RetroN5: Hands on first look

[Atarileaf]

The price increase seems realistic to me. It's a better piece of hardware than I imagined

But you already own one, hence you're not the target for sale of the new version (well maybe you are, who knows) the problem is the new consumer who's never owned one is only going to see the price increase as they don't have any experience with the original version to compare build quality with.

[Tanooki]

That's my beef, what does $20 more get you? And while i'm on it, where the hell is my replacement for my replacement?! The last one they sent was scratched up and broken hardware internally, this was awhile ago now. They're lucky I'm not one of them types trolling the company to help bring them down or I'd have had a field day with the system and how it was packaged too.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

Hopefully Hyperkin will post the differences on their facebook.

[Gameguy]

that was obviously written by hyperkin's head of sales and marketing. The only thing that is "hilarious" is you taking such a pr statement at face value. most of that is marketing jargon. the only thing thing that should be taken away from their entire statement was "Due to.... higher.... build quality.... change the MSRP ...to $159.99". Everything else they said is marketing jargon that should go in one ear and out the other.

They literally said they're increasing the MSRP to increase profit margins, if this was written by a professional involved in public relations they're really bad at it. Most companies release the same type of marketing bs, but the stuff from other companies seem much more professional.

That's my beef, what does $20 more get you? And while i'm on it, where the hell is my replacement for my replacement?! The last one they sent was scratched up and broken hardware internally, this was awhile ago now. They're lucky I'm not one of them types trolling the company to help bring them down or I'd have had a field day with the system and how it was packaged too.

I would think it would already be saving them money just to make these things better quality. You bought one unit, and you needed 2 replacements for it. Paying for one unit the company needed to give you three, that right there is losing them money. Plus at this point I'm just assuming it's 2 replacements, your second replacement hasn't arrived yet and could be defective as well.

People complained about the 360 back when it first came out and had a high failure rate, you and others should be able to react the same way with this console.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

Whoa, took DP five minutes to load. Hope everything is okay with the site.

Well, here's part 6 - Genesis does.

Also Master System if you use an adapter.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Do7_HlDn2ic

[Tanooki]

I never bought the 360, don't trust MS and they've never given any reason to change that. Hyperkin I wasn't feeling so bad about as the supaboy v2 was pretty nice, and no clone ever got me to like it at all before that. I'm technically when it arrives on my 3rd R5 as the 2nd was a beaten and broken internally system out of the box they literally I think tossed it into. I'm not amused as I haven't had one in weeks now as the whole 2.0 beta cycle started after I was out a system.

Hell I hope the new one is either the better build hardware or it's busted too and I get one that way. It had been a wonderful system before it decided it was too good to detect SMB2 of all things.

[GarrettCRW]

You know, back when this site actually had moderators, an appearance by two of the troll accounts would have invited Shandling and the other troll accounts, the thread would have been locked, Tanooki and Satoshi Matrix would have opened a new thread to bitch like the attention whores they are, and they would have been banned, and all would be right with the world.

Instead, this thread lives on, covered with dried jizz from a months-long circle jerk. No wonder Joe treats the forum like it's dead and buried, because it kinda is.








(On a side note, even if my scenario didn't play out, Satoshi Matrix would have been give the boot ages ago for being a scammer.)

[Satoshi_Matrix]

Excuse me, but neither of us have done anything but engage in civil discussion. Last I checked, people aren't banned for conveying on topic opinions and discussions except for elitist forums like NintendoAge. Your second jab is an invalid, untrue statement created by a group of trolls on NA and perpetuated by people who don't know what they're talking about. The only people who should be banned are people who deliberately derail threads much like what you're attempting. This will be my only reply to you on this off topic statement.

[Tanooki]

I didn't do a damn thing wrong in here. I haven't bitched about a damn thing other than the fact that after my system broke they mailed me a beat up used one that was defective and it's not like I've droned on and on about it. I have no idea if you're suffering from PMS or whatever, but back off.

I hate to say Satoshi is onto something, but maybe you would be happier at NintendoAge. I'm not saying more on it, he put it well enough.

[LaughingMAN.S9]

Came in to see if it had been mentioned yet but apparently I'm the first to know for once.


Apparently hyperkin is being sued by a consortium of programming teams representing a couple emulators and one actual company for hyperkin basically stealing all their emulator code and passing it off as their own without permission or cutting them in on profits.


I don't know to many of the details past that but it's looking like the retron 5 May soon become a collectors item and you better get one while you can if that's your bag

[Satoshi_Matrix]

yes its been discussed.

Hyperkin isn't being sued. That is a rumor that is being circulated by misinformed people and those who have vendettas against hyperkin to begin with. If that will happen in the future or not nobody can really say. I don't have a crystal ball to know what if anything will come from this.

What do we know is that Hyperkin used uncredited open source emulation as the basis of their early firmware revisions and that has pissed some people off. In response, hyperkin has stated they are upgrading the firmware to remove the offending code. they seem to be doing so voluntarily.

The legality of emulation and open source software is a whole gray that most of us can only speculate on. Is the Retron5 illegally using the open source software because the Retron5 is a commercial product? Only if the emu cores are sold. Are they being sold by Hyperkin? Again, a gray area. Some people say they are, but others, myself included, think that no, Hyperkin is selling the Retron5 hardware, not the emulation cores. That comes free with the hardware. Just like how there are emulators on other products like the Ouya, Open Pandora, Dingoo, Android tablets, and so on. If the Retron5 is illegally using open source emulation, then those other devices must be too. Or else, this is simply the result of people who are Anti-Hyperkin finding a way to attack them and get people who are confused about the issue to possibly join in.

So the long and short of it is Hyperkin isn't in any legal trouble currently. There is a possibility they could be in the future. There is also a possibility that nothing will come of this. It's simply too early to tell. If you look at hyperkin's facebook page, they seem to be publicly moving forward as if none of this exists.

Right now there is nothing definitive to be said on the matter.

[Tanooki]

I don't recall them having anything to do with redoing their emulators to remove offending code. What I was told was if it came to it, they'd sell the hardware as-is and remove as many emulators as needed to avoid the bullet, then put the emulators as free plugins to download from their website. On that level it would be much like downloading snes9xex for Android tablets and side loading it into the tablet, but in this case you're side loading the emulator into the R5. It dodges the entire issue of selling other peoples code, or violating any possible issue with the 'tivoization' of certain emulators for profit too. If they'd still go after them after that rate, they'd find it fairly hard without going after google play, amazon, and the others which host those free same source emulators to download on their services too.

To say they're not in some form of legal trouble would be a bit laughable. I think there's a problem, but they're also wise not to address it on their website because that can cause even more problems. They put the GPL out there, probably going to see what comes of it if anything and go from there. I think they'll ultimately have to either go the strip the system/download before usage plugin option on it, or pay off anyone who can legally lay claim to something which would be the root original authors of the non-GPL stuff and that won't be easy.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

Part 7 - GameBoy, Super GameBoy, GameBoy Color

Of all the things the Retron5 does, this is what I was looking forward to most, since there's no way to play Super GameBoy games on an HDTV without using an RGB upscaler.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrZID1iwArQ

[BTR]

With all the recent and not so recent issues (build quality, price increase, availability, not replying to requests even from professional retailers, emulator license....) it's sad that no competitor steps in, or would and at least announce a system that is similar to the Retron 5 (and while the Super Retro Trio is good, it can't reach an updateable emulation machine in terms of compatibility)

[Satoshi_Matrix]

Retro-Bit isn't currently developing anything like the Retron5. That could change in the future, but I suspect that they will continue to make reverse hardware clones.

[Leo_A]

Give it time, I would expect that two years from now, there will be another option or two from other companies right along the lines of the Retron 5 (And I would also expect to see a Hyperkin sequel appear in Fall 2016 that is bigger and better, to entice existing Retron 5 owners into upgrading).

This is undoubtedly the future for clone systems.

[Tanooki]

I'd have to agree with that. I just don't see them using cheap crap buggy system on a chip stuff going forward. LIke or hate Hyperkin, they changed the game entirely because now people who don't give a damn about the technical or the GPL complaining will see a system that plays nearly a dozen systems, nearly perfectly compared to the crud clones, and with all the added a/v perks, save/load states, and so on. I'd imagine going forward the time will go into it much further to use GPL to swipe emulators and change as needed for the hardware, still android based since it's easy enough to work with, and for some stuff that may be non-license possible you take those years to develop one of your own or license another that will be willing with more capable hardware to handle it. SNES9X isn't the only one, there's GSNES which is like $3 to buy, and if he can do it so can others. Also with a better beefier ARM and potential co-GPU the N64 has aged enough that's an option. I just don't see disc stuff happening unless the profitability is so huge you could have addon devices (external CD/DVD ROM drives) that'll be an added buy to a R5 like device to use existing discs.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

Next, Part 8. GameBoy Advance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Q06g0p6g44

[Tanooki]

If you wanted to show good 3D on the GBA you should have used V-Rally 3 for the GBA, it uses a real polygonal generated land mass on it in a similar was the Saturn does it, sprite based cars, even has a nice in car view, good framerate without chop. Asterix was a good call though, only game of its type for that. It uses that V3D engine V-Rally 3 does. Iridion you're right about, it's shallow, also aiming and avoiding getting hit is a chore, but for what it was then it was a solid game. I'm surprised at a couple of big omissions for the faux and real 3D designed games to show what the GBA really could do from appearances and total stuff going on screen -- DOOM 2, an accurate conversion entirely aside from a couple levels split into 2 due to memory limits, and then the blue roses 3D engine on WIng Commander Prophecy which accurately converts that whole PC game.

I do like you made sure not to put the first party re-hash on display there with the Mario and Zelda re-releases as it's so unnecessary. I think a little more variety overall could have been a good idea but the showing there is not bad at all. You also reminded me I still need to get FZero Climax back (want to sell it?) and I do need to eventually make time to buy and play Golden Sun1 again(and 2, never had it.)


GBA is my favorite overall handheld that Nintendo ever put out. I know I very well due to age put more time into the 8bit GB(and since it's the same GBC) lineup, the GBA just had more solid entries and amazing work done on it in total variety. It is the one gameboy I've held onto and still play so having the R5 do all this is great.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

I could have covered V-Rally 3, but rather than go from one Velez & Dubail game to another, I chose to simply show Asterix XXL and demoed the 3D car models of that one Need for Speed game I have that kinda sucks but hey it works when many emulators chug when they try to run it.

A little more variety? I thought the games I demoed were extremely varied! I carefully picked out games that would be interesting and unique. The GBA version of Doom and Doom II look like ass on a 50" HDTV. On the 2.7" GBA screen they're fine I guess, but those FPS games on GBA don't scale well, and I showed Ice Nine, which is by far the best FPS game on the system.