• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Retron 5 (4?) announced at Midwest Gaming Classic

Frolow

Banned
Screen-Shot-2013-03-22-at-4.41.56-PM-618x341.png

If you were a kid in the late 80’s or early 90’s, you might have been forced to make a very difficult choice: Sega or Nintendo?

Wouldn’t it have been great to own a single system that could play games designed for any console? Nintendo and Sega would never have built a console together in the heyday of their rivalry—but now, two decades later, a company devoted to retro gaming has reverse-engineered the 20-plus-year-old hardware to create a sort of universal system.

The company is Hyperkin and its product is called the RetroN. The current version is the RetroN 3, which plays NES, SNES, and Genesis games. But Hyperkin is taking the RetroN to the next level (actually two more levels) with a brand-new product called the RetroN 5.

In addition to NES, SNES, and Genesis, the RetroN 5 will play cartridges from Famicom (the Japanese version of NES) and Game Boy Advance. The GBA slot is compatible with Game Boy Color and the original Game Boy, so the RetroN 5 can actually play games from seven systems. Perhaps best of all, the RetroN 5 brings HDMI capability and a host of features designed to make retro gaming feel slightly more modern.

Source

Also, here's the announcement video which has more details.

  • Supports NES, Famicon, SNES, Super Famicon, Genesis, Megadrive, GBA, GBC and GB games
  • Upscales to 720p with HDMI.
  • New user interface which will allow you to select which system you want to play along with a plethora of options.
  • Two controller ports for each system.
  • Will allow you to use any controller for any system, for example using a Genesis controller to play an SNES game.
  • Bluetooth wireless controller with directional D-pad, six buttons, two bumpers, two macro keys on the side, LED lights, and a home button.
    [*]Option to render audio "at a higher output frequency" resulting in a smoother and cleaner audio output
  • Button remapping supported for all controllers
  • Save states supported
  • Overclocking supported
    [*]Price point to be less than $100 with a release most likely in July.

Looks pretty great. I have the opportunity to play the thing out tomorrow so if you guys have anything you want me to try out let me know.
 

Quackula

Member
  • New user interface which will allow you to select which system you want to play along with a plethora of options.
  • Button remapping supported for all controllers
  • Save states supported
  • Overclocking supported

So basically it's something along the lines of a raspberry pi with cart slots running emulators.

I don't have much need for it personally. Still pretty neat though. The design of the casing is pretty slick.
 

qq more

Member
Supports NES, Famicon, SNES, Super Famicon, Genesis, Megadrive, GBA, GBC and GB games
Upscales to 720p with HDMI.
Option to render audio "at a higher output frequency" resulting in a smoother and cleaner audio output

oh my god all of my issues with RetroN 3 sounds like they're fixed

dont let me down!
 

Tashi

343i Lead Esports Producer
Holy shit this is awesome. Crowd was weak. Guy was dropping megatons left and right and there was no reaction.
 

Orayn

Member
Interesting controller design. We need more clicky thumb joysticks like the Neo Geo CD and Neo Geo Pocket Color!
 

IrishNinja

Member
well, this is pretty interesting - ive got genesis & snes on s-video (still looking into upscalers) but i gotta know about compatibility here, first thing.

save states, region free, overclocking...there's a lot to like here! i hope they get the sound right on the genesis, many emulators did not.

id still need said genesis for cd/32x, but man id love to see someone do one of these including turbo and other systems later.

Jesus Christ that controller.

no good? i can never eyeball these things, gotta get a hands-on for me to know anything personally
 

Bgamer90

Banned
I might get this.

Very convenient. No need to have multiple systems hooked up to different TVs or multiple systems hooked up to the same TV; the former though being due to new TVs not coming with that many inputs outside of HDMI.

Under $100 too? Yeah, definitely interested.
 

IrishNinja

Member
any chance for USB, you guys think? id love to save the $ on an expensive SNES flashcart mostly for fan-made games.
 

Alfredo

Member
I always passed on these things 'cause it looked dumb, aesthetically. That render doesn't look too bad, though (aside from the controller, lol). Features sound pretty neat.
 
I love the idea, but I can't gwt excited until I read hardware impressions.

Also, the controller looks terrible. Make an SNES controller with 6 face buttons.

Interesting controller design. We need more clicky thumb joysticks like the Neo Geo CD and Neo Geo Pocket Color!

If it is like those, it'll be alright, but I still want a directional pad.
 

Persona7

Banned
Oh nice, it has HDMI and regular composite.

I want to try this on my old SDTV setup I have for my Wii and older consoles.
 

scitek

Member
Sounds pretty cool. It'll have a UI to navigate with a home button and everything. Save states, HDMI, remappable controller layouts that can be saved, 6 controller ports... I'll keep an eye on this.

I would be able to plug in controllers from other systems right? You were able to do that with the 3.

Yep. You can even use controllers with other systems, i.e. a SNES controller with Genesis games, etc.
 

IrishNinja

Member
also, if the wireless controller ends up being shit, that'd be a shame, but ive a tone of SNES and 6-button genesis controllers about.

weird that you can play genesis but not master system, though.

do these guys usually do good work? so want this, but i gotta get impressions, and again, compatibility talk. i like that the presentation just mentioned FX chips working, for one.
 

Gunsmithx

Member
also, if the wireless controller ends up being shit, that'd be a shame, but ive a tone of SNES and 6-button genesis controllers about.

weird that you can play genesis but not master system, though.
In the article they say its an issue sourcing the pin connectors
 

Chairhome

Member
I would be able to plug in controllers from other systems right? You were able to do that with the 3.

Yeah, it says up in the OP that there are 2 ports for each system.

This is going to be awesome. Gonna buy a bunch of GBA games for my kids for cheap and throw them on this thing.
 
If you guys have any thoughts and wishes, let me know. I'm in direct contact with the folks at Hyperkin and can pass on suggestions and such.
 

IrishNinja

Member
In the article they say its an issue sourcing the pin connectors

ah, watching the presentation but havent read that yet...i guess i cant just plug my power base converter in, heh

Yeah, that's pretty much what's holding me back. I hope it sounds better.

was audio an issue in the previous versions?

If you guys have any thoughts and wishes, let me know. I'm in direct contact with the folks at Hyperkin and can pass on suggestions and such.

nice! all i can think of is USB (video says right now it's only for charging the controller), and tossing a turboduo in there, haha
 

qq more

Member
If you guys have any thoughts and wishes, let me know. I'm in direct contact with the folks at Hyperkin and can pass on suggestions and such.

How is the audio of NES, SNES and Genesis games compared to RetroN 3? On the RetroN 3... NES sounded okay, a bit inaccurate though, meanwhile SNES games sounded really distorted and Genesis games had unbalanced volumes between channels. I hope they're mostly fixed in this!

Oh and how is the imagine quality of the games on 720p HDTVs? Better than S-Video? I'll seriously gladly replace my RetroN 3 for this if many of these issues are fixed!


was audio an issue in the previous versions?
yeah, it was pretty inaccurate. NES/Genesis sounded acceptable but the SNES sounded absolutely awful at times.
 

DRG

Neo Member
Can you plug in original NES controllers with this? I know with some of these retro consoles you can't, or it only lets you use a Super Nintendo controller.
 
Top Bottom