iCade 8-Bitty: an analog controller for your smartphone and tablet games

Remember the iCade? It's the iPad gaming cabinet that started out as an April Fools' joke, and then evolved into a real product.

Neat, but at US$99.99, it's not exactly an impulse buy — and it leaves Android, iPhone and iPod Touch gamers out of the fun.

Enter ThinkGeek's latest retro-gaming accessory, the iCade 8-Bitty. It's a handheld analog controller that closely resembles the old Nintendo NES controller — minus the cord. The 8-Bitty works wirelessly (via Bluetooth, we're guessing, although ThinkGeek doesn't specify).

It works with nearly all Android and iOS phones and tablets, although Android support is just a promise at this point: "Because the 8-Bitty uses a completely open-interface system, any app developer can easily add game support — even to Android devices." Translation: no Android games support the device — yet.

As you can see in the photo, the 8-Bitty has a four-way D-pad, four red game buttons, two shoulder buttons and Start/Select buttons. The whole thing is wrapped in wood paneling to complete the retro look.

The 8-Bitty will cost you US$24.95 when it goes on sale "later this year". The question is, will you want one?

We ask because we found the original iCade rather disappointing. Not because the hardware wasn't cool — it was — but because the games we wanted to play didn't support it. Asteroids, yes. But Frogger, Galaga, Donkey Kong and countless other arcade classics, no.

Admittedly, there's a fairly substantial list of arcade-compatible games, and the arrival of the 8-Bitty might lead to more. But there aren't many mainstream titles on that list — no Madden Football, Dead Space, Need for Speed or other games that would benefit greatly from an analog controller.

That's a shame, because a lot of the retro arcade stuff just isn't that fun anymore.

Of course, that's just our inner curmudgeon talking. If the 8-Bitty worked with the games we wanted to play, we'd be all over it — especially for US$25, which seems like a reasonable price for an accessory like this. What do you think?

Via cnet