Hot on the heels of ANBERNIC announcing their RG DS Plus, Retroid have teased their first-ever dual-screen handheld in a new post on Instagram and X, the latter revealing the name 'Retroid Pocket Duo' as the only thing we currently have to work with.
Retroid started off their dual-screen journey with an add-on for the Retroid Pocket, and it wasn't quite the revolutionary add-on that we all hoped it would be. Many gamers ended up being disappointed with the dual-screen attachment having cable issues, giving them problems while playing. I feel like Retroid are kind of acknowledging this in their new video, with the adage 'no clips, two screens, one pocket' letting us all know that we can finally get the power and reliability of a Retroid Pocket with two screens and no messing about.
So what are we looking at? What will the Retroid Pocket Duo be able to play? I'm going to go out on a limb and say that it's going to be powerful to be able to play the DS and 3DS back catalogue, and that's just based on the fact that the Retroid Pocket 5 and 6 are both capable of playing our favourite demanding PS2 titles exceptionally well.
I think Retroid are going to want to blow the ANBERNIC RG DS out of the water and create a powerful machine at a higher price point that offers higher-quality emulation performance. That's just my take on what's going to happen and total speculation at this point without any access to any official facts and figures.
What I will say is that now that we've had a tease of the console, it will probably only be a matter of days until we get an official spec sheet sent through showing us just how powerful this thing is and what games it will be able to cope with. I would guess that the Retroid Pocket Duo will, at the very least, go toe-to-toe with the AYN Thor in terms of boasting a Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 Processor and AMOLED screens, but only time will tell.
For now, I'm just imagining the comfort of the Retroid Pocket 5 with a screen that doesn't feel like I've had to attach some kind of frankenconsole to the top of it!
Keep your eyes peeled here for more updates as and when I get them!
