Stop the classic consoles! Following the tiny little NES Classic, SNES Classic, PlayStation Classic, Mega Drive Mini, Neo Geo Mini, Baby Amstrad GX4000 and recently released FM Towns Marty Dimunitive, the industry has officially run out of consoles, gone completely hatstand and brought us the PC Classic. Well, why not, eh? Why in the world not? And in thirty years, they can do the Classic Console Classic, with twenty of the best Classic Consoles. Whatever! And then in thirty more years, the Classic Console Classic Classic Console.
YOU GET IT. You can see what I'm swinging at here. There's a glut of them.
Actually, though I'm being scornful, the idea of a mini PC that will let me play pre-configured DOS games with a controller is extremely appealing to me. It's not yet known which games will be included on the device - the trailer shows the id Software titles Commander Keen, Doom and Quake 2, but these are apparently "for demo purposes" only. Personally I know what I'd like, but it's become very apparent that what I want to revisit is markedly different to most other people. Anyone for a quick game of Space Dude? Thought not.
The inclusion of the controller - and suggestion that every game will be playable with it - seems to immediately exclude a lot of the most obvious home computer mainstays you'd expect to be on there; how are Sim City, Syndicate and Monkey Island going to work? And don't point to the SNES or Mega CD versions, smartarse. Hopefully there'll be plenty of Gravis Gamepad mainstays available to make up for it, like Jazz Jackrabbit or Duke Nukem 2. And, erm... that's it.
Creators Unit-E (I don't know them either) are planning to crowdfund this monstrosity towards the end of this month, aiming for a price point of $99.