Yes I agree! Been narrates precision. Light gun companies should employ him when designing product. He has helped me repair my arcade guns and saved me lots of money over the years
damn, I have no knowledge of these things, but I found your whole video engaging and interesting, I was on the look for a PC compatible controller for light gun games when I found this channel, awesome video man.
Thank you very much! You might want to check out episode 251: That light gun is very similar, but clearly the superior product. =) th-cam.com/video/HdfWBJzIrHU/w-d-xo.html
Calling out the distributor, correcting information from another youtuber (lol his face where you paused it), justifying why the price was inflated, flaws with the software, and inability to adjust the tracking sensitivity. This video had it all and I was glued to it the whole time. Feels like ergonomics, ease of us, and more importantly accuracy should always be the primary goal with with flash being secondary.
Most thorough review available. Who actually makes the mainboard? Feedback without the solenoid is just cost cutting. Mass produced big name boards would allow main mfg software and calibration utilities.
Thank you Edwin, that's a kind thing to say! The board is made by 3A Game Electronic Technology themselves. They actually solder many of their products by hand still, without assembly robots. They have a few videos available showing the process. Very likable!
This is why calibeation and aiming for perfecrion is so important when it comes to lightguns for me. With so many historically inaccurate or weird guns on the market, it will be hard to even compete unless you're selling to the lowest common denominator. The mold is great, but it can be so so much better. At that price, one can go for any of the better competitors however. I would rather get a second Sinden. As always, excellent review.
Thank you very much for your support, Kitch! Indeed, a nice calibration procedure and good sites are paramount. It makes it all the more puzzling how companies can mess this up :D Also you are right about the price! This supposed "budget solution" is too expensive for what it offers in my opinion.
I assume Retro Shooter is using Sam's Samco code base. That one isn't as accurate as Gun4IR or Sinden, even when using four spots. The only reason to get a Retroshooter is the subpar emulation box. But that one is also inferior to competitiors such as the OneHit (Pandora Gun Max). Ultimarc is not perfect, but priced more reasionable. =)
Another great video! Good assesmment of the gun with its strengths and weaknesses. Pity they dont make tweaking its settings a bit easier for the user. The split design is pretty neat. Shame about the recoil feedback though.
Thank you very much, Chuck. The lack of on-the-fly calibration is among what nags me the most. It wouldn't be as much of a problem if the calibration wizard would run more reliable, but the two problems combined equals a bit of a pity :D
About that misinformation: yeah retro ralph isn't a reliable source. if anything, he kept lying about the price and the capability of the gun overselling it, and of the pandora box.
@@Boojakascha According to the official website, you have to get the Pandora with the guns. And those Onemore guns you mentioned in the video, they cost over $700
This is a great review. Unfortunately it is essentially immediately outdated as Retro Shooter has permanently switch to using a 4 point system. It is possible to order and upgrade for your current light guns for $91, but any new customers will receive the 4 point system guns. Will you be reviewing the 4 point system guns? I am curious as to how they perform vs other 4 point systems such as Gun4IR.
Luckily the information on the built quality and such remains valid =) No, right now I don't plan review the Retro Shooter upgrade package. But I will be getting the Pandra Gun Max in the mail soon! :)
Do you have a link to where I can purchase this 4-point upgrade? I can't find it anywhere on their website. I have their guns only package with the PC hub and have been quite happy with it but two more points of reference could only serve to improve the experience. So I'm definitely interested.
@@HeavyInstinct Here you are, Sir: retroshooter.com/checkout-sens4/ let me know what you think of them, once you get them. I am still not planning to purchase those.
@@BoojakaschaThanks man. Much appreciated. Their website sure has a crappy design. I had a heck of a time finding the guns and PC hub only package when I purchased mine. I was definitely not interested in the Pandora box console. Looks like they're out of stock at the moment but I'll definitely leave you a reply if I get them down the road.
Hi Ben, a lot of people are raving about the RS3 Reaper Kit. Is this the same one you have in your review or is RS3 Reaper Kit a newer model? Also have you seen Openfire and blamcon?
@@MickMacklerack The RS3 in entierly new gun. I have that one, but haven't tested it yet. The button locations, feeling, look and built quality seem very good. Also I think this time around they use a solenoid =) I have not yet tried open fire, because I want to test the original Samco first :D (also already at home but no time yet) Currently I am not interested in checking out Blamcon.
@@Boojakascha Thank you Ben. Looking forward to your video. I use namco reproduction guns ("Named") with gin4ir on my cabinet. They have solenoid and rumble. I can't really fault them other than the DIY nature of the build and the LED sensors I use are a bit ugly around the monitor. Interested to hear your views on the RS3 since you are the light gun guru! If it has rumble as well a solenoid it might be the new all round winner?
@@MickMacklerack The build of the RS3 Reaper seems very nice. On the original Retro Shooter the bad PC configuration program, the limited configurability and the tracking quality were the issues. I really don't know whether they tried to address these points.
The "confusing things about power loss" that you see claimed on their website is not at all about "not knowing the difference between battery powered and wall-powered" light guns. It's pretty obvious to me that they are referring to the Sinden light guns which are notorious for the fact that their recoil will start to bog down after several seconds of fully automatic fire. This is because they are bus-powered rather than having a dedicated power supply like the retro shooter guns do. Surely you must know this? Other than that I felt this was a good and fair review. Although I'm a bit surprised at the claim of "subpar force feedback performance". Admittedly I don't have any other light guns to compare it to but I have found the recoil on these guns to feel and sound quite satisfying.
I know how the Sinden Lightgun works, because I reviewed it. But your suspected explanation would make even less sense, wouldn't it? A whole class of items is described misleadingly and falsely, because in the world there is one single object, that charges it's solenoid via a capacitor? A charging/powering design which 3A wouldn't have to do, because they are powering their motor externally anyways? So using a solenoid wouldn't have a power loss disadvantage for 3A at all? And besides, the adjustable cadency decides how much time the capacitor has to recharge and I don't think the Retro Shooter Lightgun has a higher cadency than what the Sinden Lightgun could do, while still staying reasonably impactful. Have you seen any comment by the manufacturer or the Canadian vendor on that topic? What I find subpar about the force feedback of the Retroshooter Lightgun is the delay: It takes way too long between pressing the trigger and having the pistol being knocked.
I agree that the way they word things is a bit sketchy. I'm just saying I think that's a much more likely explanation then you're suggestion that they're referring to some sort of battery-powered option. And no I haven't seen them comment on this particular thing. That's just the first thing that came to mind when I read the information on their website.
Nice video but it's pretty funny you took screenshots of comments from Facebook stating we don't know how the system works. That was a joke, of course they emit IR light, but most people refer to them as sensors so to make it easy for people we call them sensors.
Looking at the conversation in question I am not really convinced, I must say. Even if it was a joke, wouldn't you agree that teaching false terminology to your customers won't gain you anything? I find it particularly unlucky considering - IR light guns that indeed swap the IR light and sensor position (IR LEDs in gun, sensor at the TV) - IR light emitting guns which are used with photo diodes (toys and Tiger games) - IR laser emitting guns used with full fledged cameras in shooting theaters and in MARS.
@@Boojakascha ok, you win. It was not a funny joke. But you should have read the whole post with all the comments in order to see everything that was said not just cherry pick one thing and say that we don't know what we are talking about. We are clearly the only ones selling this, obviously we will know what we are talking about. We also did design it with 3A. They didn't come up with the idea, we asked them to make it for us. Our logo is on the side of the mold. Anyway, you did go into some good detail on your video, good job.
No idea how you can say the accuracy/precision is "very good". I've tried on various monitors, screen resolution (720p, 1080p, 2k, 4k), from various distance without moving an inch (1 to 5 meters), distancing both IR group leds or making them a tiny bit closer. No effect, the results were the same. It is bad. Either there's a very special way to calibrate that I'm not aware of, or the hardware of the guns I have is simply poor/defective. Edit: I had to move even further away, similar to the AE LightGun to start getting a "good" calibration. This is almost two times worst than the wiimote.
Hi, @LightGunMan Accuracy and precision are not the same thing. To get good accuracy out of the Retro Shooter Lightgun, you have to use a small screen and play from a large distance. Because it's a two points system, the accuracy suffers if the distance or angle to the screen change. And now think of it for a moment. What changes (even if you keep staying in place) when you are super close to a huge screen and aim for the corners of the monitor? For the Wii Remote the same limitations apply. On the original console, there is an additional dependence which Remote you use in particular. Often people have better success placing the IR lights fairly far apart. At the Retro Shooter Lightgun, how good of a calibration you can achieve, is also hindered by the wizard. It's narrowly time limited and won't give you the means to tweak and offset calibration manually, thus leaving you at the mercy of the moment, demanding as many repetitions of calibration as necessary, until you reach a good accuracy.
I love how we ended off with a critique of the screwdriver.
To be fair, it's an insult of a screwdriver! :D
Gold
Just wanted to say that I love your channel. Light gun games deserve a lot of love, and your voice is sooooooooooo soothing.
Thank you!
Pan-European accent for the win! :D
Yes I agree! Been narrates precision. Light gun companies should employ him when designing product. He has helped me repair my arcade guns and saved me lots of money over the years
I really enjoy your reviews. Is it possible you might repeat this one with the 4 led version? I wonder how much the performance might have improved.
Thank you very much! =)
I obtained the upgrade pack recently. I will look into the topic eventually. Right now I am on sick leave^^
Surprise how good these guns look.
^^ I agree. I like the Glock-With-Flashlight look. Reminds me of Metal Gear (eventhough they used a H&K SOCOM)
damn, I have no knowledge of these things, but I found your whole video engaging and interesting, I was on the look for a PC compatible controller for light gun games when I found this channel, awesome video man.
Thank you very much! You might want to check out episode 251: That light gun is very similar, but clearly the superior product. =)
th-cam.com/video/HdfWBJzIrHU/w-d-xo.html
@@Boojakascha You are the absolute goat, I'll be sure to check this one out!
@@ElvenImmortal thank you, Sir. I am glad that I was of help :)
Wow brilliant review !
Thank you!
5:56 My man! Is that SIM card ejector?
Excellent video as always man, neat to see a proper breakdown on this system.
You Sir, have the eyes of an eagle! =)
It's a SIM card ejector indeed :D
Thank you very much! I am glad you liked it!
Calling out the distributor, correcting information from another youtuber (lol his face where you paused it), justifying why the price was inflated, flaws with the software, and inability to adjust the tracking sensitivity. This video had it all and I was glued to it the whole time. Feels like ergonomics, ease of us, and more importantly accuracy should always be the primary goal with with flash being secondary.
Thank you so much for your feedback =)
I am very glad that you were able to enjoy all facets of the video :D
Most thorough review available. Who actually makes the mainboard? Feedback without the solenoid is just cost cutting. Mass produced big name boards would allow main mfg software and calibration utilities.
Thank you Edwin, that's a kind thing to say!
The board is made by 3A Game Electronic Technology themselves. They actually solder many of their products by hand still, without assembly robots. They have a few videos available showing the process. Very likable!
Love this episode
Thank you, I am glad to hear that =)
Love Ur videos we'll post this on FB via Light gun Lunatics
Thanks a lot for the support! It's much appreciated! =)
I just saw that retro shooter updated with 4 sensors now. Would love to hear your review on that.
Sadly the upgrade kit is out of print already. Right now I don't intend to try to get one.
This is why calibeation and aiming for perfecrion is so important when it comes to lightguns for me. With so many historically inaccurate or weird guns on the market, it will be hard to even compete unless you're selling to the lowest common denominator.
The mold is great, but it can be so so much better. At that price, one can go for any of the better competitors however. I would rather get a second Sinden.
As always, excellent review.
Thank you very much for your support, Kitch!
Indeed, a nice calibration procedure and good sites are paramount. It makes it all the more puzzling how companies can mess this up :D
Also you are right about the price! This supposed "budget solution" is too expensive for what it offers in my opinion.
The retro shooter is now sold with four sensors and different lenses. Would you recommend retro shooter or ultimark for general use?
I assume Retro Shooter is using Sam's Samco code base. That one isn't as accurate as Gun4IR or Sinden, even when using four spots. The only reason to get a Retroshooter is the subpar emulation box. But that one is also inferior to competitiors such as the OneHit (Pandora Gun Max). Ultimarc is not perfect, but priced more reasionable. =)
Another great video! Good assesmment of the gun with its strengths and weaknesses. Pity they dont make tweaking its settings a bit easier for the user. The split design is pretty neat. Shame about the recoil feedback though.
Thank you very much, Chuck. The lack of on-the-fly calibration is among what nags me the most. It wouldn't be as much of a problem if the calibration wizard would run more reliable, but the two problems combined equals a bit of a pity :D
About that misinformation: yeah retro ralph isn't a reliable source. if anything, he kept lying about the price and the capability of the gun overselling it, and of the pandora box.
:(
Is the game show after the 10 minute mark "The shoot"?
It's called Mad Bullets & it's on Steam :D
Thanks.@@Boojakascha
you are back, great, thanks for the entertainment!
Thank you, Attila!
It's nice being back, I hope I can keep it up and make more videos soon :)
Interesting, I should get them myself
Will you get them lose, or are you looking into buying the gun(s) plus Pandora system bundle? The latter costs more, but is the better deal overall :D
@@Boojakascha According to the official website, you have to get the Pandora with the guns. And those Onemore guns you mentioned in the video, they cost over $700
ben youre back!! miss ur videos!
Thank you, Ray! =)
I hope I will keep my pace now better and won't make another large gap^^
This is a great review. Unfortunately it is essentially immediately outdated as Retro Shooter has permanently switch to using a 4 point system. It is possible to order and upgrade for your current light guns for $91, but any new customers will receive the 4 point system guns.
Will you be reviewing the 4 point system guns? I am curious as to how they perform vs other 4 point systems such as Gun4IR.
Luckily the information on the built quality and such remains valid =)
No, right now I don't plan review the Retro Shooter upgrade package. But I will be getting the Pandra Gun Max in the mail soon! :)
Do you have a link to where I can purchase this 4-point upgrade? I can't find it anywhere on their website. I have their guns only package with the PC hub and have been quite happy with it but two more points of reference could only serve to improve the experience. So I'm definitely interested.
@@HeavyInstinct
Here you are, Sir:
retroshooter.com/checkout-sens4/
let me know what you think of them, once you get them. I am still not planning to purchase those.
@@BoojakaschaThanks man. Much appreciated. Their website sure has a crappy design. I had a heck of a time finding the guns and PC hub only package when I purchased mine. I was definitely not interested in the Pandora box console. Looks like they're out of stock at the moment but I'll definitely leave you a reply if I get them down the road.
Hi Ben, a lot of people are raving about the RS3 Reaper Kit. Is this the same one you have in your review or is RS3 Reaper Kit a newer model? Also have you seen Openfire and blamcon?
@@MickMacklerack The RS3 in entierly new gun. I have that one, but haven't tested it yet. The button locations, feeling, look and built quality seem very good. Also I think this time around they use a solenoid =)
I have not yet tried open fire, because I want to test the original Samco first :D (also already at home but no time yet)
Currently I am not interested in checking out Blamcon.
@@Boojakascha Thank you Ben. Looking forward to your video. I use namco reproduction guns ("Named") with gin4ir on my cabinet. They have solenoid and rumble. I can't really fault them other than the DIY nature of the build and the LED sensors I use are a bit ugly around the monitor. Interested to hear your views on the RS3 since you are the light gun guru! If it has rumble as well a solenoid it might be the new all round winner?
@@MickMacklerack The build of the RS3 Reaper seems very nice. On the original Retro Shooter the bad PC configuration program, the limited configurability and the tracking quality were the issues. I really don't know whether they tried to address these points.
The "confusing things about power loss" that you see claimed on their website is not at all about "not knowing the difference between battery powered and wall-powered" light guns. It's pretty obvious to me that they are referring to the Sinden light guns which are notorious for the fact that their recoil will start to bog down after several seconds of fully automatic fire. This is because they are bus-powered rather than having a dedicated power supply like the retro shooter guns do. Surely you must know this? Other than that I felt this was a good and fair review. Although I'm a bit surprised at the claim of "subpar force feedback performance". Admittedly I don't have any other light guns to compare it to but I have found the recoil on these guns to feel and sound quite satisfying.
I know how the Sinden Lightgun works, because I reviewed it.
But your suspected explanation would make even less sense, wouldn't it?
A whole class of items is described misleadingly and falsely, because in the world there is one single object, that charges it's solenoid via a capacitor? A charging/powering design which 3A wouldn't have to do, because they are powering their motor externally anyways? So using a solenoid wouldn't have a power loss disadvantage for 3A at all?
And besides, the adjustable cadency decides how much time the capacitor has to recharge and I don't think the Retro Shooter Lightgun has a higher cadency than what the Sinden Lightgun could do, while still staying reasonably impactful.
Have you seen any comment by the manufacturer or the Canadian vendor on that topic?
What I find subpar about the force feedback of the Retroshooter Lightgun is the delay: It takes way too long between pressing the trigger and having the pistol being knocked.
I agree that the way they word things is a bit sketchy. I'm just saying I think that's a much more likely explanation then you're suggestion that they're referring to some sort of battery-powered option. And no I haven't seen them comment on this particular thing. That's just the first thing that came to mind when I read the information on their website.
Well, your explanation might indeed be correct^^ But I would have questioned Retroshooter bringing it up anyways :P
your video is classic
Thank you very much, Darksunwu! =)
So expensive tho, not even any ebay offers so you can only buy from the website for 160, wish I could get it but its outta my price range 😭😭
Indeed. I think it's super out of touch from big TH-camrs to call this "the budget solution"...
Nice video but it's pretty funny you took screenshots of comments from Facebook stating we don't know how the system works. That was a joke, of course they emit IR light, but most people refer to them as sensors so to make it easy for people we call them sensors.
Looking at the conversation in question I am not really convinced, I must say.
Even if it was a joke, wouldn't you agree that teaching false terminology to your customers won't gain you anything?
I find it particularly unlucky considering
- IR light guns that indeed swap the IR light and sensor position (IR LEDs in gun, sensor at the TV)
- IR light emitting guns which are used with photo diodes (toys and Tiger games)
- IR laser emitting guns used with full fledged cameras in shooting theaters and in MARS.
@@Boojakascha ok, you win. It was not a funny joke. But you should have read the whole post with all the comments in order to see everything that was said not just cherry pick one thing and say that we don't know what we are talking about. We are clearly the only ones selling this, obviously we will know what we are talking about. We also did design it with 3A. They didn't come up with the idea, we asked them to make it for us. Our logo is on the side of the mold. Anyway, you did go into some good detail on your video, good job.
Thank you so much for being honest. The glorified Wii remote with accuracy only slightly better if that... Glad I didn't buy it.
I am glad that you found the video informative :D
No idea how you can say the accuracy/precision is "very good". I've tried on various monitors, screen resolution (720p, 1080p, 2k, 4k), from various distance without moving an inch (1 to 5 meters), distancing both IR group leds or making them a tiny bit closer. No effect, the results were the same. It is bad. Either there's a very special way to calibrate that I'm not aware of, or the hardware of the guns I have is simply poor/defective.
Edit: I had to move even further away, similar to the AE LightGun to start getting a "good" calibration. This is almost two times worst than the wiimote.
Hi, @LightGunMan
Accuracy and precision are not the same thing.
To get good accuracy out of the Retro Shooter Lightgun, you have to use a small screen and play from a large distance. Because it's a two points system, the accuracy suffers if the distance or angle to the screen change. And now think of it for a moment. What changes (even if you keep staying in place) when you are super close to a huge screen and aim for the corners of the monitor?
For the Wii Remote the same limitations apply. On the original console, there is an additional dependence which Remote you use in particular. Often people have better success placing the IR lights fairly far apart.
At the Retro Shooter Lightgun, how good of a calibration you can achieve, is also hindered by the wizard. It's narrowly time limited and won't give you the means to tweak and offset calibration manually, thus leaving you at the mercy of the moment, demanding as many repetitions of calibration as necessary, until you reach a good accuracy.