AYANEO has released its fair share of retro inspired handhelds over the last 6 months starting with the AYANEO Pocket Micro which was fantastic for older games, and the overpowered Pocket DMG which is what I’ve been taking with me on trips for all of this year, but the newly released Pocket Ace brings the best of both of those devices together to present what is absolutely the final form of retro Android handhelds.
The AYANEO Pocket ace feels fantastic in the hands weighing just 310 grams and coming in at 76 x 82.5 x 18.4 mm size-wise. Just like all of the other AYANEO retro handhelds that I’ve used, it is made of an extremely high quality material that has a good amount of weight to it without being too heavy.
It’s small enough to chuck in your bag, but feels extremely ergonomic, with the two hall effect analogue sticks being extremely reachable and same for the D-Pad and all of the face buttons. The handheld has a brand new turbo button which allows you to quickly change performance modes as well, but it’s a nice aesthetic touch that retro gamers will appreciate.
The handheld looks like a larger Pocket Micro with a 4.5-inch 3:2 IPS display that has a resolution of 1620 x 1080. It has a totally bezel-less display hat is super vibrant and has incredible colour reproduction. The 3:2 resolution makes it it’s perfect for playing GBA games with a perfect higher scale without any stretching or distortion.
Whilst the smaller 3.5-inch display of the Pocket Micro wasn’t great for newer systems such as PS2 and GameCube, that’s where the Pocket Ace really shines. Whilst I’d have loved an OLED display like the gorgeous one on the Pocket DMG, it’s still a fantastic LCD display. Another thing worth mentioning is that the speakers are now front-facing which makes for a much better listening experience providing better bass and more clarity as well.
The AYANEO Pocket Ace has a Snapdragon G3x Gen 2 processor which is pretty much top of the top when it comes to current Android processors, and it runs every Android game extremely well even on balanced mode. Playing the likes of Genshin Impact, Honkai: Star Rail, Diablo Immortal and Call of Duty Mobile, all ran like an absolute breeze.
When it comes to emulation, you can play anything up to GC and PS2 at 3x with ease (which matches the resolution of the display perfectly). It’s a fantastic way to play retro games and whilst there’s probably other handhelds that can do the same for a less, this is easily the best experience I’ve had with these Android handhelds that deliver the best of both worlds. You can push it up to 15w of performance but honestly you won’t need that for most of the gaming experiences that you’ll be enjoying on the Pocket Ace.
Similarly, the battery life thanks to the 6,000 mAh battery as well as Android are fantastic with anywhere between 8-15 hours of battery life depending on the mode and what you’re playing. This is easily my favourite thing with these retro handhelds. I can easily take them with me on international trips and they last the entire trip without charging.
As with all other AYANEO handhelds, AYASPACE comes pre-installed on the handheld, and it’s a great way to manage updates and settings for the Pocket Ace. When it comes to frontends for emulation, there’s probably better ones on the market, but it’s come a long way since it was introduced.
At the time of writing, the AYANEO Pocket Ace isn’t coming to local stores here in Australia, but you can still grab it from Indiegogo for roughly ~$500, which is definitely a premium for a handheld that most will jsut be playing retro games on, but there’s a certain quality and the fact that it is running Android with the latest chipset that does make it worth the money in my opinion.
This is absolutely for the gamer that knows what they’re doing in the retro gaming space and wants a handheld that they can rely on without having to mess around.