That sounds amazing! I'd love to try doing something like this but have no idea where to start... do you have any tips? Or am I overthinking this?
this post was submitted on 25 Dec 2024
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Yo it is sooooooo unbelievably easy to do. Especially if you are going for PS1 and older games. I'm not super tech savvy so maybe it's the same for the newer console games but I havent ever done it so I don't want to say one way or the other.
Raspberry Pi 3 Case Power source (Just get one of the kits off Amazon. Eliminates the searching for part compatability issues.) SD card Flash drive 7zip software
Follow the instructions in the link the other comment posted but basically you'll download the Linux OS image to the SD using the version in the linked instructions.
Put it all together (couple screws here and there)
Put in the SD card and fire up the Raspberry pi
The older pi models aren't guna have or need a power button without more work to them so just plug it in to fire it up.
The image you put on the SD card shouldn't need much if any troubleshooting. Just set it up to have internet access either via cable or wifi.
On your actual pc, Google "snes roms" or whatever the desired system. There are loads of sites with rom libraries to go thru. Select the games you want. Download them.
Then plug the flash drive into your pc, create a folder named "retropie-mount" eject it from the pc and just plug it into the running Pi, leave the flash drive plugged into the Raspberry pi once the retropi is all done installing for like 30 seconds. Unplug the flash drive and plug it back into the pc. It will now have the folder system of the retropie.
Unzip all your downloaded compressed game files into the folder of the console that matches the game.
So for Mike Tysons Punch Out, you'll unzip the game's files to the /retropi/roms/nes folder.
Can put the whole library on the flash drive. When you're done, plug the drive into the pi and let it sit to transfer the files.
Restart retropie and play all the games your heart desires.
On your actual pc, Google "snes roms" or whatever the desired system. There are loads of sites with rom libraries to go thru. Select the games you want. Download them.
I recommend just looking on a BitTorrent tracker for an archive of "every NES rom" (or whatever platform you want). At least until you start getting into platforms new enough to use CD-ROMs, the entire platform catalog -- including every US/EU/Japan version of every game, and even obscure stuff like games downloaded from Satellaview or Sega Channel -- is only going to be a gig or so.
You might even be able to find a single torrent with ROMs for every pre-CD console game ever made (including for arcade machines and oddball consoles like Intellivision and TurboGrafx-16), if you look hard enough -- that'd be even more convenient.
(Getting a one-and-done complete collection of old home computer games -- Windows, DOS, Mac, Apple II, Commodore 64, etc. -- is harder because there's no authoritative and discrete list of every game for those platforms, since they didn't require first-party walled-garden licensing.)
Eh might be easier for initial set up but would be more inconvenient, for me personally, to have to scroll thru preloaded game libraries to get to the games I would like to play. I take value from the personalization of the game library over speeding up the setup. But if that isn't the case for you, I totally agree the pre loaded libraries are great. They even come in tiers from what I've seen. So you can get, for example, 200 games for console X, 500 games for console X, or 750 games for console X. And go console by console.
If your doing it as a present, it's worth noting you can get a lot of fun cases for the raspberry pi (most are quite cheap on ali express). I've personally got a NES style case. It definitely adds to the nostalgia element.
You don't need a special computer for it, any ancient computer laying around can do this. You don't even necessarily need a gamepad controller, the keyboard is a fine input device for any game before like playstation
Absolutely. Most of what I have been recommending tho was surrounded by the context that it was for a father aged 55+. My father thinks I made up the word "firmware" when trying to show him how to update the firmware on his cellular trailcams lol. He is not going to adapt well to using a keyboard to play megaman. Fuck he even bitched that he has to get atari style controllers because the games just aren't the same using the snes controller I bought him cuz it is able to be used with the atari, nes and snes games and those are his gaming stomping grounds.
I made one for my dad when he retired a few years ago. I got some NES, Genesis and SNES controllers from Aliexpress and 3D printed a case to make it look like a small NES. He played with it a lot until my nieces started playing videogames and now they play on my old wii
Cool story, bro!
But... like, not ironically.
Now I'm going to get my dad something fun that'll play Duke Nuke'em, because that stupid game is why I know a fuck ton about computers.