Many people who were hoping to get their hands on a retro handheld console from Analogue have been disappointed. The Analogue Pocket sold out of all pre-order units within the first fifteen minutes of sale, and fans aren’t pleased.
TheAnalogue Pocket pre-order release datewas announced via tweet not long before the actual sale, with a plan to ship in May of 2021 and a MSRP of $200. It will be able to play Game Boy, Game Boy Color, and Game Boy Advance games and comes with a DAW (digital audio workstation) that can connect to a PC or Mac. Buying an adapter also enables Game Gear, Neo Geo Pocket, and Atari Lynx games to be played. Needless to say, the nostalgia factor was making a lot of people excited.
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In a tweet, Analogue announced that it had hoped to produce more copies, but “the unfortunate global state of affairs” prevented it from meeting the demand.Video game delays are common in the pandemicsituation, and it sounds like Analogue is one of many companies facing production issues due to COVID-19. Analogue didn’t publicize how many units were available during the fifteen minute sale, but the low amount of available copies wasn’t the only issue during the sale.
A lot of potential buyers faced issues with Analogue’s shipping calculator, which popped up once the Pocket was added to the person’s basket but then buffered calculations for a few minutes. With the sale moving so fast, every minute counts and a lot of people saw that pre-orders had sold out by the time the shipping calculator finished processing. This has a lot of people very disappointed, given theretro appeal of the Game Boy-lookalike.
Analogue limited the purchases to two per order, most likely in an effort to combatconsole reseller price markuplike the Nintendo Switch has been facing during a product shortage. However, some people have reported that pre-ordered Pockets are being auctioned off for much more than the MSRP of $200, and a quick eBay search confirms this is the case. It looks like scalpers got the upper hand again this time.
Retro gaming consoles are incredibly popular due to the nostalgia factor, with some people even going so far as to make andsell emulators for the N64 and other old consoles online. The Analogue Pocket is versatile, has a great look, and has already proven itself to be very popular. Hopefully Analogue will restock its stores, and fix the shipping calculator issue so that people can actually complete their orders.
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