RetroArch iOS and tvOS Emulator for Atari, Commodore, Nintendo, Sega and Sony Games Now Available - MacRumors
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RetroArch iOS and tvOS Emulator for Atari, Commodore, Nintendo, Sega and Sony Games Now Available

With Apple's decision to allow game emulators on the App Store, several popular emulators like Delta have now launched for iPhone and iPad. RetroArch is the latest emulator to come to the ‌App Store‌, allowing gamers to play games from a wide range of systems.

retroarch iphone
RetroArch supports multiple versions of Atari and Commodore systems, as well as the Nintendo DS, Game Boy, NES, SNES, and Virtual Boy. Multiple Sega and Sony systems are also included, as are the NEC PC Engine and Neo Geo Pocket.

RetroArch is free to download, has no ads, and is open source. It supports save states, cheats, custom overlays, fast forward and rewind, AI translations, and RetroAchievements. RetroAchievements adds trophies to all manner of classic games, providing incentives to unlock new content and top leaderboards.

RetroArch is fairly well-known because it was previously available on PC and Mac, it just was not able to be released for iOS devices until Apple's rule change. RetroArch is also the first console emulator that works on the Apple TV, allowing games to be played with an MFi controller on a larger screen.


RetroArch can be downloaded from the ‌App Store‌ for free. [Direct Link]

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Top Rated Comments

33 months ago
Oh! TvOS support!!
Score: 21 Votes (Like | Disagree)
toobravetosave Avatar
33 months ago
really they’ve just been scared mobile game devs can’t compete with free 3 decade old games that the ip holders don’t even sell anymore

given the quality of most mobile games i’d say they’re super duper right about that
Score: 20 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Nermal Avatar
33 months ago

No it isn’t legal. 98 percent of the ppl using emulators are doing so illegally. Quite sad really.
The emulator itself is legal, and the developers assume (or perhaps wishfully believe) that people are using legitimate games.
Score: 17 Votes (Like | Disagree)
JSDK Avatar
33 months ago

How do I get my ROMs into my Apple TV,
You load them from the web. From your iPhone, iPad, Computer, visit a "appletvname.local" ish address, and upload your ROM files.

From the RetroArch website:
RetroArch on tvOS has a built-in web server. While RetroArch is running, open a browser on your computer and open the URL that RetroArch displays. You can use the web-based UI to create subdirectories and upload or download files.
Score: 16 Votes (Like | Disagree)
gaximus Avatar
33 months ago

No it isn’t legal. 98 percent of the ppl using emulators are doing so illegally. Quite sad really.
If Nintendo, and Sony would just sell the roms, people would buy them. Not everyone, more some would. And it wouldn't cost them anything to do so. They could even create a legit emulator, for their system. Sell it and roms they only work with it, and make a lot of money.
Score: 14 Votes (Like | Disagree)
goobot Avatar
33 months ago

really they’ve just been scared mobile game devs can’t compete with free 3 decade old games that the ip holders don’t even sell anymore

given the quality of most mobile games i’d say they’re super duper right about that
Problem with modern gaming is that in the past to make money you had to make a good game people would want to buy, now it’s just how can we make a cheap game that makes people want to buy micro-transactions over and over. Also back then they had to ship a complete working game
Score: 14 Votes (Like | Disagree)
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