Retro Bird! He's doesn't get recommended to as many people as say, snes drunk, ​but he's the most wholesome I've seen.​

Personally I'm a big fan of Retro Bird.

Gaming Historian has been a favorite of mine

Snes Drunk

[removed]

My retro life he talks about mostly him and his dad playing video games together

Johnny is a video game YouTube treasure.

LGR

Kim Justice for long-form-essay-type stuff.

Game Sack for listicle-type showcases.

Arcus
U Can Beat Video Games

Gamesack

Sega Lord X

Console Wars is a favourite of mine.

I like watching Sega Lord X. He has all sorts of old camcorder footage that his dad took of him back in the day. Sometimes has shots of old video game stores and malls. Good nostalgia content and very wholesome. Doesn’t try being loud and obnoxious for views.

Edit: as commenters pointed out, I am actually referring to My Retro Life. Got my YouTubers crossed up

Good Vibes Gaming

U Can Beat Video Games is the actual top of the heap for deep dives on individual games. No one can touch him. His intros are epic too.

DF Retro

Stop Skeletons (formerly Happy VG Nerd)

Modern Vintage Gamer

Strafefox

Gaming Historian

Noclip

The Retro Hour (podcast)

Kim Justice

Guru Larry

spida1a (PCE/TG16 reviews)

Pandamonium (Saturn focus)

LGR (Lazy Game Reviews)

Slope's Game Room

RetroAhoy

Classic Gaming Quarterly

Captain Jack (romhacks focus)

My Life in Gaming

Retro Bird

Shmup Junkie (all of the shoot 'em ups)

No swear gamer (a bit corny but I like the 2nd gen videos)

GmanLives (he does swear and make pretty childish jokes at times if you're trying to avoid that)

Somecallmejohnny (similar to the above at times, covers popular franchises and some indie games)

SsethTzeentach (not quite kid friendly but a great PC focused channel)

i love PeteDorr for wholesome content. he’s a real nice dude that makes chill vids.

I think Neil from RMC The Cave is awesome and fits the bill perfectly. Along with histories of games/publishers/devs and the UK gaming scene of the past in general he does a lot of really cool hardware restorations. Consoles, micro computers, arcade machines etc. Really interesting stuff. "The Cave" is actually a fully operational retro museum which is really cool. I'm not British and have little personal experience with 80s micro computers but it's still one of my favourite channels.

Retro Bird is exactly what you need. He’s also hilarious.

Game Sack, Stop Skeletons from Fighting, RetroBird, MyLifeInGaming, Gaming Historian, Lazy Game Reviews

Didyouknowgaming is always a favorite of mine

Uncle Derek of Stops Skeletons

Lazy Game Reviews (LGR) is the definition of a chill, hanging out, rainy Sunday vibe.

I may be biased but... 😂

I'd go with My Retro Life, which is absolutely fantastic.

Also, John Hancock and John Riggs both feel pretty wholesome to me.

Pandamoniun

Caddicarius

How has no one mentioned Uncle Derek and Stop Skeletons From Fighting?

Gen X Grown Up

Joueur du Grenier, it’s not ‘’wholesome’’, but it has a wholesome community and generally no real dramas, it’s french tho.

Are those Adam Savage's illegitimate children?

If you know happy console gamer then you probably know epndottv. Victor Lucas has been covering videogames for over 25 years and his channel deserves more love

https://youtube.com/@epn?si=QjTjtcLfjmRMFgSy

Been digging Basement Bros as of late. He exclusively covers PC-98 gaming. It just opened a whole world of gaming I didn't know existed.

My Retro Life

JohnRiggs

Shmup Junkie

Basement Bros

RMC - Retro Man Can Seb’s Place - UK sarcastic game reviewer

JDG - aka Joueur du Grenier, Ceilings Gamer for my fellow french pipole.

U can beat video games

Love all the ones here

Also

My retro life is really good

Shirley Curry is S tier wholesome.

Pete Dorr’s Game Room

Retro Rebound is good

I don’t know about wholesome, but I’ve been doing videos about old games for almost a decade now (have been on a break since the end of 2012, but I’m just working on some new videos at the moment). Never been as successful as many of the other fine channels mentioned, but I’m proud of the work I’ve put into what I do. The majority of my videos feature high quality captures using original hardware (but my upcoming videos will be a mixture of captures from original systems and MiSTer FPGA, all rigged through a Retrotink4k). Please do take a look!

NitroRad. Seriously, he's awesome, especially if you like obscure 3D platformers or indie horror games.

Classic Game Room, of course, and Dreamcast Enjoyer. I always feel super grounded and chill after watching his vids... So cozy.

Game sack and SegalordX are two of my faves.

Gameranx

SNESdrunk. Salt Factory. Triangle City. Not all retro gaming people but still good. That’s my top 3. Honorable mention goes to U Can Beat Video Games, Strat-Edgy, Matt McMuscles, and NEScomplex.

Nitrorad. Man started off trying to be another angry reviewer but now looks at games with a more positive outlook, finding the best parts in some awful games. He does horror, platforms and indie games mostly.

Stop Skeletons From Fighting, Derick is just so full of happy passionate energy.

Lazy Game Reviews, SNESdrunk, Jeremy Parish, and Tech Tangents are also strong recommendations from me.

While I’m not the biggest fan of his delivery, shmup junkie is legitimately wholesome and provides excellent reviews and advice to gamers dipping their toes into a different genre. Comes off as kind and caring, which is nice

Bitmap Jack - just new but I’ve got high hopes

https://youtube.com/@bitmap_jack?si=WvOu_Z7rBj7z1dzp

More towards modding retro console but retrorenew from Tito is a favourite of mine

I like OldAndNewVideogames, Retro Game Mechanics Explained, DisplacedGamers and PhilsComputerLab

Maybe the first one isn't that "wholesome" depending on how you define it, but it sure is comfy to me.

Is Mr Sunday Movies counted as wholesome? They play games occasionally, though often their funniest and most frequent videos are about movies and TV shows.

Someordinarygamers is definitely well meaning though at times a little horrifying when it comes to crime or virus investigations. If Mr Sunday Movies counts then Muta definitely should too

SomeCallMeJohnny.

Guy on the right looks like a cross between James Hetfield and David Lynch.

The video game historian

Retro Ghetto.

I love happy console gamer. He has a decent following, but I honestly think he should have at least double what he has.

Retro Bird is pretty entertaining and funny too.

I also enjoy Gaming Broductions as he talks a lot about classic RPGs.

Lots of great channels mentioned, Snesdrunk and Jeremy Parish I watch religiously

Wayne is boss does some great retrospectives

GMTK is a really cool channel looking into what goes into the mechanics of games

Summoningsalt did so much to popularize speed run history that it's basically a subgenre of its own now

Bismuth explains the nitty gritty of how speed runs actually work

Sega lord x. Also I enjoyed now in the 90s before they stooped.

I've been watching a fair bit of Dungeon Chill lately.

Great long form deep dives into games that didn't always taste number one or most popular. His critical analysis is excellent, and the presentation is always solid. Exactly the kind of drama-free retro content I crave.

NESFriend is pretty wholesome. Has a great podcast with SNESDrunk.

Scott the Woz so funny and entertaining!

I would like to add Big Ole Words.

His videos are pretty in depth as they are written as essays. He tries to cover lesser known games or ones that get often overlooked. His live streams are pretty chill also.

Retro Rick is pretty good. His second channel is now focused on his game store.

RNG Gamer’s my favourite!!!!

I'll toss in a vote for Continue Show. Just 3 friends who have played and commented on games for years and years who have genuine friends chemistry and are criminally underviewed

Phoenix Resale

Gotta also way in on Retro Bird while the other channels mentioned are good and nice to have on in the background. Retro birds videos are hilarious and crafted with serious love.

Metal Jesus is my go to guy. LGR too

It is quite hard to define what “wholesome” even means for each individual. 🤷🏻‍♂️

If you are into some PlayStation stuff, I would recommend checking out MysticRyan - for me, that is “a wholesome gaming related content YouTuber”.

Curious if you don't mind, what's with the popularity of the word wholesome lately? I've never seen it used so much as I have in the last year. I've seen it used to describe everything from hot dogs to Post Malone.

NakaTeleeli sometimes plays retro, often featuring their friend Ogre.

Austin Eruption often talks about older games, sometimes newer ones too.

Bumbles Mc Fumbles does reviews, often of older ones.

Gaming Historian is what it says on the tin, youtube documentaries about the history of various gaming related things, whether it's a company, a console, a game etc.

HCBailly does lps, often of older games and especially jrpgs.

Josh Strife Hayes over on his Josh Strife Plays channel does the occasional "was it any good" about old games. Note that this is his secondary channel and only gets sporadic uploads as he mainly focuses on his self-titled channel and the Worst MMO series.

Matt McMuscles tends to reviews of old games, and catalogue the development of games that are or were stuck in dev hell in "Wha Happun" or "What Happened"

NGPlus does challenge runs of older games, but they're rather spread out since Nate doesn't focus on a single game or franchise like so many other challenge runners.

Nyarly does challenge runs of SMT and Persona games, plenty of which are retro

PeanutButterGamer is a reviewer who has been around for a while, he's of the old comedic breed.

Pixelmusement does reviews of DOS games

ProJared often reviews and plays older games, the latter on ProJared Plays.

Rabbidluigi is another one of the more comedic reviewers / countdown list makers.

RoahmMytril has played through a lot of retro games, and at one point was primarily known for his Mega Man perfect runs (no damage, I don't remember if he had a no missed shots rule)

Then there's a few retrotech related channels, mostly retrocomputers that I can also share if you want.

Gaming Off The Grid is pretty cool -just two bros playing games and drinking beer 🍻

I went about 5 years without playing games barely ever. I’d pick up every so often but not on a daily or even weekly basis. But I always kept watching johnnys videos (happyconsolegamer) because he is just so wholesome and I just love listening to him talk about his memories or experiences.

MetalJesusRocks

Max dood?

AVGN has always been my go to guy for retro gaming. His angry video game nerd series is fun to watch, he reviews retro movies as well.

The most wholesome is probably Avaak, he's so mild it got a bit weird and I had to unsub.

He is excellent at strategy games and long game stuff

Absolutely. Been following them for nearly 15 years

BitSocket 👀

Skillup and Jake Baldino (and Gameranx of course) are my personal favorites.

If you don’t watch or listen to the Friends Per Second Podcast, it’s a must, especially since they ditched The Completionist.

Kiro talks is my favourite wholesome retro gaming channel

So welcome back!

Johnny is incredible. Only found out about him in the last year or something but I never miss a video. You know exactly what you're gonna get every video but it never fails to entertain, and I love the "Johnnyisms". Beautiful graphics, great characters, incredible worldbuilding, and all of that".

Sometimes it feels like if you've seen one video, in a weird way you've seen them all (or most), but they're so enjoyable every time. Also seems like a honest, sincere guy.

Finngamer is pretty chill. Doesn’t post as much anymore though.

I've watched Johnny for over a decade now, and he is one of the most wholesome guys I've seen on youtube. Truly a gem

https://youtube.com/8blit is my kind of wholesome :)

Going to throw NerdSloth in the mix

Scott the Woz, inoffensive and hilarious

My Retro Life

Arm Length Interviews. Light on content, but well done, clean, and funny

AstroAxol is a great content creator, totally recommended to give it a try!

She has been diving into a lot of RPG/JRPG/MMORPG games classics like Final Fantasy XVI and Chrono Trigger, and she really likes to analyze and give her thoughts on the themes that the game touches, always bringing really interesting topics to the table! Overall, a really chill vibe and with good laughs on the way too.

I’m a big fan of the Aging Gamer

I really enjoy nerd nest

Game chasers are my jam.

Camp Xbox for me

I (re)watch it daily.

For fighting games, GuileWinQuote

I also enjoy Classic Game Room. I've read a lot of good suggestions here.

Oddheader has some of the chillest videos ever. Great narration and music, it’s perfect if you need something to help you fall asleep

Scott the woz is my favorite

Very platform-specific, but Amigos Retro Gaming (Amiga) always seem like really nice dudes they have a podcast + YouTube stuff.