It’s at all times a threat betting on new online game {hardware} from a little-known firm: what if sport builders by no means present up? However the $50 Thumby Colour, on sale this week, is a better promote — the two-inch handheld is cute as a button, suits in your keychain, lets aspiring programmers construct and publish video games proper on the internet, and I’m discovering it a lot simpler to play than the tinier $30 authentic!
Right here’s my video evaluating the 2 and exhibiting off playable takes on Tetris, Join 4, Minesweeper, Doom, Bust-a-Transfer, 2048, and extra:
The place the unique Thumby makes use of a 133MHz Raspberry Pi RP2040 to energy a black-and-white display screen measuring simply 0.4 inches diagonally, with a mere 1.4MB of house for video games, the brand new Thumby Colour can double the clockspeed with its RP2350 chip, has double the display screen at 0.85 inches, and practically 10 occasions the storage at round 14MB usable house.
As you could have simply seen, that isn’t a lot of energy, nevertheless it’s sufficient to wow in such a tiny package deal. (Sure, there’s legitimately an actual, playable copy of Doom operating on the unique Thumby because of Graham Sanderson, with tweaks by James Brown, and you’ll set up it right here your self!)
The unique Thumby was so troublesome to play. Neglect thumbs, I wanted to make use of my thumbnails to press its buttons and D-pad, and I virtually wanted a magnifying glass to inform the tetrominoes (Tetris shapes) aside on its 1-bit OLED.
Fortunately, the Thumby Colour’s D-pad really has a tangible pivot level. It’s stiff, however I can really roll it with a thumb! Now all these authentic Thumby video games (the colour is backwards appropriate!) and new Colour video games have reasonably usable controls — and if you add the 16-bit colour LCD display screen at 128 x 128 decision, it’s far simpler to make out these pixels. Particularly when every tetromino will get its personal colour.
The Thumby Colour additionally has new shoulder buttons a la Sport Boy Advance — that are a lot simpler to actuate than face buttons at this measurement that I hope TinyCircuits will allow us to remap them to A and B for authentic Thumby titles. For now, they’re underused by present video games, as are the brand new rumble motor and speaker.
One apparent win is a brand new USB-C port for knowledge and charging; no extra digging out a micro-USB cable like the unique. And also you’ll need that cable. TinyCircuits estimates a battery lifetime of simply two hours, and I noticed the Colour’s LED indicator sign low battery each time I took it for an prolonged play session.
I gained’t fake there’s a lot to play on a Thumby Colour but, any greater than there was on an authentic Thumby when it first got here out. However I didn’t should look arduous to search out enjoyable.
I’d positively whip one out for a fast sport of trick shot pool (ComboPool for Thumby Colour), the stress-free zen of my tiny sand and water backyard (Sand for Thumby Colour), or the novelty of difficult somebody to the tiniest sport of two-player Pong (2pddl42ppl for OG Thumby). You possibly can browse previews of each Thumby Colour sport right here and each OG Thumby sport right here, and even strive taking part in the latter titles in an online emulator (click on the sport, then click on “open”) so that you see what you’re getting. The web site additionally handles updates and loading video games onto your Thumby, and energy customers can join and add information with Thonny as effectively.
It feels just like the Thumby Colour is launching a contact early. It’s slower than the unique Thumby in addition, and its UI is slower to scroll by means of video games than I’d like, which might be useful contemplating what number of extra it might probably match. Some authentic Thumby video games additionally crashed at launch for me. “I hear your criticisms, we do have an replace deliberate for later this summer time that deal with a few of these,” TinyCircuits founder Ken Burns tells me.
Name them novelties, name them stocking stuffers, however the Thumby and Thumby Colour are cool; like the corporate’s TinyTV, I’d gladly be gifted one, and I may see shopping for one if I loved programming and wished to create a tiny sport of my very own. I’m additionally desperate to see what different shenanigans Thumby Colour house owners handle to drag: the RP2350 chip is technically able to SNES and Sport Boy Colour emulators elsewhere, in addition to a quick full-color model of Doom.
Although if you’d like emulation in a Sport Boy Advance package deal, and don’t thoughts probably supporting piracy, there’s additionally Anbernic to have a look at.
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