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.