Retroflag GPi CASE 2 for Raspberry Pi Compute Module 4(CM4), 32G SD Card(with RecalBox System), Card Reader, Safe Shutdown, with 4000mAH Battery

I got the GPi Case as a birthday present. I assembled the Raspberry Pi Zero W, 32 Memory Card flashed with the Supreme Team Image for the GPi Case. It was an easy time getting everything to work together. I recommend getting a Zero W, as this has wireless and therefore allows you wirelessly scrape game art from the web for your roms, and it allows you to transfer games from your PC or Mac directly to your GPi Case over scp or FTP. I found that Batocera and also Recalbox ran poorly on the GPi Case, which is why I finally turned to the Supreme Team image for a truly optimized experience. I got a base image with no games on it, as I didnt want to use one of their pre-configured full images. I wanted to customize my own. I had to get it to work myself and do things like change the control scheme to be the correct version the Pi would accept by pressing left d-pad and the start+button. This fixed that. I also had to load on a GBA Bios file and put it in the Bios directory, which I copied over by the way of scp from my Terminal. After this was done I was off to the races to see what games would run well. GBA games run flawlessly on the Supreme Team Image with my GBA Bios file. They have no artifacts or slowdowns. They are just perfect in terms of frame rate and audio. Gameboy Color games run flawlessly as well. Gameboy games have a bit of artifacting sometimes. At least I saw a few games have that issue, but just minor tearing at the top of the screen while playing certain games. SNES games run well on this unit. They do sometimes have a small stutter or slowdown. I think this could be fixed by overclocking the Zero W, but that would also increase the power draw of the SOC and lower your battery life, so thats the trade off. The Zero W only having a 1.0GHz CPU is probably why the SNES emulation sometimes has a hicup, but the SNES games are fully playable. I have seen MegaDrive and PS1 one games run on the GPi Case. I would say MegaDrive is what it can handle, but PS1 probably is stretching it, as the 1.0GHz Single-Core CPU struggles with SNES games. I dont imagine PS1 would be that much better in terms of performance, and there are plenty of YouTubers who show that PS1 has choppy performance on the Raspberry Pi Zero / Zero W. N64 Emulation is bit much for this as well since its CPU is just super underpowered. And just go into this with knowing you will need to use the Supreme Team image and tinker with it for the best results. I definitely recommend using a Supreme Team image, as they do things like button mapping configurations for all the emulators to be button mapped properly. They also do some great optimizations for the loading screens and start up screen. The image I got was hosted on the Arcade Punks site. The form factor and the buttons of this GPi Case are great. It feels like a real Original Gameboy when I play. I get a real sense of nostalgia. I think its great for that. In terms of playing games I would say getting a New 3DS system and modding it to play SNES, GBA, GBC, GB, and Mega Drive would do exactly what the GPi Case does and more with costing about $80 or $100 on eBay for a non-XL version. Be sure to buy some Eneloop batteries with a battery charger. Or get some rechargeable batteries as this thing chews through batteries like no tomorrow. 3 AA Batteries will last you about 4-5 hours of play time with GBA or GBC games. And so $15 in an Eneloop Battery kit with 4AA Batteries and a wall charger is what I highly recommend. If you dont care about this thing being a handheld device. And you just want a way to play emulated games. Use a PC or get a Raspberry Pi 3 or Raspberry Pi 4 and use it on your TV. A Raspberry Pi 3 with run about $50 and a decent controller will be about $30, but that will allow you to run PS1 games just fine. I would recommend getting a heatsink for a Raspberry Pi 3, as if you dont run one with a heatsink it would overheat the Raspberry Pi 3. So this case mostly is for those who love the Classic Gameboy and Gameboy Color form factors. If you want a system that is a throwback to the iconic 1989 system, but has an updated screen, and can play SNES, NES, GB, GBC, and GBA games this is your system. Other emulators may be hit or miss, but this is a great device.

Okay, so first off the quality of this product is top-notch! Its a great little machine that if configured correctly it will blow your mind with its quality. HOWEVER, the key here is to configure it correctly. And IF YOU ARE NOT FAMILIAR WITH RETRO PI & THE RASPBERRY PI FAMILY, then this product may not be for you. Simply because there is quite a bit of setting up and configuring to do. There are some work around solutions however, all of this does include download software that you may not be familiar with. IF YOU DONT CONFIGURE THIS CORRECTLY THEN THIS NEAT LITTLE MACHINE WILL BE JUST A USELESS PAPERWEIGHT. I will praise RetroFlag for this Gpi Case system, but I give them low marks on their instructions. They really need to step up there game on supplying software support. I suggest throwing their crappy instructions away and research online: best ways to setup Retroflag gpi. A few good websites I have found is howchoo.com and stevecombs.com. Both have very good step by step tutorials. Oh, and watch out for accidently downloading copy-protected software from some dodgy site. We wouldnt want to do that! And its probably a good idea to use a VPN. Happy gaming!

The build quality and screen are better than I was expecting. Original Game Boy and Game Boy Color games look better on here than the originals but it plays just like I remember. It can handle a ton of other systems as well, unfortunately due to using a Pi Zero it has trouble with anything beyond SNES games and even those sometimes have trouble.

Perfect case for a ready to go emulator. Everything is “almost” plug and play, you need 2 scripts from the retroflag site and you’re golden. Like everything, this is a great consumer product, but so many parts can be tweaked and updated to make this thing truly yours.

I love this device, and while I wish it had rechargeable batteries (even if it cost more), my only issue is the cartridge for the Rpi Zero. Its a bit loose, so sometimes the signal gets fuzzy on the screen. My workaround is sticking a piece of tape near the front-bottom of the cart to help keep the contacts flush. I just wish they made the cart more secure when in place.

I love this thing! Came when it was supposed to come and everything I expected!

Im a Pi nerd and happily spend my time cobbling together devices. However, pricing out the parts for this myself would have cost a bit more and then Id have to deal with a 3D printer. Retroflags case is easy to set up and get to playing. Install only took a few minutes (not including OS setup) and I easily set it up to appear as a network folder over wifi so I can drag and drop new games onto it on the fly. Love it! Just know that the device is limited by the Pi ZeroW itself, and while you can play 8bit and most 16bit games without issue it will really struggle on render intensive titles like the original Star Fox or other RARE games on SNES.

Amazing what this case can do with a little effort.

got this for my husband and he cant stop playing

These are great. First one had a bad screen but replacememt was fine. Dpad is a little wonky but these are a great deal for the money.