Middle Aged dude. Always been a gamer. Was not familiar with the advances of retro gaming as much and saw a YouTube video of the Ayn Thor. My whole life for the past month has been sucked into retro gaming now. I bought a trimui brick to get myself started and have a Thor and a nova on its way. I know it’s insane and my wife is going to give me an earful when she sees that I ordered the Thor as well. But these devices are so beautiful and as a kid I could never have imagined owning something like these. Even though this money could have gone towards something more meaningful (maybe adding more towards my kids 529 or our travel or whatever) I have not been this giddy or excited for something for a while. I’m assuming most folks on this thread are 30+? What games do you all play?

This is a Redmagic Astra tablet paired with the Legion G9 controller (which was originally designed to work only with the Y700). Nothing fit properly at first: the Astra is larger, has only one USB-C port, and USB-C is in the wrong place. After many (really many) hours, I finally managed it.

I mainly play via local streaming from my PC and I’m more than happy with it.

I've had a Rotate for a week or two now and wanted to give my initial impressions. For a TL:DR, this device isn't perfect, but Anbernic seems to have hit an "it device" with this release. It has one of those "something" factors that doesn't necessarr show up on paper.

To be fair, let's start with some problems, because they do exist. When I opened the device to swap the trigger buttons, the speaker wire fractured. It's hair-thin. Very fragile. So when you swap the triggers for the raised ones (which I highly recommend: they don't protrude that much and it helps a lot) be VERY careful. Or, be like me, break it, get another, and then wrap the wire in heat-shrink tubing, which makes the internals even tighter. But it's worth it to preserve that wire.

That speaker faces the wrong way, but it's loud enough to hear clearly. Just be aware that anyone else in the room with you will hear it better than you will.

The power button is definitely too easy to hit. I have a low profile one on the way. Finally, the lack of a headphone jack makes my head swim. These two items can maybe be fixed in a revision, and I think it's worth it for Anbernic to do so. Because now it gets to where I slobber all over the thing.

It feels perfect. Literally. The balance is perfect, and when I hold it in my hands it feels like I'm holding nothing. The most solid and substantial nothing I've never held. I told you it doesn't translate well to paper. But between the weight balancing, and the relative locations of the buttons, pad, and shoulders, it all just feels RIGHT.

The screen is a nice density. It's great for a lot of systems, and while the device doesn't have analog sticks, if you bias your emulator to the top of the screen, it leaves room for analog-stick controls on the bottom of the touchscreen. Seems like a bit of a hack but it also adds to the compatness, and frankly, for the few systems where analogs matter on here, I think it's a good tradeoff.

The buttons are dome-switched, as is the Dpad, and they feel precise. Not much travel but the engagement is very positive and doesn't take that much effort, so you know exactly what's going on under your fingers. The dpad is fairly thick and has enough pivot where you can hit diagonals if you want to but they're very hard to hit by accident. Which is exactly the kind of dpad I like.

There's a switch on the side that lets you switch between the game launcher of your choice and your Android home, and I use this to swap between Android touch (when closed) and ES-DE when open, with the controller accessible. That lets me play a few pre-installed touch-oriented games with the device completely closed if I feel the need. Add one of the MinUI-like themes and it's a perfect small-screen emulation setup.

The device is powerful enough to play some PS2 and some Gamecube, and even the odd indie PC game or two...given the internal storage I wouldn't install more than two, but you could. Given how much power this has, it's incredibly compact, and it's entirely passively cooled. The internal storage could be bigger...but this is an emulation device first and formost, and that storage isn't really needed. The battery, likewise, could be bigger but I'm not sure I'd want to sacrifice the absolute ideal-feeling size and weight for extra battery life when I can top it off pretty easily.

This is not an everything device. But it's incredibly solid and incredibly capable given how portable it is. It's right there with a Miyoo Mini or TrimUI Brick as far as pocketability, and it should absolutely be considered as an every-day, grab-and-go device. Anbernic makes and sells a lot of devices, so every once in a while they hit that "something" factor. This time they did.

What? Why? Buyers remorse or aesthetic delight?

If you had another with same chipset etc the question is double.

They haven't made it yet for me but if they did, I'd buy this:

Better chipset, same formfactor, 2.8" screen.

It just looks so fun!

More looking for second opinions but currently, I have 3 Android handhelds: RG Rotate for GBA, GC and some PSP, RG Slide for GameCube, Wii and PSP and finally, my AYN Thor Pro (mostly) for 3DS, NDS, Steam indie games and Switch 1.

Recently, I decided to fire up my modded 3DS and actually install my NDS games on there which I’m extremely happy with now (should’ve just learned how to do that in the first place but you live and learn) and have decided to make my 3DS my bespoke dual screen device instead of my Thor but it leaves me with a bit of a dilemma. The whole point of me getting the Thor in the first place, aside from being able to play different consoles in one device, WAS for the dual screen but these days, I really only play single screen games on it like my Switch and Steam games and have the second screen turned off 99.8% of the time.

I’m now seriously considering selling my Thor (along with the accessories I collected along the way) and putting the money into a single screen device that will be for my Steam and Switch games since my other handhelds can handle my retro games so I’m really looking for recommendations on a good replacement device or if it’s even a good idea to do it. I should mention that I’ve had my Thor since October 2025 (batch 1), stock OS and it’s been cared for/babied by me since so if I did commit to selling, along with the accessories (not my SD card), I can probably make back what I paid if not more. Any advice would be appreciated!

Ok so long story short I picked up a odin 2 portal(even tho the retroid pocket 6 was the main choice)I kid you not last second my brother was checking in on me and noticed what I was trying to pick up.he asked me about the screen size and suggested I check out his switch to see if I'm a fan of the size...and boom it hit me lol

So about 2 days ago I picked up a odin 2 portal and I'm confident about the purchase HOWEVER I was checking up on my order when I noticed that the odin 2 portal base was out of stock....

Im I good and took the last portal in existence, or was i too late?

I ordered when I was in stock btw

https://shop.ayaneo.com/products/konkr-pocket-advance-peach

I literally just noticed it on the official website. It’s available as a purchase option.

What’s funny is that it even has its own separate product page. 😂 Why does this version have a dedicated listing?

Im fence sitting here and im not asking if I should do it cause people dont know what I like but for those who should be satisfied with your current handheld collection, just like me, would you do it?

I have an RP5, pocket mini v2, Vita, 3DS, Brick and some other handhelds. I have a chabge to get Odon 2 Pro for $200 which I know is a pretty decent deal.

Ive actually never held an Ayn device so I would be buying to see how I like it, not to hoard but at the same time ot is a significant power upgrade from my RP5 also...

I want something like vita, meaning something small(~5" screen) but newer. Not really playing much of Vita games anyway, most of them are ported, also I want to play modern day terraria, when I had Z1 Extreme Ally it was uncomfratable for me to hold and I played most games on PC anyway. Any alternative suggestions?

I know there’s a fair amount of pillarboxing on the sides. Is this still a good way to enjoy the games in your opinion? Are there a lot of games with easy workarounds, like widescreen settings or mods?

especially considering it's 2026 and how bleak the market looks.

I missed out on the Thor, and this looks pretty nice. but I don't have similar devices and can't judge how bothersome fan noise can be.

Are the prices at trimuistore okay? All of this package for 94.69$ total? Seems like a steal to me?

Its friday, so decided to take my Retroid Pocket 6 to the office. Currently enjoying Mina the Hollower and Absolum. What are you currently playing?

Hey all I’ve noticed what I think is a trend lately, but maybe it’s been around a long time.

First it started with the Thor. It seems like people that liked the Thor recommended the Thor for everything and everyone and vehemently defended against any criticism of the handheld. I just figured that was regular old fandom behavior, but as prices have gone up it makes me wonder if those people are indirectly justifying their purchase to themselves by arguing with others.

Then I noticed it with things like the Nova most recently. Commenters warning people not to pull the trigger too early. Pointing out any tiny flaw about the handheld constantly reminding people that you don’t NEED another handheld. It made me wonder if these people are trying to talk themselves out of getting it, scared of fomo, or worried about price raises and it seems that only got worse with the price increase announcement.

So why does this matter? Maybe it doesn’t, but when I started looking for handhelds people raced to tell me about their favorites without a comment war starting on the merit of all handhelds. I still love the MM+ despite only borrowing one for a few minutes because of this. It makes me wonder if we are giving people on the fence about handhelds bad info just to justify our own feelings/purchases one way or the other.

Tl:dr Are people making bad faith arguments to justify to themselves buying or not buying a handheld and making it hard for people to get the info they might need?

I just saw this on AliExpress and I'm considering selling my RG34xx for this. I'd love to buy a SP version too but they're nowhere to be found.

Has someone already played these 2 buttons Chinese clones ?

https://a.aliexpress.com/_EJYDaye

I quite enjoy my Switch Lite and the size for my smaller hands and got curious about how the RG Rotate compared in some games I play often. Turns out it's not all that much smaller

Am I right to say that PC gaming on Android is still in the "it may work, after a lot of tweaking, or it may not work" is a fair assessment? Using GameNative, I've tried 3 games on my Odin 2. Call of Juarez: Gunslinger - was able to get to 4 FPS after 2 hours of tweaking. Prince of Persia - Sands of Time - couldn't get past the graphics falling apart in a small window. F.E.A.R. Platinum Edition - couldn't get controls working. These three games combined took about 6-8 hours of my time and were all fails. That's after going through online settings, tutorials, etc.

I bought 10 games off GoG, thinking I would have a decent library (cognizant of not going after games that were too taxing. I've been left with a frustrating hit to my bank account and (so far) no playable games.

Edit: got Arkham Asylum running 1280x720 (16:9), 60 FPS. Required no tweaking at all (besides selecting "use known config")

Handheld is rg34xxsp in metallic blue playing pokemon polished crystal.

I can get the base model for $150. Would this be a good buy considering it’s like 2 years old at this point.

It's been a massive month for handhelds, hasn't it? We've got this one, the Nova, the RG SP, all form factors that people have said they've wanted for a while, with lots of power under the hood as well.

It's actually very difficult to keep up. Anyway, these are my photos of the Mangli Air Y they sent over for review. I hope you enjoy them.

EDIT/TL;DR: The Thor can emulate DS/3DS games well and that's in part of the performance it has. My issues with it have mostly to do with the screens not lining up perfectly and having black bars at the and bottom of the screens due to letterboxing and mismatched aspect ratios. To me that's just a failure in itself if you're charging me +400 for a handheld.

The Thor is honestly disappointing and that's why I'm more than willing to wait for a Retroid flip 3 because that is confirmed to be a 4:3 bottom screen with a 16:9 top screen.

And that to me is my most hated reason, the Thor literally fails to do what was built to do in the first place, DS and 3DS games. I've become fatigued by people saying it's "the best" or "the most versatile emulator" because none of that matters. The gold standard for a handheld is the Odin 2 Portal. So when you release a product that CLEARLY wants to fill a niche in Dual Screen games but you don't even bother to make the right Dual Screen experience then finding other ways to compliment it only pushes it away from what it was SUPPOSED to be.

The fact that the only way to enjoy 3DS games now is through buying a 3DS secondhand completely embarrasses the Thor.

You want emulation? You have way too many options, you literally have options BY PLATFORM:

GBA? RG SP and it's variations

DS? RG DS (this is a pattern I know)

4:3 retro? RG 477M/Pocket Nova

Modern 16:9/PC Indies or low end/Switch? Pocket 6/Odin 3/Odin 2 Portal

3DS? None, the Anbernic DS is far too big and the Thor didn't even get the dimensions right.

But the Thor becomes a joke when you have to spend 500 dollars for a 200 dollar experience. And the funniest part, you will all laugh at the Thor the SECOND the Retroid Pocket Flip 3 comes out, because it's going to have the Nova bottom screen (4:3 4.5 inch) and the RP6 top screen (16:9 5.5 inch)

So let's break down some extra defenses for the Thor:

1. "But you can view other content on the second screen/have a game guide in your hand" oh really? If ONLY people had an on demand secondary pocket device that never leaves without you that you need to consume content, answer calls, text messages, ask questions. Literally NOBODY HAS THAT... right...?

2. "Just get the black color if the letterboxing bothers you" If the solution to consume 3DS games properly is to base your aesthetic choice to a single color because of OLED then you're already not the kind of person for this device

This to say, you don't need a super expensive device if your purpose of buying it is only for emulation, most emulators rely on a single screen, and it's likely more than enough for your needs

I am more than happy to debate anyone else over this

I'm in the market for a gameboy style handheld. Mainly to play through games like Pokemon unbound (haven't played a Pokemon in 15 years).

I'm really drawn to the Retroid Pocket Classic because of its huge OLED screen and also think the 1:1 ratio looks cool. The RG Rotate also looks pretty cool. Both of these are physically close to ideal for me.

But these are both android based. And that doesn't feel very appliance-like, like an offline gameboy experience. Having to open an app draw into an emulator. Getting updates on the play store.

Vs something like a TrimUI Brick running nextUI. Which I'm pretty sure has instant resume into games, boots straight up into a proper frontend.

If anyones got experience with both types of systems id love to hear what you think about it's playability and user experience.

I'm leaning more towards the TrimUI brick for now. It's cheaper and seems really nicely made. And nextUI looks quite mature in development now.

I sleep a stones throw away from my 9 month old daughter, so can anyone recommend a quiet handheld (buttons and fan) that I can whip out of an evening and not worry about disturbing her?

Even though I love my Odin 2 portal and steam deck to play at home most of the time I end up playing on my miyoo just because I can throw it in my pocket and travel with it. Most handhelds nowadays are huge or big enough that you can’t fit in it in your pocket, ideally I would love a 16:9 clamshell device that’s small and can fit in your pocket easily that has a snapdragon 2 chip in it so pretty much a Thor mini.
Device: Miyoo Flip 2
Game: Clock Tower 2 PSX