Analogue Pocket
At first glance, Analogue Pocket looks like a new version of Nintendo’s iconic Game Boy Pocket from the mid-90s. And it is, more or less. The handheld accepts original Game Boy cartridges, but also those released for Game Boy Color and Game Boy Advance. This means that you can jump between Pokémon Red, The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons and Advanced Wars on the same bus trip. Analogue is also planning $ 30 adapters that will allow you to play Game Gear, Neo Geo Pocket Color, Atari Lynx, TurboGrafx-16 / PC Engine and SuperGrafx.
Analog
However, Analogue Pocket is more than a machine to “touch everything”. The handheld enhances the original Game Boy design with two extra face buttons, two double shoulder buttons on each side of the cartridge slot and three small system buttons. There are also stereo speakers, a headset and a 4,300 mAh battery that charges via USB-C. The 3.5-inch screen also has a resolution of 1,600 x 1,440, which should offer superior brightness and color reproduction. Finally, the company will sell a $ 99 dock that allows you to play cartridge-based games on a TV.
Pocket will also have support for Nanoloop, an application that musicians use to create chiptune music. The functionality can help justify the Pocket’s high tag price. At $ 199.99, it’s more expensive than Nintendo’s Switch Lite laptop. Some will say that this is a steal, considering the screen and the internal hardware needed to run so many types of cartridge. The first units are expected to ship in May 2021. Buying one can be a challenge: Analogue opened pre-orders last August and sold out in minutes, bothering many hopeful customers.
Analog Duo
The Pocket is not the only analog machine to support TurboGrafx-16 cartridges. Analogue is also working on a home console called Duo. As the name implies, it has two slots for physical media. The one on the left is for HuCard cartridges – the format with which the TurboGrafx-16 and PC Engine were launched – while the one on the right accepts discs that were designed for the TurboGrafx-CD add-on. In addition, the Duo will support titles developed for the PC Engine SuperGrafx, a successor to the TurboGrafx-16 that was released only in France and Japan.
Analog
Like Pocket, Analogue is using FPGA (field-programmable gate array) chips to read the original TurboGrafx-16, PC Engine and SuperGrafx games. This means that the Duo acts as the original hardware and does not depend on any software emulation or ROM files to function. There is only one disadvantage: Analogue has not yet developed a chip to emulate the PC-FX. If you want to play on that specific system, you will need to look elsewhere. Still, it is a beautiful island aimed at a small, but passionate part of the community. (How many people collect TurboGrafx-16 games?) Analogue says the Duo will be released next year for $ 199.
Game date
Panic’s Playdate is a peculiar thing. It has a monochrome screen, unlike the Analogue Pocket, and a foldable crank on the right. The latter is not there to power the device, thankfully. It is a genuine control method, just like the D-pad and double-sided buttons. Teenage Engineering, the company that designed the OP-1 synthesizer and Capcom-themed pocket synthesizers, helped Panic dream of undeniably beautiful hardware. It measures 74 × 76 × 9 mm, which is smaller than the Game Boy Pocket and therefore much more portable than the Nintendo Switch and Switch Lite.
Panic
Panic is best known for its developer-focused Mac and iOS software, such as Nova and Transmit. The company also published occasional video games, including Fire clock and Untitled goose game. As Greg Maletic of Panic told Engadget last year, Playdate aims to be a spiritual successor to Nintendo’s iconic Game & Watch series. Since then, it has become something between these devices and a more sophisticated notebook. Each Playdate is a devkit, for example, and owners will be able to install third party games directly on the system. “[Developers] you won’t have to go through us, ”Panic confirmed in a blog last October.
Playdate is priced at $ 149 and is due to launch early next year. For that price, you get a ‘season’ of free games that are unlocked weekly. Originally, it would be 12, but the prolonged development of the console allowed Panic to “commission even more games from the first season from more developers,” according to a blog post. A number of developers, including Keita Takahashi, the creator of Katamari Damacy and Wattam, confirmed that they are working on Playdate titles. Panic also shared several prototypes from the community, including a Doom door.
Atari VCS
Atari is not the video game giant it used to be. The company, best known for the Atari 2600 and classic titles like Pong, was most influential in the 1970s and 1980s. Since then, the iconic brand has been sold several times and battled bankruptcy. What remains of Atari has not given up. The company is preparing an entirely new system called Atari VCS. The design is certainly similar to Atari’s, with long idents along the top and, for at least one model called VCS 800, a walnut imitation finish on the front. The company also made a retro joystick to accompany its approach to a modern controller. Longtime Atari fans will also appreciate Vault, a collection of classics that includes Asteroids, Skirt and Centipede.
Atari
Atari VCS is more than a retro console. It is a “fully functional mini-PC”, according to Atari COO Michael Arzt, equipped with an AMD Ryzen R1606G processor with an integrated Vega video card. By default, the console will run Atari OS, a version of Linux designed for the living room. However, you can use “PC Mode” to install and boot other operating systems, such as Valve’s Windows, Chrome OS and Steam OS. Atari believes that this model differentiates the console from cheaper alternatives based on Android. The VCS 800 can be a simple game console for the living room, but it can also be a semi-decent PC for surfing the web and accessing basic applications.
An Atari VCS 800 All-in Bundle, which includes a standard console, joystick and controller, can be pre-ordered for $ 389.99. This is expensive: for an extra $ 10, you can buy a PlayStation 5 Digital Edition. The console was first revealed as Ataribox at E3 2017. It was renamed in March 2018 and then crowdfunded on Indiegogo a few months later. Atari expects to ship support units and a small number of pre-orders before the end of the year. Total retail production will not happen until January 2021, however. VCS has been around for a long time and some people are understandably skeptical about Atari’s ability to deliver. After all, the company is small and is working on breathtaking projects, like cryptocurrencies and hotels with the Atari theme.
Intellivision Amico
Atari is not the only retro brand trying to make a comeback. A team led by Tommy Tallarico, an industry veteran who has worked on more than 300 games, is making a new Intellivision system. Amico is designed to be a simpler system that anyone can play, regardless of their age or experience with video games. It comes with two controllers that have disks instead of D-pads, four shoulder buttons, a small touchscreen and everything needed for basic motion controls. The console will come with six games and a lot of downloadable extras that cost between $ 2.99 and $ 9.99, including an exclusive sequel for beloved Earthworm Jim platform players.
The Intellivision team believes that the casual market is terribly underserved at the moment. Modern games are very complicated, according to Tallarico, and do not encourage people to play in the same room. Amico will resolve this with a game library that does not include any violence, inappropriate language or sexual content. There will be no loot boxes or microtransactions, so parents can have complete confidence in what their children are playing. That’s the idea, anyway.
Intellivision
Like VCS, Amico is expensive. The tray-shaped system will cost around $ 249 at launch, which is just $ 50 below the Nintendo Switch and Xbox Series S. (You can also argue that the Switch meets a similar need for family games .) Still, there is a group of people who grew up in the 1980s and remember the name Intellivision fondly. For these people, the curated library and simplistic controllers may be sufficient to justify the asking price. The Tallarico team was originally planning a launch in October 2020, but that date has been postponed to next May. If the time is right, we could have a rematch of Atari and Intellivision in our hands.
Switch Pro
We cannot end this list without mentioning the much talked about Switch Pro. To be clear, Nintendo has never confirmed the existence of the console. Bloomberg reported in August that the company was planning to release an updated Switch next year. According to unidentified sources, the company considered a more powerful model that can support 4K visuals. It could either replace the standard switch – which has already received a small overhaul, slightly increasing battery life – or stand beside it. There is no guarantee that a Switch Pro will happen, however. Nintendo performed incredibly well during the pandemic and has sold an impressive number of consoles in the past three quarters. Still, a Switch sequel could help maintain that incredible momentum in the coming year.