DIY Handheld Is An Emulation Powerhouse

January 19, 2025 by Inderpreet Singh 8 Comments

If you’re into handheld gaming, you’ve got a wide array of hardware options to choose from these days that are capable of running everything from console classics to full-fledged PC titles. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t enterprising gamers out there who are still building their own custom handhelds — like the Retro Lite CM5.

For this project, [StonedEdge], [GinKage], and [notime2d8] set out to create a powerful enough handheld that could emulate games spanning the PlayStation 2, GameCube, and 3DS eras. Using a Radxa Rk3588s compute module as a base, the build navigates the design and construction of things like the carrier board, custom controllers, and the enclosure.

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A white handheld with a centered screen and Xbox-style controllers flanking an 8" screen. Speaker grilles are visible below the controllers in the face of the device.

Beth Deck Is A Framework-Powered Gaming Handheld

November 3, 2024 by Navarre Bartz 22 Comments

DIY gaming handhelds have long been the purview of the advanced hacker, with custom enclosures and fiddly soldering making it a project not for the faint of heart. [Beth Le] now brings us a custom handheld for the beginner that can be assembled in 15 minutes and doesn’t require any soldering.

These claims might seem suspicious at first, but the fact that the build is powered by a Framework mainboard makes the dream seem attainable. Using an 8″ touchscreen and a rehoused mobile device controller, the 3D printed enclosure turns the PCB and battery into an interesting alternative to a Steam Deck.

[Beth] recommends waiting for the forthcoming revision 2 to make your own as she is working on refining the model. She also suggests printing in PC or PETG since PLA is too brittle and ABS warping can be an issue for tolerances with the pogo pins. In any case, this is definitely a project to keep your eye on if you enjoy gaming on the go.

As you know, we love Framework around here and the Cambrian Explosion of high-powered custom builds it’s enabled. This isn’t the first time we’ve seen a Framework-Powered handheld either. If you’re looking for a different form factor, we’ve also seen portable all-in-ones, keyboard PCs, and slabtops too.

PS2 Gets The Ginger Portable Treatment

August 23, 2021 by Brian McEvoy 14 Comments

The first thing we notice about this portable PS2 is that the plastic looks like a consumer-grade shell, not a 3D printed case. It comes from [GingerOfOz], who has lots of portable conversions under his belt, so we are not surprised this looks like a genuine Sony device. When you are as experienced as he, details like plastic texture, and button selection, are solved problems, but shouldn’t be taken for granted by us mortals.

Of course, this isn’t just pretty, and if it weren’t functional, we wouldn’t be talking about it. The system plays nearly all PS2 titles from USB memory. The notable exceptions are the ones that refuse to load without a Dualshock controller. Rude. If you’re wondering if it plays games at full speed, yes. It achieves authentic speed because it uses a PS2 slim motherboard which gets cut down by a Dremel. Custom PCBs provide the rest of the hardware, like volume buttons and battery charging. There is no optical drive since they are power hogs, so your cinematic cut scenes may lag, and load times are a little longer.

Modern mobile phones are one of the most powerful gaming systems ever built, but there is something about purpose-built portable gaming hardware that just feels right. You know?

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Valve Sells Software, So What’s With All The Hardware?

August 16, 2021 by Drew Littrell 47 Comments

Steam branding is strong. Valve Corporation has turned their third-party marketplace into the first place millions choose to buy their PC games. The service has seen record-breaking numbers earlier this year with over 25 million concurrent users, so whatever they are doing is clearly working. Yet with all those software sales, last month Valve announced a new piece of hardware they call the Steam Deck.

Use the colloquialism you’d like, “not resting on your laurels” or “Mamba Mentality”, it’s not as if competitors in the handheld PC space are boasting ludicrous sales numbers. At their core, Valve is in the business of selling computer games. So why venture into making hardware? Continue reading “Valve Sells Software, So What’s With All The Hardware?” →

WiiBoy Color Is Exactly What It Sounds Like

September 2, 2020 by Lewin Day 16 Comments

Anyone can go out and buy a handheld console, and if you want to be the cool kid on the school bus, you can always ask your parents to take you out to get one. But if you want real street cred that lasts through your adult years, you’ve gotta put something together yourself. [GingerOfMods] has done just that with the Wiiboy Color.

Yes, it’s another home-console-turned-portable, and it’s perfomed with exquisite execution. The Wii motherboard is cut and sliced to the absolute bare minimum, as the aim was to build the entire system to the rough form factor of the original Game Boy Color. Custom PCBs were then used to link the chopped ‘board to peripherals, such as the USB drive used to load games and the circuitry from a Gamecube controller. The screen is a beautiful looking 3.5″ IPS LCD, running at 480p and originally intended for use as an automotive backup camera. Battery life is around 2-3 hours, with a USB-C port included for easy charging. More details are included on the forum build log.

It’s a tidy build, and the 3D printed case, Switch joysticks and DS Lite buttons give it a near-production quality finish. [GingerOfMods] intends to build more for commissions, though expect a hefty price tag given the labor and custom work involved. We’ve seen other portable Wiis before too, like this tightly-packed Kapton-heavy build. Video after the break.

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Simple Sprite Routines Ease Handheld Gaming DIY

May 26, 2020 by Donald Papp 2 Comments

Making your own handheld games is made much easier with [David Johnson-Davies’] simple sprite routines for the Adafruit PyBadge and PyGamer boards. Sprites can be thought of as small, fixed-size graphical objects that are drawn, erased, moved, and checked for collision with other screen elements.

xorSprite() plots an 8×8 sprite, moveSprite() moves a given sprite by one pixel without any flicker, and hitSprite() checks a sprite for collision with any screen elements in a given color. That is all it takes to implement a simple game, and [David] makes them easy to use, even providing a demo program in the form of the rolling ball maze shown here.

These routines work out-of-the-box with the PyBadge and PyGamer, but should be easy to adapt to any TFT display based on the ST7735 controller. The PyGamer is the board shown here, but you can see the PyBadge as it was used to create an MQTT-enabled conference badge.

If you really want to take a trip down the rabbit hole of sprite-based gaming graphics, you simply can’t miss hearing about the system [Sprite_TM] built into the FPGA Game Boy badge.