Mildly related to minis maybe, but I ordered a Pandora's Box 6 (family version) from Aliexpress last week.
I've been poking around at the idea for a while now getting one. I want to build a 2 player arcade panel and set it up inside that. I've heard good to mixed things about them as well, so here's hoping most of what I'd like it to do runs well on it.
Anyone else happen to have experience with these things?
I hope it works out and post and update here on it, but my initial google on it makes it seem shady. What's the difference between that and a Pi besides coming with games and from china?
It's similar to a pi, but this one has it's own front end and doesn't need as much setup. I wouldn't really call the product itself "shady" per se, as it's just a single board system that plays the games through some sort of emulation. The pandoras box is just a bit more "plug and play" than a pi. They started out with actual jamma boards that were just drop in for arcade cabs.
There is an "official" pandora's box though, and there are plenty of clones out there for it. The official ones actually don't ship with roms out of the box, but i do think they'll point you to where you can get their packages for all of them after you buy one. I think if you don't order from the official store for them on aliexpress then there's a good chance you're getting one of the bootlegs.
Powerstone is an amazing game that I am sad just fell off the face of the earth.
Played the first one not too long ago, and it feels... overhyped?
Not bad by any stretch, but for the way people go on about it, it just didn't live up to the hype that people have built up over the years. For me personally, at least.
Like Mega Man Legends? Then check out my story, Legends of the Halcyon Era - An Adventure in the World of Mega Man Legends on TMMN and AO3!
You need 4-player Powerstone 2 to really see the appeal. Its strengths are pretty much in a free-for-all over bullshit powerups, this game did that better than smash at the time.
I always liked Power Stone 2 more than Smash Bros.
+1
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SteevLWhat can I do for you?Registered Userregular
One of the guys who works on hakchi recently obtained one of the SNES Classic fakes that are out there and found some interesting stuff. Here's his writeup about it.
It comes with the same amount of RAM but comes with a WHOPPING 4GB nand instead of 512mb nand! WTF
Not only that. The Fake has 6 USB headers (2 for the controllers, 2 unpopulated headers and 2 unpopulated pads. AND a fully functioning micro SD card reader on the board. The Fake technically has better specs than the official console!
He also has some pictures of it on how to identify it as a fake.
He also notes:
What to do if you got one of these fakes? Get your money back. I highly doubt the person will be expecting the unit back knowing it's a counterfeit. However if you can't get your money back or you are left with this console. DON'T TRASH IT. This console is actually pretty decent and I will en-devour to write a hack for it to allow legitimate decent emulation on it.
So, I'm really excited for Yoshi's Crafted World on the Switch. I played the demo and loved just about everything about it. It looks great, plays great, and strikes the perfect balance between cute and chill.
In anticipation of it's release, I've been thinking of the Yoshi series on the whole. I never played any of the other games. I specifically remembered not bothering with Yoshi's Island back in the day because 15 year old me thought Yoshi was stupid, and that the aesthetic of the game looked ugly. Present day, 39 year old me knows that 15 year old me was a dumb ass, so I decided to do a little research.
So, first, I simply read the Wikipedia article about the game. Learned some interesting things about Miyamoto's distaste for DKC, saw that Yoshi's Island was universally acclaimed and considered one of the best platformers of all time.
Huh.
So, I decided to watch some Twitch streams. Trihex is currently re-learning the game for speedrunning purposes. It looks amazing.
Huh.
So, I decided to boot it up on the SNES Classic my buddy got me a while ago.
The game is a damn masterpiece. I didn't make it very far - level 1-4 kicked my ass, but that's likely due to my old man reflexes - but it's just a masterclass of design. Not just aesthetics, which it oozes, but in every aspect. No timer. Countdown health. Crayon everything. Almost every level feels like a self-contained Metroidvania. Stomping and shooting.
I'm simply blown away. It's amazing, and I hope to get better at it.
we never had manuals around back in the day
I never knew how the hell to play Yar's Revenge, and that kind of game is unplayable without the manual.
But I agree that I can play Frostbite for about 5 minutes, which is at least 4 more that I can play most atari games
Guessing because I grew up on Atari games (have a few Activision patches to prove it) I can play all of the old games for quite a long time. Also being little I had no idea how to even play Yar's correctly till I was in High School and actually took the time to read the instructions. Oddly enough my brother and I were playing it correctly by trial and error.
I grew up on Atari games and have no interest in playing them today, other than for a few minutes of member berries and the academic "ah, that's what it played like" look through my adult lens.
Pretty much all our Atari games were garage sale/used purchases, so we had very, very few manuals. Probably had manuals for less than 10% of our games. Raiders of the Lost Ark was incredibly disappointing. We loved Indiana Jones, and here this game of his was unintelligible and unplayable.
I grew up on Atari games and have no interest in playing them today, other than for a few minutes of member berries and the academic "ah, that's what it played like" look through my adult lens.
Pretty much all our Atari games were garage sale/used purchases, so we had very, very few manuals. Probably had manuals for less than 10% of our games. Raiders of the Lost Ark was incredibly disappointing. We loved Indiana Jones, and here this game of his was unintelligible and unplayable.
Having the manual probably wouldn't have helped with that one.
I can usually get a few minutes out of any of the 2600's single screen shooters, Megamania is a particular favorite. Games that tried to be too ambitious... well, there's a reason my entire peer group moved over to home computers as fast as we could.
because we could copy the disks, mostly. But the games were better, too.
The nobody-asked-for-this reboot of Yar's Revenge a few years ago was a half-decent riff on Panzer Dragoon, but also one of the worst PC ports I've ever seen.
I grew up on Atari games and have no interest in playing them today, other than for a few minutes of member berries and the academic "ah, that's what it played like" look through my adult lens.
Pretty much all our Atari games were garage sale/used purchases, so we had very, very few manuals. Probably had manuals for less than 10% of our games. Raiders of the Lost Ark was incredibly disappointing. We loved Indiana Jones, and here this game of his was unintelligible and unplayable.
Having the manual probably wouldn't have helped with that one.
Eh, I think back in the day you'd need the manual at least to tell you that inventory control is on the second joystick. My cousins and I beat it, but it definitely wasn't a movie experience like jumping into a snowspeeder and blasting AT-ATs. More like a proto-King's Quest style adventure.
I remember five Atari games that were pretty damn inscrutable without the manual - Raiders, Superman, ET, and the two Swordquest games (never beat those last two even with the manuals). Yar's, Starmaster and Star Raiders might have been borderline.
I disagree with Star Raiders being borderline. We had that game and could never make heads or tails of it.
F-18 Hornet (7800) was another one. I was lucky to be able to make it to the end of the first stage alive, let alone that I could never figure out how to destroy any targets.
It was only many years later I found out that many of these impenetrable games required hitting switches on the console during gameplay in order to perform certain actions. I'm not even sure if the 7800 had all the switches necessary for 2600 games...
I admit that back in the day I did like the 2600 Indiana Jones game. And the 2600 Krull game, and the 2600 E.T. We were young and didn't know any better. I can't recall offhand if we ever actually finished them.
Wasn't Star Raiders the one that came with a special second controller -- sort of a keypad sort of thing?
I think the Activision equivalent 3D space shooter (whose name current escapes me) was better.
I admit that back in the day I did like the 2600 Indiana Jones game. And the 2600 Krull game, and the 2600 E.T. We were young and didn't know any better. I can't recall offhand if we ever actually finished them.
Wasn't Star Raiders the one that came with a special second controller -- sort of a keypad sort of thing?
I think the Activision equivalent 3D space shooter (whose name current escapes me) was better.
Yeah, Star Raiders came with the keypad and an overlay. There was probably another game or two that used the keypad too.
There was another game very similar to Star Raiders that did not use the keypad called Solaris. I thought it was one of the best-looking Atari 2600 games back then: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f68IjW7_w98
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I imagine it plays better with a Wii Classic controller or another USB controller of one's choice.
I personally first plated through Half-Life on the Dreamcast which was probably a weird way to do it. I used the Dreamcast keyboard and mouse.
My Backloggery
It's similar to a pi, but this one has it's own front end and doesn't need as much setup. I wouldn't really call the product itself "shady" per se, as it's just a single board system that plays the games through some sort of emulation. The pandoras box is just a bit more "plug and play" than a pi. They started out with actual jamma boards that were just drop in for arcade cabs.
There is an "official" pandora's box though, and there are plenty of clones out there for it. The official ones actually don't ship with roms out of the box, but i do think they'll point you to where you can get their packages for all of them after you buy one. I think if you don't order from the official store for them on aliexpress then there's a good chance you're getting one of the bootlegs.
Played the first one not too long ago, and it feels... overhyped?
Not bad by any stretch, but for the way people go on about it, it just didn't live up to the hype that people have built up over the years. For me personally, at least.
Like Mega Man Legends? Then check out my story, Legends of the Halcyon Era - An Adventure in the World of Mega Man Legends on TMMN and AO3!
He also has some pictures of it on how to identify it as a fake.
He also notes:
My Backloggery
and even the good ones are too boring for me today
Oh wait, you didn't mean that Atari...
Steam | XBL
Steam | XBL
I still find that odd.
Problem when looking back at the Lynx library is that its like 80% arcade ports.
Sure they were impressive for a portable at the time... but these days you can play the arcade originals, often portably.
Isn't that true of nearly every game and platform in this thread?
Steam | XBL
only HERO is playable
Pretend I un-bolded "arcade" :razz:
Steam | XBL
All Activision games are still awesome.
Or Yars Revenge.
Edit: Stupid autocorrect...
Steam: betsuni7
I never knew how the hell to play Yar's Revenge, and that kind of game is unplayable without the manual.
But I agree that I can play Frostbite for about 5 minutes, which is at least 4 more that I can play most atari games
So, I'm really excited for Yoshi's Crafted World on the Switch. I played the demo and loved just about everything about it. It looks great, plays great, and strikes the perfect balance between cute and chill.
In anticipation of it's release, I've been thinking of the Yoshi series on the whole. I never played any of the other games. I specifically remembered not bothering with Yoshi's Island back in the day because 15 year old me thought Yoshi was stupid, and that the aesthetic of the game looked ugly. Present day, 39 year old me knows that 15 year old me was a dumb ass, so I decided to do a little research.
So, first, I simply read the Wikipedia article about the game. Learned some interesting things about Miyamoto's distaste for DKC, saw that Yoshi's Island was universally acclaimed and considered one of the best platformers of all time.
Huh.
So, I decided to watch some Twitch streams. Trihex is currently re-learning the game for speedrunning purposes. It looks amazing.
Huh.
So, I decided to boot it up on the SNES Classic my buddy got me a while ago.
The game is a damn masterpiece. I didn't make it very far - level 1-4 kicked my ass, but that's likely due to my old man reflexes - but it's just a masterclass of design. Not just aesthetics, which it oozes, but in every aspect. No timer. Countdown health. Crayon everything. Almost every level feels like a self-contained Metroidvania. Stomping and shooting.
I'm simply blown away. It's amazing, and I hope to get better at it.
I would imagine they don't really care. A sale is a sale.
Guessing because I grew up on Atari games (have a few Activision patches to prove it) I can play all of the old games for quite a long time. Also being little I had no idea how to even play Yar's correctly till I was in High School and actually took the time to read the instructions. Oddly enough my brother and I were playing it correctly by trial and error.
Steam: betsuni7
Pretty much all our Atari games were garage sale/used purchases, so we had very, very few manuals. Probably had manuals for less than 10% of our games. Raiders of the Lost Ark was incredibly disappointing. We loved Indiana Jones, and here this game of his was unintelligible and unplayable.
Having the manual probably wouldn't have helped with that one.
The nobody-asked-for-this reboot of Yar's Revenge a few years ago was a half-decent riff on Panzer Dragoon, but also one of the worst PC ports I've ever seen.
Eh, I think back in the day you'd need the manual at least to tell you that inventory control is on the second joystick. My cousins and I beat it, but it definitely wasn't a movie experience like jumping into a snowspeeder and blasting AT-ATs. More like a proto-King's Quest style adventure.
I remember five Atari games that were pretty damn inscrutable without the manual - Raiders, Superman, ET, and the two Swordquest games (never beat those last two even with the manuals). Yar's, Starmaster and Star Raiders might have been borderline.
F-18 Hornet (7800) was another one. I was lucky to be able to make it to the end of the first stage alive, let alone that I could never figure out how to destroy any targets.
It was only many years later I found out that many of these impenetrable games required hitting switches on the console during gameplay in order to perform certain actions. I'm not even sure if the 7800 had all the switches necessary for 2600 games...
I may still have the Yar's Revenge box and comic. I will have to dig around.
I remember when 2600 games dropped to bargain bin prices after the bust.
My mom sold most of my Atari stuff in a yard sale.
Wasn't Star Raiders the one that came with a special second controller -- sort of a keypad sort of thing?
I think the Activision equivalent 3D space shooter (whose name current escapes me) was better.
Yeah, Star Raiders came with the keypad and an overlay. There was probably another game or two that used the keypad too.
There was another game very similar to Star Raiders that did not use the keypad called Solaris. I thought it was one of the best-looking Atari 2600 games back then:
My Backloggery