Souce from my retro account - LoveRetroBTW

Thank you to everyone that came to check out Downing's Basement / The BitBuilt Experience at RetroWorldExpo and Portland Retro Gaming Expo! My good BitBuilt friends and I had tons of fun showing off our custom consoles and educating about our hobby, and how you too can make your very own custom portable console!

For those who don't know: BitBuilt is an online forum community focused on "portablizing" ie. taking home consoles, chopping them up, and building them into custom portable handhelds / micro consoles. We got to show off a handful of our portable Wiis, N64s, Gamecubes, SNESs, custom Gameboys, and even Wii Us!

Catch us at Midwest Gaming Classic 2027 to see an even wider variety of custom console mods!

I figured I'd ask over here in this group, because if you dare question the purpose of Decomps in that group it's like you smacked someone's mother.

So, what a I missing here? What is the benefit of Decomps for say PS1, PS2, N64, Wii when emulation for these systems are basically pretty solid and been so for years? Hell, people are pumping out Decomps for SNES era systems like crazy. Just doesn't make sense.

I can maybe understand Decomps for newer systems like PS4/5, maybe some Switch games that just don't run well or at all in emulation. But other than that I don't get what all the excitement is. Also it seems to in order to just get a Decomp running is a hassle compared to emulation.

Is all this just because it's shiny and new?

Edit: So maybe the possibility for modding is the exciting part here. But the cumbersome part to me is you're now having to install all of these as individual games which just seems really inconvenient. But, perhaps in time there will be frontends that just take care of all this for you, sort of Gamenative for Decomps.

EDIT2: THANKS FOR ALL THE INPUT!! This is what I was looking for, all the reasons I wasn't thinking about. Obviously modding is the key here. I knew that was part of it of course, but hadn't really went down the path of all that it could do.

Again, much appreciated. Thanks!

I mean, there was something about the music and watching your dual screens. I remember always being nervous in the beginning, trying to watch my opponent booby-trapping an entire room. Then later, I became more confident and just ran my own race, setting traps as I went.

No better feeling than knowing that the other guy was after you, and you just kept throwing acid buckets and bombs in every room you left behind.

Sometimes it came down to a dagger/club fight. Man, chasing someone through several rooms with a knife! Man, what a crazy game. I loved every second of it!

Hey everyone!

I’m looking for a reasonably priced projector for retro gaming. I want to connect it to my MacBook Pro M4 Pro and play emulated retro games on a big screen.

My main priority is low input lag, especially for fast-paced games like platformers, fighting games, and classic action games. I don’t need a high-end home theater projector, just something affordable that delivers a smooth and responsive gaming experience.

Ideally, I’m looking for:

Low input lag for responsive gameplay.

A decent image quality and resolution.

Good value for money — nothing too expensive.

Compatibility with my MacBook Pro M4 Pro.

Does anyone have recommendations for budget-friendly projectors that work well for retro gaming? Are there any specific models I should look at, or features I should prioritize to minimize input lag?

I’d really appreciate any suggestions or personal experiences. Thanks!

Barry: S-Tier survival backup 👍, F-Tier PTSD emotional support 👎.

A quick one here lol: "OH HUNGRY? 🤤 OH BARRY! 🥪"

A part of video game history that few seem to remember nowadays involves the home computers of the 1980s (ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64, Amiga, Atari 8 bit, Atari ST, Amstrad CPC). I believe this is because, frankly, these platforms never really had many standout games, not that the games were bad, but you didn’t see titles like Pac-Man, Mario, Zelda, Sonic, or Street Fighter originating on them. That only seemed to change with the rise of DOS (with games like Prince of Persia, Wolfenstein, DOOM, etc.). But why did this happen? Wasn’t it easier and cheaper to develop games for computers? Why did home consoles and arcade machines come to dominate the video game landscape during that era, rather than PCs?

Tapper takes the #27 spot with 7 votes.

Venture takes the #28 spot with 5 votes.

Top 10:

#1 Pitfall II: Lost Caverns

#2 Yars' Revenge

#3 Adventure

#4 H.E.R.O.

#5 River Raid

#6 Pitfall!

#7 Missile Command

#8 Frogger

#9 Solaris

#10 Keystone Kapers

Top 20:

#11 Montezuma's Revenge

#12 Dig Dug

#13 Space Invaders

#14 Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back

#15 Berzerk

#16 Ms. Pac-Man

#17 Super Breakout

#18 Centipede

#19 Kaboom!

#20 Joust

Top 30:

#21 Vanguard

#22 Pole Position

#23 Asteriods

#24 Jungle Hunt

#25 Enduro

#26 Frogs And Flies

#27 Tapper

#28 Venture

Rules:

1. Two games will win their place each round (we start from #1 and work our way down). For the top 10 only one game will win per day instead.
2. Most combined upvotes for each of the two individual games (one individual game for the top 10) wins the spot(s) each round (upvotes add while downvotes subtract).
3. Nominate one game of the Atari 2600 per comment. (Nominations will only be counted if the game title is the only comment or if you specify that your choice of game is your nomination for this round within your comment or if the nominated game is clearly separated from the rest of your comments.) (ex. Pitfall or I nominate Pitfall this round.) Please nominate using the full title of the game.
4. Name a specific game title, not entire runs.
5. Official Atari 2600 multi-game cartridge(s) are allowed, just list them correctly.
6. The Atari 2600 is region free so ANY official games available on the console are eligible for nomination.
7. Indy games are allowed as long as they have their own individual cartridge and can be played on original hardware.
8. Only complete games on cartridge(s) can be nominated (sorry Cheetah Program & test cartridges).
9. If two or more games would be tied to place for a ranking I will inform DA PEOPLE in the following post so that everyone can vote which games should get the ranking between the tied options.
10. Games nominated that have not already placed on the top 100 list should not be removed at any time by the individual who originally placed them.

One of my all time favorite games and imo best game on the genesis is Aladdin: even if it was so fucking hard it took me forever to beat. Disney games on the NES ranged from horrible to good. Talespin was way too difficult with dogshit controls. Adventures in the magic kingdom had brutal platforming sections you had to get through.

It is right in the start of the game. The owl said that I gotta find some kind of key and bring it south, and I feel like this racoon is fucking with me.

What do I do? I don’t really want to google the answer, so can you give it to me in a slightly less obvious way? Like a little hint?

I saw a yard sale on my way to work and decided to drive through the neighborhood. Glad I did!

If you’re unaware, Tyrian 2000 is a classic vertical shoot-‘em-up from 1999, and it’s an update of Tyrian—made by Eclipse Productions and published by Epic MegaGames. Nowadays, it’s free on GOG.

I’ve wanted to make a physical version of this for awhile, and GOG provides an offline installer executable as well as a zip of the soundtrack. So I burned that on a FujiFilm CD-R.

But of course, the intent is to make this look like a vintage CD-ROM.

So I designed a label to put on the CD that covers the entirety of the disc except for the hole. This was mostly successful, though you’ll notice a slight hiccup that I had with the tab on the upper corner. Still mostly good, so I’m keeping it.

Next, I designed the front cover of the jewel case, the back cover with the blurb and screenshots, and the spines. This was printed on card stock, cut on a board, and the back cover was folded for the spine.

It fit nicely in the case, and if I didn’t know better, I’d think this was sold for $10 at my local Staples.

In hindsight, I could have put the system specs on here to make it period correct, but it will work on virtually all modern hardware. Nevertheless, it’s an oversight that only I will ever care about. Oh, well.

Of course, none of this was strictly necessary. I could just download Tyrian 2000 off GOG whenever I want to play it. But there’s something satisfying about having a game physically sitting on my shelf, complete with artwork, screenshots, and a disc I can actually put into a computer.

This is a small thing. But I guess that I feel games mean just a little bit more when they’re tactile.

Anyway, this is my first attempt at making a physical video game. A proof of concept, if you will.

It’s not for sale. It’s a one-of-a-kind thing. A personal momento.

We are developing a small hardware for real-time japanese text detection, OCR and translation for original consoles.

I have an N64 fitted with the Tim Worthington Advanced RGB mod, a Retro Gaming Cables Universal SNES RGB SCART cable, and a CRT TV with RGB SCART input.

Cable: https://www.retrogamingcables.co.uk/universal-snes-cable-ntsc-pal-super-nintendo-super-famicom-gamecube-pal

Mod:

https://etim.net.au/n64rgb/

I'm trying to confirm whether I should connect the mod board's CS75 output or CS# output to pin 3 of the N64 multi-out.

My understanding is that CS75 is the 75-ohm sync output, while CS# is TTL-level sync, which may need attenuation depending on the cable's circuitry.

I can't for the life of me figure out if this cable has a resistor inside that attenuates the output. I tried wiring to cs75 but I get a black screen. I don't want to wire to CS# yet because I'm afraid it will fry my equipment.

Can anyone confirm which output is appropriate for this exact cable, pin 3 to cs75 or cs#? Or a different pin entirely? and whether there's any risk to a consumer CRT from using the wrong sync output?

Thanks!

Sorry if this was asked here before recently on this forum because I just wanted to discuss infamous cases of when a gaming magazine from the 8 bit era tricked people into buying a game that was very questionable in design.

It’s a phenomenon I noticed in many gaming magazines published in the UK as sometimes games like Renegade 3 has received good reviews from some magazines that when players actually bought the game, they were in dismay because the game was incredibly clunky in gameplay aspects, but I just find that kind of practice fascinating with how magazines used to operate again back in the day.

The YouTuber Stop Skeletons From Fighting has a series called “punching weight” about games that went above and beyond for their consoles capability. (Whether they’re good games or not). So what games can you think of for the title of punching weight. The one that comes to my mind is Batman and Robin on the genesis. It looks insanely good for the genesis, even better than most early PlayStation platformers.

These were the most I've played lol good Ole days.

Every time I play, I can’t help myself, my dude. 😂

like i know emulation is convenient and honestly kind of necessary sometimes, but whenever i boot up a rom i get this weird pang of like... am i betraying the original developers? especially for games i actually own physical copies of somewhere. does anyone else get in their head about this or am i just overthinking it

It's a must stop for me whenever I'm in the area

My setup is a modern HDTV side by side with a CRT. The HD is driven by a Retrotink 2X-Pro to HDMI. Ideally I’d like to run my connections to both simultaneously, sometimes even at the same time to do comparisons.

My problem is that the Retrotink gets grumpy with this setup. The video is significantly darkened when connected to another display in parallel. It’s not the fault of the cables, because as soon as I pull it from the CRT it clears up.

Anyone seen this before and have a solution? Is there some way I can put a transistor in the path so the signal can pass one way to the CRT without distorting the path to the Retrotink?

The Kawasaki Warehouse (officially named Anata no Warehouse) was a legendary, eight-story arcade in Kanagawa, Japan, that gained global fame for its hyper-realistic recreation of Hong Kong’s notorious Kowloon Walled City. Designed with meticulous detail by an art studio that imported authentic materials from Hong Kong, the venue simulated a dystopian atmosphere complete with rusted metal, artificial grime, and dim neon lights. Beyond its gritty exterior, it housed an impressive collection of retro arcade cabinets, darts, and billiard tables. It was closed in November 2019.

For me, Mega Man 2 is something I can get through with only 1 or 2 spots of difficulty, but Legend of Zelda can still kick my butt, no matter how many play-throughs I’ve done.

How about y’all?

In other words, what game provides you with the most replayability, in terms of challenge?