You can buy very cheap emulation boxes/handhelds from AliExpress pre-configured that will happily run everything up to PS1/n64, people have different opinions on this as they come bundled with roms and bios.
The value proposition of spending 50 bucks and having a plug and play device vs hours of time setting something up is a no brainer for me.
The real problem is that kids already have expectations around technology so are less likely to enjoy/find novel some of the really retro games.
Also, when you get a device that has 10k ROMs bundled curation/signal to noise becomes an issue.
Definitely worth doing but maybe make a plan for what games to play through and adjust expectations that interest will probably only spark around nes/snes onwards.
Edit: Quick browse seems to indicate the Kinhank brand devices are the way to go.
Build one. I did that for Christmas for my daughter. She is into ninja turtles and a skateboard game. So I built her a ninja turtle surfboard skate game using nano banana to create the images. The game play is bad but we built it together in a day for fun. checkout pandahugs.fun I’ll share my process if you’re interested
You can buy very cheap emulation boxes/handhelds from AliExpress pre-configured that will happily run everything up to PS1/n64, people have different opinions on this as they come bundled with roms and bios.
The value proposition of spending 50 bucks and having a plug and play device vs hours of time setting something up is a no brainer for me.
The real problem is that kids already have expectations around technology so are less likely to enjoy/find novel some of the really retro games.
Also, when you get a device that has 10k ROMs bundled curation/signal to noise becomes an issue.
Definitely worth doing but maybe make a plan for what games to play through and adjust expectations that interest will probably only spark around nes/snes onwards.
Edit: Quick browse seems to indicate the Kinhank brand devices are the way to go.
Build one. I did that for Christmas for my daughter. She is into ninja turtles and a skateboard game. So I built her a ninja turtle surfboard skate game using nano banana to create the images. The game play is bad but we built it together in a day for fun. checkout pandahugs.fun I’ll share my process if you’re interested
I am interested, and this could be the next step. I'll check it out. Thanks! I had forgotten about "Skate or Die", I'll check that out, too :-)
pandahugs.ai