New Anbernic RG 55G1 tested: Affordable handheld console impresses in games

Anbernic’s first Qualcomm Snapdragon-powered gaming handheld, the Anbernic RG 55G1, is now on the market. Currently starting at just $139 for 4 GB of RAM and 64 GB of storage. If you want to know the ins and outs of the hardware, check out our launch article. What we are here to discuss, however, is the performance of the Anbernic RG 55G1 and its Snapdragon G1 Gen 2 SoC.

YouTuber ETA Prime has tested the Anbernic RG 55G1 in a variety of titles, using a variety of emulators to give us a fairly good idea of what to expect from the handheld console. Despite only coming in at less than $150 and utilizing the modestly powerful Snapdragon G1 Gen 2, the Anbernic RG 55G1 is reportedly an excellent handheld emulation machine.

Starting with GameCube emulation, the Anbernic RG 55G1 is powerful enough to emulate games like The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker, Soul Calibre, and Resident Evil at 60 FPS, using 2x to 3x resolution scaling. The only tested GameCube game that struggled to hit playable frame rates was Spider-Man 2.

When emulating PS2 games using the NetherSX2 emulator, the Anbernic RG 55G1 proved up to the task. The handheld console delivered 60 FPS in Kingdom Hearts, Devil May Cry 3, and Gran Turismo 3 at 60 FPS, at 1.5x to 2x resolution scale. More demanding games like Ratchet & Clank: Up Your Arsenal and God of War 2 ran between 40 and 50 FPS at 1x resolution scale.

ETA Prime also shows the Anbernic RG 55G1 running PSP and 3DS games. So, check out the full video linked at the end.

Simply put, the Anbernic RG 55G1 appears to be an affordable but capable Snapdragon-powered handheld gaming console. If this is a sign of what Anbernic can achieve with Snapdragon SoCs, we are pretty excited about future Anbernic portable consoles with more powerful Snapdragon chips.

In the meantime, you can buy the Anbernic RG 55G1 directly from Anbernic. There are also plenty of Anbernic gaming handhelds for sale on Amazon.