ThinkGeek Comes Out With a New iCade Controller – iOS and Android

I’m sure by now many of you retro enthusiasts have heard of the iCade (especially those of you with an iPad). But ThinkGeek has decided to move beyond the mock arcade housing and provide an 8-bit styled bluetooth controller to play all of your retro or retro inspired games for both iOS and Android. They for some reason went with the name 8-Bitty, I guess it makes the intended use very obvious. 

The controller is obviously styled after the NES controller despite the Atari wood grain and 70′s rainbow graphics (and two extra buttons). It even looks to be the same size as the NES controller, and even has the little indention on the front where the cable would be. So, let’s just say it like it is and say that they used the NES controller for a mold. 

Now the funny thing about this iCade controller is it advertised for iOS devices and Android but iCade as a controller format is an open platform to be integrated with games to be used. It essentially emulates key presses from a bluetooth keyboard.  ThinkGeek advertises that it works for Android based on the fact that iCade support was added for MAME4Droid; this means two things. If you have an Android powered tablet that can run MAME4Droid you can use the original iCade cab for it as long as it fits and of course you can use this new 8-Bitty controller. This also means that you shouldn’t buy the 8-Bitty controller in hopes that you will be playing all of your games with it, if it doesn’t support the iCade (or some other way to emulate the key presses) it wouldn’t work. 

You can check out all of the specifics about the new 8-Bitty controller on the Think Geek website 

8-Bitty Controller Description

Source: Android Central 

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