How to turn my Raspberry Pi into a small game console?

Question

I am thinking about turning my Raspberry Pi into a game console but I was wondering how much it will cost and how difficult it actually is. I tried finding some guides to do this but it did not help me that much. For example I found this:

http://www.raspberrypi.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?t=55664

I need a good start. So I have to get the product but I don't know that much about what would work for the Raspberry. Like a controller (joystick etc), a small screen, a case for everything and I want the console to be running wireless. As I don't know which controllers, screens etc. would work, I really need some help with this. Also an easy and good tutorial would help.

I would love to have it not too expensive.

Can I get an explanation of how to start this?

Answer 1

Here is a great guide on Lifehacker. I'll list all of the supplies that you need, and the basic idea of the steps you will have to follow. You'll have to read the entire post on their website for a complete tutorial (it's too long to post everything here).

Here's what you need:

• A Raspberry Pi (duh)
• At least a 4 GB SD card
• USB Controllers (optional, but makes the whole thing a lot more fun. Here are cheap USB SNES controllers from Amazon)
• A USB keyboard and mouse (just for the initial setup, you won't need it afterwards)
• A router (to transfer your ROMs)
• TV/monitor, AV/HDMI cables, power supply (you can find a full list of compatible SD cards, power bricks, and everything else on the Raspberry Pi Wiki)
• A Windows/Mac/Linux computer to transfer your ROMs
• A copy of the free software Cyberduck (or any FTP, SFTP client)

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List of steps:

1. Download and Install RetroPie on a SD Card

2. Boot Your Raspberry Pi and Set Up EmulationStation

3. Configure Your Controllers for the Emulators

4. Transfer Your Roms from Your Primary Computer

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To make the console wireless, you are going to have to power the system as a whole from a USB battery pack (one with multiple USB outputs is better). You will also need a small wireless USB dongle to transfer the ROM's.

Answer 2

The Lifehacker post is a bit outdated by now. Below, my sugestion:

1. Get a Pi2 with 16GB+ SD card (8GB will not do when you want actual games on the SD card)

2. Get the extra's you need for the wireless/handheld stuff

   2.1 a battery pack

   2.2 get a USB controller to hack up into the handheld (PS3 - Xbox like controllers so you have enough buttons)

   2.3 get a low power display to connect to your handheld build

3. install retropie

4. configure retropie (I.E. do like most people and get it working on a TV)
5. make sure everything is stable
6. try the same but from the display instead of the TV and make sure it works.
7. try powering the pi from battery pack
8. start hacking up the controller into a case for your handheld.
9. curse yourself for ever undertaking step 6-7-8

10. ???

11. profit

If the above fails at the part where you move from set-top box to hand-held; you can get a bluetooth dongle and some wireless ps3 controllers and still use it as a console/mediaplayer.

BONUS: Get a wifi dongle, so you can access the pi with smb/ssh (default enabled in retropi) this will help you loads if you don't want the thing plugged into an ethernet cable while working on it.

You can mount an NFS or smb dir with roms aswell, so you could easily have all your games on a NAS or something if you do run out of space.

note that you most likely will not be able to overclock the pi since the battery will run out quicker. so forget N64 games and some ps1 games.

EDIT:

Do know you are not threading an unwalked path here. Many people have made or atleast started this undertaking, like this guy.