Today, AYANEO held a livestream on their YouTube channel and other social platforms to show off upcoming products, updates and more, starting with a look back at their older consoles released over the last few years.
CEO Arthur Zhang led the livestream as usual and kicked it off by showing a new colourway and a new edition of their very popular Pocket Air Mini handheld, which as you may know, is one of the best retro handhelds we've ever reviewed for under $120.
This new edition collaborates with Taiwanese, International Games System (IGS) and goes down the arcade route, signifying and relating to the iconic classics of the 80's according to AYANEO. This Pocket Air Mini features a new burgundy coloured shell and golden buttons, more reminiscent of the Famicom colours, alongside pre-loaded with officially licensed IGS games such as Knights of Valour and Oriental Legend inside of a Limited Edition version of AYAHome.
The full list of officially licensed games included are:
- Knights of Valour ver.115
- Knights of Valour v114 Hong Kong
- Knights of Valour 2 V107 *4P
- Knights of Valour 2 V106 *4P
- Knights of Valour 2: Nine Dragons
- Knights of Valour Plus v119 set2
- Knights of Valour: Super Heroes *4P
- Knights of Valour: Super Heroes Ver.101 *4P
- Knights of Valour: Super Heroes Ver.102 *4P
- Knights of Valour: Super Heroes Ver.103 *4P
- Oriental Legend v126
- Oriental Legend v111
- Oriental Legend China, set1
- Oriental Legend China, set2
- Oriental Legend English, set1
- Oriental Legend *4P
- Oriental Legend v105
- Oriental Legend 2 *4P
- Oriental Legend SUPER
- Oriental Legend: Chaos Rising
- Dragon World 2001 China
- Dragon World 2001 Hong Kong
- Dragon World 3 SUPER
- Demon Front V102
- The Killing Blade Ver100
- Martial Masters
- Road of the Sword MV101
- Alien Challenge
- Happy 6 In 1
- Photo Y2K v105
- Puzzle Star
The design is very clean, especially seeing as the paint used for the action buttons and shoulder buttons gives off a metallic look, which offers a premium vibe, matched with the rich burgundy, which AYANEO believes looks like "a visual symbol of the arcade era". On the back, there is subtle "Arcade Home" branding too.
To go alongside the reveal of their IGS collaboration and the fact that it can play these hyper-niche games, AYANEO has self-developed an emulator to go with this, enabling those who aren't familiar with this set of games, nor familiar with tinkering with emulator settings, to have an easier and more fluid gaming experience. Fair play, AYANEO, great call!
It features the same specifications as the original Pocket Air Mini, such as the Helio G90T Processor, a 4.2" display, 2GB or 3GB RAM, 4500mAh of battery and 32GB or 64GB of storage, so enough to get you great Gamecube performance and a touch of PS2.
Price & Release Date
The new Arcade Home edition of the AYANEO Pocket Air Mini will start at around $129 for the 2GB version and $139 for the 3GB version. It is available to order today from AYANEO.com, and according to Arthur, they will begin shipping mid June.
