What's your favorite "retro" console?

[storino03]

The console you always go back to, whether you leave it connected to your TV, or hook it back up once in a while to fire up some games...

For me, it would be a tie between the JVC X'EYE (Sega Genesis and Sega CD unit in one)--best of both worlds! And then the Turbo Grafx 16/CD combo unit. I just love how they were ahead of their time (NEC) in creating the CD unit that took advantage of the increased space and music quality. Revolutionary for late 80s / early 90s!

Of course, I have other systems hooked up like my SNES, Sega Saturn, and fat PS2 (which I'm currently playing).

[PW_Patrick]

I still need a Turbo Duo badly.

I guess for me it's the PS2, with PSone games also in play. I really think gaming peaked in those years.

[ramzastrife]

Either my Saturn or my SNES. Those would be followed by PS1 and Dreamcast. I wish I had a turbo duo, but most of my exposure to the TG/PCE was before the cd addon. I had a friend that had a tg16, and my brother had a friend with a pc engine. Spent a lot of time as a kid playing both.

[zborgerd]

-=-=-=- Short Answer -=-=-=-

My PS2 was recently connected to my TV to play some old PSX and PS2 games that I didn't have time to finish during their original release. I've been picking up the classics that I missed out on. All of my older 8/16/32 bit consoles are going to get reconnected when I finish some renovations and can pick up a nice CRT (interlaced consoles with limited resolutions look terrible on HDTVs - Even the PS2 looks best on a CRT).

My Dreamcast was on my desk for the past decade with a VGA (and BBA) adapter attached. I just took it down temporarily to make some space.


-=-=-=- Long Answer -=-=-=-

It's very tough. I think that the best gaming started to take shape in the third and fourth generation of consoles. It's a tie for me between the the NES and TurboGrafx 16. I have just too many fond memories of the NES era, and many of the games are still awesome today. Likewise, the TurboGrafx 16 / Duo was an awesome piece of technology, and the Turbo Express was an amazing portable. That said, there just weren't enough great US games, but the real greatness was in the imports. Many of the PC Engine games were nearly arcade-perfect, and it had some of the best shooters that have ever been released on a console. You just didn't find that on an NES.

When moving onto the SNES and Genesis; Some of my favorite console RPGs were on the SNES. It's hard to not place it among my favorites. My buddy had a Genesis and we got hundreds of hours out of that as well.

The PSX had one of the best gaming libraries ever, and was the first time that we had more localized RPGs than we could possibly ever play. Not to mention, it also has some of the best Working Designs games - See my avatar. I have a pretty diverse collection of PSX games. It marked the time when I was trying to get back into all sorts of genres, rather than just RPGs. The Saturn, while in a slump in the US, had a handful of some of the most memorable games of the era.

And on to the next generation. The Dreamcast was way ahead of its time. The graphics were outstanding and the games were unique. It really didn't deserve its fate, and you can see this in how much people love the console even to this day. The PS2 was an RPG powerhouse, with a massive selection of awesome games. The only problem that I have with it is its technical limitations; grainy graphics and interlaced video for most games. But otherwise, the console still holds up well even 13 years later. The Gamecube, while technically among the top along with XBox, wasn't given the same quantity of great games, but there were certainly plenty of awesome exclusives. The console really helped to reinvent some of the old franchises; Metroid is a good example.

I guess that means that I love them all.

[Tsukoblue]

Sega Genesis is probably my favorite retro system because it was the first one I ever owned

[LuciedBR]

I was under the impression that "retro" refers to something new that deliberately calls back to the old, while "classic" is the term for actually old things, e.g. an iPod album of 60s songs is a retro album, but a record of 60s songs is a classic record.

The oldest gaming platform I own is a PSP. All of my older consoles have been sold or no longer work. Rather, all of my Famicoms have broken down, while the others have been sold. I play classic games using the digital versions of the consoles, with the 3DS getting the largest share of play time.

[Fabrizo1]

I still buy and play PS1 games, but my favorite retro systems (Saturn and Dreamcast) I've played every worthwhile game on to death so there's very little reason for me to use them anymore.

[Aristides]

For me it's the system that no one remembers, no one has played and hardly anyone know's of it's existence lol. THE SMS! (Sega Master System) :P this thing made my entire childhood and I never had so many games for one system until I had a PS2. I grew up playing Shinobi, Space Harrier,The Ninja,Double Dragon, OutRun, Altered Beast, HangOn/Wild Things, Assault City, After Burner and a ton of other classics. The system was quite popular here in PR, people in their 30s know the system well. (I inherited mine from my big brother, even after acquiring the Genesis and SNES we still played it)

[ramzastrife]

For me it's the system that no one remembers, no one has played and hardly anyone know's of it's existence lol. THE SMS! (Sega Master System) :P this thing made my entire childhood and I never had so many games for one system until I had a PS2. I grew up playing Shinobi, Space Harrier,The Ninja,Double Dragon, OutRun, Altered Beast, HangOn/Wild Things, Assault City, After Burner and a ton of other classics. The system was quite popular here in PR, people in their 30s know the system well. (I inherited mine from my big brother, even after acquiring the Genesis and SNES we still played it)

To this day, I have never seen a sega master system in person let alone played on its original hardware.

[Tsukoblue]

To this day, I have never seen a sega master system in person let alone played on its original hardware.

Get one!!!
It's worth it, Phantasy Star is a game worth getting one for, there is a SMS version of Ys 1 as well