Evercade VS, we tried the rear console in the "home" version

Evercade VS

Discussions on retrogaming now always tend to go in two main directions: the first is that of pure nostalgia, with joyful memories of their experiences as a gamer grappling with the classics of the Amiga or Commodore (assuming you are our advanced age, if not, the platforms are quite different); the second, on the other hand, focuses on the so-called "gray zone" of legality, and focuses on emulation and its importance in the historical preservation of videogames of past eras.

Recovering some great games of past generations, in fact, is less simple than one might think and, leaving aside the fact that to date it is not even obvious to have a TV equipped with a SCART socket, there are not many digital services that allow you to easily download the entire libraries of the glorious hardware that supported the protogaming. For heaven's sake, there are those who have done a great job in this area - GOG has been invaluable if only to preserve the classics on PC - but in general the safest option is always emulating, and this is certainly not openly supported. by those who hold the rights to the titles sought (except in rare cases).

To those who have moral dilemmas related to this situation, today the Evercade VS comes to help in Italy: the home version of the retro portable console homonymous. A nice object that "officially emulates" a long list of games, through beautiful (and nostalgic) cartridges. We tried Evercade VS in Koch Media's Milan offices, and today we will give you our impressions.

A beautiful object

Evercade VS: the console is small and elegant The Evercade is a tiny console, reminiscent of a more modern and refined version of a Famicom (the color scheme is about the same). It felt pretty solid and well-made, and even its pads - modeled to resemble those of the NES, but with a number of modern pad keys - show some attention to detail. For heaven's sake, these aren't amazing quality peripherals, however they do their job worthily and are perfectly suited to the proposed titles.

During the test we had both purchasable bundles containing the console available: the starter pack contains only a pad and a Technos Arcade cartridge (with eight titles, including Double Dragon II, and The Combatribes), while the Premium Pack adds another controller and a cartridge with 10 Data East games (among the best currently available, in all sincerity). Once you have everything, the operation of the console is very simple: it has an HDMI cable about three meters long, four USB sockets for peripherals and can hold two cartridges at a time. The interface, moreover, is incredibly intuitive, it immediately shows the games present in the cartridges on the screen as soon as they are inserted, and can do so even if you replace them with the console on. All in all? The cost of the two packages, respectively 99 euros and 129 euros, seems quite sensible to us for the invoice of the object, which it transmits to the screen with a resolution of 1080p.

At the moment the titles available for the Evercade VS are the same as the portable version, which in turn is obviously compatible with cartridges. Overall we are talking about almost 300 titles from various retrogaming eras, according to the list on the official website.

Emulation slap-up

Evercade VS: the cartridges are contained in some pleasant packs, complete with manuals For the record, despite this aesthetic attachment to the gaming of the past, the Evercade is an emulation machine, and as such has various advanced features of the best programs in circulation. This means that for each game you play you will have save points to start from, filters and various graphic options (obviously including scanlines), and in general superior performance to the original ones. There are no features such as the ability to play in slow motion or rewind present in some very advanced emulators, yet it is not certain that these options will not be added in the future. We have had the opportunity to test several cartridges during our test and, apart from very rare visual artifacts in a couple of games (nothing really worrying or annoying anyway), we think the experience is almost flawless. If that wasn't enough, the console can connect via wi-fi for updates to individual games and the interface. You will not be able toa> play online or download the leaderboards.

Of course, not the whole list of games is absolutely to be played, and there are titles that to date do not retain an ounce of their original charm. For our part, however, we have grown up a lot by getting our hands on pearls like the games of the Bitmap Brothers (The Chaos Engine above all), or Earthworm Jim in the Interplay Collection. Fewer butterflies in the stomach instead caused us to throw ourselves back on many of the Atari games, understandably, while understanding their historical importance in the medium.

Curiously among the Evercade cartridges there are also new games: the Mega Cat Studios cartridge it literally contains some rom hacks of pre-existing titles, and it was interesting to test the Strider and River City Ransom variants of this small software house. Even here, however, do not expect fine masterpieces ... they are in general more complex than the games from which they take inspiration, but we can hardly define them as modern video games.

Evercade VS: the open door Well, we're out satisfied by the direct test of the Evercade VS, it seemed to us a more than respectable hardware with a reasonable price, and although not equipped with all the possible features and perfect in terms of games list, it represents a beautiful nostalgia operation, apparently much more accurate than many other views in the past.

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