One of the reasons I never sold my old consoles was because I had the notion I might want to play them again when I got older. There's something tactile and personal about plugging in a controller, slapping in a cartridge, and clicking that power switch. Without any debate, playing games on the original hardware is absolutely the way to go.

But emulators, ROMs, and projects like Retro-eXo are major stopgaps, ensuring that people who want to play the less-popular or the no-longer-licensed games which aren't available anywhere else. :)