The Intellivision Amico release date has been delayed again, pushing back the launch of this retro-inspired, family-friendly gaming console to later in 2021.
Old-school gamers are probably familiar with Intellivision to some degree; the company competed with Atari in the early days of home video gaming. Not much happened with it until a recent announcement that a new Intellivision console was on the way back in 2018.
Since then, the Amico has had to deal with quite a few issues in development, one of which was a yearlong delay announced late last summer. Now, the Intellivision Amico release date has been delayed yet again; you can check out the Intellivision Amico Launch Update video below to see the Intellivision Team explain the situation.
Why Was the Intellivision Amico Delayed?
The Intellivision Amico release date has been delayed for a number of reasons, but one of the biggest underlying causes is simple logistics — Intellivision is having difficulty getting its hands on some of the hundreds of components that are used to build this upcoming console.
"The biggest companies in the world are literally fighting over a limited supply [of components.]"
Take the Valve Index, for instance — this VR headset relies on many of the same components used in other tech, and Valve soon found that bigger companies were purchasing huge quantities of components due to the shortages brought on by the coronavirus pandemic. This has subsequently made it pretty darn hard to get your hands on a Valve Index; this is also a contributing factor to the shortages of other big tech products such as the PS5 and Xbox Series X|S. Now, it looks like Intellivision is having similar problems on this front, too.
"You know, we have hundreds of components in Amico and it's been an ongoing challenge to source all of those in a timely manner," explained Todd Linthicum, Intellivision's Director of Product Development. "And this is due in part because there's a global pandemic and there's really a scarcity of components out there. And the biggest companies in the world are literally fighting over a limited supply. Luckily, we had the foresight to pre-purchase a number of items, but it's going to be an ongoing battle for us to secure everything in a timely manner."
Logistics wasn't the only reason for the delay, though. One item mentioned in the video was that an August release date would arrive when a lot of Europeans are going on vacation. That would impact sales at retailers and it ultimately didn't make for the most optimal time to launch a new game console.
When is the Intellivision Amico Release Date?
The Intellivision Amico release date is now October 10, 2021 — one year after the team originally intended to launch the console.
Hopefully, this announcement means that Intellivision is confident that it can make this new release date. If you'd like to get one of these upcoming home consoles for yourself, you can pre-order an Intellivision Amico right now for a deposit of $100 or your regional equivalent.
What do you think of the Intellivision Amico release date being delayed again? Do you think this console will do well in the long term? Let us know in the comments below!
