I’m actually not interested in something i have to pay for during the pandemic that won’t ship till next year. I’m trying to spend my money wisely and I have no shortage of other ways to play what that machine supports. Also by not going with a gba form factor my hype went down considerably. I think i was more upset about missing out on the hand drawn Zelda guide. It actually feels refreshing that my fomo didn’t get the best of me.
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I hate that I missed preorders and that eBay is full of them. They really need to implement a ticketing system if they are having trouble with demand.
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Oh was it a money up front preorder? I’m less keen if so - much prefer money taken on dispatch, with an ability to cancel beforehand.
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It’s always been money upfront with Analogue. That’s why I didn’t try to get a Pocket. I’ll wait til they have some in stock before I bite, same as the Mega Sg that just arrived!
I do hope they understand that their demand is higher than forecast for this one as it seems like the Pocket appeals to a broader segment of gaming than their prior machines. The specific capability for it to be developed and them promoting that seems likely to make it a lot more desirable for a lot longer.
They also charge like a million dollars for shipping, which you’ll also pay upfront for the chance to wait.
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In case anyone missed it who’s interested - the cartridge adapters for SG1000/MyCards/Game Gear carts went back up this afternoon and they’re ready to ship so it’s not a pre-order.
I finally caved and bought a Mega SG along with the cartridge adapter set, stoked to finally play my Game Gear games again as well as enjoying my Genesis carts through HDMI.
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Evil is a strong word - I don’t think he really justifies its use in reference to Analogue. Are they a luxury brand that can treat their fan base however they want? Seems like it. But not evil.
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I don’t remember if its in the article or if it was just on twitter but he basically says since its not fully open source its evil, and that is just giant eye roll inducing.
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The idea that any retro product should somehow be open source and free for everyone, which is what I feel like some people think, is just plain wrong. Analogue is providing a high quality product that is very focused. There is nothing wrong with them making money on something that’s obviously worthwhile to many people.
I think a lot of that mentality is because there is often no line between the people who love retrogaming and the people who love software piracy.
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No, they don’t seem to be evil. I think evil requires a bit more intent or gross negligence.
I think the more likely scenario is that running a business is very hard, and they just don’t have the skill to do it right. It’s one thing to make a good product, it’s another to be able to deliver it at the right scale to meet demand with good profit margins and good customer service.
All of that requires capital that I assume they’ve never raised since they’re operating out of a basement somewhere.
They’re no different than something like Jamma Nation X or Rose Colored Gaming, except for the way they falsely brand themselves to create expectations they’ll never be able to meet.
They’re hobbyists that are trying to go pro without the capital.
The article also leaves off one more big important point: no one is forcing you to buy this stuff. Even forgetting about mister, there are original hardware alternatives too. FGPA is the most niche stuff around.
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I don’t have much of a problem with the high prices but the shipping is a joke. Takes it from expensive to too damn expensive.
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I agree they’re not evil. Though they don’t have much concern for reducing costs to their customers.
I’m not sure about that, Christopher Taber is CEO of Analogue and CMO of 8bitdo. No stranger to producing and shipping things.
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Perhaps I’m mistaken then.
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That article is a mess.
I said it on the discord as well but the comparison between Analogue stuff and MiSTer is a false dichotomy. Analogue products are fancy clone consoles, MiSTer is a fancy raspberry pi! Neither of these things are bad or evil, everyone has different tastes and interests, and there’s room for both of these things and more.
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Evil? No
Shady? Yes.
There is no reason to overcharge for shipping, make customers pre-pay before it ships, say you are an American company and charge you in foreign currency. Offer a product and change the scope after the fact. Making everyone assume this is the last time to buy a NT when you know they aren’t going to move to cyclone 5 for NES without making a plastic version later down the line. They are awful at communication. I’ve been contacted by analogue team members to take down my YT video after i helped figure out the issue for them.
I was a huge fan of them. Mister isn’t making them worse but it shows that supporting your product long term like Krikzz adds a lot of value to retaining their customers. Also, from nearly day one they have the scanlines not lining up correctly. And they will never fix it despite it being a known issue.
At this point, I’m more interested in them making more all in one devices. As someone who has paid $500 twice for NTs I’m not buying another. I’m ready to sell off my analogue equipment. It just doesn’t make sense to choose their offerings over real hardware or mister for me. If they updated the cores frequently, i would not feel this way.
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“This means that unlike software emulation, you will never find a game that is compatible with original hardware that is incompatible with an FPGA.”
In regards to their shipping, my pocket pre-order was only 20 dollars shipping. Which is half of what I paid for the Super NT shipping. So maybe they’re improving that. I’ve heard speculation with the pocket that it is in fewer quantities because of the screen and they sourced what they could at the time, seems a valid possibility but who knows. I will also agree with DaveLong that a lot of people who seemingly want anything and everything open source are also just really into not paying a dime for their games. I saw some one in a discord channel pushing a petition to make it like a law or something that 10 years after release all games have to be free, and 20 years after release companies have to release the source code and its just so LOL eye roll inducing.
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Shipping for the Mega Sg I recently received was $23.30. That’s high, but it’s not the $38.09 they used to charge so they’ve definitely gotten better, although that’s obviously relative.
On the other side of that coin, I ordered Monday and had it Friday of that week. It was fast.
The whole retro should be free thing irritates the hell out of me. I wish companies would sell all their back catalog so you can easily buy on any platform, or at least on the company’s platform that’s still viable, but the reality is you can’t. That still doesn’t make it eligible to be downloaded for free. Sigh.
To each their own. That’s a personal judgment call. I don’t think you are wrong for your stance. However, I don’t see how buying a used copy makes it any better since the company never got a cut of that anyway. I would love to be able to pay for my roms similarly to MP3s and use them how I wish, not how they wish to provide it (nintendo’s current nes/snes on switch is horrible, especially for people with OLEDs).
Piracy for music is almost none existent now since music is basically offered in such a way that people find it easier than piracy. This is how gaming should be. Lower the barriers but the whole public domain thing is with everything. You can invent an awesome widget but eventually, your patent will expire and as long as others aren’t stealing your code to make it. There isn’t much you can do.
Streaming might be the answer, at least for some, but I don’t even like streaming for movies (unless I ripped my bluray and put it on my network storage). You lose too much with streaming and likewise, i don’t think cloud gaming will ever be good enough for me.
A lot of these homebrew companies are selling their roms digitally. I love this. I can put that right on my pc, mister or everdrive and it becomes part of my collection. I would do this for just about every game rom i didn’t rip from my own collection.
Haha… companies may not even be around 20 years after a game’s release. Very eye roll inducing indeed.