I would love to be able to play the old Atari 2600 games today but all of the options I've found have terrible reviews.  It doesn't seem like building a modern 2600 that plays all the old games would be very difficult but nobody seems to have managed it.  I found one system on Amazon that seemed perfect at first because it had many of the games I wanted built in but the most reviews said it either barely worked or not at all.

Is there a system out there that works?  I've got a SNES but only a couple games and it just sits in a box.

Raspberry Pi gaming console. It'll emulate just about any gaming console from the 70s, 80s and early 90s.

I'm sure you can download just about any game you can think of, though to be legal, you might have to own the cartridge, unless it's been released to the public domain, and apparently there are ways you can buy licensed games to play on them.

I second the Raspberry Pi with Retro Pi.  I've done one for my office and one for the boys room.  Not to complicated and there's some vids to walkthrough the whole operation.

Look into MiSTer FPGA.

Third vote for retro pi

Very interesting, I didn't know such things existed.  One issue with the Pi seems to be lag but then other people say it's barely noticeable if at all.  Is it an issue?

The Mister seems to be the better performer from what I've read but it's also a fair bit pricier so I'm not sure it's an option for me.

If you want to use carts the Retron 77 is ok. https://hyperkinlab.com/retron-77-hd-gaming-console-for-2600-hyperkin/

Honestly if you are ok with ROMs a retro Pi is a great way to play the old games.

Stella on a PC works pretty good.

I had a disc for my PS2 that had all of the Atari 2600 games on it.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/114418838896?chn=ps&norover=1&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-117182-37290-0&mkcid=2&itemid=114418838896&targetid=882300791467&device=t&mktype=pla&googleloc=9029973&poi=&campaignid=1669934609&mkgroupid=65058347499&rlsatarget=pla-882300791467&abcId=1123856&merchantid=6296724&gclid=CjwKCAjwmv-DBhAMEiwA7xYrd0XNeD3ifp2JPXguHBCtM1fuRvH6aheViyZsaJY0YvMdHmLJE9oVOBoCt_QQAvD_BwE

Lag?  Or just forgotten that video games from 40 years ago don't run as smoothly as the latest and greatest.

Lag - old games generally ran smoothly on the old consoles, since:

A)  The programs were much smaller and simpler (especially the graphics) and not nearly as much stuff needed to be done - The 2600 only pumped out graphics at 192 x 160 pixels, after all.
B)  The programmers were acutely aware of what the system could do, and didn't try to stuff so much stuff into a game that it couldn't run - they generally programmed directly in machine language, and new how to write fast and efficient code.

The new systems running emulation rely on software, typically written in slower high level languages to simulate the execution of code.  Much of the I/O in the Atari was very fast hardware-based - finding out the direction that the joystick was pressed was simply a matter of reading a single memory location, which also told you whether the fire button was pressed.  Emulating this on a Pi or other computer will take much more effort, as the emulator will have to capture that memory call as a memory mapped I/O function and then fetch (through software routines) the appropriate data to populate the address - leading to control lag.

Mike

Edit - by smooth, I don't necessarily mean high frame rates - they generally just pumped out video at the nominal (NTSC) television rate of just under 30 frames per second.  They tended to be pretty consistent though, without suddenly stuttering as the game loaded a bunch of textures, etc.

I see they have the same thing for PS4 which we have so I may get one of those discs (there are 3 total) and see if it's worth going that route.

Here is another site to check out used games.  I've bought a handful of games from there w/no issues.

Games

Thanks!

I still have 2 atari 2600 systems that work great. We pull them out one or twice a year. Still fun.

Do you still have old NTSC monitors/TVs to use them with, or do you have to use a downconverter?

We have an old Sony flat screen TV that still works. It's got to be at least 25 years old.

As others have said. Retropie on a raspberry pi 4. I build one a few weeks ago. Love it. PS1 and older games.

Pretty cool idea but after finding one that works and then finding all the games I think it would probably become cost prohibitive for me.  We had a bit of an emergency house repair last month and had to drop $11.5k to replace the entire HVAC system in our house which means my budget for nonessential fun stuff disappeared unfortunately.   I'm pretty much limited to playing Pac Man with a sock puppet now

lol, I still have mine. Works too. Everyone was getting NESes and I got the 7800.

I need to try and find my SNES.  We recently moved and some of our stuff "disappeared" while the movers had it.  If I can't find it I'll know where it went.  If I do find it I don't think it will even plug into our Tv's anymore

On that note....if you are moving, NEVER EVER EVER go through a moving company broker.  You will regret it.

EDIT:oops. thought I sent that as an IM...

If you can find an "ATARI FLASHBACK 2", it has perfectatari joysticks, and can be modded to accept cartridges.

Also, a working 2600 isnt that much on eghay, right?

This would be cheaper than a Pi setup, as you will still need controllers and an adapter for the Pi:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/255181887212?hash=item3b6a0696ec:g:vIgAAOSwicZhaxdP