It’s that time of year, friends! The house is filled with greens and reds, the music channels all start dropping the Wham, Buble and Mariah, the fridge fills up with eggnog and we gorge ourselves on fruit mince pie. It’s such a special time of year!
We love the season at DDNet, and one of the best things about it is that it’s also the perfect time to catch up on some games. When you’re not juggling parties and gatherings, it’s a slower time for work and it’s easier to steal a bit of time on the side to play something new, or finally get through that game that you stalled on.
Each year at DDNet we run a “games of Christmas” list, that works just like an advent calendar. We count down to Christmas by sharing one game recommendation for the season each day. Crank up the Jingle Bells and get into the spirit of the season with these!
Day #20: Ayn Odin Pro (Read our review here)
This isn’t a game, but it is a piece of hardware that, once you’ve got stuck into it, will greatly deepen your love of gaming, by giving you access to just about everything great from the retro eras of gaming. The Ayn Odin Pro is a beautiful piece of hardware that is comfortable to hold and use. It’s powerful enough to run everything up to and including most games on the PlayStation 2 via its Android-based OS, and it is so much cheaper than a Stemdeck or other powerful Windows PC handheld that you might be considering for the purpose.
The Ayn Odin Pro will help you discover games that have been long lost (and are never likely to be recovered by developers or publishers). It also doubles as a near-perfect resource for both Android gaming (read: Genshin Impact), and Xbox Game Pass + streaming. Since getting this thing I’ve played through Yakuza: Like a Dragon, the Mass Effect Trilogy, Elder Scrolls: Oblivion and so much more, and the experience has been incredible every time. Hook it up to your TV via HDMI, and you’ll basically never need a console again. Truly, 2022 has been a breakout year for handhelds and emulation gaming, and Ayn has been at the very forefront of that, so be sure to treat yourself to one of these this Christmas.
