Second Chance, or Game Boy Advance XL

There's a happy ending for my 3DS XL! While the system itself isn't well suited to emulation (cough cough it sucks for it cough), it's backward compatible with Nintendo's last two handhelds, and those do the job a whole lot better. I can run a hefty portion of the Neo-Geo library with NeoDS... the games don't quite run at full speed, but they come surprisingly close, and the graphics look even more sharp and vibrant than they do on the PSP. (Needless to say, the circle pad and D-pad are a big improvement over what passes for control on that system, too.)

My port of GORF for the Game Boy Advance,
ported to the 3DS. Trust me, the second port
was a whole lot easier than the first.

Better yet, now that I have the old system hacked with rxTools, it can run Game Boy Advance games too. It's not a perfect solution... instead of emulating the games, the 3DS is essentially downshifted into a Game Boy Advance, losing a lot of its handy features in the process. It does work, though, and it's nice to have the option to play all of my favorites from the GBA library on the 3DS XL's super-sized screen. If I had the patience for it, I could convert my entire library to a 3DS-friendly format and play them all without having to lug around a plastic tub crammed with cartridges. (I don't, but I'm sure I'd be quite happy with a couple dozen of those games on the go.)

One more thing before I head out. Evidently Street Fighter V sold rather poorly in its first month, compared to other big-name titles in the same genre. According to data from NPD, it moved just 200,000 copies at retail, compared to 800,000 for its predecessor and 1,200,000 for Mortal Kombat X. Gee, who'd have thunk selling a half-finished game for sixty dollars would end badly?