Love ya, Fatty but at least copy the interesting bits from the article in the tweet
SEGA has successfully dipped into the mini console trend and released two Mega Drive Mini consoles but what's very interesting is that an individual who says he works for a small specialist electronics manufacturer received a Request for Quote from a company that has worked on licensed SEGA hardware before. The request was for what appears to be a modern low cost 2D centric handheld gaming device. This could be SEGA dipping its toes into the handheld market with a modern handheld that plays classic SEGA games. Here's what the post author wrote:
Low cost handheld gaming device
Low power ARM processor, not x86
5″ OLED panel (same form factor as the Vita), aggressive cost cutting elsewhere to accommodate this
Seemingly pretty limited internal storage
Removable game cartridges
No mention of 3D acceleration beyond basic UI/compositing
References being designed for "modern 2D titles" and "pixel art presentation"
The cart design is the the most interesting part:
Not the usual high capacity consumer NAND you'd expect of a modern handheld
Looks like low capacity industrial eMMC modules – these are readily available and not caught up in the AI memory price inflation
Smaller storage, makes sense if the target games are 2D Indies etc.
Not sure what to think of this. I mean, we're 20 years into the era of handheld 3d. I'd be happy with somewhere in between DS and 3ds/Vita. I don't think it would have to sacrifice 2d at this point. Just good enough for 2d/3d hybrid games aside from the standard games. Think of Saturn without the weaknesses. Or even Dreamcast. * shrugs *
This could work if they did an open ended hardware so the community could take advantage of it and build stuff, like a GBA version of Pico 8. It would be awesome. Nurture a community and let some of then use your IPs if they did it well enough. It will, of course, never happen lmao.
I'd be all over that, launch it with a new 2D Phantasy Star and Shining Force game and I'll pay any stupid price they'd set!
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Personally I was holding out hope that some tech guru would have solved the refresh rate hurdle of e-ink screens by now. Those screens are extremely comfortable to look at and uses fuck all when it comes to power. Perfect match for handhelds.
But it would also have needed the backing of one of the big companies and be super cheap to have any hope of hitting mainstream support and success ....and that's not happening.
Ah well, a man can dream.
I've been using my Switch to play the Sega Genesis Collection. Phantasy Star IV has been on my list for ages. There's also that nice port of the original PS on Switch. Idk how good it would have to be. Maybe get past the whole "room" aesthetic? Those mobile ports, even when you pay to remove ads, aren't the greatest device. Perhaps a Sega branded device that doesn't bottleneck the game list would be nice. Are sales going to come from anywhere besides enthusiast?