Games

Here you'll be able to find lists of official resources to purchase and play retro games through repurchases, backwards-compatability, console compilations, or emulation services.

Nintendo

Nintendo notoriously does not release their games on other platforms, so there won't be any official options that do not live on a Nintendo console.

For official emulation, there was the release of both the Nintendo Classic Mini Nintendo Entertainment System, or just "NES Classic Edition" emulator console intitially in 2016 and rereleased in 2018, followed by the Nintendo Classic Mini Super Nintendo Entertainment System, otherwise known as the "Super NES Classic Edition" or "SNES Classic Edition" in 2017, which were small compilation console releases that had small libraries as well, with 30 preloaded titles for the NES Classic edition and 21 preloaded titles for the SNES Classic Edition, including the previously unreleased Star Fox 2. As you can probably tell by the release dates though, they have since ceased production, so if you want to get your hands on one, you'll have to go through resellers, usually in the price range of $150 to $200 for one in good condition.

Nintendo also offers multiple emulators for their old end of life consoles through a Nintendo Switch Online membership, though these services are split up into three catagories.

On Nintendo Switch, with a $4 monthly/$20 yearly subscription to Nintendo Switch Online, you will be able to access the NES, SNES, and Game Boy emulators. While still on the Nintendo Switch, you can purchase a monthly-only plan of Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack for $50 a month and gain access to the Game Boy Advance, Virtual Boy, and Nintendo 64 emulators. On Nintendo Switch 2, the expansion pack also grants exclusive access to the Game Cube emulator.

SEGA

SEGA, having notably dropped out of the console wars after the Dreamcast, had to become very lenient with the publishing of their games on other consoles and storefronts, which gives you many options to still buy games in the form of compilations.

As stated on the Emulators page, you can officially pay to emulate Genesis/Mega Drive games on Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2 with a subscription to Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack.

Sony

Sony's backwards-compatibility history is messy, as we're now five console generations deep, we're down mutliple console revisions in this time, too. Generally, on modern Play Station consoles, PS4 and PS5, you get a catalog of classic games with your Play Station Plus subscription, the catalog of which you can view here. It doesn't contain the full library of any one of the consoles included, and is noticably missing some classic hits. PS4 and PS5 also notably do not come with the ability to play PS1 or PS2 disks, both only having the limited digital catalog for these consoles, the PS1 library being entirely absent from the PS4.

Without using an emulator like those provided within the Emulators page, your best bet at playing the most of the classic Play Station game libraries is to track down a "fat" Play Station 3, also known as the original/first model of Play Station 3, specifically the CECH-G04 model of fat PS3, made before the "slim" revisions. This is because the original PS3 had the capability to natively play its own disk library, the PS2 disk library, and even the PS1 disk library, as well as play Bluray disks if that is handy to you. It is the most backwards-compatible Play Station out there.

Finally, there was also a "Play Station Classic Edition" in 2018, inspired by Nintendo's two miniature emulator console releases. It had a preloaded library of 20 games, but was less of a "best hits" like Nintendo's two releases and was more of a smorgasbord of genres from the Play Station's library. If you can get your hands on one, supposedly it is pretty easy to load more games onto it.

Microsoft

The Xbox line of consoles is pretty straightforward with backwards-compatability. Certain games, so a limited digital library like Sony and Nintendo's solutions, from the original Xbox to the Xbox One will work when inserted into your Xbox Series X/S, and others will not, and will tell you as much. Backwards-compatible games are avalible for purchase individually on the Microsoft storefront, so if you've lost your disk, never owned one, or lost your disk drive with a fully digital console, you can still play backwards-compatible games. They are officially supported and emulated, and you can find other classic games for sale as parts of compilations, such as Halo: Combat Evolved now only being playable through The Masterchief Collection, or weird off-platform releases like the MacOS version. Without emulation, the only official way to play most old Xbox titles is to purchase an original Xbox or Xbox360 physically and play them on their original hardware.