I’ve lost count of how many “retro handhelds” I’ve bought, but this one grabbed me hard, purely because of how it looks. Anbernic markets it as a “fighting handheld” built for FTG, but the button layout is obviously lifted from the SEGA Saturn pad. Which means it’s not just good for fighting games — it’s better suited to SEGA MD and Saturn titles. That’s the idea, anyway. Reality is another matter. When this thing launched, they pulled a sneaky one and split it into two versions: the single-OS ARC-S and the dual-OS ARC-D. Generally the whole “Linux and Android dual system” thing on these handhelds is pointless, but of course this one used it as a sales gimmick. The retro colorway everyone wants is exclusive to the dual-OS model, while the single-OS one only comes in “translucent black” and “translucent white” — the colors that love to crack. And the dual-OS version costs more, so players like me end up paying extra for a dual-boot setup we’ll never use, just to get the color we want. And in practice, this machine has way more problems than I expected.

As someone who loves portable devices, I was actually pretty interested in the Steam Deck. But earlier this year, the Steam Deck was terrifyingly expensive and basically impossible to buy. The few Chinese handheld makers that bothered to show up were all just drawing pies in the sky. Then Maxzhou, Brother Zhou, released a Windows handheld: the Anbernic Win600. Not only was it in stock, it was the cheapest thing from a legitimate manufacturer on the market… Most importantly, before launch they advertised it as: made in cooperation with Valve, supports Steam OS, and they even showed some demo videos. So I got carried away. Couldn’t afford the expensive one, bought the cheap one.