Cyber Gadget "Retro Freak"

[speedlolita]

Remember the Retron5? Well Japan is having a go, and adding PC Engine/TG-16/SuperGrafx support.

http://www.cybergadget.co.jp/retrofreak/?retco&lang=jpn

No release date as of yet (I think) or price but it is believed to be shooting to cost around $99.

At first I thought to myself "meh, another emulation box" but to be honest I'm curious about this one - perhaps because it is created by the Japanese?

Anyone, discuss initial impressions and if you would consider purchasing one if the price was right here! I know the PCE side of things is proving to be a big draw with people within the community. I might get one just for dumping saves from carts myself.

[Soundwave]

Remember the Retron5? Well Japan is having a go, and adding PC Engine/TG-16/SuperGrafx support.

http://www.cybergadget.co.jp/retrofreak/?retco&lang=jpn

No release date as of yet (I think) or price but it is believed to be shooting to cost around $99.

At first I thought to myself "meh, another emulation box" but to be honest I'm curious about this one - perhaps because it is created by the Japanese?

Anyone, discuss initial impressions and if you would consider purchasing one if the price was right here! I know the PCE side of things is proving to be a big draw with people within the community. I might get one just for dumping saves from carts myself.

This could be the one I finally get as it has the PC-E built in & if they go the route of the Retron & add in the HDMI but with the ability to do scanlines, Use original controllers etc. it could be a winner & means I could get shot of the consoles & my XRGB & just have a one box solution for everything

Watching this like a hawk

Neil

[Lebowski]

The decent output via hdmi is the killer app on this something that would make the old hardware look decent on modern tv's is a great idea, being able to finaly ditch crt's or expensive add on's for retro gaming on modern tv's would be a goodsend. if only they could figure out a way to get duckhunt working well too

[importaku]

Cybergadget are not known for making super high quality stuff their codefreak devices are usually flaky as hell although compared to the retron5 i can't imagine their attempt been any worse as the retron was bug ridden as hell.

Just don't set yourself up for something super high quality people, or you are going to be sorely dissappointed.

[Colin]

Ive thought about these devices a fair bit, but my conclusion is that if you're considering one you'd be as well just to go full on emulation.

[speedlolita]

I'm pretty anti emulation when it comes to actually playing games, I see this device more as a useful in the preservation sense. I'd be using this to compliment my original hardware, if anything. If I can dump saves to a device, replace the battery of a cart and dump them back onto the cartridge - that in itself is worth the entry cost - if it does end up being around $99.

There may be kinks, but it can't be as bad as the Retron5 can it?

[importaku]

Well the retron 5 had a habit of destroying save files on gba games so hopefully this one doesn't have that horrible habit. My save data is more valuable than the carts, some of it is now irreplacable. It's the reasons i spent time and archived all my DS saves as some of them had wifi download data which if lost i'd never get back again due to the system no longer operating for DS. Did the same for my GBA games as well with my GBA save stick, all my mario advance games are safe along with the e-reader data as well as my warioware perfect save files, yoo many hours worth of playtime to risk losing.

[Greg Moss]

I realise I'm probably the only person thinking this, but would it kill one of these companies to include a master system? I've got loads of SMS and NES games I'd love to be able to use on the same device.

[J0e Musashi]

I might get one.

[speedlolita]

I realise I'm probably the only person thinking this, but would it kill one of these companies to include a master system? I've got loads of SMS and NES games I'd love to be able to use on the same device.

You can use a Power Base Converter for SMS games. You can use a NES to Famicom converter for NES stuff.

[randombs]

I really like how you can remove the cartridge adapter and just use the tiny, Famicom-cart-sized main device if I want. Colour me interested(unless I buy a tiny HDMI PC or something to use for emulation in the meantime).

This could be the one I finally get as it has the PC-E built in & if they go the route of the Retron & add in the HDMI but with the ability to do scanlines, Use original controllers etc. it could be a winner

It does HDMI out and scanlines. From the screen shot, it just lets you turn them on and off(in-game and/or in the main menu) but I see nothing about intensity if that's a concern. As for original controllers, looks like it's USB-only so you'd need USB converters.

If I can dump saves to a device, replace the battery of a cart and dump them back onto the cartridge - that in itself is worth the entry cost - if it does end up being around $99.

It mentions you can copy save data back and forth between the carts and the device so you'll be able to do just that. It can also use save internally for carts that can no longer save for whatever reason(e.g. for someone who can't replace the battery in the cart).

[Digfox]

It's the reasons i spent time and archived all my DS saves as some of them had wifi download data which if lost i'd never get back again due to the system no longer operating for DS. Did the same for my GBA games as well with my GBA save stick, all my mario advance games are safe along with the e-reader data as well as my warioware perfect save files, yoo many hours worth of playtime to risk losing.

Just out of interest how did you do this for the DS games, and does it allow you to re-insert the saved save state to a new cartridge?

[importaku]

Going a little off topic for a moment,

There are a few methods to back up DS saves one is via homebrew using the DS wifi, don't know the exact method but it's possible the other methods are using save dongles. There is the NDS adaptor plus it's a usb dongle you plug your DS game into then into your pc and then you use the software to back up your saves files to the pc and you can restore them from your pc back into a cart. When you restore the save to your cart it will be exactly like you left it, if you have multiple copies of the same game you could make them all have the same save data on them if you wanted.

It recognises pretty much all DS games but some of the more exotic ones that have unique hardware inside it may struggle with. Tested my DS tv adapter today with it and it couldn't recognise the cart but there are only a handful of weird games like that. It's really easy to use the software but thanks to Microsoft been annoying with driver authentification in windows 7 when i use mine i have to choose the windows boot option to disable driver authentication to make it work. If you use it with a version of windows below 7 it works fine without needing to tinker with stuff.

The makers website is here if you want to read up on it

http://www.hkems.com/product/nintendo/0907.htm

There is also another dongle that's pretty much the same type of thing called the NDS SMS4 but that one can also rip DS roms as well as saves so it's a lot more powerful with what you can do, not got one of those yet but will do at some point as they are handy tools to own.

On top of backing up and restoring saves to real carts they can be used to wipe saves off of carts as well for games that don't have the option of deleting saves. I did this for someone on here who had infinite space as it doesn't have a save delete option to make it totally new again. If you take a save file from a different game and use the dongle to load it on the cart then it corrupts the save and the game cart behaves like you had used it for the very first time. Doesn't damage them but it does wipe the save which is really handy if you buy used games.

[randombs]

That's strange. I've never had a problem installing unsigned drivers in Windows 7. Even at work I do it all the time. Just pops up the message and keeps going. I think 64-bit XP blocked them but I can't remember.

[speedlolita]

Maybe it's a UAC thing? I still don't know how people live with UAC turned on. Don't have that issue either.