The Best Controllers for Retro Gaming. Thorin Klosowski. 1/12/17 11:00am. There was one controller that not only felt the best for me. The $20 Buffalo Classic USB gamepad is all you need.
AdvertisementYou’ve installed RetroPie on your Raspberry Pi, and tried out a few classic games. But something’s not right—it’s not how you remember. Perhaps the game is slow or jerky; maybe the controller isn’t working quite as you expect.The truth is, while setting up RetroPie is straightforward, there’s more you can do to get the most authentic retro gaming experience. Use these five tips to get the more out of your Raspberry Pi’s retro gaming suite. No Raspberry Pi Retro Gaming System Is PerfectIf you’re looking for a way to run retro games on your Raspberry Pi, you have several options.First, you could employ individual emulators. Second, you could use special builds of Raspbian that focus on a specific platform.
For instance, you can run the Want to relive the days of Amiga video games? Here's how to get started with a Raspberry Pi and the Amibian operating system.However, if you’re looking for a more in-depth experience, perhaps a retro gaming suite will suit you better. The first element to check is whether your Raspberry Pi device is up to the task.Specifically, consider these two points:. Can the emulator run reliably on your Raspberry Pi?. Is the platform you’re attempting to emulate within the capabilities of the Pi?For example, the original Raspberry Pi can emulate MAME and other 16-bit platforms with ease. The same goes for 8-bit systems. But it can’t emulate later devices, limiting the choice of games you might want to revisit.Conversely, the Raspberry Pi 2 and later can If you want to emulate Dreamcast games on Raspberry Pi, you can't use RecalBox.
Here's what you need to do instead. Thanks to the Reicast emulator, while the Raspberry Pi 3B+ can run the Nintendo 64 and Sony PSP, albeit with some performance issues. The takeaway here is that you shouldn’t expect too much from the Raspberry Pi when it comes to emulation. Stay within the computer’s hardware limit: currently emulators for platforms released before 2000.Be sure your is up to the job of emulating the games you want to play. Use the Right EmulatorSometimes, games that you believe should run (even if checking online confirms this) simply won’t. Various issues can cause this. The game ROM might be unstable, or created with additional software (or requirements) that the emulator cannot handle.
While many emulators are included, you don’t have to stick to the default option for a particular platform.Most emulation suites will give you the option to switch to a different emulator. For example, in RetroPie, you can open RetroPie Setup (P) Manage Packages Manage optional packages, and browse the list of alternative emulators. Use the Install from Source option when you find the emulator you want to try.Running multiple emulators for the same platform shouldn’t cause you any problems. It will, however, give you an additional option if software refuses to boot.
Find an Authentic ControllerEnjoying classic games doesn’t just mean loading them up with an emulator. You wouldn’t play a Nintendo Wii game with a keyboard, would you? No, you would want a Wii Remote to relive that console’s gaming experience.The same is true of titles from the 20 th century. MAME arcade games will play better with a joystick and six buttons; a Commodore 64 title is best with a standard one-button joystick.While some classic gaming platforms have been graced with USB versions of their classic controllers, others have not. Your best bet is to check online for a suitable converter, enabling classic joysticks and joypads to connect to the Raspberry Pi via USB.Or you could just build your own classic style joypad, using a kit like.$18.88It’s best to rely on USB controllers too, especially on older versions of the Raspberry Pi.
If you must use a Bluetooth controller, ensure your Pi has Bluetooth built-in (such as the Raspberry Pi 2 and later). See The RetroPie is only as good as its controller.
Here are the best controllers for RetroPie. For some ideas. Is Your Pi’s Power Supply Up to the Job?So many people suffer from overall poor performance on their Raspberry Pi due to a poor power supply. Forget about grabbing the nearest mobile phone charger and hoping for the best. Emulation often requires a lot of power, which means connecting your Raspberry Pi to a reliable AC adapter.Many alternatives are available, but you’ll get the best results with the from the Raspberry Pi Foundation.$14.14Power issues can cause hangs, forcing you to manually reboot and unintentionally corrupt the SD card.
Avoid this with a reliable 5V supply. Overclock Your Raspberry PiFinally, if you want really good performance, and perhaps a boost to the frame rate, your best option is to.Unlike other computers, overclocking is built into the Raspberry Pi as a feature. All you need to do is upgrade to the latest version, then edit the config.txt file in the boot directory. Amend this with new values for the computer’s clock speed, save and reboot, and you’re done.Once overclocked, however, you might well encounter further performance issues. This is why cooling is so important.
You have several options available for With all the cool stuff you can do with a Raspberry Pi, it's no surprise they can get a bit hot. Here are the best ways to cool them down., from heatsinks and fans to liquid cooling.
. NOTE- If you are adding this one manually (or using a build prior to 4.1.5) then you MUST update the Gampepad.cfg file because this controller does not work properly inside games when you add it through Emulation Station. So if it doesn't work inside of games, but it does inside the menu system (Emulation Station), then download Gamepad.cfg from, connect your Retropie to WiFi and copy the downloaded Gamepad.cfg to this location RETROPIE configsallretroarch-joypads and say yes if it asks you if you want to overwrite the existing file.