$500 aluminum version of the Analogue Pocket looks like the Game Boy’s final form

Analogue has released multiple variations of the Analogue Pocket, its Game Boy-style handheld console that can play old cartridges and game ROMs using its FPGA chip. But until now, all of those designs have been riffs on the regular Pocket’s black (or white) plastic shell.

The company’s latest Pocket iteration might appeal more to people who prefer the solidity and durability of anodized aluminum to the cheap practicality of plastic. On July 15, the company will release a limited run of all-aluminum Analogue Pocket consoles in four different colors: white, gray, black, and a Game Boy Advance-esque indigo. The company says that “every single piece” of these consoles is “entirely CNC’d from aluminum,” including not just the frame but also all of the buttons.

The new material will cost you though: each aluminum Pocket sells for $500, over twice as much as the $220 price of a regular plastic Pocket.

The aluminum versions of the Pocket will run the exact same software as the standard plastic ones, and will be compatible with all the same cartridges and accessories. Analogue’s site doesn’t compare the weight of the aluminum and plastic Pocket consoles, though intuitively we’d expect the metal one to be heavier. The aluminum consoles begin shipping on July 17.

When the Pocket first launched in late 2021, ongoing supply chain disruptions and high demand led to monthslong wait times for the initial models. Things have gotten slightly better since then—you can’t simply open Analogue’s store on any given day and just buy one, but the basic black and white plastic models restock with some regularity. Analogue has also released multiple special edition runs of the handheld, including one made of glow-in-the-dark plastic and a colorful series of models that recall Nintendo’s mid-90s “Play It Loud!” hardware refresh for the original Game Boy.

As much as we liked the Pocket in our original review, the hardware has gotten much more capable thanks to a series of post-launch firmware updates. In the summer of 2022, Analogue added OpenFPGA support to the pocket, allowing its FPGA chip to emulate consoles like the NES, SNES, Sega Genesis, and others aside from the portable systems that the Pocket was designed to emulate. Updates toward the end of 2023 allowed those third-party emulation cores to use their own display filters, replicating the look of classic CRT TVs and other displays.

The updates have also fixed multiple bugs in the system. The latest update is version 2.2, released back in March, which primarily adds support for the Analogue Pocket Adapter Set that allows other kinds of vintage game cartridges to plug in to the Pocket’s cartridge slot.