Mangmi have only ever created great handhelds, and is one of the newer brands on the scene doing some great work. The first one we reviewed was their affordable $99 Air X handheld that offered a sprinkling of PS2 emulation in a price range that was incredibly hard to compete with.
The Air X put them on the map, then they announced their larger, more powerful, and more serious handheld named the Pocket Max that offered high-end Android gaming and emulation for $229 with interchangeable magnetic buttons, allowing you to switch between mechanical microswitch buttons or conductive rubber. Both are superb handhelds.
Now they're adding their third device to their portfolio, named the Air Y, and it will come in two variants, including an Air Y Pro version that features not one, but two analogue sticks. Mangmi are being very limited with what they share, all down to one image in fact.
The image shows the two colourways: Black and Retro with a very TRIMUI Brick Pro look if I do say so myself, but then again, most vertical handhelds with a 4" - 5" all look the same these days. The analogue sticks are LED backlit, it seems to have a volume wheel on the side, minimal bezels, and is powered by a Qualcomm processor, which is currently unnamed and of course, this will be Android-focused, too.
We have spoken with Mangmi to offer Retro Dodo readers some extra information, and we can indeed share that specs, pricing and release date information will be announced towards the end of July, with a likely pre-order date of July 30th, but this could be subject to change as we were told they wouldn't tease anything until later in the month, but here we are with a early drop of information, which we can't complain about!
I'm intrigued by this one, as we've all got our fair share of vertical handhelds, even more so as the TRIMUI Brick Pro pre-orders have started and our sample unit arrived literally yesterday, so these two devices will be directly competing, and look and will likely feel very similar. I am a big fan of Mangmi. Personally, I think they've got some balls coming into this space so late, but they've shown they can deliver something different every time, so I'd be interested to see what unique angle they can pull off for this.
