Why Palmer Luckey's Chromatic blew my mind



Last December we tackled the ModRetro Chromatic, a handheld gaming system that plays Game Boy and Game Boy Color games.

The brainchild of tech billionaire and founder of Anduril Industries Palmer Luckey, the Chromatic offered enhanced display and functionality, with the ability to pop in Pokemon games of the past. It came only with Tetris as a bundled launch title, with other games available for separate purchase.

Now, a full rerelease of the ModRetro is finally here, and it is beautiful.

'We have a generation growing up having never had any need to touch physical media.'

Apart from the original sapphire screen cover, purposefully clicky buttons, and enhanced lighting one typically gets from a modified Game Boy, the Chromatic now comes with even more games and a slew of accessories, which are very exciting.

Let's say the leaf-green Chromatic is your go-to ($199.99). You're going to want to pick up the matching Koss Porta Pro headphones ($49) because they absolutely stole the show.

Yes, stole. Originally released in 1984, these retro-style headphones will shock you with their quality. They feel natively louder, especially when compared to different types of headphones. Tested with the new game Self Simulated ($39.99) — a platformer starring a R.O.B.-esque robot — the Porta Pros outshined a 2020 pair of JBL Live 400BT on-ear wireless headphones, Sony WF-C700N wireless ear buds from 2023, and Sony's 2025 MDREX15AP/B, which are newer but old-school wired headphones.

Be warned: Sliding these retro headphones on will certainly induce flashbacks to the back of your family's station wagon.

RELATED: Back to the future? Palmer Luckey's Chromatic does nostalgia right

Photo by Blaze News

Gamers will be surprised by the rerelease of Sabrina: Zapped! ($39.99), which originally came out for the Game Boy Color in 2000. Why? Because it shows ModRetro is indeed interested in reviving old feelings for different demographics.

The Mod Kit ($14.99) is also available for budding engineers (a nice nod from Luckey that I couldn't get my hands on). It offers replacement parts and buttons to style to a user's liking but does not require any complex maneuvering — just a pointy device and desire for change.

Replace the directional pad, A, B, or start and select buttons, among others.

What the Chromatic offers that no other old handheld can do is streaming. The device can now stream gameplay natively to Discord, Mac, and PC, with no extra hardware required.

Return asked Torin Herndon, CEO at ModRetro, why this was such an important feature to include this time around.

"So many devices require an intermediate dock for streaming video, which drastically reduces the possible convenient use cases," Herndon explained. "We felt that it was essential to open up streaming Game Boy games, simply while using a handheld console with proper button layout."

What Herndon and ModRetro did not know, though, is that Return had a secret weapon up its sleeve: a Game Boy Camera.

Not only does the Game Boy Camera work on the Chromatic for taking offensively bad pictures that range in color from light green to black, but by simply connecting the Chromatic to a PC via USB-C, gamers worldwide can livestream in sparkling low-res quality through the device.

Not many will take up this offer, but this crossover of retro tech was an incredibly satisfying discovery.

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Photo taken by Blaze News via Game Boy Camera on the Chromatic

Gamers can also marry a Chromatic to an old Game Boy Color through the Link Cable ($14.99). This can revive decades-old Pokemon trades and rivalries or provide head-to-head match-ups on Mario Golf, for example. (The link will not work with the original Game Boy, alas.)

The rechargeable battery pack ($29.99) that 90s babies wished they had as a kid provides about 16 hours of gameplay after charging by USB-C for a few hours. This means you can save those official ModRetro-branded batteries if you are insane about your collecting, which is totally normal.

Photo by Blaze News

According to Herndon, Return was far from being the only group of gamers excited about the product. The success of the Chromatic is what sparked a second release, with the new games, kit, and even a firmware updater tool.

"Last year, we had no idea if we would strike a chord with a wider audience or if this device would only appeal to a handful of weirdos like us at ModRetro," Herndon joked. "Since it ended up having broader interest, we wanted to make the experience available to as many people as possible."

Why is retro gaming coming back, and how did the company come to realize that not everything has to be frontier-level tech to be desired and important?

Herndon replied reflectively. "A lot of frontier tech never stops to ask itself 'why?' At the most basic level, people oscillate between being productive and being entertained. Increased technology can sometimes be correlated with increased entertainment, but generally it is not," he went on. "This is why there are probably games with tens of millions of dollars of development that have fewer play hours than Chromatic Tetris in 160x144 pixels. At ModRetro, we like to think about distilling entertainment into simple forms."

The CEO added that if physical media is going to make a comeback, it is going to be through a new generation yearning for it.

"We have a generation growing up having never had any need to touch physical media. I think it was inevitable that they would become curious about the romance of the physical form of various media formats from their parents' generation."

After plugging in that Game Boy Camera, we totally agree.

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Back to the future? Palmer Luckey's Chromatic does nostalgia right



Billionaire entrepreneur Palmer Luckey seems to have hit the nail on the head at the exact right time with the new Chromatic, a Game Boy reboot of sorts offering better screen resolution and updated features.

With the tagline, "The future is retro," Luckey seems to, in some way or another, have his ear to the ground when it comes to the rapidly growing nostalgia trend sweeping North America.

Not even 10 years ago, most Millennials and Gen-Xers would have looked at an old Super Nintendo, Nintendo 64, or Game Boy and paused for a moment, remembered a vague gaming memory, and moved on. Now, that box full of junk has huge retail value.

With mobile gaming capturing a gigantic market share, and platforms such as Netflix and YouTube pumping out their own low-cost games, the population is figuring out that some of their favorite old titles still stand up. With these games and consoles completely phased out of production, a new high demand for old tech has completely rocked the video game industry.

For example, a gold Nintendo 64 in a beat-up box can run a cool $1,000. Meanwhile, if your parents dished out around $100 for the special release of EarthBound for Super Nintendo in 1995, that investment has now grown 20 to 30 times, at around $2,000-$3,000, depending on where you look.

To fill the gap, consoles with the capability of playing everything from 1987-2005 and beyond have flown off the shelves.

Enter Chromatic, the latest gap-filler for Game Boy and Game Boy Color games. Produced by Palmer Luckey's ModRetro company, the tech guru said he wanted to "build the ultimate way to play Game Boy games."

"Not just the next one or one of many, but indisputably, the very best way, the most authentic, the highest quality, one that will last for generations as a piece of heirloom-grade tribute art," Luckey said in a launch video.

He's not wrong.

While most — not all — new-retro consoles feel somewhat soulless, before even opening the box gamers are greeted with colorful graphics right out of 1994 — the cheesy era, not the extreme era.

The box emulates a grade-school notebook that was drawn on by countless friends, each leaving a memory behind. The package communicates to the owner to keep it and not let it get damaged.

The Chromatic itself looks like a Game Boy but feels updated.

Photo courtesy ModRetro

Purposely made to feel like an old Game Boy — only in the good ways — the Chromatic includes those old-school button *clicks*, the use of a directional pad, and the same orientation of an old Game Boy Color.

The volume is operated by a dial (wheel), which feels great for some reason. Additional features include a Game Boy Color connector port and the IR port to communicate with other systems, as well.

The lesser features of a gaming system from 1989 were solved, too. The screen is an obvious upgrade from a Game Boy and Game Boy Color but manages to look identical, which Luckey said was a completely "irrational" move from a money standpoint.

The screen has the same pixel structure, identical layout, identical resolution, and size to the Game Boy Color display while promising to reproduce "the strange colors" that its predecessors did before it. By most accounts, including this one, it does the job it set out to do.

The body of the product is magnesium aluminum alloy, giving it a very industrial feel that brags about being indestructible. There is an additional headphone jack, USB-C port, and a single button on the right-hand side to bring up the settings menu.

Power options include a rechargeable battery pack, or users can simply use three AA batteries. Without either, users can plug-and-play but obviously must stay connected.

'I love the Game Boy, and I don't see this as a way to make money.'

A Chromatic side by side with an original Game Boy Color.

The Chromatic launched with nearly a dozen games, all of which are unique aside from a new Tetris cartridge that comes with the system. A new game is set to release each month.

At $199, this handheld will cost about as much as a secondhand, out-of-box Game Boy Color will cost today. Of course, it will also play all the games from Game Boy and Game Boy Color, plus its own catalogue.

Having said that, this is a collectible, and it was smartly made that way on purpose. With so much more heart than other reproduced firmware, the Chromatic delivers on what it promises. Gamers will feel what they're meant to feel with their old games, but their eyes won't be burnt out and a night-light won't be required to see the screen.

With this product, Luckey should be ranked as less of a Mr. Burns and more of an Arthur Fortune.

The 32-year-old basically threw his money at creating a system for sheer enjoyment, and so long as he doesn't try to block out the sun, maybe he can be trusted to recreate an N64 or PlayStation.

"I love the Game Boy, and I don't see this as a way to make money. I see this as a way to make the world's best tribute to the Game Boy, something that I'll be proud of for a very long time."

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