This is not meant as an attack in any way, anyone can obvously buy whatever makes them happy.
I’m just really curious who buys consoles that aren’t that old for such high prices.
I can see the appeal of holding childhood consoles in your hands again, and I can also see the appeal in collecting cool really old stuff. But I struggle to understand why someone would buy e.g. a New 2DS XL for €300 or more.
So just out of curiosity, if you are someone like that, what’s the appeal that makes it worth spending so much money, instead of e.g. just going with a steam deck and an emulator instead?
Edit to avoid confusion: I am not talking about new reproduction systems (like the N64 Mini) or premium emulation/FPGA systems (like the Analogue Pocket or the MISTer), but about original game consoles that aren’t supported any more but also aren’t really old. Something like the DS/3DS, PSP, Wii U, Playstation 3. Some of them are now more expensive in mediocre second-hand condition than they were when they were new.
Can you return second-hand consoles?
True, but I mostly meant relative to other devices you could use instead. The cheapest option would probably to get a phone-attachment controller for maybe €50-100 and connect that to the phone you already have.
Okay, I see we have some confusion, when you said “new retro”, I was thinking of the N64 raspi thing that came out last year. Those did have a manufacturer warranty.
In terms of second hand consoles, yes, no warranty, but, it’s still not messing around with emulators, it should play the games largely as expected.
Phone attached controller might be cheaper, but surely you can see that its a significantly worse experience than a properly built console?