Playing handheld retro games using the original hardware can't be beat, but the devices of old are beginning to show their age. As these units celebrate their 30th birthday, the original production parts are beginning to give out, and repairing them can be complicated and expensive. However, a modding genius has shown that all you need is a special Raspberry Pi unit to "resurrect" a Sega Game Gear.

Bringing a Sega Game Gear to life with Raspberry Pi

The modder in question is Jeff Geerling on YouTube. If that sounds familiar, it's because we've previously mentioned him when he managed to attach an external GPU to his Raspberry Pi 5. Now, he's back in the lab and resurrecting old hardware using the tiny motherboards.

It's not an exact repair job, per se; the unit he purchased turns the Sega Game Gear into a RetroPie emulator, which you can also do as a simple project for a Raspberry Pi 5. It makes loading games easy, but you can't use your original Sega Game Gear cartridges on it. Also in the video, Jeff discusses some issues he had with the emulation and the tweaks he had to perform to get his games running smoothly.

However, the end result does look fantastic. He modded the shell of the Sega Game Gear to include four face buttons and replaced the screen with a brand new one. Now, Jeff can play all his old retro favorites on a shiny new console, alongside titles from other systems like the N64 and SNES.

Jeff Geerling states that this couldn't be possible without the help of the Zega Mame Gear, which sells Raspberry Pi units designed to replace the original unit's hardware. So if you have a broken Sega Game Gear sitting around, why not turn it into a home project and give it a second life?