Welcome to my review of the Miyoo Mini Plus retro gaming handheld. This tiny little device packs a punch and allows up to and including PlayStation 1 game support. It’s brought to us from the now well-known manufacturer, Miyoo. This device is a successor to the even smaller Miyoo Mini.
The Little Handheld That Can!
For the purpose of this review, we were sent the white Miyoo Mini Plus with a 64Gb MicroSD card.
The Hardware
You can purchase the Miyoo Mini Plus in four different colourways, white, transparent black, retro (grey), and transparent atomic purple.
In the box, we get the handheld itself, a MicroSD card reader, a USB-C charging cable, a small instruction booklet, and a tempered glass screen protector kit.
Key Features:
- ARM Cortex A7 Dual Core Processor clocked at 1.2GHz
- 128MB RAM
- 3.5″ IPS Display at 640×480
- 3000mAh Battery that offers up to 4-5 hours gameplay depending on the system you’re playing.
- 3.5mm Headphone Jack
- 1 x MicroSD Card Slot that supports up to 128GB (Although I have a 512GB in mine now!)
- USB Type-C Charging Port
- Power and volume buttons
Design and Functionality
So, this tiny little device really is small. I’m used to holding a Steam Deck for gaming on the go so the Miyoo Mini Plus was a real shock when I held it.
However, even though it’s small, it’s pretty comfortable to hold and play for extended periods. I’ve played hours of Columns III and lots of various other games such as Cannon Fodder, Desert Strike, Pokémon Ruby, and more.
It has 15 buttons (including up, down, left, and right on the D-Pad). Up front, we obviously have the D-Pad, A B X Y in the Nintendo format, The quick access button, Start, and Select. On the rear we have R1, R2, L1, L2. We can also quite easily access the battery on the rear so you could buy some spares and swap them out whilst on the go.
As you can see, the design of the device is beautiful. The screen looks absolutely gorgeous and really shows on the more colourful games of yesteryear. The viewing angles are very good and I must admit I have not had any problems at all with the screen or the device as a whole.
The base OS that is installed on the Miyoo is good and offers quite a lot for the average gamer to enjoy. It also comes pre-installed with 2500+ games, and these are proper games, not homebrew or hacks.
However, the real icing on the cake is when you install OnionOS, this unlocks a whole boat load of new features. Unfortunately, neither offer Bluetooth connectivity. This means you cannot use Bluetooth headphones with the Miyoo Mini Plus. That’s unless it gets unlocked via a software update if the hardware is inside.
Gameplay and Supported Systems
So, the Miyoo Mini Plus supports a good range of platforms. The most demanding it can handle is the PlayStation 1. Unfortunately, it cannot handle anything else such as N64 or Dreamcast. But what it does support is fantastic considering Droix UK sell the device for under £80!
I have had no trouble playing Sega Mega Drive, Super Nintendo, Game Boy, and PlayStation on the handheld. I’ve played quite a range of games but I seem to be drawn to the 16-bit games more than PlayStation games.
As mentioned above, I have mostly played Columns III on the handheld. But, there has been some real love restored for classics such as Wiz ‘N’ Liz, Cannon Fodder, even Rayman on the PlayStation.
Every PlayStation game I’ve chucked at it has ran very well and I’ve not experienced any issues with performance. The battery actually seems to last longer than the stated 4-5 hours for, but that could be because I have OnionOS and only really playing 16-Bit games. I believe OnionOS has had some tweaks for the battery life to help it last longer.
Conclusions
Whilst the Miyoo Mini Plus is a fantastic device out of the box, it is made even better when you install OnionOS. As mentioned, I was disappointed that there’s no Bluetooth, especially seems it has a Wi-Fi chip. As far as I am aware most if not all Wi-Fi chips also have a Bluetooth module in them. Hopefully this is something that can be enabled via a software update in the near future.
To learn more about Miyoo, you can visit their official site.
All in all, you’ll have a great time regardless. I score the Miyoo Mini Plus a 9/10.
A sample was kindly provided for us to review this product.
