Access the mysterious Evercade website and the first thing that will grab your attention is the text; “EVERCADE – A BRAND NEW HANDHELD CONSOLE WITH UNIQUE MULTI-GAME RETRO CARTRIDGES FROM LEADING GAMES PUBLISHERS AND CONSOLE PLATFORMS”.
It says a lot, but then again, it leaves a lot of questions in the lurch. Below that, there is a very basic image. That consists of a silhouetted animation, resembling a SNES controller, with a cartridge going into the top. News of the Evercade hit the major press outlets yesterday, but for the most part, not a lot of information is known. As far as I can tell, no social media pages even exist yet.
Okay, but here’s what we do know. One, more information will be released this month. However, a launch of sometime this year is currently promised. The games will be primarily 8bit and 16bit era focused, and the makers (whoever they are) claim to have major publishers onboard, including “one classic platform holder”.
As for the emulation, well, in their own words; “Where possible, we are working directly with the original software/emulator developers to support them for their hard work and also to ensure their emulation is accurately reflected on our hardware – to deliver the best possible experience for you.” The possibility of an SD card slot is also bought up in the FAQ, and while there won’t be one built-in, they’re considering a development cartridge that includes one for “development and testing purposes”.
Otherwise, the shortlist of features given include a 4.3” screen (same as the PSP, they point out) but there will also be HDMI if you wish to plug it into a TV. The handheld will also include 4.5 hours of battery life, charged by USB. No internet connection is required, save-states will be a thing as well as “collectable elements”. Hmmm. The Evercade even includes a headphone jack, as that’s seemingly the cool thing to now add after Apple was oh so “brave”.
The URL of the website is from the UK, so there’s a hint of its origin. But that’s it. You can sign up for a newsletter, however, so let’s hope more solid information is forthcoming soon.
Growing up while the fifth generation of consoles reigned supreme meant that Brendan missed out on much of the 80’s and early 90’s of gaming the first time around. He either lacked the cognitive ability to play them, as naturally, he was a baby - or he simply didn’t exist yet. Undeterred, Brendan started a blog called Retro Game On in 2011. This followed his exploits as he collected and played everything he could get his hands on no matter what the release date. While RGO is mainly YouTube focused these days concentrating on video reviews and historical features, the itch to do some old fashion writing never went away. More recently, Brendan has been a staff writer for the gaming website, GameCloud, mostly focusing on the indie gaming scene in his locale of Perth, Australia.
