Why is RetroPi ungodly complicated

No one said that it would be simple, unless you bought it from someone who set it up that way. In other words, Raspberry pi is not a game console, those are simple. Is basically a linux computer, computers are not simple. they are complex

yes

@Sonic Angel Knight Tell that to the people who act on blind sycophancy and insist everyone who gets an NES or Snes Classic that they should get one ad nauseum.

Nothing says simple like buying:

- An SD card
- A case
- The RP3 itself
- PSU/AC adapter
- Setting up and installing the software
- Getting a controller

Yeah, that's so much better than getting a console that has everything set up, alright

you got punked by all the memers. Raspberry pi has issues running snes games and is not powerful enough for a lot of stuff. You'r better off just using a cheap older computer.

Google is your friend a couple of keywords would've probably found a site with pre built images similar to hyperspin, custom sized for your sd card, and ready to go from the off: I know a right group of punks fond of an arcade that set me up pretty nicely...

TBH, A RPi3 is cool, for anyone that wants an RPi3, and I mean a RPi3 with all that it implies (specially if you really like DIY stuff).

And a SNES Mini is cool, for many reasons, specially for someone that wants a SNES Mini, it is plug and play and it is beautiful.

The only things that is not cool, is people patronizing others and imposing whatever they think as what needs to be made.

PS: I have an RPi1 and an RPi3 since... day 0 almost, but I've used them mostly for DIY projects, small automation projects, remote private proxies to avoid Chinese internet censorship (once, it was kind of cool), etc. I could use them for media and emulation, but I didn't really buy them for that, and actually I think they are quite cumbersome to set up for those purposes, specially if you just want to plug it and chill out.

I just Steam Link my desktop to my other TV

Honestly, I found the RP3 with RetroPi to be terrible as a gaming device. Settings can be finicky, often times not sticking at all, some things take a lot of tweaking to manage properly, and even under optimal settings the input lag on most emulators is enough to ruin my gaming experience. I think it's a really neat little thing, all things considered, but the amount of issues and time spent just to get a sub-par gaming experience out of the thing is too much for me to justify.