This morning Qualcomm announced its new crop of next-gen chipsets in the Snapdragon family, with the Snapdragon G1 Gen 2 being one of those chips, and it’s powering devices like the Retroid Pocket Classic.
The Classic is Retroid Pocket’s latest handheld gaming device, and just like Retroid Pocket’s other handheld devices, the new Classic handheld is running on Android. That means you can install your favorite emulators and play all your favorite games from those classic systems.
Version-wise, the Classic is running on Android 14 and it comes in two variations. One with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of storage, and one with 6GB of RAM and 128GB of storage. There are also seven different styles. There’s the Retro color which looks like your typical Game Boy color scheme, and then there’s Berry, Teal, Kiwi, PKM Yellow, and Atomic Purple. Additionally, there’s the Classic6 design which comes with six buttons instead of four like the other colors.
It has a 5,000mAh battery inside which seems substantial. Especially given that Qualcomm designed the Snapdragon G1 Gen 2 to be more power efficient, it should be sipping battery life instead of chugging it.
The Retroid Pocket Classic goes up for pre-order tonight
Officially the Classic isn’t available for sale yet. However, it will be soon. Retroid Pocket says pre-orders will go live on March 17 at 6:30 PM PST. The device retails for $119 for the 64GB model and $129 for the 128GB. It has a TF card slot as well if the internal storage isn’t enough for your needs. In terms of other specs, the Classic has a 3.92-inch AMOLED display so games should look nice and colorful, provided you’re playing games that have color in the first place.
The display also has a resolution of 1240 x 1080 and a refresh rate of 60Hz. There are trigger buttons on the back and these are curved, so your fingers should rest nicely on them when playing games. Retroid Pocket also designed the Classic with active cooling to ensure the temperatures stay down if you’re planning to play games for a bit longer.
Retroid Pocket is also launching the Flip 2
While it doesn’t use the same chipset as the Classic, the Flip 2 is another handheld from Retroid Pocket that’s launching today. Pre-orders for it go live at the same time as well.
The Flip 2 is more of a Nintendo DS-style handheld but with only one display. It’ll retail for $229 so it’s a bit more than the Classic, and it runs on Android 13 instead of Android 14. As for the chipset, there are actually two variants here. You can grab the Flip 2 with either Qualcomm’s Snapdragon SD865 or MediaTek’s Dimensity D1100.
