You can find this review in full at GBAtemp.net:
https://gbatemp.net/review/revo-k101-plus.1680/

The GBA is a beloved console not only for myself, but for our forum itself. Serving as my go-to console for the vast majority of my childhood, it’s blessed me with fond memories across many years. Roll on 2021 and people wanting to re-experience this joy find themselves with a dilemma–how exactly do you play? Do you cramp your hands for the square clamshell that is the SP? Do you put a backlight in your original console? Or do you just throw authenticity to the wind and resort to emulation? There is another way: the clone console. And this is exactly what I’m checking out today with the Revo K101 Plus.

Getting straight into the box, we have a delightfully clean design, sporting everything you’ll need to get started:

• The K101+ console
• K-Card custom “flashcard”
• A mini USB to USB-A cable
• A 2.5mm AV cable
• A screen protector
• A screwdriver (for the battery compartment)

That’s all, and that’s all you really need to get going out of the gate. Starting with the console itself, I was shocked by the quality. With clone consoles and emulation devices, I’ve come to expect something cheap with a horrid screen and poor software; think back to the early BittBoys and you’ll understand my general apprehension. Having said that, I’m in love with this particular design. Recreating the Famicom design of the limited edition Gameboy Micro, it feels like a weird blend of that, and the bottom half of a DS Lite. The DS Lite comparison goes a bit further with the inclusion of the X and Y buttons, but we’ll go into more detail on those later. The screen clocks in at a reasonable three inches, but doesn’t match the GBA’s aspect ratio, going with the more common 4:3. It’s bright with decent viewing angles, and I’ve had no issues playing it in a variety of differently lit environments. The buttons are a joy to press, and the L and R buttons have some of the most satisfying clicks I’ve found in a while. The point of usual contention is the D-Pad, and while I wasn’t all too fond of it out of the gate, it’s definitely not bad. While it’s possible to push it inwards from the centre and hit several inputs together, in practice I found it worked fine.

Along the top of the K101+, you have two ports and a button. The button lets you configure the screen brightness and, if held while pressing another button, will let you switch the screen display between 4:3, 3:2 with bars along the top and bottom, and pixel-perfect. I’ve kept it to the more traditional 3:2 myself, but for people who perhaps didn’t grow up with these games, the 4:3 aspect ratio generally doesn’t look too bad, and being able to fill the screen is nice. Of the two ports, one is a mini USB for charging the system, and the other supports link cables for connecting with other K101+ and GBA owners. I did manage to test this briefly with a third party cable I had lying around, and had no issues trading between an official system and the K101+. It’s just a shame the port is set in the system without the holes for the wireless adapter or GameCube link cable to clip into. It would’ve been great to try the unit out with these, but I just couldn’t bring myself to dismember my peripherals on such a whim. Other minor things of note on the unit include a volume rocker on the right of the console, a power button on the left, and on the bottom next to the cartridge slot, a 3.5mm headphone jack.

Moving on from the unit itself, I find the K-Card particularly interesting. Not quite a flashcard in itself and not functioning on official hardware, it serves more like a micro SD adapter for the system, allowing you to access the firmware settings. You can naturally play GBA backups too, and there are a great deal of features improve the experience when compared to a standard console, or even standard cartridges on the K101+. The most interesting of these improvements come in the form of cheat support, including a handy menu that can be loaded in-game to toggle cheats on and off. It reminds me more of DS flashcards and how they’d operate. The K-Cart also supports RTC, which can again be toggled on and off, with the option to set the current date and time. Being able to change these settings on the fly makes things like berry growing in the Hoenn Pokemon games trivial, and it’s a really nice inclusion. Really, my faults with the card are skin-deep. Functionally it’s hard to fault, but using it just doesn’t feel like using a GBA. It feels like a clone console, and I just can’t bring myself to be fond of that. Fortunately, the device has no issues handling both legitimate cartridges and other flashcards, the EverDrive-GBA X5 Mini being my card of choice. It’s also worth noting that it’s the K-Card you need to use to have any of your screen settings save, so even if you’re in a similar boat to me, it’s something worth keeping around.

I’ll briefly touch on another feature of the K-Card: emulation. I’m only briefly touching on it because it’s a novelty, and not something you should be picking up the K101+ for. Officially, the device supports GB, GBC, Sega Master System, Game Gear, NES, and PC Engine. I would say using Goomba for your GB/C games is a better pick, and to abandon the idea of playing the other systems on the K101+. There are better consoles for this, so get them instead. With the lacklustre emulation in mind, it stands as a real shame to me that the X and Y buttons can’t be remapped. There would have been a real saving grace here if you were able to set Y to be select and X to be start to mimic the more modern Pokemon games, just as a quick example. As it stands though, you’re stuck with Y being L, and X being R.

The biggest disappointment I’ve found with the K101+ is the lack of HDMI output. Instead of a mini or micro HDMI port, the device opts for the frankly sad 2.5mm AV option. I will concede it works fine when paired with something like a RetroTINK-2X, but the quality at best is on par with the GameCube’s Game Boy Player. I’ve included a bit of recorded footage to give you an idea of how this looks at its best. Without some kind of upscaler though, you’ll be struggling for both quality and compatibility with modern TVs.

Looking at compatibility, I’ve struggled to find any faults. Between frequently using my EverDrive for actual play, and the K-Card for testing, everything I’ve pitted against the unit has come up rosy. Even my fake cartridge of Sims Bustin’ Out ran without issue. I’m not sure if I was expecting any particular problem with fake games, but it’s nice to see it running fine all the same. I don’t really see much point in listing random games I’ve tested when I’ve faced no issues so if you want me to try a particular game, let me know in the replies and I can give them a shot.

Frankly, the K101+ is an incredible piece of kit that I didn’t expect to like. It’s become my go-to for anything GBA, and I expect it will be for the foreseeable future. While its additional features feel a little shoehorned for the sake of advertising, the core functionality is strong enough that it stands tall anyway.

You can find this review in full at GBAtemp.net:
https://gbatemp.net/review/disgaea-4-complete.1645/

Until recent years, the SRPG genre has remained a relatively niche market. Though big hitters have come and gone, be it Final Fantasy Tactics, Shining Force, or Advance Wars, each had their following, but none quite became the mainstay they had hoped. With the advent of games like Fire Emblem Awakening and XCOM: Enemy Unknown, the genre exploded with new life and love, but no title can quite hold a candle to the absurd brilliance of the Disgaea series. With this definitive edition of the definitive edition of the fourth entry available on PC and modern consoles, I hope to give you a glimpse of what makes this series so great.

The game opens in Hades where you meet our protagonist Valvatorez, a vampire sworn to never again taste human blood. Once a powerful tyrant, he now has the generally-undesirable job of Prinny Instructor, doomed to eternally mould the souls of sinful humans into the obedient doods you all know and love. I’ll waste little time trying to explain the plot, because frankly it goes off the rails fast. The Corrupternment decides that Prinny overpopulation has become a real issue in the Netherworld, and decides the mass-extermination of our patchwork penguins is the only option. One thing leads to another, and suddenly our main man is on a warpath against the very Corrupternment he once worked for. If the plots of this series are one thing, they are consistent. They’re unpredictable, they’re devilishly funny, and they’re also fully voice acted. Listening to the characters as they frame a prison warden for their own crimes, or discuss sardines as a substitute for human blood, it elevates the whole thing. The series as a whole is one of few I find myself skipping very little of the voiced dialogue. It’s just too good; I crave more.

Looking to the gameplay, any SRPG fans will feel right at home. It’s familiar in all the right ways. As standard, you have an isometric view akin to Final Fantasy Tactics, where a turn can be broken down into moving your characters, performing an action, and watching them be executed. It’s worth saying here though that a top-down view more closely similar to the Fire Emblem series is also available. I did notice a few minor texture layering issues using this mode, and it’s more difficult to visualise height, but I’m grateful it’s there all the same. Isometry was the biggest reason I struggled to get into the series initially, my mind just doesn’t play well with it. Back to the gameplay though, there are a number of actions available to you in a turn to provide a surprising level of depth to play. Sure you can attack and use skills, but then you also have things like Magichange–the ability to turn your monster allies into weapons for your human allies. This is interesting because the weapon’s effectiveness is based on the monster’s stats. The stronger the monster, the stronger the weapon. And just like that you find yourself wanting to train another character. You can also merge two of the same monster type to create a giant monster and again you find yourself wanting to train more characters, wanting to try new things. As a series, it incentivises grinding and experimentation in a way I simply haven’t come across elsewhere, and the games are designed to accommodate this.

Of course, much of my praise is praise for the larger series, so what does Disgaea 4 have to offer for itself? In all honesty, there’s not that much. The most significant feature you’ll only find here is Cam-Pain HQ. Since Valvatorez is taking on the Corrupternment, it makes sense he’d have his own campaign to win the masses. In reality, this is a large map that houses all the characters in your party. As you complete more maps in the story, you unlock more tiles here that can be occupied by more party members. What’s more, you can use this space to place Evil Symbols if you find yourself not at capacity for allies. Evil Symbols provide a good variety of boosts and advantages to you, some only working for characters within their proximity, while others providing a set effect. You can see my setup below for the first two Evil Symbols you acquire. These two allow for a fraction of EXP and Mana gained by the leader, in this case, Valvatorez for both, to be distributed to the other members within the vicinity. Some characters also have Evilities that are provide bonuses based on their position in Cam-Pain HQ, such as providing a bonus to stats based on how many allies are adjacent to the appropriate ally.

There is one more thing that, at least to the best of my knowledge, is unique to Disgaea 4–or to be more specific, Disgaea 4 Complete+. I am of course talking about the new “DLC”. For small portions of real-world money, you can minimise the grind with EXP boosters, and various other handy tools. That’s right folks, microtransactions! Honestly, it goes beyond the usual response of corporate greed. I’m just left asking why? Who is this for? The game is well-paced where you don’t need to grind unless you enjoy it, and is designed in a way as to make it accessible and simple if you do. Heck, it’s a game that has a cheat shop as a feature. A cheat shop where you can readily increase your yield of EXP, Mana, or money. On top of this, you can scale enemy difficulty to get as high levelled as early on as you want. I understand EXP boosters in games designed around a certain task taking a certain amount of time, MMOs that lock levels behind hours of grinding to keep people in their ecosystem. Disgaea 4 by comparison, is a game where you can hit max level many times in an hour by the point in the game where it actually matters. It’s really not the microtransactions in themselves that annoy me, it’s the choice of game they decided to put them in. It doesn’t make sense to me, and would even go as far as to say it diminishes the satisfaction that comes from defeating the game’s hardest foes, knowing you didn’t quite earn it yourself. If you want the payoff without the effort, you may as well be using Cheat Engine if you’re playing on PC. At least that’s free.

Looking beyond the unwanted extras, much of what makes Disgaea great is on show here. If you get tired of grinding levels for your cohort of corruption, you can get to work on levelling up their items through the Item World. Using this chain of randomly generated levels, you can delve deep and reap incredible rewards. You also have Chara World, which is used to increase certain character attributes, though if you’ve previously played Disgaea 5 you may be left a little disappointed. Where Disgaea 5 evolved Chara World to be a cute board game and something entirely its own, Disgaea 4’s implementation is a carbon copy of Item World. Random levels to get through, with permanent bonuses waiting at the end for you. They’re both certainly fun, but going back to Disgaea 4 now, I really do appreciate the changes made by its successor. It’s not that the Chara World on offer here is bad, it’s just nothing particularly different. If you’ve been grinding Item World for a few hours, you probably wouldn’t want to jump into Chara World for more of the same. I live in hope the upcoming Disgaea 6 can evolve these features further, though exactly what I want to be added remains somewhat of an unknown.

To give a brief rundown of the PC port, I can say it’s fine. There’s no real frills, but it runs well. Testing it on my 1440p ultrawide monitor, the game did run at its native resolution, albeit with the somewhat expected black bars. The mouse and keyboard support is equally fine, though perhaps a little clumsy. There’s just something unsettling about the screen panning when you click the mouse on a tile. If camera movement and tile selection were detached, I think I’d have had a far more comfortable experience, but as things stand I’d probably recommend using a controller. 

All things considered, I struggle to contest that Disgaea 4 Complete+ is a great entry to the series. While I definitely wouldn’t call it the definitive edition, with its additions being more detrimental than positive, it’s great to see it hit both the Switch and PC for an unparalleled sense of availability. If you enjoyed Disgaea 5 and haven’t had a chance to play any other games in the series, this is one to check out. It’s familiar in all the right ways, and incredibly easy to jump into and fall in love with. Limit your spending to the price of the game, and you’ll have a grand time.

You can find this review in full at GBAtemp.net:
https://gbatemp.net/review/redmagic-5s.1620/

Phones have come a long way since the days of my youth. From a device to speak with another person, to sending words, images; I remember being blown away by a friend of mine playing Pokémon Yellow on an old Nokia. Taking leaps and strides, smartphones have developed into something essential to many of our day to day lives, and now, they take a step further to encroach on a sacred sacred land. Can a phone truly stand among the greats and make an impact in the world of gaming? What makes a phone a gaming phone? And is a gaming phone still a reliable phone when it counts? After my time with the RedMagic 5S, I feel comfortable delivering these answers.

Starting from the top, the RedMagic unboxing experience is something completely unique to the brand. Each of their phones coming packed in a uniquely over the top and interesting box, from the moment you set eyes on it you know you have something different. The garishness of the phone design seeps outwards, and I love it. While I enjoyed the space comic panels of the 5S, I do think it somewhat a step backwards from its predecessor’s design, individual taste is something you really can’t account for. Lurking within, you can expect to find the phone itself, along with the usual SIM tray poking tool, a USB-A to USB-C charging cable, a USB-A power adapter, and a transparent case. Everything is fairly standard, and packaged well to keep the contents of the box safe. Aside from these, I decided grab the two available accessories, these being the Pro Handle and Ice Dock, but more on these later.

During setup, you’ll find a relatively clean Android 10 experience, and little out of the ordinary with the OS. Under the hood, you’re looking at a Snapdragon 865, notably not the 865+, with 5G support, staying largely in-line with its predecessor, the RedMagic 5G. In fact, the majority of its specifications find itself matching the 5G. The 144hz display, while still delightful, debuted with the 5G. Really, the improvements from the 5G are minimal. The storage is faster, utilising UFS 3.1, the triggers have a marginally higher polling rate, and the touted Trinity Cooling has apparently been upgraded. RedMagic phones are largely known for their internal fans. Somewhat to my surprise, the latest one actually spins slower than the 5G, the advertised RPM being up to 15,000, in oppose to the 16,000 of its predecessor. This is splitting hairs, and it does still do a good job in keeping things cool, but it’s an odd detail all the same. The phone also features “active liquid cooling”, and a silver plate to complete the trinity. Though my knowledge of metals is limited, silver does seem to be a better conductor of heat than the usual copper, though much like the rest of the phone’s upgrades, the difference is marginal.

It’s easy to take these minor changes as a negative of the phone as a whole, but it’s not necessarily the case. The RedMagic 5G was a great phone in itself, and while it’s a little disappointing to not, at the very least, see the CPU upgraded to the newer 865+, the device as a whole still finds itself at the higher echelons of power and capability. Where it does, for the most part, feature flagship performance, there are some compromises to be made for the more affordable price point. The biggest hit comes from the phone’s cameras; they’re hardly standout. In a device marketed towards gaming, I completely understand the decision, and it’s probably the best place to cut costs, but I can see it putting some off making the 5S their daily driver. You have a 64MP main camera, an 8MP ultra wide camera, and a 2MP macro camera. Each are fine in capturing moments in a pinch, but wouldn’t be my ideal choice. Compared to my previous phone, a Motorola One Zoom, admittedly a device more camera-oriented, it’s difficult to adjust. Where I would usually retire a phone completely on getting another, I still have my Motorola One Zoom handy to fill the gap the 5S simply can’t. You can check out a few shots below.

On the left side of the phone sits a bright red switch. Unlike the switches of yonder, this one doesn’t mute the device, nor does it lock the screen orientation. It would have been interesting to have had this switch be mappable to actually accommodate things like this, but as it stands, it exists for one reason only: gaming. Which shouldn’t be much of a surprise really, pretty much every big player in the gaming phone scene has a switch much like this one, putting the phone in a launcher much like this one. There’s a few interesting things to find here. Obviously you can add games to the launcher to have easy access to them, but swiping from the right reveals a nice array of options. You can toggle the fan, screen refresh rate, block calls and messages, and record your screen. On top of this, you have a few more interesting options. The two capacitive triggers can be mapped to any area of the screen, you can create macros and play them back, and you can even open a WhatsApp window that displays over the game. Unfortunately, you’re limited to WhatsApp for this, and not apps like Telegram that I more frequently use, but it’s a nice addition. There is one thing that even after owning the phone for a month, I still don’t have a clue about: small-window hangup. All I’ve managed to figure out is that whenever I flip the red gaming switch while I have a game still open, it’ll tell me that it doesn’t support small window hanging. No app does apparently. This is just one of many translation quirks you’ll find on the phone. 

Within the Game Boost mode, you’ll also find a nifty breakdown of how long you’ve been playing games, along with stats of which games you’ve been playing most. I adore this kind of tracking. I loved it on the 3DS, and it’s great to see something similar implemented here, albeit with some odd decisions. You see, it doesn’t actually keep a record of the total time you’ve spent playing each game. All it tracks is what you’ve played today, and what you’ve played over the last week. It’s a shame to be falling short in such a trivial way, but there is more to it than that. This “Personal Center” is riddled with odd translations, and an even more odd keyword, along with what I think is a short motivational message? Apparently my keyword for today is “Health”, and I should be aware that moderate play is good for physical and mental health. Thanks phone, I’m glad I asked. 

On to the main event of the RedMagic 5S. I’m excited to share how it performs in its element. With Android devices, you can generally split this into two core areas: native games, and emulation. I’ll be the first to admit the native games that actually utilise the phone’s full potential are slim pickings. You have your titans in Fortnite, Call of Duty Mobile, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, and a few pretty looking racers. Beyond that, much of what’s on offer you’ll find runs fine on almost any modern Android device. The games I’m particularly fond of, like Disgaea 1 Complete, Danganronpa, Professor Layton, and even Monster Hunter Stories, have been ported from other platforms, but they’re not demanding in any way. If you’re not into your battle royale games on the go, it’s easy to question why you would bother with what could be considered an overspecced device in some regards. This is where emulation begins to shine.

Android is an Eden of quality emulators. From the NES to the Wii, the PS1 to the PSP, there are games to be played and replayed from years gone by. It should go without saying that any modern Android device is capable of everything up to the N64, so for this I’m putting a particular focus on the performance of two emulators in particular: Dolphin for GameCube and Wii, and Citra for 3DS, with a brief look at DamonPS2 for your PS2 fix as a bonus.

Dolphin was at the forefront of my mind when deciding to buy the 5S. It’s long-since been a dream of mine to play New Super Mario Bros. Wii from my phone. I don’t really know why, but it’s something I’ve wanted for years, and naturally it was the first thing I tested. Flawless. Though it is admittedly not the most demanding of Wii games to be testing, it was running at x2 native resolution with no issues at all. Following that, almost every Wii game I tested worked perfectly. To save on flowery text, I’ve put a list of Wii games below, along with a brief note on how it performs. It’s worth noting that the “Skip EFB Access from CPU” option is enabled unless stated otherwise for these tests, as it provides a significant performance improvement with little to no noticeable drawback in the majority of cases.

Game Title	Rating	Internal Resolution	Notes
Animal Crossing: City Folk	Flawless	x2
Endless Ocean	Flawless	x1
Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn	Flawless	x2
Fortune Street	Unplayable	x1	Game struggles after reaching main menu
Mario Kart Wii	Flawless	x2
Mario Strikers Charged Football	Flawless	x1
Monster Hunter Tri	Flawless	x2
New Super Mario Bros. Wii	Flawless	x2
Pokémon Battle Revolution	Flawless	x1
The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword	Minor Slowdowns	x1	Only noticeable slowdown was when loading in an enemy for the first time
Super Smash Bros. Brawl	Minor Slowdowns	x2	Slowdowns isolated to loading into stages; flawless otherwise
Super Mario Galaxy 1/2	Issues	x1	Pointer controls don’t work with Skip EFB Access from CPU; slowdowns with this disabled
Wii Sports	Minor Slowdowns	x1	Infrequent minor slowdowns in Baseball, usually in panning shots; still very much playable
Xenoblade Chronicles	Flawless	x1

As a general overview, almost everything I tried worked perfectly. The odd standout is Fortune Street, and why it wouldn’t run well is beyond me. It seems like a fairly low demand board game, but maybe there’s a lot going on behind the scenes. With the 5S facing few issues with Wii games, GameCube performance is just as good as you’d think. The vast majority of games I tried faced no issues at x2 native resolution, with taxing games like The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker needing to be run at x1. Again, you can check out the list below of the games I’ve tried.

Game Title	Rating	Internal Resolution	Notes
Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance	Flawless	x2
Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour	Flawless	x2
Mario Kart: Double Dash	Flawless	x2
Mario Party 4/5/6/7	Flawless	x2
Pikmin 1/2	Flawless	x2
Pokémon Colosseum	Issues	x2	Plays perfectly, but holding down on the analogue stick is read as up; issue with the game more than the emulation, as this is replicable on real hardware with unofficial controllers.
Pokémon XD Gale of Darkness	Minor Slowdowns	x1	Stuttering only really noticeable when you have audio on to hear it; perfectly playable muted
Shadow the Hedgehog	Minor Slowdowns	x1	Slowdowns when there’s a lot happening on-screen; the lasers in the first stage make this more frequent early on
Sonic Adventure 2 Battle	Minor Slowdowns	x1	Somewhat infrequent; very playable
Super Mario Strikers	Minor Issues	x2	Loading screens backgrounds are a solid purple colour; also minor slowdowns on loading into a match
Super Mario Sunshine	Major Slowdowns	x1	The game chugs hard once you’re past the airstrip; difficult to play
Super Monkey Ball 1/2	Flawless	x2
Super Smash Bros. Melee	Minor Slowdowns	x2	Slowdowns isolated to loading into stages; flawless otherwise
Taz: Wanted	Major Slowdowns	x1	Large fluctuation with game speed; can be very playable, but flips to a stutter fest in an instant
The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures	Minor Slowdowns	x2	Slowdowns largely confined to there being many effects on-screen at once (fire, shadow particles etc)
The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker (+Randomizer)	Flawless	x1	Tested with 16:9 widescreen cheat active
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess	Issues	x1	Transparency issues with minimap; game runs flawlessly otherwise

All in all, Dolphin performs above and beyond what I could have possibly expected. Even now it feels impossible to be playing Mario Kart Wii on the train to work, yet here I am doing just that. I have a library of games at my hand, and it of course doesn’t stop at Dolphin. Next on my list is 3DS, and more specifically, Citra-MMJ.

When it comes to Citra on Android, you have your standard release, which gets the job done, but you also have Citra-MMJ, a fork by weihuoya with several great features to enhance the experience. These include the ability to create custom screen layouts, use cheats, and a myriad of minor tweaks; it is in my opinion the best way to play 3DS games on Android. Though the games I tried were a little more hit and miss than with Dolphin, I’m ultimately impressed all the same. You can find the games I tried below, along with information on how they performed. I decided to leave out the internal resolution setting here, since it didn’t seem to have all that much effect on performance when compared to Dolphin. You might see minor slowdowns at x4 resolution on some games, but for the most part, if it ran well at x1, it ran well on everything else too.

Game Title	Rating	Notes
Fire Emblem Awakening/Fates	Slowdowns	Major slowdowns in battles, particularly with magic; play without combat animations and it runs great
Mario Kart 7	Minor Slowdowns	Slowdowns mainly seen when loading into new levels; races run without issue
Mario Tennis Open	Unplayable	Huge slowdowns throughout; game speed doesn’t manage to get past 50%
Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate	Issues	This game will set the phone on fire without a cheat code to cap the FPS at 30 (FPS cap is otherwise 3000, thanks Capcom); cutscenes run at ~33% speed even with this, but past that the game runs at full speed
Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate	Minor Slowdowns	Slowdowns usually when loading into maps; no real impact on gameplay
Monster Hunter Generations	Minor Slowdowns	Slowdowns usually when loading into maps; no real impact on gameplay
New Super Mario Bros 2	Slowdowns	Game occasionally drops to 70-80% speed for a second or so; frustrating, but not impossible to play around if you’re eager to play
Pokémon Omega Ruby	Issues	Largely runs at full speed, but has graphical issues with the lines around Pokémon; using a cheat to disable these makes things look almost normal
Super Mario 3D Land	Slowdowns	Frequent speed drops to ~90%; game can also sometimes be stuck for around half a second when the camera comes to a new area with a lot going on
Super Smash Bros for Nintendo 3DS	Minor Slowdowns	Slowdowns isolated to menus and loading into stages; also random graphical glitches that mix up character portraits on the character selection menu
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D	Minor Slowdowns	Slowdowns largely when loading into new areas; very playable
The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask 3D	Minor Issues	Similar slowdowns to OoT3D, but also has small character model glitches that while amusing, are somewhat distracting

While it does impress me to be able to play Pokémon Omega Ruby on the go with very few issues, I wouldn’t say any of the 3DS titles I tried were flawless. As things are, I wouldn’t be going out of my way to get a phone with the intent of playing 3DS games, but the ones that do perform well are a delightful bonus. 

DamonPS2 is a different beast entirely to that of Dolphin and Citra. It’s cluttered, it’s messy, there’s no option to alter touch control transparency… but it works? Sometimes. Of the notable games tried, I apparently managed to get a fairly consistent 60fps on Shadow of the Colossus, albeit with some hefty graphical glitches. I say apparently because that’s what the app is telling me, but it didn’t feel smooth at all, to the point of developing a headache from playing. The original Monster Hunter suffers from a bizarre screen shaking in the village area, but surprisingly is playable once you’re out on a quest. Ape Escape 2 looks like your character is in a constant state of simultaneously exploding and imploding with polygons flying in every which direction. My greatest surprise is that, Shadow of the Colossus aside, the games do seem to run well. They’re just riddled with issues that make the majority unplayable. Maybe this will improve in the future as the app continues to be developed, but for now, I wouldn’t bother.

Having looked at the games, you might be left wondering what makes this a gaming phone. Sure, it’s impressive it can run what it can, but you’ll find flagships and other modern phones rocking something similar when it comes to internal specs. Really, there were two things that drew me to RedMagic in particular: the garish design, and the accessories. I’ll throw my hands up and say outright, the garish design isn’t going to appeal to everybody. I’d go as far as saying that for the vast majority of people reading this, it probably doesn’t appeal to you. But to me, it’s something so outlandish and fun, something you just don’t see in the phone market nowadays. In a sea of monochrome slabs, I love seeing something pack a punch. For those not quite enticed by the red and blue of the Pulse design, it is worth noting more muted “Sonic Silver” and “Eclipse Black” models are available, though they do come with 8GB of RAM and 128GB of internal storage, in oppose to the Pulse’s 12GB and 256GB respectively. This wouldn’t matter so much if there was any kind of expandable storage, but unfortunately there isn’t. In their next phone, I’d love to see you able to pick your design without having to be tied down to a lesser model, but given this is something RedMagic have done since their first phone, I doubt they’ll change any time soon. 

The accessories are a little more tricky to discuss. There are really two of note: the Pro Handle, and the Ice Dock, as I touched on earlier. To shed some light on these ambiguous names, I’ll start with the Pro Handle, a special case with a rail on the top and bottom of the phone to mount two Joy Con-style controllers. I am in love with this, and it’s definitely up there with the phone’s biggest selling points. These controllers slightly smaller than Nintendo’s detachable design, and they can function in one of two ways. The first is as standard Bluetooth controllers; this is how I use them with Dolphin. The benefit here is that you’re able to make use of every button on the controller, there being four face buttons, two shoulder buttons on the top, two shoulder buttons on the bottom, and what I affectionately dub the RedMagic button. The reason these work well in Dolphin as standard Bluetooth controllers is that Dolphin is able to detect them as two separate controllers, and lets you map them as such. If every emulator worked like this, they would be a dream. Alas, Dolphin is the only one I found with such a feature. Other emulators fall into the trap of recognising them both as the same controller, which, as you might imagine, causes a number of issues; this is where the second functionality comes into play.

Via the phone’s Game Boost mode, you’re able to map not only the built-in shoulder buttons, but the Pro Handle also, to any region of the screen. For native Android apps, I’ve got in the habit of only using the left handle for a much nicer feeling analogue movement, with my right hand free to adjust the camera and hit the array of option and attack buttons that tend to cluster the right side of the screen. It works genuinely well, and it enhanced my experience with Genshin Impact in particular. For emulation, I’ve found myself getting a little craftier. With the vast majority of emulators I tried, you’re able to not only use touch controls, but alter their opacity. What this means is that you can map the Pro Handle to each button on-screen, and then hide the controls entirely, making the gamepad effectively function as a gamepad should. It’s weird, but it does work well once you have it setup. The downside here is that you’re a little more limited with the buttons you can map. When in Game Boost mode, the RedMagic button on each controller isn’t available for mapping, instead it acts as a button to open the mapping menu itself. The two shoulder buttons on the bottom of the controller are out of action too, with them only coming into play if they’re positioned at the top. Unlike the Joy-Con, either controller of the Pro Handle can be used on either side of the phone; you just need to rotate them. It’s actually a great design, and I’ve found them really comfortable even in prolonged Mario Kart Wii sessions, but again you find small things holding them back. In losing the RedMagic button for mapping, you lose your ideal candidates for start and select, instead having to throw these on one of the shoulder buttons. You need both shoulder buttons for the emulator you’re using? Then you’ll be missing out on some buttons, or mapping them to the device’s own shoulder buttons and awkwardly reaching over. Neither option is particularly great. Small criticisms though for an otherwise great addition. The Pro Handle is an essential accessory for anybody looking at this phone.

The Ice Dock though? Not so much. I can’t comment on whether the dock itself helps with the phone’s performance, so we’ll put that to one side. Frankly, I think the phone performs well enough with its internal fan alone. The Ice Dock is just poorly designed, that’s all there is to it. Clamping to the back of the phone, it’s supposed to sit dead-centre. The symmetry is nice, but the glaring oversight is that both the volume and power buttons also sit in the middle of the phone’s body, much lower than any other phone I’ve used because of the internal fan’s placement. On attaching the Ice Dock, you’ll find it pressing down on the volume rocker and the power buttons. But that’s not all! The only way you’re able to use the dock is by removing the phone from any case it’s in. It needs to be flush to the device; another glaring oversight. You want to use the Pro Handle? Too bad. You can’t even use the transparent case the phone comes with. It’s another shame, and another mark against a device I really do like.

The accessories as a whole just lack a sense of larger synergy. The transparent case that comes with the phone lets you see the striking design clearly, but in using it, you’re locking yourself out of both the Pro Handle and the Ice Dock. In using the Pro Handle, you need to use a specific case, this being a black case covering much of the phone’s coveted design. You’re stuck with a more mundane device with only glimmers of colour poking through, not to mention you are again unable to use the Ice Dock. And as you may have guessed, you can’t use the Ice Dock with anything else. It’s so frustrating to me just how close each of these come to being great. For the Pro Handle, make a transparent case. For the Ice Dock, make a case that can mount it; heck, go to town and give it rails so you can use the Pro Handle too. Small adjustments are all it takes to elevate these accessories, to elevate the phone as a whole, to a higher level. 

Having used the RedMagic 5S as my daily driver for little over a month now, I can say I’m more than happy with my purchase. It’s a mighty box of high end specs with a price tag to jump at. Coming home from work each day, the battery sits somewhere between 60% and 30% depending on use. The lowest I’ve seen the battery go is 10%, being a person who charges their phone each night, and this was really only because I left the phone playing Disgaea 1 Complete on auto all day to grind characters. I’ve had no issue in taking or receiving calls, nor in the more standard internet browsing and day to day messaging. Saying that, however, it’s not a phone I’d recommend to your average user who wants an all-rounder. It’s a phone for the over the top, for the people wanting something a bit different, or those wanting the best gaming experience for the lowest price. If you’re one of those people, look no further for a great device, or even wait and see what’s to come next. With the Snapdragon 888 just around the corner, I can say it’s only going to get better. 

You can find this review in full at GBAtemp.net:
https://gbatemp.net/review/powera-enhanced-wired-controller-for-xbox-series-x-s.1615/

In recent years, Xbox controllers have somewhat fallen off my radar. Where they once were the gold standard of compatibility and comfort for PC gaming, we now have widespread support for everything from DualShock 4 to Switch Pro controller through Steam’s simple interface. Beyond that, with varying amounts of effort, you can now go as far as playing Dark Souls with your favourite set of Donkey Konga bongos. Going somewhat back to basics with PowerA’s latest take on the tried and tested Xbox design, how does it hold up in the modern marketplace of quality controllers?

Going by first impression alone, PowerA go out of their way to stress that despite the affordable price, it isn’t a budget controller you’re buying. The packaging screams quality, featuring a magnetic flap to cover the transparent plastic window that behind which lurks the pad itself. I’m a sucker for this kind of packaging, and it always makes me that bit more excited to unwrap its offerings. Inside the box is fairly standard, featuring the controller, a 3m micro USB cable, and a small instruction booklet. The controller being wired-only, it’s incredibly light to hold, weighing in at just 211g according to my kitchen scales. Compare this to the official Recon Tech Xbox One Wireless Controller I have on hand, which comes in at 287g with batteries, and 239g without; PowerA wins out, if only by a little. That is, of course, assuming you prefer a lighter controller. I do understand the allure of something a bit heftier in your hands. The design itself, while not usually my preference, has a surprisingly pleasant feel to it. Where I expected a flat pattern, there sits texture. Each blotch of the camo design can be felt as you move your thumb across the controller, and having had a good scratch at it, I can say they’re fixed firmly in place. If camo isn’t your favourite, the controller also comes in 11 other variants that I could find, so it may yet be worth a look.

Holding it in my hands, it feels as every other Xbox controller I’ve had before it felt. It’s nice. A somewhat bulky design by comparison to the likes of DualShock 4 and Switch Pro controllers, but marvellously comfortable, even for longer sessions. What makes it different to your bog standard Xbox controller though? What does it do to justify that “enhanced” moniker? There’s a few parts here that stand out. First, there’s the headphone jack built into the bottom of the pad. My official controller has this too, but what the official controller doesn’t have is a little rocker to control volume and mute the microphone. It’s a nice touch, but the more significant addition becomes visible when you look on the flipside: programmable buttons! Or, as PowerA call them, “Advanced Gaming Buttons”. I had no idea how much I’d love these.

Now don’t get me wrong, these style of buttons aren’t exactly new. You have companies like SCUF releasing controllers with paddles on the back much in the same vein as this, but those controllers often come at a steep price. At just £30, this is the first controller I’ve been able to use with these extra buttons, and I really wish they were more widespread. With the use of the mapping button, you can put the functionality of the face buttons, D-Pad, bumpers, and triggers, onto these easy to reach extras. I’m quite fond of putting the bumper buttons here as standard, but in games like Ace Combat 7, I’ve had a good time in mapping the buttons for firing and swapping between missiles. With how simple it is to switch these mappings up, much to my delight not requiring additional software, you’re free to switch and swap for every game you come across.

Back to the buttons as a whole, you may be happy to hear that this is technically an Xbox Series X|S controller, and with that, you get the bonus share button. The face buttons are a little heavier to press than my Recon Tech pad, giving a satisfying thud when hit, while avoiding accidental inputs. Both analogue sticks come fitted with “anti-friction rings”, which much to my surprise are more than just PR jargon. These are some of the smoothest analogue sticks I’ve ever had the pleasure of rotating. Even compared to the real deal there’s a slight scraping feel; that just isn’t present here. If I had to find one complaint though, it is where most complaints lie: the D-Pad. I’m not a fan. Where the Recon Tech pad has a delightfully clicky D-Pad with clear feedback as you shift from up, to right, to down, to left, PowerA’s offering is lacklustre. I will say that the D-Pad isn’t so much of a deal breaker in a controller like this when compared to something like 8BitDo’s range, where their focus is more catered to retro gaming, but it’s still disappointing to see an otherwise fantastic controller fall short in such a familiar department.

Is PowerA’s Enhanced Wired Controller worth your money? I’d say so. At almost half the price of the official Xbox Series X|S offering, it is a fantastic and feature-packed choice for anybody who doesn’t necessarily need the freedom that comes with a wireless controller. If you need a second pad for some multiplayer console action, or just something fresh for your PC gaming, give this one a shot. I doubt you’ll regret it.

You can find this review in full at GBAtemp.net:
https://gbatemp.net/review/sakuna-of-rice-and-ruin.1574/

Sakuna: Of Rice and Ruin is a game many people have heard about, subsequently forgotten, and heard about again. First shown in 2016, and featured at three consecutive E3 events, Sakuna has been a long time coming. I’ve found myself excited for it several times over, and now that it’s finally being released, I can say the wait was worth it.

Kicking off on a grand bridge, our story begins with not the titled goddess herself, but a group of lowly humans fleeing a world of strife. Surrounded by fog, their hazy memories blur into the background. Despite an echoing warning to turn back, they press on. They walk, lifeless and void of hope, until an unexpected foe greets them: the armed hoodlum Ishimaru. With no other option, a quivering samurai in the group turns to fight… until a tipsy girl in ornate attire graces the scene. After an offhanded comment comparing her to a child, she promptly smacks Ishimaru off the bridge, before walking back to the banquet to reacquaint herself with “the joy of intoxication”. Once more ignoring advice to turn back, the group follow the girl in hopes of finding food, and it’s here things start to go wrong for our small heroine. The humans work their way through the capital, eventually stumbling across the many offerings of rice and sake for the celestial ruler Lady Kamuhitsuki. In trying to chase them off, Sakuna ultimately knocks over a candle, setting the offerings ablaze, and landing herself in a whole heap of trouble. Her punishment? Banished from the capital, her life of luxury comes to an end, allowed to return only upon ridding the Isle of Demons of… Well, its demons, quite unsurprisingly. With the humans by her side, they set sail for a new life.

I adore the opening sequence. From the music, to the art style, to the voice acting, and even the smaller touches like the story of our human group being told silently as they walk across the heavenly bridge, it’s stylistically marvellous and entirely gripping despite presenting you with very little in actuality. You learn of the two realms, the Lofty and Lowly realm, you learn of the harvest goddesses, you learn of the humans and their plight, and finally, you learn of the spoiled goddess, now separated from her inherited wealth. It sets the stage wonderfully and swings open a delightful door for character development, because let’s face it, Sakuna isn’t a great person.

The monster culling of the game is set in a 2D side scrolling environment oddly reminiscent of Umihara Kawase for its grappling mechanics. Using Sakuna’s Divine Raiment, you’re able to grapple onto walls and enemies alike, propelling you in whichever direction you find yourself latching onto. Add to this a relatively standard mix of light, heavy, and customisable special attacks, and you have a surprisingly robust side scrolling experience, though one I admit didn’t quite gel with me at first. In the beginning especially, the game feels slow. Levels are sparse as you learn mechanics and things are steadily introduced, and while I do appreciate why this is, it made me yearn for something to make it go faster. A dash, a double jump, if nothing else just something to blindly occupy me as I walked through the slower initial areas. I am glad to say this is short-lived though. Once past the first few areas, you struggle to find yourself without something to do on a screen. Be it a platforming challenge, a particularly tricky grapple, or even a more standard encounter of the demon kind, your time is filled in a meaningful way, and it only gets better as you play more. You grow from a clumsy childlike player to something much more as you come to terms with the controls, learn the combos, and unlock more special moves to mix in. It is insanely satisfying to pull off strings of attacks as you dodge and grapple around demons like the cannon fodder of Attack on Titan. This sense of clumsiness and growth go deeper than the combat though, and seep into every aspect of the game.

As a farming goddess, it should come to no surprise that the other half of this game is growing rice. While the combat areas are side scrolling 2D environments, your base camp embraces something more modern, and comes in the form of a stunning 3D mountaintop to freely roam. It’s here you can talk with your new human buddies, rest for the night, eat for stat bonuses, and, as mentioned, grow rice. Starting out with a small field just in front of the cosy shack of a house, the game throws you in at the deep end with the most basic of instructions, before berating you for doing it wrong. I love it. Plant the seeds it said. Well, that’s all it said. You live in the inexperience of Sakuna, and as frustrating as it is to be told you’re not doing a great job, it again leads to this sense of growth. You’re not going to get it perfect the first time, and that’s fine, at least to an extent. My field of sporadically-placed seedlings did ultimately thrive, and I knew I could do better next time. Stick with it and the game rewards you. After a few fields of strewn seedlings, Sakuna gained a skill that put a little grid down for me to see the ideal spacing. After pulling so many weeds, Sakuna gained a skill to spot them more easily. You put in the effort, and you get something for it, not to mention the actual benefits of farming rice. You see, there’s no formal level up system in this game. Instead, your strength comes straight from the quality of your grain, and there’s a brilliant number of factors that go into a perfect harvest. How do you want to balance your fertiliser? Do you want your rice to focus on growth or bonuses when eaten? How close together were your seedlings? Did you pull every weed? Did you harvest soon enough for the crop to dry? It’s so hard to get a perfect result, but it should be. It’s in the etching closer to it where the joy of the game is found.

Clearing out monsters and progressing is a fairly simple process. Each area comes with a list of objectives, and in clearing these, your exploration level increases. As your exploration level increases, you can venture further out, unlocking new areas, and in turn, gaining access to more objectives. These objectives are comparable to the stars of Super Mario 64; you don’t need all of them, but you can skip over a few less desirable ones if you decide to collect everything early on. What you’ll need to do varies from map to map, but it usually boils down to an assortment of “collect X of this”, “defeat X of this”, “find a secret treasure”, or “clear the final part of the area”. While the variety isn’t all that impressive, it doesn’t feel repetitive thanks to the area design. You’ll have some focusing on a gimmick, like launching enemies into things, others with a spotlight on platforming, vertical stages standing out to me in particularly here, and others with multiple zones to work through, sometimes even with a boss at the end. Varying in length and complexity, the game manages to feel fresh without necessarily reinventing the wheel every other stage, and the mix-ups it does throw in keep you engaged in a way where they’re a bonus, in oppose to a focus. A nice example of this is a boss that’s made available to fight right at the start of chapter two. You can fight it right out of the gate, and hey, with enough skill and dedication, you can more than certainly beat it, but you can just as easily fight it and get completely wiped out. You’ll reach a point where you have to pick between going all in to outplay it, or just explore the other areas available to you while you also work on building your strength with farming.

Since each season lasting just three in-game days apiece, it’s easy to shift focus when you find yourself stuck. With the seedlings being planted at the start of spring, harvested at the end of summer, and left to dry throughout autumn, faming is a year-long process, so I’m glad it’s not drawn out too much. While still a primary mechanic, it’s streamlined to the point where it doesn’t feel a chore. It’s a difficult balance to maintain, but I feel it’s done well here. I found myself in a circle of demon hunting until I hit a roadblock, farming in a Rocky-style training montage, and returning to thwart the evil, rice power in hand.

Really, Sakuna: Of Rice and Ruin is a great game. I struggle to summarise it better than that. A unique idea blending two fond genres in farming and 2D fighting, it’s a joy to play, and one I’m more than happy to have waited for.

You can find this review in full at GBAtemp.net:
https://gbatemp.net/review/akaso-keychain.1581/

Cameras find themselves in a strange place nowadays. Unless you’re a professional eager to throw down hundreds of your chosen currency, you’ll often find a smartphone more than able to fulfill your needs. With the good majority of flagship phones capable of 4K and beyond in their video recording, and some midrange devices putting a particular focus on their cameras, it’s easy to resign yourself to thinking a device like they Keychain just doesn’t have a place. 

Straight out of the box, the Keychain has a certain air of quality. Featuring a pivot stand and mount, a magnetic board, a clip, and a handy case, as well as the camera itself, you have everything you need to get stuck right in, regardless of what you plan on recording. The packaging is sleek and simple, much like the product itself, and getting started is as simple as following a few steps on a short manual. The Keychain sports a compact design, its 63x33mm dimensions apparently making it the smallest 4K camera on the market. The device is relatively limited in its hardware buttons, featuring just two on the right side, positioned similarly to a phone volume rocker. To the bottom, you have a compartment home to the USB C charging port, as well as a Micro SD card slot. Finally, the back of the device houses a relatively strong magnet, this used to secure the Keychain in place on a variety of accessories, or prop it on an unassuming fridge should the need ever arise. 

Following the steps on the aforementioned manual to get going is brilliantly simple. You charge it up, plop a Micro SD card in, and that’s all you really need to do. Hold the top button to turn it on, followed by the bottom button to start and stop recording. Just point and shoot, and you’re on your way. It is worth mentioning here that the Keychain won’t function at all without a Micro SD card, and I did find it a little picky with the ones it’d accept. I tried every one of my available Sandisk cards, and none of them worked. As my go-to brand for Micro SD cards, I had a lot of them lying around to test. It ended up being a rogue Kingston card that did the trick, so it might be worth keeping in mind should you decide you want to try this camera for yourself. 

With so few buttons, you may be left wondering just how many options a camera can have, and you’d be right to wonder. You see, to get the most out of the Keychain, you’ll be needing a smartphone handy, as well the AKASO Go app. To connect to the device, you hit the top button until it starts flashing yellow, and connect your phone to it as a WiFi source. I’ve not used a device like this before, so it took a bit of getting used to, but once I’d done it a few times, it became a somewhat trivial process. This setup does mean you can’t use WiFi while being connected to the camera though; a note maybe worth mentioning. Mobile data still functioned as normal though. Through the app, you get a live display of what the camera is pointing at alongside a myriad of fun options to pick between. The most important of these for most will likely be the quality settings. You have the touted 4K/30fps option as default, but looking down the list, there’s plenty more to choose from. To give you the full rundown, you have: 4K/30, 2.7K/60, 2.7K/30, 1080/60, 1080/30, 720/120, and 720/60. On top of these, you also have a few options for slow motion recording, time lapses, and a neat loop mode, that’ll record videos of a set duration that’ll delete earlier recordings as storage fills up. 

Before looking at my limited selection of video clips, I will just preface this by saying we’re currently in a national lockdown, so I haven’t been able to get out much. With that in mind, please enjoy a few clips of me in my back garden on a good spread of the Keychain’s available quality settings. The portrait videos were recorded with the camera mounted to the strap of my backpack, as you might have when hiking, and the landscape ones are just with the camera in my hand. I unfortunately lacked a headband I could clip the camera to see how it’d look. It’s also worth noting that YouTube doesn’t support 120fps videos. I decided to include them either way to give a look at the image quality in a reasonably well-lit setting.

As a quick breakdown of quality, it’s a mixed bag. To my untrained eyes, I’d say the camera excels when in motion, and less so with slow panning shots. I tried to do a few spins and jumps in a futile attempt to show a bit more action, but unfortunately I am somewhat limited in what I can record. I can see the camera doing well attached to a sportsperson, or overlooking something a bit grander than the garden fence, but the current climate makes getting that kind of footage a fair bit more challenging. 

The app does also come with a surprisingly robust set of editing tools, allowing you to splice and dice your clips on the go. Perhaps the best part of this is that the app is free, and is something I would genuinely recommend checking out if you just want an easy way to crop, trim, and combine clips without any kind of real learning curve or effort. Sure some of the filters have untranslated Chinese text under them, but with how much is available given you have no obligation to actually buy an AKASO product, I’m impressed. 

Looking back at the camera, I did find a few notable issues in my time using it.  The most significant of these was the camera simply freezing; there is no way to turn it off if this happens. During my testing, I found myself recording short ten second videos in each of the camera’s available quality settings. Switching between these in the app is easy, but on selecting the 4K option, the app became unresponsive, along with the camera itself. From here on, nothing I did had an effect. The app wouldn’t connect to the camera, and neither of the camera’s two buttons responded to my wide range of pressing and holding. With no other option, I set it to one side and went to bed, hopeful the battery would be drained by the morning. Now this only happened to me once, but it’s a significant issue considering the camera’s point and click ethos. It’s supposed to be a camera that you can rely on to work when you need it to, and incidents like this, no matter how infrequent, sully the confidence I may otherwise have. The camera does have a reset button of sorts in the form of a pinhole hidden next to the USB C charging port, but it didn’t seem to do anything in this instance. I’d also argue it somewhat unreasonable to expect people to be carrying a pin for the event their camera stops working, but maybe it’s just me that doesn’t carry such a commodity in this day and age. 

Recording in low light is somewhat grainy, but passable all the same, just as long as you stick with 30fps to record. On higher fps settings, you’ll find your footage much darker, though this is more to do with recording at higher framerates than the camera itself. The more frames recorded in a second, the less time the shutter is open for, and the less light is available to each individual frame–that’s the gist of it anyway. While this may just be a quirk of recording at higher framerates, it does pose an interesting issue for the minimalist camera; you need a phone handy to switch between these quality settings. With the two buttons on the device only capable of so much, you’re left in an awkward spot. To me, the Keychain should be the kind of thing you can just throw in a pocket, or in your bag, and use in a pinch. It’s the kind of thing I might want to take with me to record exciting moments, but it gets to a point where you have to question why you aren’t just using your phone. I want to defend the idea as a product you can take with you where you might not want to risk your excessively expensive phone, but I struggle to even do that when a phone is required to access the majority of the camera’s features. You’re left in an awkward place where you have to compromise to achieve what I believe this camera’s intent to be, and it just isn’t ideal. It’s as if they went overboard with the clinical minimalist look and forgot that people might not want to have to fumble around connecting their phone every time they want to switch between simple settings. Even having the option to store two presets to the device would go a long way in mitigating this criticism, but as it stands, it just falls into a weird place for me. 

The AKASO Keychain is an interesting device, I’ll give credit where due. It’s tiny, capable of 4K video, and has a plethora of useful accessories. It’s likely great for climbing, for sports, for recording the great sights you see on a hike, but I simply lack the confidence to want to use it for any of these things. If it decides to freeze up, then what? You’re stuck with a breathtaking view, or a magnificent accomplishment, and no way to share it… Except maybe your phone, which you’ll likely be carrying with you anyway to get the most out of the Keychain. At $99, it may yet be worth a punt as an affordable and relatively versatile little camera, but when it comes to longevity and overall reliability, I’d be hesitant to recommend it. 

You can find this review in full at GBAtemp.net:
https://gbatemp.net/review/8bitdo-sn30-pro.1552/

From so much as looking at the SN30 Pro+, you can see something is different. Embracing modern design principles, 8BitDo have stepped into the present day to deliver a controller that is both stylistic and comfortable for the large-handed among us in extended play sessions. That’s right, an 8BitDo controller has grips for you to hold onto! At a surface level, I can’t deny my conflict. It feels like a compromise on the traditional designs they’ve so fondly embraced time after time, making it look like any other third party controller from a distance. On the other hand, however, controllers abandoned the old-world’s flat design for a reason, and using this controller for around a week at the time of writing, I can say I do thoroughly appreciate how it feels to hold.

With three colour variants available, you still have your recognisable Nintendo designs, should you want them. While the iconic Super Famicom buttons are surprisingly absent here, in its place you can choose from an American SNES design, one based on the original Game Boy, and for those wanting something a little more plain, a simple black design. It’s a reasonable range to choose from, and the Game Boy design I have definitely looks the part; I just can’t fathom why 8BitDo would favour the American SNES controller over the widely more popular European and Japanese design. It’s an odd choice, but I’m sure some will still favour the concave X and Y buttons that come with the purple beast.

On the features side, the SN30 Pro+ packs everything the SN30 Pro did, with a few nice additions. That means you have all your standard buttons for Switch gaming, including a screenshot and home button, as well as the more uncommon motion control and rumble functionality. Too many third party controllers miss out on these, so it’s great to see 8BitDo continue to deliver on complete functionality. You do of course miss out on Amiibo support, and the rumble remains standard definition, but these are the luxuries you pay twice as much for when you buy Nintendo’s Pro Controller. Perhaps the most strange addition to the controller when compared to its predecessor is the inclusion of analogue triggers; after all, the Switch’s ZL and ZR buttons are digital. Though they have little impact on the controller’s performance on the Switch, these triggers feel divine, and sit on par with that of a PS4 controller’s. With 8BitDo’s great range of compatibility in mind, you’ll find these triggers coming in handy if you decide to use the pad on the PC, be it for your regular bout of PC gaming, or something like GameCube emulation.

The biggest standout feature comes from the companion app: 8BitDo Ultimate Software. If you can get past the cheesy name, you have a genuinely fantastic tool to support an already great pad. First, it handles updates for you. I’m quite fond of this, even if it is somewhat basic of a feature. The more exciting stuff comes after your controller is up to date though; 8BitDo really went to town. Not only can you remap every button, you can customise analogue stick sensitivity, vibration strength, and even create simple macros. What is a bit of a shame to me is that there’s no kind of option to setup the triggers for the Switch. While you can customise the stick sensitivity for the XInput mode, it would’ve been great to see more options here. For example, if you were able to map one button to a trigger if it’s held down up to 80% of the way, and another if it’s held down more than 80% of the way, you’d essentially have Mario Sunshine‘s analogue shooting in its 3D All-Stars release. I’ll admit this is a bit of an obscure desire, but I do hope something like this gets implemented down the line. For the bulk of my time with the controller, the triggers, while delightfully smooth to press, felt useless to me. Overall though, the software is brilliantly simple to use, and even lets you save profiles you can load onto the controller as you want them. You basically get all the configuration options available to an official Nintendo controller, and a cherry on top.

When using the controller, there are two parts that should be scrutinised more than the rest: the analogue sticks and the D-Pad. After all, these are your two main portals to controlling your characters, and with Joy-Con lacking a D-Pad, there are many understandably eager to find their perfect third party controller. In this respect, the SN30 Pro+ might not be for you. The D-Pad is fine, but that’s about as far as I’d take it. I’m perfectly comfortable using it to navigate menus, but as a primary means of control, it just doesn’t feel fantastic. The directional inputs lack a degree of definition. You hold right, and it feels as though you might also be holding up or down. When looking at D-Pads on the Switch, I’ve yet to find a controller to match the feel of Hori’s Pokken Pro Pad. If you’re after a controller for your platformers, definitely check that one out. Having said that though, the analogue sticks are great. The motion controls are great. The buttons feel great. Put simply, the controller, as a whole, is great, and for the vast majority of games, you’ll have a blast. If you’re primarily moving with the analogue stick, there’s amazingly little to complain about; it’s comfortable, it’s responsive, and it has the classic 8BitDo support for multiple platforms.

This is a controller that excels in every aspect except the one that people will probably be looking to it for, but to me, this alone shouldn’t be enough to put you off. The SN30 Pro+ is a fantastic controller as long as you know what you’re buying it for. As long as it isn’t the D-Pad, you’ll be having a blast.

You can find this review in full at GBAtemp.net:
https://gbatemp.net/review/minisforum-x35g-mini-pc.1545/

Now, for a site like ours, a mini PC makes for an interesting review. Our banner marks us as an independent gaming community, and make no mistake, this isn’t something that’s going to be replacing your gaming rigs or consoles any time soon. Sporting a 10th generation Intel Core i3 processor, paired with Intel’s integrated UHD graphics, what we have here is a machine aiming to deliver reasonable performance in a compact package. You can check out the full specs straight from Minisforum below:

• Processor: 10th Gen Intel® Core™ i3 1005G1 Processors 2 Core/4 Threads Base Frequency 1.2GHz，Max Turbo Frequency 3.4GHz 4 MB Intel® Smart Cache TDP 15W
• GPU: Intel® UHD Graphics (300MHz – 900MHz)
• Memory: DDR4 – 3200MHz 16GB (Onboard)
• Storage: 1×M.2 2280 NVME SSD (PCIe 3.0 4X) Intel® Optane™ Memory Supported
• Storage Expansion: 1×2.5 inch SATA3.0 HDD or SSD Support , 1×M.2 2280 SATA SSD Support
• Wireless Connectivity: M.2 2230 WIFI support (Intel® WIFI6 AX200, BT 5.1 pre-install)
• Video Output: HDMI 2.0 (4K@60Hz), Display Port (4K@60Hz)，USB-C (Thunderbolt 3 5K@60Hz)
• Audio Output: HDMI 2.0, Display Port, 3.5mm audio jack
• Peripherals Interface: RJ45 Gigabit Ethernet×2, USB 3.1 Gen2 ×2, USB 2.0×2, USB-C×1, TF card Slot×1, DC Jack×1
• Power DC: 19V/1.9A (adapter included) or via USB-C Port
• System: Windows 10 Pro
• Feature: RTC wake up/Wake on Lan/Power on auto power on (BIOS setting) / Network boot

On paper, what excited me most was the storage expansion options, and the sheer number of ports. To start with the storage, this little box has the capacity to house not one, but three storage devices: two M2, and one 2.5 inch SATA. The small caveat here is that the second M2 port is only capable of supporting M2 SATA SSDs, in oppose to the superior NVMe drives. It’s not a huge deal, but it’s something to be aware of to avoid buying something that flat out won’t work with the PC …like I ended up doing. I did manage to try out the 2.5 inch SATA port though. After unpacking the contents of the PC, you just have to plug in a small included cable, and fit the drive into grooves along the top of the case. Once you’ve done that, you just put everything back together and it works with no issues. I’ve tried a 500 GB SSD I had lying around, as well as a 2 TB HDD that I bought specifically for it, and both worked with no issues.

Looking to ports, there are frankly a lot, which is great for such a compact device. On the back you have four USB 2.0 ports, two ethernet ports, a HDMI 2.0 port, as well as a DisplayPort …port. To the side, there’s a small slot for a micro SD card, and on the front you have two USB 3.1, the power button, and the one Thunderbolt 3 port. Now it’s the last of these many slots and spots that had me particularly excited. As the owner of a Razer Core X Chroma eGPU, there was a not-so-insignificant part of me that thought it’d be hilarious to throw some hefty games at the PC Minisforum themselves marketed as a learning computer that will “prevent children from indulging in games”. Unfortunately, it just wasn’t to be. Despite my best efforts, the Thunderbolt device wasn’t detected at all. I tried reinstalling Windows 10, I tried drivers old and new, but nothing seemed to work. We’re going to have to accept what we have here for what it is, and for what it does not have; the eGPU simply wasn’t meant to be.

GPU or otherwise, I did still want to see what I could run comfortably on it. Obviously, your retro collection are a safe bet; up to N64 is all but a guarantee on any modern PC, mini or otherwise. Where things start to get a bit more interesting is when looking at the GameCube and beyond. I find myself genuinely surprised this box of wonders can handle this generation of gaming, and it handles it admirably. From my small assortment of games, I tried Smash Bros. Melee and Brawl, Xenoblade Chronicles, Zelda Wind Waker and Twilight Princess, Fire Emblem; they all ran at full speed. The only flaws I could notice were in the Smash Bros. games, where the emulation would stutter maybe once every three or four minutes for around half a second, so while I wouldn’t recommend this for the most competitive seekers of perfection among us, it really did blow me away with its capabilities considering the marketing line I’ve had fun mocking. Admittedly, you could only get this performance with the bog standard settings, with no kind of upscaling and prettification. For the beefier stuff, you’ll likely find yourself needing a discrete GPU of some sort.

Moving past emulation and onto the larger sphere of PC gaming as a whole, I once again find myself pleasantly surprised. With the Fatalis update of Monster Hunter World having recently released a few weeks ago, I’ve found myself somewhat eager to play, but haven’t had time. Setting some aside to slay two elder dragons with one bomb pod, I decided to see exactly what state I could get the game running in on the X35G. It’s magnificent.

In the video, I fight a few Barroths to get my bearings again, and take on a Kushala Daora to see if its ever-irritating whirlwinds and effects will push the game a bit too far. Don’t get me wrong, it doesn’t look fantastic, but by my standards it definitely hits the playable mark. Maintaining a relatively steady 30fps with a stutter here and there, I can confidently say it runs better than the PS4 version on a non-pro console. Jokes aside, I’ll reiterate something I said earlier: this won’t replace your gaming rig. That said, it does a good job in a pinch, and can handle less strenuous games like Stardew Valley effortlessly. Playing Monster Hunter World did go some ways in amplifying my disappointment that my eGPU wouldn’t work, though this will likely not be a concern for many with how uncommon eGPUs are as a whole. While I’ve only touched on a few games when looking at what it can do, if there’s anything specific you want to see running on the X35G, be it emulated or otherwise, let me know in the comments, and I’ll try my best to make it happen.

Away from gaming, Minisforum put a lot of effort into advertising the versatility of the system. Whether you want a box to be hooked up to a projector, something to manage your security system, a mini media centre, or even a low-spec gaming hub, there’s a bit of something for everybody. With WiFi 6 support on top of its other offerings, you also have a somewhat future-proofed device, even if you don’t currently have the capability to use everything available to its fullest. 

The big question left to answer is whether it does enough to justify its price. With the PC recently going live on Indiegogo, it’s available in three varieties: a base model with no included storage, a model with a 256 GB NVMe SSD (this being what I received), and a model with an Optane SSD and a 1 TB HDD. These are currently listed at $349 (£271), $399 (£310), and $429 (£333) respectively. To me, it’s about right for what I’d be willing to pay. As a package, I don’t believe it’s so much a bargain as Minisforum asking a reasonable price given the device’s capability, design, and form factor. It’s a sturdy little box that managed to surprise me several times over, and something I genuinely recommend if you’re in the market for an all-round great mini PC setup. Minisforum have made something really quite great.

You can find this review in full at GBAtemp.net:
https://gbatemp.net/review/rha-trueconnect-2-wireless-bluetooth-earbuds.1541/

When given the opportunity to review RHA’s latest earbuds, two thoughts prevailed: I wonder if they’ll send some of that delightful chocolate again, and exactly what was there left to improve on their previous design? While I may be lamenting the lack of chocolate this time around, I’m happy to share all that’s changed, and all that’s stayed the same, in RHA’s somewhat iterative TrueConnect upgrade.

From the outside looking in, it’s hard to notice any difference at all. If the TrueConnect 2 unit I received wasn’t navy blue, in oppose to the black variant of the original product I own, I have no doubt I’d have had difficulties myself. The case remains the same shape, the same size, with the same premise. It’s sleek, it does a good job of protecting the earbuds, and it can charge them while they’re safely stored away. It ticks all the same boxes it did before, now with almost double the battery life–44 hours total versus the previous 25, with the earbuds themselves going for nine hours before needing to be put back in their case. It’s an impressive mark-up given the complete lack of changes when it comes to form factor, but with the case, that’s about all that differs. The more exciting changes however lurk on the earbuds themselves.

Now when I say exciting, you again won’t notice much on the surface. The earbuds sport the same stalks as the original TrueConnect in an attempt to put the mic closer to your mouth, as well as increase overall connectivity by moving the Bluetooth antenna that little bit closer to your device. Not to mention the extra space to actually fit the hardware. Physically, there’s one major change, and I’m on the fence on whether I like it: the mechanical button on each earbud has been replaced with a perhaps more standard capacitive touch sensor. I can understand the rationale behind this; the buttons were fairly sturdy, and to activate them, you’d need to put a not-insignificant amount of force to them. In doing this, the earbuds may be pushed further into your ear or move slightly, detracting from the overall experience. On the other hand, the intentional nature of the buttons were a significant positive. You wouldn’t find yourself accidentally pausing your music or skipping songs. With the touch sensors, this is far easier to do. I go to scratch my ear, the music stops. I go to adjust my hair, the music stops. They’re small actions, but they do affect how I use the earbuds. It’s something I have no doubt I’ll eventually adjust to, but whether you prefer mechanical or touch buttons may have a larger impact on how you experience the TrueConnect 2.

When it comes to audio quality, I struggle to find complaint. This is everything I loved about the original TrueConnect: clear audio without any excessive bass or notable unbalance when listening to a variety of music. From Megadeth to Westlife to Powerwolf to the Initial D Discography, everything just sounds as it should. For those bass enthusiasts who like their ears thumping, they might not be the most impressive, but as a generalist pair of true wireless earbuds they really do sound magnificent. Having gone to and from the original TrueConnect and their successor, it’s hard for me to really find much of a difference in quality, with the only notable change being the maximum volume. The TrueConnect 2 definitely gets louder should you crank it up.

Though listening to music would always be my number one recommendation for any kind of Bluetooth audio device, they are capable of more, depending on your tolerance for delay. With a very unscientific test, I measured my reaction speed using my laptop’s speakers, and pitted it against the TrueConnect 2. Averaging 177ms with the speakers and 437ms with the TrueConnect 2, we can estimate the delay to be around 260ms. I tried using them to play Pokémon Emerald and came into no real issues, but with games requiring speedy reactions to audio cues, you’re obviously going to struggle. For videos, you can however usually adjust the audio delay in your favourite media player’s settings, so you shouldn’t find issue there.

The final upgrades worth mentioning fall in three areas. The first is slightly better resistance, IP55 up from IPX5, meaning they fare a little better against dust, albeit not entirely impervious to those tiny particles. Next, we have improved connectivity thanks to a new chip used. While I never came into issues with the original TrueConnect’s connectivity range, it’s difficult to find fault in the improvement here. Finally, we have a twofold increase in microphones. Instead of just having one per bud, there’s now one on the stem, and one near the button. The idea here is that the stem mic will better detect your voice, while the button mic will better pick up external noise, allowing it to identify and eliminate unwanted background noise. From my experience it does seem to work well enough, but they’re still just microphones on a pair of true wireless earbuds. There’s only so much you can squeeze into their tiny form factor, and I’m glad to see the focus is on audio. Though a marked improvement all the same, and perfectly good for use with a smart assistant or for making a call, they’re not something I’d recommend for anything more than that.

For those in search of a quality pair of true wireless earbuds, I find myself once again putting RHA on a pedestal. The TrueConnect 2 are fantastic, let there be no doubt of that, and £20 cheaper than their predecessor at £129.95, they’re even easier to recommend. If my experience with the original TrueConnect is anything to go by, these are earbuds that will last you, and last you well.