CES is a bona fide melting pot of incredible ideas and exciting announcements from the tech world, and so far we’ve seen some amazing retro products shining through amongst the AI vacuums, electric salt spoons, and HDMI cables. In many ways, I still think My Arcade should have sponsored the event with the sheer number of new products they have announced, especially considering one of them was first announced at CES four years ago and is only just coming out!
Can you remember the Super Retro Champ? My Arcade first brought the notion of their SNES & Genesis/Mega Drive cartridge playing handheld to the table back at CES 2020 and we’ve been waiting for it to appear in our lives ever since. It certainly didn’t look as slick as Hyperkin’s Mega 95 handheld, but considering it catered for cartridges for both systems I remained open-minded, especially because it was a handheld that brought together the best moments of my childhood on one machine and almost made it feel like the Nintendo Vs Sega console war never even happened.
Looking at the pictures My Arcade have shared, the design looks identical to what we saw four years ago. It’s set to cost $39 more with an updated price tag of $149.99, but that’s the only change to their original plans, and considering how much Olive Oil and Petrol have gone up in the past few years, I’m not surprised…
It’s still not exactly what you would call portable in any way, shape, or form, but it does fulfill the criteria of being a handheld nonetheless, and a hybrid one at that. The Super Retro Champ has an HDMI output for hooking straight up to your TV and a power adapter to keep it running all day long, but you can play handheld or even in tabletop mode with a kickstand if you wish and enjoy your Genesis/Mega Drive, SNES/Super Famicom games on a 6″ screen.
Honestly, this thing does everything the Nintendo Switch Online service already provides. If you’re looking to play SNES and Mega Drive classics and already have a Switch, then you probably won’t even be that interested. Still, if you have a massive back catalogue of physical cartridges for the Super Nintendo and the Genesis/Mega Drive, then I can definitely see the appeal of kicking back on the sofa and playing some Sonic or Super Star Wars while your other half watches something trashy on TV. The Super Retro Champ will be launching later this year, so keep checking back with me for more information as and when I get it.
