
Season pass = preordering DLC

On some site I saw a photo of the DS XL next to the switch and the switch screen was hardly any bigger. Meh.

But how big would you want it to be for a "portable" device? It still can be stuffed in to (big) pants pocket.

At least Nintendo knew to use a capacitive touchscreen.

Well, maybe make the screen close to the overall size of the device? Instead of having the huge bezel around it? I don't know how to quantify in inches, but definitely bigger than it is. The DS screen is way too small. Not just a little bit too small.

Also, I'm not sure what your comment about the touch screen meant. I found the touch screen on the DS and the DS XL to be kindof ****ty. It certainly isn't as responsive as any phone or even cheapo $50 amazon tablet.

The DS has a resistive (membrane) touchscreen. It is ancient technology.

I think the Wii U Gamepad also had such screen. Man, that device kinda sucked. I want to know what was the thinking behind that design. What were they trying to accomplish with such a bulky, awkward controller that can't even be comfortably held with one hand?

Yes, Wii U also had the obsolete screen.

Nintendo has been baffling me since the DS came out. I have no idea what they're thinking at all.

Uh.

http://www.polygon.com/2017/2/28/14726580/nintendo-switch-launch-not-finished

Didn't stop them from releasing the Wii, either.

Have Nintendo ever made a controller that wasn't awkward or uncomfortable?