Link: https://old.reddit.com/r/SBCGaming/comments/1tf8dqt/let_all_remember_to_relax_and_enjoy_the_hobby_we/

This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.

The original was posted on /r/sbcgaming by /u/vintagerust on 2026-05-16 23:06:18+00:00.

I've seen the patterns here and other subreddits, and subcultures as a whole. A few camps form, a few common phrases start getting upvotes, and getting repeated, all of a sudden we're tearing each other down instead of enjoying what we have. We don't need or benefit from elitism. The bigger the community grows, the more of a market for devices and you even see more rom hacks being created and supported.

I think deep down we all know.

• No one is having fun "wrong", even if they enjoy setting up devices more than gaming or visa versa.
• There's no perfect device or at least it's probably not significantly more perfect than another handful of devices.
• You can spend under $100 and enjoy thousands of games, from dozens of systems you may want to revisit or never had a chance to enjoy in the first place.

This is so much better and easier than it was ten or fifteen years ago. The screens, the battery life, the community support, the compatibility, GBA cores now being able to system link even on these tiny handhelds. If you want clicky buttons, it's out there, if you want soft quiet buttons, it's out there. The youtubers providing incredible step by step guides on setting up devices. We could go on and on.

Early on this was a really obscure scene, you had some oddball kickstarter things, people trying to jam a pi in a gameboy dmg shell, some of the early Korean handhelds. We have so many excellent, affordable choices now we get the luxury of debating which one is slightly better at each price point and I'm just thrilled there's something available, to fit anyone's budget, that is still an excellent device.