As handheld consoles continue to grow and push the limits of what you can actually hold in your hands , the Arduboy FX-C comes in a refreshingly pocketable package. It manages to squeeze the best features of past models and some welcome upgrades into a handheld that’s still no larger or thicker than a few credit cards. It’s the best version of the Arduboy so far, particularly for gamers who want to jump into the handheld’s ever-expanding library of games and apps right out of the box, but one of its most compelling upgrades isn’t quite ready for primetime.

The original Arduboy was a Tetris -playing business card created by Kevin Bates to show off his electronics skills. It went viral in 2014 prompting Bates to turn the idea into a commercial device a year later that was both a tiny open-source gaming device and a tool that could help would-be developers learn to code.

After over a decade of minor iterations , the Arduboy FX-C looks very much like the original.…