Ayaneo announces a ridiculously fancy Game Boy

Ayaneo, the company that’s been quietly making some of the most premium gaming handhelds on the market, has finally opened pre-orders for its Pocket VERT. And this thing looks like what would happen if Nintendo decided to make a Game Boy for people with very expensive taste.

The Pocket VERT is now available on Indiegogo, with early-bird pricing starting at $269 for the base 8GB RAM and 128GB storage configuration. If you want the 12GB RAM and 256GB storage model, that’ll run you $349. There’s also a “Lava Red” variant that adds an extra $20 on top of the highest-spec model.

Hidden touchpads, metal body, and more

The Pocket VERT packs a Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 processor paired with an Adreno 730 GPU, which is more than enough to handle emulation for basically every retro console you can think of. This includes Dreamcast, GameCube, and PS2 titles.

That 3.5-inch display is genuinely impressive too. It’s an IPS LCD running at 1600 x 1440 resolution, which works out to 615 pixels per inch. For context, that’s the same panel density as the FPGA Analogue Pocket, and it offers perfect 10x upscaling for original Game Boy games. Those are going to look absolutely crisp with the right shaders applied.

One really cool feature is what Ayaneo is calling the “MagicTouch” touchpad. This is a large invisible touchpad hidden beneath the open space in the middle of the device, sitting right below the D-pad and face buttons. You can use this as a mouse input for DOS games, or split it into dual-stick controls for more modern titles.

Beyond these, you get a 6,000mAh battery, active cooling with an internal fan and heat pipe, Wi-Fi 6E, Bluetooth 5.3, a USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C port, and even a fingerprint sensor built into the power button.

All of this is wrapped in a CNC metal body with a glass front, diamond-cut shoulder buttons, and a MagicSwitch scroll wheel for quick settings access.

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Ayaneo is estimating that the Pocket VERT will start shipping in early February 2026.