Apple TV - Retro Gaming Console
It took years for Apple to allow gaming emulators on their platforms.
After a failed start with a fake emulator, it was time for the first one that worked and was not preying on someone else’s intellectual property. However, the creator quickly got scared and withdrew the application from the store. You can understand him to some extent, because in reality, David rarely beats Goliath.
Less than a week later, however, we were able to enjoy the Delta emulator, which remains to this day.
Delta has introduced support for many emulators in a very friendly graphic design. However, it is not Delta that I will be writing about.
Some time passed when the Gamma and PPSSPP emulator officially came to the store, however, what they, and Delta, lacked was support for another Apple platform, namely Apple TV.
And so one day it came to the Apple platform with support for Apple TV multi-emulator RetroArch.
With a bluetooth controller connected (I personally use an Xbox controller), my Apple TV finally became the game console I had been waiting for.
While I previously used Raspberry Pi and RetroPi for this purpose, RetroArch on Apple TV is more convenient and allows you to easily add files via a web browser.
My Apple TV is always connected and in use, so I don’t have to switch between devices.
If I want to play Super Mario Bros for 5 minutes and then watch a movie, I can do it from the couch without any fuss.
Before I could play, however, I had to turn off “overlay” in the application, because it looks strange to have on-screen buttons on a TV that does not have a touch screen.
The creators of RetroArch did not take into account the fact that overlay should be disabled by default for Apple TV :)
In December 2022, after purchasing the latest Apple TV, I wrote that it was a good game console with missed opportunities. While it was possible to play newer games from Apple Arcade, everyone was actually waiting for something simpler, such as Super Mario Bros.
A year and a half later, Apple users experienced a breakthrough that was nothing new for the Google platform, but we can finally play some “old” games.
RetroArch brings to our Apple TV not only the NES, SNES, MegaDrive consoles, but also Nintendo 64, Gameboy, Nintendo DS, as well as PlayStation 1, PSP and others.
It is PlayStation games that can encourage many of you to try something “old” but good.
Now I would like to see if it is possible to add support for Light Gun, which users have enjoyed in the past while playing Duck Hunt!
Well, that would be the icing on the cake :)
As a matter of curiosity, RetroArch is also available on Apple Vision!
