Atari just showed their hand at CES 2025, and they’re not messing around. The legendary gaming company finally pulled back the curtain on the Gamestation Go, their new handheld that’s been stirring up rumors for the past year. Yes, it finally happened.
While a lot of people (me included) expected another basic retro machine, what Atari revealed is surprisingly ambitious. The Gamestation Go brings something completely new to the table with its control setup. Beyond the standard analog stick and button layout modern gamers expect, Atari went full nostalgia with some cool additions.
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First Glimpse At The Atari Gamestation Go
Comes Equipped With A Rollerball, Dial Controller, And Keypad
The star of the show is a legitimate Trak-Ball (Atari’s trademarked version of a trackball) built right into the device. Anyone who remembers spending hours on Centipede or Missile Command in the arcades knows why this is the coolest thing to happen to this console. These games never quite felt right without that distinctive control method, and now players can finally get that authentic experience in a format that is easier to carry around.
It also looks like they packed in a paddle control, which is, again, perfect for games like Breakout, and even includes a numeric keypad. The keypad is definitely an interesting addition when you consider Atari’s recent Intellivision acquisition. That massive library of over 200 Intellivision titles could find new life on the Gamestation Go, especially since many of those games relied heavily on keypad controls.
The modern touches show Atari has been paying attention to what gamers want in 2025. The backlit action buttons only light up the controls needed for specific games, which looks great while actually also having some practical purpose. The widescreen display runs at a 16:9 aspect ratio, which could mean the Gamestation Go might handle more than just classic titles.
On the connectivity front, based off of what I could gather from the teaser video, we have an HDMI output for big-screen gaming, a standard headphone jack, and two USB-C ports, which I’m assuming are for hooking up additional controllers. It also looks like they have a microSD card slot for storage expansion, but again, it’s important to keep in mind that Atari has not confirmed any of these details yet, and we are still waiting on official specs.
My Arcade, known for its solid work with retro gaming hardware, is handling development duties. Their previous collaboration with Atari on the Gamestation Pro packed in over 200 games, so expectations are high for the software lineup this time around.
Price remains the big question mark. The original Gamestation Portable was supposed to hit the market at $150 a pop, but the Go’s expanded feature set and custom hardware solutions could mean we’re looking at a slightly higher price tag. Atari plans to reveal final pricing details during CES 2025.
Surface details aside, I feel like the community has a lot of reasons to be skeptical about Atari announcing new hardware. Their track record has been… rocky, to put it delicately. But the Gamestation Go shows genuine promise. The inclusion of authentic control methods like the Trak-Ball and paddle controller addresses issues that simple emulation never could.
Again, all the specifications remain under wraps, and we still need to see the full game library, but Atari’s approach here feels refreshingly thoughtful. Instead of just packaging old ROMs in new hardware, they’ve possibly created something that preserves what made these classic games special in the first place while adding a touch of modern convenience.
By focusing on authentic controls and compatibility with multiple classic platforms, they might have found a sweet spot between nostalgia and innovation. Now we just need to see if they can stick the landing with pricing and software support.
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