The PlayStation Vita was one of the first truly modern gaming handhelds, and, sadly, the last one that Sony made apart from the dubiously portable PlayStation Portal. It might have been a commercial failure, but the candybar layout, dual-stick design, and all-glass front set the stage for future handhelds in a way that the Nintendo 3DS certainly didn’t.
The Anbernic RG Vita ($109.99) and RG Vita Pro ($149.99) are the first handhelds to attempt to recreate that aesthetic, and after spending the better part of a month with them, I have to say the results are somewhat mixed.
Before you get too excited, neither device is a replacement for the PlayStation Vita. Even the more powerful RG Vita Pro, which I’ll focus on for this review, isn’t capable of playing the majority of the PS Vita catalogue.
Instead, it’s a tribute in design only. To be fair, that was the best part of the PS Vita, with the games a distant, distant second.
Thankfully, it mostly succeeds on its own merits and has a bright future thanks to community developers. However, it comes at a very precarious moment for retro gaming handhelds, which makes it a much harder sell than it would have been a year ago.
A Vital Difference Beneath The Surface
Out of the box, the Anbernic RG Vita Pro feels less like the ultra-premium PlayStation Vita that I sold many years ago and more like every other Anbernic handheld I’ve tested over the past few years – which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
It’s surprisingly comfortable to hold for a device with no ergonomic bumps (the divots on the back are purely decorative, unlike the PS Vita), and the all-glass front makes it feel more premium than its $150 price tag implies. At least, as long as you don’t drop it.
Beneath that glass front is a surprisingly nice IPS panel. It’s slightly larger than the original Vita (5.5 inches vs 5 inches), and although I found it a little dim, the 1080p resolution makes for clear, crisp visuals.
Unsurprisingly for an Anbernic handheld, the controls feel great. The D-pad uses a soft membrane (sorry, clicky Vita D-pad fans), and the buttons have a nice amount of resistance to them. The buttons themselves have Nintendo-style ABXY labelling, likely due to trademarks on the PlayStation’s signature shapes.
I’m not usually a fan of stick-on-bottom handhelds, but the Hall-Effect sticks on the RG Vita Pro are solid performers. They’re slightly inset and far enough away from their neighbours to prevent accidental inputs. I also appreciated the lack of ergonomic bumps here, since it was very easy to shift my hands up or down without having them forced into a predetermined spot by the grips.
The digital shoulder buttons and triggers are a nice size, but I found them excessively clicky. Anbernic has a bad habit of using the loudest shoulder buttons of any retro handheld maker, to the point at which I felt bad about using it in bed next to my partner.
The downward-firing speakers aren’t anything to write home about, but they get the job done. There’s a headphone jack at the bottom of the device, housed right between the two MicroSD card slots.
The reason there are two microSD card slots is simple: the RG Vita Pro can dual-boot between Linux and Android 14. By default, it boots into a simple Linux build that felt a little half-baked to me. It’s functional, and games launch quickly, but it looks very basic. Anbernic still hasn’t really figured out how to make a decent operating system, despite releasing more than three dozen handhelds over the past six years.
I didn’t test them for this review, but I have to mention custom firmware options like GammaOS (Android) or Knulli (Linux), which promise improved performance and customisation. In fact, the first build for GammaOS on the RG Vita Pro just launched as I’m writing this, with overclocking, system-wide shaders, and more baked in. It’s not necessary for casual users to enjoy the device, but for tinkerers, there’s a lot of potential here.
If you’re not a tinkerer, the good news is that no matter which OS you use, everything comes pre-configured. Emulators are pre-installed, and typically, you just need to launch them once for everything to just work. You may need to point an emulator to your game folders or BIOS files, but the rest is taken care of by default.
Switching between Linux and Android is simple. With the stock builds, holding the R button beneath the left joystick at bootup launches the handheld into Android, which again, is a fairly basic build. The most important note here is that there’s no Google Play Store, but there are a few handheld-specific settings for things like stick sensitivity.
Even without the Play Store, you can still install games and apps via sideloading. In fact, it’s probably a good idea to keep Google Services off the device, since it will eat up some of the precious little horsepower this thing has.
New Chipset, Same Old Anbernic
The Anbernic RG Vita Pro is the first gaming handheld to ship with the RockChip RK3576, paired with 4GB of RAM. On paper, it’s a solid lower-mid-range chip, with benchmarks that land above other budget devices like the Mangmi Air X but well behind Anbernic’s own T820 devices, like the RG Slide or RG 476H.
But in actual use, I didn’t find the difference particularly noticeable. All of these devices offer stable performance for retro home consoles up to the N64/Dreamcast, but imperfect emulation of GameCube, PS2, and above. The extra bit of performance in the T820 translates to slightly more reliable frame rates, but I’d still recommend spending more on something like the Retrode Pocket 5 or Anbernic RG 477M for sixth-gen home consoles.
Where the RG Vita Pro really excels is in emulating handheld systems. This is my new favourite way to revisit my favourite PSP games, with every game I tested running smoothly at 3x upscaling, and many at 4x upscaling.
But it isn’t just the performance that won me over. After all, the PPSSPP emulator runs great on just about anything. It’s the way everything comes together. The RG Vita Pro feels much closer to Sony’s design language than other widescreen handhelds like the Mangmi Air X or even the TrimUI Smart Pro S. It feels like I’m playing a bigger, more powerful PSP – a console that still holds a very special place in my heart.
Battery life is also excellent here, and I got roughly five hours of PSP gameplay off a single charge. Charging was much faster than average for Anbernic, taking roughly 70 minutes to go from 10% to 90%.
The RG Vita Pro is also whisper-quiet, since there’s no integrated fan. It can get a little toasty when pushing the chipset to its limits, but it never felt uncomfortable in my hands.
The elephant in the room is PS Vita performance, and to be honest, it just isn’t there. Some lightweight games run fine – until they don’t, and the game crashes. This is more of an issue with the Vita3K emulator, which isn’t nearly as mature as most emulators. Maybe this will change in the future, but for now, hang on to your old PS Vita if you want to play Vita games.
One place where the RG Vita Pro does deliver is game streaming. Widescreen handhelds are undoubtedly the way to go for game streaming, and this is one of the cheapest options with full controls and dual joysticks, not to mention a 1080p screen. The only asterisk is a lack of analogue triggers, which might limit you when it comes to certain games.
The RG Vita Pro is also great for playing on a big screen, with video out supported via USB-C or the micro HDMI port on the top of the device. This is pretty unique at this price point, with most budget chipsets not supporting any kind of video output.
That said, local PC emulation is pretty limited with this chipset, which is both underpowered and has poor driver support. There is good news here, and that’s PortMaster support via Linux. Despite appearances, this is one of the most powerful handhelds that can boot into Linux by default (aside from the Steam Deck, of course), and that means you can easily play PC games that would otherwise be impossible, like Morrowind or GTA Vice City.
Anbernic RG Vita Pro Review: Should You Buy It?
I had a great time playing PSP games on the RG Vita Pro, and if that’s what you’re primarily looking for, it’s a great choice. There are plenty of affordable handhelds that can play 4:3 retro consoles, but few that are ideal for widescreen systems.
PS Vita games are another story. Was Anbernic irresponsible to call this the RG Vita Pro when it can’t reliably play Vita games? Probably.
But the bigger problem is the price. Retailing for $150, it’s skirting right at the edge of more powerful systems like the Retroid Pocket 5, which can comfortably play PS2 and GameCube on an OLED screen for ~$50 more, or even less if you can find it on sale.
Still, I have to give credit to Anbernic for launching the RG Vita Pro now, into what is easily the most hostile market for gaming handhelds I’ve ever seen. This (and its less-powerful sibling) are among the few major handheld releases in the past few months, with most competitors slowly increasing the prices of their top handhelds, like the Retroid Pocket 6 and AYN Thor.
I also have the feeling that the RG Vita Pro will age well as custom firmware packages become available. This has been the case with previous Anbernic handhelds, but the company sent test devices to developers early this time. Flashing new builds and optimising the aesthetics of a handheld is a lot of work, but it’s increasingly becoming a main part of the emulation handheld hobby.
Whether or not the juice is worth the squeeze is up to you. There’s an awful lot you can do without tinkering, but at this price, it’s well out of impulse buy territory.