Multisystem Pocket 2 Final Design Adds Six Face Buttons and Fighting-Game-Friendly FPGA Controls

The Multisystem 2 Pocket team reveals what it hopes is the final industrial design of its FPGA handheld, featuring six face buttons, a Nintendo-style cross D-pad, dual analogue sticks, four shoulder buttons and a square display suited for classic aspect ratios.

The team behind the Multisystem 2 Pocket has shown what it hopes will be the final industrial design of its FPGA-powered handheld before production work advances further. The latest prototype adopts a broad landscape shape reminiscent of Sega's Game Gear and Atari Lynx rather than the narrow vertical form used by most Game Boy-inspired handhelds. Community feedback has resulted in several important changes. The front now features six face buttons, immediately making the device more attractive for Mega Drive, Saturn and arcade fighting games that otherwise require awkward shoulder-button combinations. The D-pad has also moved away from a PlayStation-style segmented appearance toward a Nintendo-like cross design positioned in the upper-left corner. Dual analogue sticks remain underneath, and four shoulder controls support later systems and configurable arcade layouts. A square display sits at the centre of the unit, reflecting the Multisystem project's focus on classic systems with varied aspect ratios rather than widescreen Android gaming. A future dock is also planned, potentially allowing the handheld to function as both portable and living-room FPGA hardware. The project remains in development, and key consumer details such as final price, complete internal specifications and firm retail timing are not yet confirmed. That caveat matters because ambitious FPGA handheld projects face manufacturing challenges very different from software emulation devices built around mass-produced mobile processors. MiSTer-derived hardware uses programmable logic to reproduce consoles, computers and arcade boards at hardware level rather than running conventional emulators under Android or Linux. This can offer extremely accurate timing and low latency when cores are mature, but powerful FPGA chips, memory and custom PCBs remain more expensive than the system-on-chip components used in budget retro handhelds. The six-button layout demonstrates that the designers are thinking about what people actually play rather than simply how the device looks in photographs. Street Fighter II, Mortal Kombat, Neo Geo fighters and Sega's 16- and 32-bit libraries all benefit from six accessible front buttons. The result is chunkier than minimalist handhelds, but comfort and control accuracy matter during actual use. If the final product retains this layout and its FPGA implementation performs as intended, Multisystem Pocket 2 could become one of the more serious portable options for enthusiasts who care about authentic timing as much as convenience.