Best console for emulation (not including pc) in your opinion

[Brasilian Belmont]

What it in your opinion the best console for emulation, both in aspects of availability and low price.
For me is the psp because the psp's system allows it to emulate ps1(naturaly) and below also can run a gba emulator and a 64 emulator, even though the 64 emu consume a lot of battery and to be in a good performence you need to turn off the sound.

 

[micjohvan]

100% the Nintendo Wii! It can do Atari all the way up to N64 (even decent PS1) then it can do the entire GameCube and Wii Library. Also the wii remotes support the classic controller, NES mini controller, and the SNES mini controller. That means you can emulate NES and use a real first party modern NES controller to play it on an actual Nintendo console.

Best of all it was the last system to support 240p, so playing it on a CRT over componet looks amazing and gives you that classic proper retro feel. It can still work on modern TVs well, pair it with an upscaler like the OSSC and you have near perfection.

EDIT: Also insanely cheap, even compared to the PSP and SUPER easy to hack. SD card slot right on the front lol. You can find Wiis at yard sales, thrift stores, and grandmas houses all day long. I regularly pick them up for under 20 dollars including controllers and games. EVERYONE and their grandma actually had this console lol!

 

[DunkeyKong]

Maybe PS Vita and the Dreamcast because not only can it emulate a lot of stuff, but both of them also have an active homebrew community, so many amazing ports for them lately

 

[Havacross]

in my personal opinion it's the original X Box, while its a bit tricky to actually get homebrew on the thing and mod it (god forbid battery acid be spilled all over its guts) it's a quite capable machine for it's era, im more into retro gaming and it's worked good for me weather it be sprite based or some older 3d titles!

Now when it comes to ease of modding, the Wii and 3DS are insanely easy and can be cracked wide open in no more then a couple of minutes, and with both you dont need much help from a PC once you got home brew on them, its got its own apps and they're all useful, best homebrew i've ever seen really, though they aren't that powerful.

The psp/vita is a good mention but i couldnt get it to work since mine was broken lol

 

[Boog111]

My Wii U is hacked. I like that that I can have a show on the television and still play emulated games on the Wii U gamepad.

 

[Somnia]

Xbox Series S is probably the best overall, but my picks are WiiU for home console and Vita for handheld (assuming Steam Deck isn't an option).

 

[Stookymalarkey]

The Playstation Classic is a decent emulation machine for games up to PSX and arcade if you soft-mod it. If you exclude the mini-consoles, the Wii is another contender for an emulation device though it can't do PSX reliably. It's best if you emulate 16-bit games on it.

 

[BinaryMessiah]

Honestly, any console you can hack and get an emulator on. It's just a matter of how much you want to mess with it. Some are super quick and some can take hours to get setup right. No matter what console you choose outside of modern ones (like Steam Deck, handheld PCs, etc) you won't get anything past the PS1/DC/N64 era. For PS2/GC/MAME you really need something like a Steam Deck or ROG Ally or similar. I'm pretty sure the PS4 can do it, but it's pretty complicated to get that thing hacked. I'm sure a few more years and it will be easier.

It's also all about the developer availabilty. Some emulators never did very well on certain consoles (SNES and N64 suck on PSP and Vita) while some had a lot of active development (PS2 can't really do anything outside of 16-bit consoles) I would research the systems you currently own and see what the emulator status for each system you want to play is.

 

[goregoregoregoregoregore]

Honestly, any console you can hack and get an emulator on. It's just a matter of how much you want to mess with it. Some are super quick and some can take hours to get setup right. No matter what console you choose outside of modern ones (like Steam Deck, handheld PCs, etc) you won't get anything past the PS1/DC/N64 era. For PS2/GC/MAME you really need something like a Steam Deck or ROG Ally or similar. I'm pretty sure the PS4 can do it, but it's pretty complicated to get that thing hacked. I'm sure a few more years and it will be easier.

It's also all about the developer availabilty. Some emulators never did very well on certain consoles (SNES and N64 suck on PSP and Vita) while some had a lot of active development (PS2 can't really do anything outside of 16-bit consoles) I would research the systems you currently own and see what the emulator status for each system you want to play is.

I was going to say exactly that.
But emulating N64 on Wii is very good, a lot of people consider their main choice even over original N64. It doesn't even compare to emulating on PC or Gamecube(The decomp "ports" of N64 games on pc doesn't count lol)

 

[Unreal]

The Xbox Series X can run basically anything thrown at it, you just got to buy developer mode access and then you can get retroarch and other random ports of all kinds of things. It has a surprisingly active scene.

 

[Don Patch]

I've gone on about it in other threads, but, if you like Nintendo games, the Wii U.
The nifty catch is that it's natively compatible with GC/Wii games (not emulation. So, you catalog of nifty software is huge.
Played through quite a few PS1 games on retroarch on the Wii U, too.

 

[Evaccaneer Doom]

Super Nintendo, Arcades, Genesis, GB, GBC, GBA, DS, N64, 32X, Game Gear, Master System, and PC Engine for ease and for small storage
PSP lags behind only cause they take up to to a GB usually

 

[Muklas]

My cheapo android phone from China has emulated everything from the SNES to the PS2.

 

[Gaz]

What it in your opinion the best console for emulation, both in aspects of availability and low price.
For me is the psp because the psp's system allows it to emulate ps1(naturaly) and below also can run a gba emulator and a 64 emulator, even though the 64 emu consume a lot of battery and to be in a good performence you need to turn off the sound.

PS3 and Vita imo.

 

[Blamhammer]

Wii. I can buy one right now for....£15. And it plays so soooo much.

 

[UndeadKnight]

Xbox Series X is right now the most powerful console for emulation even though it's usable ram is limited to 8 gb because of dev portal limitations. If UWP apps somehow were granted the full power of the Series X it could without a doubt emulate Wii U and Switch games. Which is probably why microsoft wont allow it. If you care about hooking up to a CRT the Wii is probably the best although it has some issues.

 

[ablaikhan1536]

As PS3 Super Slim owner, I would say PS3 is quite cool variant from emulation machine. Cuz RetroArch can be installed on PS3, and sometime I saw how people made pack of retro games (Like for GBA for example). For short - PS3 is superior for me.

 

[hazys]

The Wii is really good. Runs Gamecube games natively, excellent N64 emulation, native 480p output for 8/16-bit games. Plus the Wii's library is pretty unique, and hard to emulate due to hardware.

The 3DS is also really good. Native DS/GBA emulation, easy to hack, lots of community support for mods. You can even run Virtual Boy games on it, with actual 3D! Neat. And it goes without saying that DS/3DS emulation is kind of unsatisfying due to hardware.

The Vita is the most premium-feeling handheld ever, and you can run pretty much every PSP/PS1 game on it, which gives you access to a massive and ultra-varied library. The Vita's own library is kind of weak, but there are some gems, especially RPGs.

I'd say those are the top three. This isn't counting third-party handheld emulators like the Steam Deck or Retroid Pocket, obviously.

 

[groundbeef]

I only used emulators on my Dreamcast and PSP. While they both did adequately I have seen an Xbox original with a 2TB HD completely loaded with emulators and ports. Xbox orignal is a beast for emulation.

 

[Mr. SyS]

Steam Deck. I even post on it.

 

[Pokenami]

Steam Deck, PS3, and My Jailbroken Switch

 

[lil_thang]

SteamDeck but thats cheating as its just a controller form factor PC, but i can play ZXSpectrum through to Bloodborne on this thang

 

[Lee__Kanker]

100% the Nintendo Wii! It can do Atari all the way up to N64 (even decent PS1) then it can do the entire GameCube and Wii Library. Also the wii remotes support the classic controller, NES mini controller, and the SNES mini controller. That means you can emulate NES and use a real first party modern NES controller to play it on an actual Nintendo console.

Best of all it was the last system to support 240p, so playing it on a CRT over componet looks amazing and gives you that classic proper retro feel. It can still work on modern TVs well, pair it with an upscaler like the OSSC and you have near perfection.

EDIT: Also insanely cheap, even compared to the PSP and SUPER easy to hack. SD card slot right on the front lol. You can find Wiis at yard sales, thrift stores, and grandmas houses all day long. I regularly pick them up for under 20 dollars including controllers and games. EVERYONE and their grandma actually had this console lol!

I second that, its only weakness is it can only do a small handful of arcade games and the lack of good wired controllers, I tried the one from retrobit, bought it twice and the the membrane under the dpad broke

Handheld: psp or vita, the goergeous vita oled is the second best thing for ps1 games after a tube tv and its got a wonderful dpad

 

[Zerpina]

For home Console. that's really up to what you want to Emulate on it. The obvious Choice, as stated here.
is the Wii/U and PS3. can run mostly anything you want on them.

Hand held. of course the PSP/Vita is a Damn good choice, again as Stated already.

Myself, i found the Little trimui smart pro, is a Fairly good little PS Vita style Handheld for emulation. can Toss Knulli Linux <off shoot of Batocera> or Crossmix OS <kinda the same thing> and will emulate up to the PSP/PS1 easily. some 2d Dreamcast games. but that's pushing it.

hell if you can get one for 20-30 bucks go for it.

Since you either have to with a PSP/Vita
Mod them <not a real problem i know>
and either A. buy a overpriced Sony memory card for them or B. get the sd2psp/vita card adapter.

again not a big Deal, but those can corrupt your SD cards and you have to re-mod the system <i just gave up on my Vita after the seventh time.

 

[TamagotchiTamaHero24]

PS3 is TECHNICALLY one of the best, thanks to its powerful CPU cores, but I have to go with Wii and PSP. Both are easy to set up, benefit the games that run on them, and are remarkably stable. I use both for emulation rather regularly, so I can vouch for quality.


I just pray for the day when a CONSOLE gets a truly great Sega Saturn emulator. We have a few on PC, but I want another console to be able to run it at full speed with minimal visual glitches. Just for science.