Is the Evercade VS Premium Pack The Ultimate Retro Gaming System?

In this episode, we evaluate the Evercade VS Premium Pack provided by Castlemania Games to see if it is the Ultimate Retro Gaming System

Check out our unboxing video at, please visit https://youtu.be/UmQ7dFEr6Y4

Playing retro arcade and home video games can be challenging for some. Setting up and configuring RetroPis is not for everybody, not everybody wants to download ROMs from the internet, and getting authentic hardware to look good can be expensive. For those looking for more of a plug-and-play solution, there have been a number of options over the years. The team at Evercade looks to change the game, both figuratively and literally, with their Evrercade VS home console, an evolution of their handheld. But how did the games look, how do they sound, and how do they play? That's what we are about to find out.

Chapters
0:00 - Introduction
2:25 - Menu Overview
3:06 - Double Dragon II
4:18 - Bad Dudes
5:41 - Burgertime
6:41 - Mapping & Testing the Retro Fighters Brawler64 USB Wireless
7:48 - Earthworm Jim
9:36 - Mapping and Testing the Retro-Bit Wireless 6-Button Genesis Controller
10:44 - Tempest
11:18 - Double Dragon
12:49 - River City Ransom
15:10 - Final Thoughts

Straight from the box, the Premium Pack includes both a Data East and Taito multi-cart, giving you a total of about 18 games to play. With two included controllers, I plugged one in and got to playing. I like the fact that I could change from a 4x3 aspect ratio, a Pixel perfect aspect ratio, and a 16x9 aspect ratio. This way there's something here for everybody's visual preferences. You can also change the wallpapers behind the games in the event that you use something that is not 16x9. It's a nice touch. Finally, they do offer a scanline option for those who like that look.

The Evercade VS gives you the option of actually having two cartridges in the system at any one time. I had assumed that you would have to toggle back and forth between cartridge one and cartridge 2 somehow, but that's simply not the case. You can have all the games on both cartridges displayed on the menu, or you can toggle to only show cartridge one or cartridge too. This is a super nice and convenient feature, and something I honestly didn't expect.

Once I launched into the games themselves, I was very impressed with how crisp the visuals looked and how authentic the audio sounded. Starting first with Double Dragon 2 for the arcade, the sprites looked amazing, it sounded accurate, and overall it was a terrific experience. And this was repeated Time after time with additional titles as I tested them.

After I played some of the initial titles, I decided to test out additional controller compatibility. I was super curious to see what USB controllers I could get to work. I started with a Retro Fighters Brawler64 Wireless because I'm kind of sick and twisted like that. I plugged in the USB dongle, the LED lit up, and it paired to the controller. I was able to navigate through the menu automatically without any setup. I did go through and map the buttons which was super easy to do. One thing I could not get to map properly, however, was the home button which was kind of frustrating. Also, the analog stick didn't work, it only recognized the D-Pad, so that's important to remember.

After the Brawler64, I tested out one of Retro-bit-s six-button wireless Sega USB controllers, and to my delight, it actually had a configuration pre-installed for this controller in the Evercade VS. That was unexpected and really nice to see that sort of third party controller support. And I was able to play all of the games perfectly with this controller as well, but again I could not map the home button to the home button on the controller. I don't know what's going on with this.

Why it RoX:
- Exceptional value
- 1080p
- 2 controllers included
- 18-games included on two cartridges
- Shared library between the Evercade handheld and Evercade VS
- Compatible with third-party USB controllers
- Displays games from two cartridges at one time
- Visual options including aspect ratios, scan lines, and more
- Additional cartridges are only about $20 each

What could be improved:
- I could not map the home button to any other controller
- I've heard the Namco collection no longer works

It's getting even easier to play excellent quality retro arcade and home games on modern flat-panel TVs. Thanks to companies such as Evercade, you have the ability to get terrific hardware that simply works, and you also have the option of expanding your library relatively inexpensively with authentic, licensed software. I really dig the system, I love the concept of it and the execution is terrific. If they could fix the option to map the home button to a different key on another USB controller this would be nearly perfect. As it is, the flaws that it has in my opinion are very minor and this is a damn good system to add to your collection.

#EvercadeVS #VideoGame #Sega #Taito #DataEast