Fantastic review as always. If I'm going to drop that kind of coin on a retro console emulator, I want it to outperform the Ali Express handhelds. I could forgive occasional frame drops, but the the controller glitches just make it an instant nay.
I'm interested in a Disc based emulator console like this. That can play all those Saturn and 90s CD consoles I missed out on. But the high cost of even the base console, plus the cost of those Saturn games on Ebay. Its just ridiculous. I've messed around with countless emulators and front ends and raspbarry pis and emulator handhelds. They all have terrible UI experience. And require a lot of manual fixing on my side. I would absolutely pay like $200 to play roms and discs with a cool and snappy UI and fully setup configs I never have to touch.
@@WIImotionmasher I agree. I can do the same thing this thing does with my laptop and RetroArch. Being able to play cartridges was the only thing I saw that was valuable and that just makes the polymega way more expensive. Honestly, at least imo, if you are using an emulator just use a rom on a computer. I get the simulation hardware (like analogue’s stuff) as that is meant to recreate the hardware and give a more authentic experience, for better or worse. But for emulation just use a computer or something like a raspberry pi. That way you don’t risk damaging your games.
@@WIImotionmasher I just use batocera on a 5700g or 8700g APU PC for emulation yeah it takes some tinkering but once you get it perfect you can make a copy of the drive which will be basically plug and play on almost any dual boot PC system, I 1st used it on my beelink sei8 i5 8278u and it was able to play upto ps3 but not all games, so it will easily play Sega CD and Saturn games 💯
Man, for 500+ bucks to get up and running, this has way too many issues for me. I love the concept of a definitive modular retro box, but it needs either a massive price drop or a lot of work to smooth out some of those issues. Thanks for the in-depth review!
@@Deep_wolf Exactly. I thought my Retron 5 used to be kind of cool back in the day...until I realized using my cartridges was meaningless and it was all emulation. Either use the actual hardware or just use an emulator on your computer
@user-se9dz1wy3y it's damn near 100% though. I have all the analog fpga consoles to date and they are indistinguishable from playing on real hardware. Aside from the better video output from the analog consoles, of course.
I'd heard of the name around the block, but never really knew what a Polymega was. This not only educated me on what it is, but also why I don't want one!
How the hell is this thing still so unfinished after all this time? Specially considering it uses free Emulators that have existed for years? The shimmering in the output is absurd for such an expensive device...
Some of the issues relate to the choice of emulators: Mega Drive emulation is somewhat fragmented, but Kega Fusion hasn't been updated for almost 15 years now and the only reason to use it at all at this point is the 32X support (the Mega CD emulation is especially ropey). It seems really weird that they didn't license Genesis Plus GX, BlastEm or Ares instead.
The fact that this thing costs so much and requires physical modules to expand its capabilities makes me think this was envisioned as a hardware emulator at some point before they realized that it would be to difficult/expensive to do that but decided to go ahead anyway. So my guess is that this is basically a highly compromised zombie project, which would explain a lot.
I don't know about CD-i, but good 3DO emulation would have been nice. I have like 50+ games for it somewhere since the 90's. I have some legit good memories about 3DO. Other than it was too expensive at release, it was a solid console for the time.
Wow. $500,00 + $80,00 a module for a lot of plastic waste running a CELERON, with a free OS (Linux) and free emulators, that has a lot of bugs. How is that price even justifiable? How can the devs put on the market something like that?
For that price they should be using something much better, and except for the attachments for cartridges/controllers, you can easily do everything with Retroarch.
I mean, it's cool that you can upgrade the CPU but I agree, it should've been tweaked and fixed. 2GB of RAM? Should've been 8GB instead. Makes me wonder if there's ways to upgrade the RAM too.
Yeah, honestly you can buy a brand new Raspberry Pi 5 for like $80, and a USB DVD drive for like $40. Rip the games on the computer you already have, send them over to a Retro Pie install, and you'll get the same (or better) experience.
@@Starwarsgeek-98And gets upstream support from its authors without needing to go through a vendor. And you're allowed to apply patches to it yourself if desired.
Not buying the thing, but consider it a Pi + a bunch of retrode modules. Those are expen$ive. It's a pretty niche project nonetheless and would have sold probably very well about 10 years ago.
@@nintendo1889x looking thru the comments there genuinely don't seem to be any which is surprising. Some owners posting about liking the product but none of the crazy PS5/Xbox like fanaticism.
$500? For a system with 2GB of ram and a Celeron? Using software emulation? With 4-7 frames of audio delay? Yiiiikes. Seems hard to justify the cost when emulation is right there anyway. Not being able to pull your cart saves either? What's the point of the console then? Just for the novelty of putting in the cartridges you own? Hard pass, really. Great video though! Always love your production quality!!
For that price point why wouldnt you just buy an old laptop or a Beelink mini PC...? The idea of this machine is cool but what are they thinking with those prices??
Correct its Not worth it especially if you don't even OWN physical games for all of those systems anymore and I don't even buy Physical PS3/PS4 games anymore.
@@ChairmanMeow1 I got a beelink mini-PC for half the price of this, with a modern Ryzen CPU, 16GB of RAM, 500GB of M.2 storage. I can download all of these emulators, put them in a front-end, and use whatever controllers i want. The only thing i wouldn't be able to do use insert my physical copies, which doesn't even remotely matter in this case anyway since you can't dump unknown games nor can you import your own battery saves. It's a novelty for sure but that's a LOT of money for something that's not an FPGA/Mister
i got mine a few months ago. Started boot looping out of the box. Never got to play a single game on it. The company takes over a month to respond to emails. Should have kept my money.
It's pretty cool but, running emulators on a 6 year old laptop you have sitting around in your basement through HDMI is surprisingly competent for a fraction of the cost.
I've watched some video reviews of this in preparation before I made the jump to order and this one by far is the most damning. While I understand that emulation isn't perfect on other devices and in some cases I don't mind, the constant need for configuration from booting a game to just plugging in a controller on top of the emulation issues is a major deal-breaker for me. Though I'm intrigued by the convenience of getting to have access to various game libraries on one console, this is gonna have to be a hard nay for me, especially for $500. Great in-depth review., brother. This is why I subscribe. 👍
Hey Joe! Just wanted to say that over the years I’ve watched your channel grow, and your content constantly improve (as well as your humorous delivery). You have a knack to make technical info delivery understandable and entertaining, I honestly think that in the retro space your content is the best out there. Much appreciation from a fellow Gen-X
Me too. I cancelled my preorder years ago. Ended up building a mini itx pc with a bunch of emulators, then I dumped my whole PS1 and Saturn discs. Couldn't be happier.
I had high hopes when it got announced, I could deal with the change from FPGA to Software Emulation (if done right) and they announced the Polymega with an Intel i7 / i5 at the start, seeing it run on a lowly Intel Celeron now while still carrying the hefty price tag is stunning. I applaud myself for going MiSTer years ago :)
You shouldn't even have to deal with software emulation over fpga given the $80 price tag for the modules. For those things being emulators that are simple and a big waste of plastic, that thing should be $40-$50. And I only say that high because of the included controllers.
@@Coldsilfur4 You're not wrong, although you COULD use a DVD or BR over USB but that would look even worse. I had one running PS2/GC roms on my CRT gaming setup (I have a 90's themed sitting room for my classic games collection) but I never really used it... it does kill the aesthetic. My point was just that the price for this thing is way too much for the hardware you're getting.
Yeah but can the MiSTer quench my ever more perverse obsession with inserting ancient plastic discs/cartridges into things? I didn't think so, check and mate. *Throws $550 dollars at polymega to watch a disc go into a drive while his eyes roll into the back of his head from pure bliss*
A friend of mine recently bought one… that arrived without booting 🤡 he hasn’t heard back from Polymega yet. I don’t see the point of buying one instead of buying a MiSTer FPGA or a RetroTink 5X and proper SCART / component cables. And, finally: awesome content, as usual.
You could get an older office PC that still has its optical drive and get almost the same experience as the PolyMega, at least when it comes to the disc based systems as Retroarch lets you play those games directly from the drive or will copy them for you. Sure you'd be giving up being able to use real cartridges but since you aren't actually playing the game from them using another cart dumper to get your roms would be no different, if a few extra steps. All in all you'd get almost the same experience at a far cheaper price and with more systems available to play.
Thank you Joe! I was so excited for this, and was trying to save up for this... Now I don't need to waste my money! I was under the impression that modules were needed for near hardware level emulation... not simply to adapt the cartridge. So glad youtubers like you exist.
I really love the concept of the Polymega and have been a supporter since its early announcement. The Base + Ultra Expansion was the package I really looked forward for. However to see that it has still so many baby-illness problems unfixed after all this time is bad, and for such a heavy price-tag it is difficult to justify such a big investment....
I like these concepts of newer hardware running older games,. The main downside I can see is that if the main unit breaks down and the manufacturer stops making that specific unit, you're left in the dust, and getting another used unit will most probably be VERY expensive due to the sparse availability. On the other hand, finding original consoles is easier, much more affordable, and in some cases easier to repair due to being older hardware and the existence of several videos and tutorials spread all over the Internet. AND it's also easier to just buy a second or third console as backup in the eventual case your original consoles also start breaking down and you can't repair them 🙂
Man I love this machine. It definitely needs some updates and yes it's expensive but I'm having a blast having access to my full retro collection again
My guy, there are like 20 other ways to do this without having wasted 500-1000 dollars lol You got absolutely fucking hosed buying this shitty low power computer running a bunch of free emulators badly. Just get over the weird obsession with needing to stick a cartridge or a disc in things and download the roms for the stuff you own.
1.Started at $250, ended up costing $550. 2.Abandoned Features: Dropped FPGA support after pre-orders. 3.Performance Problems: Reports of bugs, lag, and compatibility issues. 4.Expensive Expansion: To get other 5 modules , they will cost your around $400. 5. Dated hardware Unlike Analoge pocket, which bundled expansions together, Polymega requires users to purchase each module separately, increasing the overall cost and making it less convenient for consumers seeking a comprehensive gaming experience.
if the Polymega was based on an FPGA ,that could drastically improve its quality. A more user friendly, consolized version of MISTER would be pretty awesome.
Such a cool device! And good video about it as usual. Interesting about the Enhanced Audio part, I think preferred it off since it had some more clarity in the setup I'm listening in here, but I could see that it could be a bit too sharp maybe. But when comparing the Audio Enhancing on made it sound a bit muffled. But that's in this A B testing context of course so probably is just fine. :)
5:10 You know you're watching a good channel when you start to smile as soon as you see a game sideways 'cause you know you're about the hear the thing XD
Great review. It was very fair and well researched. Hope to have you review it again once more features come out in the future. Also, if you haven’t yet, check out the patches you can side load to your games. It really is a great feature, especially when taking Disc games into account. :)
If I want an emulation box, I can connect any old controller to my pc and emulate there, with better quality, playing literally any of the... ALL? of the roms that you can find online, for free. I don't see the point of these devices. Either you play with original hard, or you go FPGA or just use a pc.
Meh, people should just play these games in whatever way they find most enjoyable. The real problem here is how little you get for your money rather than the concept itself.
Something that alot of Clone systems seem to ignore is that many consoles have a eject button. The death grip wouldn't be half as bad existing if they just remembered to include a proper eject mechanism. I know the megadrive didn't half a eject feature, mainly just the Nintendo consoles had them from what I recall, but still. Also the emulator for the Megadrive is supposedly worked on by the original developer for Kega Fusion. Which is neat. I'd been told, but never verified this myself, that the original developer hadn't updated that in some time before being contracted to work for this. So again, I found that neat. Not a machine here that I'm interested buying. The backup feature is interesting, but there are cheaper options, open source ones know I'm aware. So the one neat thing isn'tsomething I need to buy this one for. If I wanted to play these games properly, I'd use a crt with the original systems or a upscaler. Great video though.
Thanks for the video! I've been waiting years for the Polymega. But seeing that after all this time there are so many issues i doubt the system will ever work perfect...
I remember asking the "value" question when this thing was first announced. I was told "this isn't for the enthusiast who knows about emulation. Its for the person who just wants to put in their game and play." So its an expensive toy for people with little to no understanding of tech... I think we all know what to call something like that.
Honestly, the Polymega sounds like a good idea on paper, but once you run it(and you have to have actual games, which means repros, homebrew, and flashcarts are out), it runs into problems. This episode was highly informative, and I have nothing else to add, though I do wanna know where you got the shirt. Also, love the skit at the end(though I think the extra 32X was one 32X too many; that's too much MEGA POWER)
just 2 little info for Joe: if you have a 120hz you can set on 120hz but remember it runs at 120hz only in the menu screen, and when you see lester the unlikely is because the cartridge is dirty, if you clean it really well the polymega will recognize it. .. another issue big collector probably will encounter when the primary drive will be full you cannot install more games even if the other secondary drive is empty.
I’ll need for them to fix the Sega Saturn and Sega CD issues before I ever consider it. It is nice that the 32X games work nicely, since that is a nightmare to hook up everything to play it natively.
This thing reminds me of the LaserActive from the '90s that I desperately wanted back then, only better. I'm not going to buy it but man, it's tempting. Love that stop-motion, by the way!
I had this pre-ordered years ago, I canceled my order. Kind of glad I did. The mini PC revolution and Battocera accomplishes the same thing if you don't need to use your physical media of course.
Just wanted to note that the ambient music you chose when describing the console really complimented this video nicely. It allows viewers like myself to better absorb all the technical details without some goofy chiptune blasting in the background. (Not knocking your taste in music, it is usually excellent!) Wish you would go this direction more often!
As soon as they switched the concept from FPGA to software emulation I was out. The fact that it doesn't actually play from the cartridge makes it no different to playing emulators on the PC, frankly. I can get adapters for genuine controllers to use on the PC and have a better experience than the Polymega controllers
Apparently it was because they got more interest on this thing playing CD based stuff and they said the FPGA they had planned couldn't handle the 32 bit consoles. The smarter idea to me now given the look would have been keeping the same size, including an FPGA instead and upgrading it seamlessly. Like the front end we see now would have functioned the same but the back end would have lifted off the drive bottom vertically so as to be invisible to the naked eye. This could have switched out to a newer more powerful FPGA or they could have even created a combo unit of an FPGA and traditional processor. I think our best hope now is to BEG the head of Framework, after they offer an OLED screen option on that laptop, to look at giving us what the Polymega was meant to be.
This should appeal to those who want a quality emulation based console replacement with no setup and no hassle. At that price with all those problems, potential buyers are just going to be swayed to making their own emulation box that will work better without the constraints off silly and expensive addons. Or learn about the Mister. Since these guys famously dropped the FPGA based hardware, I just don’t get who this really aimed at.
Two Xbox Ones or an XSX is my preferred way to go. The deal might not be as sweet with Retroarch patched out of retail mode, but it's consolized emulation and it works pretty well. My XSX only gets used for Retroarch.
I wanted one of these for a while, but decided on an AVS for my NES needs, and I've got a consolized Neo Geo MVS in an AES case. Reconnecting with my childhood is getting expensive, but its worth it to have no lag.
The "PolyShmegma". I'm not sure where I heard that name used a few years back... but now every time I see this console - I just hear it pronounced as the _PolyShmegma._ lol. In my head-canon, your voice Joe, is by far the funniest one to pronounce it repeatedly in a 30 minute video! Everything about this console is nonsense: from the price of base unit, to the modules (and their cost), to the fact that its a expensive modern 'software emulation' device that makes it so hard to do simple things even cheap emulation boxes allow (even accounting for it being closed source). I'm not sure who they designed this for, given its prohibitive expense - and how cheap alternative are for people who want to play with carts. But one thing is for sure: It's a fascinating device to see you cover, and the PolyShmegma is the greatest game console name ever in the history of the universe! Thank you Joe for bringing us the scoop!
Jeez, I remember when it was announced, like 8 years ago? They kind of pitched it like a retron for CD based consoles. They should have worked harder for that vision, I thought that sounded cool.
Game developer here, the audio delay is from the ALSA audio driver on Linux. On Windows, this issue is solved long ago with the WASAPI (XAudio) driver. On Linux, one would have to use the more obscure JACK driver instead.
I’m running ALSA on retropie and batocera across pi3b+, X86.64, and odroid XU4 respectively. Pretty sure ALSA is the OS backend for my latest project, a pseudo 16-bit engine being cross developed for both Windows and Linux using SDL2 and I’ve spent hundreds of hours so far testing in both environments… not only have I never noticed inherent audio lag using ALSA, I’ve never even heard someone make that claim. Do you have something to back that up?
It's actually PulseAudio rather than ALSA. Both PulseAudio and JACK use ALSA drivers. The developers most likely just need to change one PulseAudio config file to give lower latency.
IMHO, Polymega is pretty much dead on arrival. If Polymega were to use AMD AM4 motherboard with iGPU support up until Ryzen 7 5700G + upgradable external memory, perhaps this could be an emulation beast.
Great video as always, i can appreciate what they wanted to accomplish but i feel it misses , close to $700 Canadian before shipping for the base model. Thanks for a honest review.
this sort of thing is genuinely a really cool idea for somebody who just wants to declutter how many consoles they have hooked up at once, but they always seem to have an infinite amount of problems that the kind of person who bought all those consoles in the first place would definitely notice
The appeal for many was it was it was an easy way to dump all of your carts/cds and has an awesome interface. That is one thing I do hate about some of these emulation setups is the interface is horrid or JUST serviceable(I mean looks generally when I say both of these things). The emulator creators really need to take a design class.
As always some of the best reviews, fair balanced and great detail. I remember being excited all them years ago but no chance today. I am kind of torn they deserve Kudos for getting it out to customers and not pulling a Amico but yeah this needs to die fast.
I love my Polymega, but I got mine waaay before they jacked up the price on the console, so I didn’t spend the current price on it. I haven’t had nearly the level of problems you dealt with. Weird. I think for an average person, they’ll probably really love using a Polymega, but the cost of the unit is a big barrier. As is the reliance on actually having physical games. Most people probably won’t notice a lot of the issues and will enjoy their time with the console.
Yep, this review did come across as overly negative. Making a big deal about the blur option that I turned off before doing anything, done. I think all of my games worked an installed with no problems. Loving it so far, great menu experience as well.
Here's the thing about the Polymega: Brand new 6 button PC Engine controllers. And you can buy the controllers without buying anything else. Anything that brings that into the world is ok in my book.
I can't say this has ever impressed me or that I've ever thought about buying one, but an interesting watch nonetheless. I just can't imagine spending nearly $900 on the Polymega Deluxe bundle (base unit + NES, SNES, GEN, TG16) and having THAT many bugs, latency, sound issues, speed issues, non-working homebrew, and translated carts, nearly impossible to copy roms over to it, and so on... No thanks!) I'm glad I bought the Analogue Pocket ($200), Dock ($100), and adapter pack ($85), so it'll handle physical games for GB/GBC/GBA/TG16/PC ENGINE/SUPER GRAFX/ATARI LYNX/NEOGEO POCKET COLOR). As well as FPGA cores for more than a dozen plus more consoles, computers, and so many arcade cores. I also think the MiSTer might play N64 more accurately than the Polymega now, with the latest updates on it. PSX and Saturn updates on the MiSTer also bring it closer to console hardware perfection.
this does seem kinda glitchy, frankly PC emulation is ultimate unless you need to use vintage controllers or if you inherit a retro cartridge collection.
What do you think of the Polymega? Yay or nay?
Super interesting concept that seams to work very well considering. But yeah that price point 👀
The fact that it straight up REMOVES the pre installed ganes with some system software updates makes that a MAJOR Nay for me.
Fantastic review as always. If I'm going to drop that kind of coin on a retro console emulator, I want it to outperform the Ali Express handhelds.
I could forgive occasional frame drops, but the the controller glitches just make it an instant nay.
Isn’t it based on standard x86 PC hardware? Just use a PC then!
It's kind of junky for that price point. Good concept. Bad execution.
Damn, that is a LOT of problems for a bare bones emulation box that's more expensive than a PS5.
Im glad Im seeing a lot of people agree. This is annoyingly priced.
Especially of you want the cart expansions.
I'm interested in a Disc based emulator console like this. That can play all those Saturn and 90s CD consoles I missed out on.
But the high cost of even the base console, plus the cost of those Saturn games on Ebay. Its just ridiculous.
I've messed around with countless emulators and front ends and raspbarry pis and emulator handhelds.
They all have terrible UI experience. And require a lot of manual fixing on my side.
I would absolutely pay like $200 to play roms and discs with a cool and snappy UI and fully setup configs I never have to touch.
@@WIImotionmasher
I agree. I can do the same thing this thing does with my laptop and RetroArch. Being able to play cartridges was the only thing I saw that was valuable and that just makes the polymega way more expensive.
Honestly, at least imo, if you are using an emulator just use a rom on a computer. I get the simulation hardware (like analogue’s stuff) as that is meant to recreate the hardware and give a more authentic experience, for better or worse. But for emulation just use a computer or something like a raspberry pi. That way you don’t risk damaging your games.
@@WIImotionmasher I just use batocera on a 5700g or 8700g APU PC for emulation yeah it takes some tinkering but once you get it perfect you can make a copy of the drive which will be basically plug and play on almost any dual boot PC system, I 1st used it on my beelink sei8 i5 8278u and it was able to play upto ps3 but not all games, so it will easily play Sega CD and Saturn games 💯
Man, for 500+ bucks to get up and running, this has way too many issues for me. I love the concept of a definitive modular retro box, but it needs either a massive price drop or a lot of work to smooth out some of those issues. Thanks for the in-depth review!
500 for emulator station.
i'd rather just buy a desktop PC at that price and forget about having to swap hardware.
But you have to set it up yourself with the image library, etc. @@baysidejr
@@Deep_wolf Exactly. I thought my Retron 5 used to be kind of cool back in the day...until I realized using my cartridges was meaningless and it was all emulation. Either use the actual hardware or just use an emulator on your computer
Originally announced in 2017, 7 years ago. So many better options today with a smaller price tag.
yea, and it's such a buggy mess after all this time...
Yeah, I mean you could buy all the analog consoles for less than the cost of this thing. And at least there it's perfect fpga hardware emulation.
@@Cimone90 Fpga is still isn't perfect
@user-se9dz1wy3y it's damn near 100% though. I have all the analog fpga consoles to date and they are indistinguishable from playing on real hardware. Aside from the better video output from the analog consoles, of course.
@@J937-h3o Oh and this underpowered CPU it's using clearly is? 🤣
I appreciate your brutal honesty. Companies need to bring their A game before you review their product.
I'd heard of the name around the block, but never really knew what a Polymega was. This not only educated me on what it is, but also why I don't want one!
How the hell is this thing still so unfinished after all this time? Specially considering it uses free Emulators that have existed for years?
The shimmering in the output is absurd for such an expensive device...
super underpowered CPU
Some of the issues relate to the choice of emulators: Mega Drive emulation is somewhat fragmented, but Kega Fusion hasn't been updated for almost 15 years now and the only reason to use it at all at this point is the 32X support (the Mega CD emulation is especially ropey). It seems really weird that they didn't license Genesis Plus GX, BlastEm or Ares instead.
@@flandrble and probably does not use the RAM properly
@@flandrble It's not even expensive to upgrade the CPU with something way better
The fact that this thing costs so much and requires physical modules to expand its capabilities makes me think this was envisioned as a hardware emulator at some point before they realized that it would be to difficult/expensive to do that but decided to go ahead anyway. So my guess is that this is basically a highly compromised zombie project, which would explain a lot.
The price of this thing is obscene
ha HAHAHA
People will find a reason to complain about anything
@@The_Badcompanythe cost of things is usually a pretty good reason.
@@jeffro9252 Complaining won't change anything. All it does is make you and others around you miserable by being negative.
@@The_BadcompanyI have a solution. Let it be, don't complain and most important don't buy it 😅
No Philips CD-i?
Well excuse me princess
What about Amiga CD 32?
lol
Or 3DO?
I don't know about CD-i, but good 3DO emulation would have been nice. I have like 50+ games for it somewhere since the 90's. I have some legit good memories about 3DO. Other than it was too expensive at release, it was a solid console for the time.
@@kosmosyche I wish I didn't know about CD-i xD
Wow. $500,00 + $80,00 a module for a lot of plastic waste running a CELERON, with a free OS (Linux) and free emulators, that has a lot of bugs.
How is that price even justifiable? How can the devs put on the market something like that?
I mean anyone could see this thing was a disaster years ago
For that price they should be using something much better, and except for the attachments for cartridges/controllers, you can easily do everything with Retroarch.
I mean, it's cool that you can upgrade the CPU but I agree, it should've been tweaked and fixed. 2GB of RAM? Should've been 8GB instead. Makes me wonder if there's ways to upgrade the RAM too.
Oh yeah I am seriously worried about the plastic waste.
Yeah, honestly you can buy a brand new Raspberry Pi 5 for like $80, and a USB DVD drive for like $40. Rip the games on the computer you already have, send them over to a Retro Pie install, and you'll get the same (or better) experience.
$500 for an underpowered Retroarch machine is a hard ask.
Retroarch runs games a bit better
@@Starwarsgeek-98And gets upstream support from its authors without needing to go through a vendor. And you're allowed to apply patches to it yourself if desired.
Careful, you'll upset the Polymega apologist fanboys 🤣
Not buying the thing, but consider it a Pi + a bunch of retrode modules. Those are expen$ive. It's a pretty niche project nonetheless and would have sold probably very well about 10 years ago.
@@nintendo1889x looking thru the comments there genuinely don't seem to be any which is surprising. Some owners posting about liking the product but none of the crazy PS5/Xbox like fanaticism.
$500? For a system with 2GB of ram and a Celeron? Using software emulation? With 4-7 frames of audio delay? Yiiiikes. Seems hard to justify the cost when emulation is right there anyway. Not being able to pull your cart saves either? What's the point of the console then? Just for the novelty of putting in the cartridges you own? Hard pass, really.
Great video though! Always love your production quality!!
For that price point why wouldnt you just buy an old laptop or a Beelink mini PC...? The idea of this machine is cool but what are they thinking with those prices??
Correct its Not worth it especially if you don't even OWN physical games for all of those systems anymore and I don't even buy Physical PS3/PS4 games anymore.
Performance looks kind of ass on this.
@@Marmite101That too! RetroArch does too good of a job for me to consider alternatives really.
@@ChairmanMeow1 I got a beelink mini-PC for half the price of this, with a modern Ryzen CPU, 16GB of RAM, 500GB of M.2 storage. I can download all of these emulators, put them in a front-end, and use whatever controllers i want. The only thing i wouldn't be able to do use insert my physical copies, which doesn't even remotely matter in this case anyway since you can't dump unknown games nor can you import your own battery saves. It's a novelty for sure but that's a LOT of money for something that's not an FPGA/Mister
Just wanna say, I am very sensitive to audio delay. That's one thing I just can't get over
i got mine a few months ago. Started boot looping out of the box. Never got to play a single game on it. The company takes over a month to respond to emails. Should have kept my money.
Thank you for showing and trying the Polymega so we don't have to
It's pretty cool but, running emulators on a 6 year old laptop you have sitting around in your basement through HDMI is surprisingly competent for a fraction of the cost.
better hardware in the laptop, based on some specs i'm seeing here.
my 10+ year old laptop ran PSX games till about 7 years ago. thanks windows update & computer illiteracy
And near perfect emulation, too. None of that frame skips with the audio.
I have a free 12 year old Mac my neighbor gave me and it can do everything the Polymega can.
My Wii U does all of these consoles AND it's a Wii/Wii U and it runs GameCube games.
I've watched some video reviews of this in preparation before I made the jump to order and this one by far is the most damning. While I understand that emulation isn't perfect on other devices and in some cases I don't mind, the constant need for configuration from booting a game to just plugging in a controller on top of the emulation issues is a major deal-breaker for me. Though I'm intrigued by the convenience of getting to have access to various game libraries on one console, this is gonna have to be a hard nay for me, especially for $500. Great in-depth review., brother. This is why I subscribe. 👍
80 bucks for each module too on top of the 500 bucks. And u lose all svae game progress when u dump your cart, it does not transfer over.
I love the skit callback to the "too much blast processing" gag, one of my favs from the show.
Hey Joe! Just wanted to say that over the years I’ve watched your channel grow, and your content constantly improve (as well as your humorous delivery). You have a knack to make technical info delivery understandable and entertaining, I honestly think that in the retro space your content is the best out there. Much appreciation from a fellow Gen-X
I canceled my preorder and got my money back. I have no regrets.
Same. I knew this thing was going to be bad but I didn't expect it to be this bad
Me too. I cancelled my preorder years ago. Ended up building a mini itx pc with a bunch of emulators, then I dumped my whole PS1 and Saturn discs. Couldn't be happier.
You have dodged a bullet there.
The fact that you even preordered one LOL!
I still have mine and it’s collecting dust
I had high hopes when it got announced, I could deal with the change from FPGA to Software Emulation (if done right) and they announced the Polymega with an Intel i7 / i5 at the start, seeing it run on a lowly Intel Celeron now while still carrying the hefty price tag is stunning. I applaud myself for going MiSTer years ago :)
You shouldn't even have to deal with software emulation over fpga given the $80 price tag for the modules. For those things being emulators that are simple and a big waste of plastic, that thing should be $40-$50. And I only say that high because of the included controllers.
Imagine paying $550 for a freaking Celeron based Emulation box... Yeah, no thanks.
Yes, that is insane. Elitedesk mini running a Ryzen5 with embedded graphics and 8 times the RAM is $100…
Seriously. It's basically manufactured e-waste at this point.
@@strawmanfallacy you can thank Soulja boi. His scam console is even trashier than the poly mega, even by raspberry pi
@@TheWarmotor the elitedesk looks awful, cant read physical disks etc though. its also that console feeling you get and all.
@@Coldsilfur4 You're not wrong, although you COULD use a DVD or BR over USB but that would look even worse. I had one running PS2/GC roms on my CRT gaming setup (I have a 90's themed sitting room for my classic games collection) but I never really used it... it does kill the aesthetic. My point was just that the price for this thing is way too much for the hardware you're getting.
$500 U.S. for the console... then $80 additional, depending on the module you want? ...I'll stick with the MiSTer.
i wanted to like the poly but
im just gonna keep hoarding OG hardware 😅
You own a MiSTer? You da man!
Yeah but can the MiSTer quench my ever more perverse obsession with inserting ancient plastic discs/cartridges into things? I didn't think so, check and mate. *Throws $550 dollars at polymega to watch a disc go into a drive while his eyes roll into the back of his head from pure bliss*
Yeah for that price you could just get a Retrotink and original hardware.
at least a mister can PLAY GAMES CORRECTLY. this machine is the best joke of the day
I use to be a warrior like you, but then I took a HD temporal blur to the knee
A friend of mine recently bought one… that arrived without booting 🤡 he hasn’t heard back from Polymega yet.
I don’t see the point of buying one instead of buying a MiSTer FPGA or a RetroTink 5X and proper SCART / component cables.
And, finally: awesome content, as usual.
I think if you gave the MiSTeR cart and cd playback like the Polymega has and ripped off the interface most people wouldn't look twice at the latter.
You could get an older office PC that still has its optical drive and get almost the same experience as the PolyMega, at least when it comes to the disc based systems as Retroarch lets you play those games directly from the drive or will copy them for you. Sure you'd be giving up being able to use real cartridges but since you aren't actually playing the game from them using another cart dumper to get your roms would be no different, if a few extra steps.
All in all you'd get almost the same experience at a far cheaper price and with more systems available to play.
Thank you Joe! I was so excited for this, and was trying to save up for this... Now I don't need to waste my money! I was under the impression that modules were needed for near hardware level emulation... not simply to adapt the cartridge.
So glad youtubers like you exist.
"Huh, guess the next Game Sack vid will mention a portrait video mode of some sort"
- Joe's neighbours
Lol, Joe's neighbors moved away years ago
Don't you mean taint mode, I mean tate mode?
I want a multi console based on FPGA, not a weak Celeron based system from 2017 running high latency software emulation.
I really love the concept of the Polymega and have been a supporter since its early announcement.
The Base + Ultra Expansion was the package I really looked forward for. However to see that it has still so many baby-illness problems unfixed after all this time is bad, and for such a heavy price-tag it is difficult to justify such a big investment....
I like these concepts of newer hardware running older games,. The main downside I can see is that if the main unit breaks down and the manufacturer stops making that specific unit, you're left in the dust, and getting another used unit will most probably be VERY expensive due to the sparse availability. On the other hand, finding original consoles is easier, much more affordable, and in some cases easier to repair due to being older hardware and the existence of several videos and tutorials spread all over the Internet. AND it's also easier to just buy a second or third console as backup in the eventual case your original consoles also start breaking down and you can't repair them 🙂
Man I love this machine. It definitely needs some updates and yes it's expensive but I'm having a blast having access to my full retro collection again
My guy, there are like 20 other ways to do this without having wasted 500-1000 dollars lol You got absolutely fucking hosed buying this shitty low power computer running a bunch of free emulators badly. Just get over the weird obsession with needing to stick a cartridge or a disc in things and download the roms for the stuff you own.
1.Started at $250, ended up costing $550.
2.Abandoned Features: Dropped FPGA support after pre-orders.
3.Performance Problems: Reports of bugs, lag, and compatibility issues.
4.Expensive Expansion: To get other 5 modules , they will cost your around $400.
5. Dated hardware
Unlike Analoge pocket, which bundled expansions together, Polymega requires users to purchase each module separately, increasing the overall cost and making it less convenient for consumers seeking a comprehensive gaming experience.
Loved the ending 'tower' bit - vintage gamesack!!
if the Polymega was based on an FPGA ,that could drastically improve its quality. A more user friendly, consolized version of MISTER would be pretty awesome.
Originally it was meant to be an FPGA system, but something changed and this is what we ended up with.
Yet it is still priced like an fpga
What does the female pro golf association have to do with a shitty emulation box? Did they sponsor it?
Emulation works well enough for 99% of us without OCD. This is just a shitty product
I'll translate your comment: This would be better if it was a completely different product.
I'm always baffked by how much work goes into your videos. You're amazing
Base unit at 500 USD. Not a chance
NO ONE was expecting Game Sack to cover this! This should be interesting!
Such a cool device! And good video about it as usual.
Interesting about the Enhanced Audio part, I think preferred it off since it had some more clarity in the setup I'm listening in here, but I could see that it could be a bit too sharp maybe. But when comparing the Audio Enhancing on made it sound a bit muffled. But that's in this A B testing context of course so probably is just fine. :)
Oh no Joe! You missed it. "We're gonna rock down to NEC avenue!"
I actually liked the original idea but since that got lost during development, I stick to my expensive hardware from Analogue 😂
Analogue may be expensive but at least you know you're getting crisp fpga emulation
5:10 You know you're watching a good channel when you start to smile as soon as you see a game sideways 'cause you know you're about the hear the thing XD
Joe do the thing, do the thing!!!
"tAte MoOoO00oodDde!!"
Come on Bart, say the thing
@@JaredConnell "I didn't do it..... err I mean TATTTTEEE MOOO000DDEE"
Or was it "1 million MEEGGAA POOWWAAA"??
Great review. It was very fair and well researched. Hope to have you review it again once more features come out in the future. Also, if you haven’t yet, check out the patches you can side load to your games. It really is a great feature, especially when taking Disc games into account. :)
If I want an emulation box, I can connect any old controller to my pc and emulate there, with better quality, playing literally any of the... ALL? of the roms that you can find online, for free. I don't see the point of these devices. Either you play with original hard, or you go FPGA or just use a pc.
Meh, people should just play these games in whatever way they find most enjoyable. The real problem here is how little you get for your money rather than the concept itself.
Something that alot of Clone systems seem to ignore is that many consoles have a eject button. The death grip wouldn't be half as bad existing if they just remembered to include a proper eject mechanism.
I know the megadrive didn't half a eject feature, mainly just the Nintendo consoles had them from what I recall, but still.
Also the emulator for the Megadrive is supposedly worked on by the original developer for Kega Fusion. Which is neat. I'd been told, but never verified this myself, that the original developer hadn't updated that in some time before being contracted to work for this. So again, I found that neat.
Not a machine here that I'm interested buying. The backup feature is interesting, but there are cheaper options, open source ones know I'm aware. So the one neat thing isn'tsomething I need to buy this one for. If I wanted to play these games properly, I'd use a crt with the original systems or a upscaler. Great video though.
Gimme that Lightening Force model 1 synth soundtrack any day of the week!
Yep, blew the other ones comparing out of the water.
Thanks for the video! I've been waiting years for the Polymega. But seeing that after all this time there are so many issues i doubt the system will ever work perfect...
I remember asking the "value" question when this thing was first announced. I was told "this isn't for the enthusiast who knows about emulation. Its for the person who just wants to put in their game and play."
So its an expensive toy for people with little to no understanding of tech... I think we all know what to call something like that.
Honestly, the Polymega sounds like a good idea on paper, but once you run it(and you have to have actual games, which means repros, homebrew, and flashcarts are out), it runs into problems. This episode was highly informative, and I have nothing else to add, though I do wanna know where you got the shirt. Also, love the skit at the end(though I think the extra 32X was one 32X too many; that's too much MEGA POWER)
You always upload on sunday mornings here in the Netherlands, thank you for waking me up with TATE MODE!!!
It was over for this system when they dropped FPGA for software emulation.
Someone has probably already pointed this out, but the game at 2:55 is TinHead, not TinStar :)
just 2 little info for Joe: if you have a 120hz you can set on 120hz but remember it runs at 120hz only in the menu screen, and when you see lester the unlikely is because the cartridge is dirty, if you clean it really well the polymega will recognize it.
.. another issue big collector probably will encounter when the primary drive will be full you cannot install more games even if the other secondary drive is empty.
So many issues and such a hefty price tag
An excellent video. Thanks for all the effort and care put into this. Definitely helped me learn about the Polymega.
_Two_ 32Xs? Why, that's 64 Megabits of POWER!
Megashits
Do the math!
I’ll need for them to fix the Sega Saturn and Sega CD issues before I ever consider it. It is nice that the 32X games work nicely, since that is a nightmare to hook up everything to play it natively.
I live for the TATE MODE call outs
I'm surprised he is still saying it wrong
@@ru5t397gotta commit to the bit.
@ru5t397 He intentionally says it wrong to irritate Japanophiles and pronunciation nazis. It's part of his personality and style of humor.
Thanks for all the work on this! I loved getting to see what this thing is like!
When you use youtube reviews as your QA department.
This thing reminds me of the LaserActive from the '90s that I desperately wanted back then, only better. I'm not going to buy it but man, it's tempting.
Love that stop-motion, by the way!
I say nay, just use a pc you already own and retroarch with controller adapters if you want to use original controllers.
RetroArch. 🤮🤮🤮
I had this pre-ordered years ago, I canceled my order. Kind of glad I did. The mini PC revolution and Battocera accomplishes the same thing if you don't need to use your physical media of course.
I certainly know what YOU think about the PolyMega Joe lol.
Just wanted to note that the ambient music you chose when describing the console really complimented this video nicely.
It allows viewers like myself to better absorb all the technical details without some goofy chiptune blasting in the background. (Not knocking your taste in music, it is usually excellent!)
Wish you would go this direction more often!
That ambient music is actually the Polymega default system music!
Looks like Playing emulated games on PC or a hacked handheld is still the way to go.
Great review. Love the end skit too.
Probably just stick with my old PSP for retro emulation.
Glad to see you're stil around delivering such quality content!
As soon as they switched the concept from FPGA to software emulation I was out. The fact that it doesn't actually play from the cartridge makes it no different to playing emulators on the PC, frankly. I can get adapters for genuine controllers to use on the PC and have a better experience than the Polymega controllers
Apparently it was because they got more interest on this thing playing CD based stuff and they said the FPGA they had planned couldn't handle the 32 bit consoles.
The smarter idea to me now given the look would have been keeping the same size, including an FPGA instead and upgrading it seamlessly. Like the front end we see now would have functioned the same but the back end would have lifted off the drive bottom vertically so as to be invisible to the naked eye. This could have switched out to a newer more powerful FPGA or they could have even created a combo unit of an FPGA and traditional processor.
I think our best hope now is to BEG the head of Framework, after they offer an OLED screen option on that laptop, to look at giving us what the Polymega was meant to be.
Just realized I’ve been subscribed and watching for 10 years. Thanks so much Joe!
This should appeal to those who want a quality emulation based console replacement with no setup and no hassle. At that price with all those problems, potential buyers are just going to be swayed to making their own emulation box that will work better without the constraints off silly and expensive addons. Or learn about the Mister. Since these guys famously dropped the FPGA based hardware, I just don’t get who this really aimed at.
I have seen people change the processor on the polymega and it works really well
So you can buy a ps5, a 6900xt on sale, or.... this thing with a ton of issues...
Two Xbox Ones or an XSX is my preferred way to go. The deal might not be as sweet with Retroarch patched out of retail mode, but it's consolized emulation and it works pretty well. My XSX only gets used for Retroarch.
I wanted one of these for a while, but decided on an AVS for my NES needs, and I've got a consolized Neo Geo MVS in an AES case. Reconnecting with my childhood is getting expensive, but its worth it to have no lag.
2:14 -- God I hope it runs faster than 2.9 Mhz... emulation be pretty slow at that clock rate.
My ears pricked up when I heard it too 😂
"3:44" Such a dramatic delivery of this question.
Some questions aren't meant to be answered.
Intel Coffee Lake CPU running at 2.9 megahertz!?!?
I think he meant GHz
The "PolyShmegma". I'm not sure where I heard that name used a few years back... but now every time I see this console - I just hear it pronounced as the _PolyShmegma._ lol. In my head-canon, your voice Joe, is by far the funniest one to pronounce it repeatedly in a 30 minute video!
Everything about this console is nonsense: from the price of base unit, to the modules (and their cost), to the fact that its a expensive modern 'software emulation' device that makes it so hard to do simple things even cheap emulation boxes allow (even accounting for it being closed source). I'm not sure who they designed this for, given its prohibitive expense - and how cheap alternative are for people who want to play with carts.
But one thing is for sure: It's a fascinating device to see you cover, and the PolyShmegma is the greatest game console name ever in the history of the universe! Thank you Joe for bringing us the scoop!
Ooofff... the sheer gall to ask 500usd for a console that never play anything right..
Jeez, I remember when it was announced, like 8 years ago? They kind of pitched it like a retron for CD based consoles. They should have worked harder for that vision, I thought that sounded cool.
Game developer here, the audio delay is from the ALSA audio driver on Linux. On Windows, this issue is solved long ago with the WASAPI (XAudio) driver. On Linux, one would have to use the more obscure JACK driver instead.
I’m running ALSA on retropie and batocera across pi3b+, X86.64, and odroid XU4 respectively. Pretty sure ALSA is the OS backend for my latest project, a pseudo 16-bit engine being cross developed for both Windows and Linux using SDL2 and I’ve spent hundreds of hours so far testing in both environments… not only have I never noticed inherent audio lag using ALSA, I’ve never even heard someone make that claim. Do you have something to back that up?
It's actually PulseAudio rather than ALSA. Both PulseAudio and JACK use ALSA drivers. The developers most likely just need to change one PulseAudio config file to give lower latency.
Considering how far along this is you would think some of these emulation issues would have been dealt with.
IMHO, Polymega is pretty much dead on arrival. If Polymega were to use AMD AM4 motherboard with iGPU support up until Ryzen 7 5700G + upgradable external memory, perhaps this could be an emulation beast.
Great video as always, i can appreciate what they wanted to accomplish but i feel it misses , close to $700 Canadian before shipping for the base model. Thanks for a honest review.
Sackmen, unite!
I'm a man of the sack!
Getting my Sack on.
yes😎👍
Sack it!
Great presentation on this video, I was a fan of the "Bzzt!" and "Ding" along the way.
TAAAAAATE MOOOOODE! Happy Easter, Joe!
this sort of thing is genuinely a really cool idea for somebody who just wants to declutter how many consoles they have hooked up at once, but they always seem to have an infinite amount of problems that the kind of person who bought all those consoles in the first place would definitely notice
I guess this is the device for people that have more money than sense. You can do all this on PC and just get adapters for your controllers.
The appeal for many was it was it was an easy way to dump all of your carts/cds and has an awesome interface.
That is one thing I do hate about some of these emulation setups is the interface is horrid or JUST serviceable(I mean looks generally when I say both of these things). The emulator creators really need to take a design class.
As always some of the best reviews, fair balanced and great detail. I remember being excited all them years ago but no chance today. I am kind of torn they deserve Kudos for getting it out to customers and not pulling a Amico but yeah this needs to die fast.
🔥 *TATE MODE!!!* 🔥 never gets old. 5:10
Really hope he never drops this gag as well as “Did you just say tits??”
I love my Polymega, but I got mine waaay before they jacked up the price on the console, so I didn’t spend the current price on it. I haven’t had nearly the level of problems you dealt with. Weird. I think for an average person, they’ll probably really love using a Polymega, but the cost of the unit is a big barrier. As is the reliance on actually having physical games. Most people probably won’t notice a lot of the issues and will enjoy their time with the console.
Yep, this review did come across as overly negative. Making a big deal about the blur option that I turned off before doing anything, done. I think all of my games worked an installed with no problems. Loving it so far, great menu experience as well.
So like....an absurdly expensive emulator that makes you feel better by using official software. Interesting. Not really.
Here's the thing about the Polymega: Brand new 6 button PC Engine controllers. And you can buy the controllers without buying anything else.
Anything that brings that into the world is ok in my book.
I can't say this has ever impressed me or that I've ever thought about buying one, but an interesting watch nonetheless. I just can't imagine spending nearly $900 on the Polymega Deluxe bundle (base unit + NES, SNES, GEN, TG16) and having THAT many bugs, latency, sound issues, speed issues, non-working homebrew, and translated carts, nearly impossible to copy roms over to it, and so on... No thanks!)
I'm glad I bought the Analogue Pocket ($200), Dock ($100), and adapter pack ($85), so it'll handle physical games for GB/GBC/GBA/TG16/PC ENGINE/SUPER GRAFX/ATARI LYNX/NEOGEO POCKET COLOR). As well as FPGA cores for more than a dozen plus more consoles, computers, and so many arcade cores. I also think the MiSTer might play N64 more accurately than the Polymega now, with the latest updates on it. PSX and Saturn updates on the MiSTer also bring it closer to console hardware perfection.
this does seem kinda glitchy, frankly PC emulation is ultimate unless you need to use vintage controllers or if you inherit a retro cartridge collection.
2:14 "2.9MHz"? ^^
Thanks Joe!!!!!!! You make my day better
So this is just an emulator. If it rips the game to memory then it’s emulation.