[lxgr]

On the other hand, many cool games never made it to the PAL region, and a lot of PAL ports (and video releases) got technically botched in some way.

[talldayo]

There's a sad bit of irony that the year is 2024 and the game console in your pocket could feasibly run anything you want, but the OEM region-locked it again.

[nfriedly]

I initially thought of my RG35XX+ when I read "the game console in your pocket" and thought "no, it's not region locked". Then I realized this was a discussion about iPhones and yes, they are region locked now.

But, FWIW, I've been really happy with acmeplus's beta of Batocera Linux on my RG35XX+. My son and I have been taking turns playing through old gems like Pokemon and Aladdin on it, and I'm hoping to finally beat Final Fantasy VII one of these days.

[kernal]

Most, if not all, emulators ignore / bypass region locking. I've yet to come across any emulator that strictly enforces it

[TheCapeGreek]

Emulators using region-specific BIOS files can still have issues though.

[deergomoo]

Yeah, as a European retro game enthusiast I tend to avoid the PAL versions of anything older than the sixth gen of consoles like the plague.

By the PS2/GameCube/Xbox era most games were fine and PAL60 was becoming a thing anyway, but older than that and there’s a good chance the game just runs 17% slower due to the 50/60Hz difference, or has some weird letterboxing due to not accounting for 576 vs 480 lines.