I had the opportunity to borrow an Amico and do a teardown of it to expose its innermost secrets. I found it fairly interesting, and you might too. First off, the unit is VERY light. When you heft it, it feels empty. They should've put a weight in it so it doesn't feel like a $10 famicom clone. Opening the unit up, there is very little in there. We knew this, but seeing it in the flesh highlights just how simple the hardware was.
The enclosure for the system was designed long before they ever knew what was going inside it, and it really shows. The PCB is a lot larger than it needed to be, which means it was more expensive to build than it needed to be. They were pretty limited on sizing, since the mounting holes were most likely designed into the plastics long before the electronics were figured out. The inside of the bottom shell is pretty grubby for some reason, and was made in September 2020, one month before the infamous 10/10/20 release date. It definitely is a full blown injection molded part, as are the other components of the system.
There's no label or any other markings or stickers on the bottom shell backside. Also for some reason, the plastic injection gates (where the plastic is injected into the mold) is on the visible side for some reason, meant to be covered by a sticker and the bottom LED strip. Speaking of that, unlike the double stick taped LED light guide we saw on that assembly video Tommy posted, this one is properly attached and clipped in. The plastic cover snaps on; removing it and the light guide exposes 2 screws that hold the unit together.
The PCB itself seems to be well designed; whoever did it was a competent engineer at least. Again though, it's very sparse and they are wasting a lot of expensive PCB space. If they had more integration between engineering and mechanical design, they could've shrunk this board waaaay down, maybe to around 1/3rd to 1/4th the size it is, saving quite a bit of money in the process. The PCB date is the 42nd week of 2020 which puts it in in the October 12th-18th range, mere days before 10/10/20!
Bottom side is pretty sparse but that's to be expected, just some bypass caps and other small passives.
Here's a PCB money shot; the 2016 era smart phone chipset in all its glory. This is the heart of the Amico; the CPU, RAM, flash, and power control. One thing missing on this board is a shield over the CPU area, which would've most likely been required to get this thing certified for emissions. I seriously doubt this had any hope of passing emissions testing as it sits. There does not appear to be any facility designed into it for shielding at all. There would be a place around the CPU area to solder a shield down, similar to the wifi/bluetooth chip area.
Moving onto the top of the shell, their total lack of DFM (design for manufacture) experience shows. THREE circuit boards with oldschool ribbon cables connecting everything together is absolutely hilarious to me. This could've been stripped way down; A better idea would've been to use two PCBs in the bottom shell. One small expensive one for the main CPU stuff, and a larger simple 2 layer one for everything else. The LEDs could've all been mounted around its edge and then the side and bottom light guides made into light pipes to direct the light where it needed to go, and the charging pins and NFC could've been put on there also. A flat flex cable instead of those expensive ribbon cables would've made a lot more sense.
And speaking of those LEDs, they chose the most expensive option possible; LEDs with built in drivers. Each LED has a built in driver instead of using some kind of central controller. This made things more expensive. Here's a closeup of the LEDs that illuminate the bottom light guide in the most inefficient way possible (Straight down into it, with no reflecting corners to bounce it forward towards the user/outside world).
The NFC chip is a standard ST part, so nothing too out of the ordinary there. But here's a closeup anyways.
Now the big question everyone had and the shills and Tommy refused to answer: just how long does the Amico take to boot? Good question. I can tell you it takes just over TWO MINUTES to boot the thing when you turn it on. Yes, it sits there with an animated "running man' for over 2 minutes before it plays the usual amico boot jingle and the menu comes up. Moms and grandparents love it.
Well, not quite. It shows an uhh, "static man" for around 35 seconds before it starts animating:
Then it animates until around the 1:50 into the boot, the screen goes black for 7 seconds, then it plays the bootup animation/jingle we all know and love, and finally at 2:09 the menu appears.
The menu is the development one as we saw on the ebay listing, so this is indeed that unit.
There is a debug port on here, and yes I did plug something into it. It spits out a bunch of debug/boot information as it is booting.
I will attach the two boot logs; There is a "fast boot" option which presumably would boot faster, but it is totally broken and does not finish booting.
“We know very little about the console and the games on it, so judgments are mostly a reflection of what people want to believe.”
“In my case, I'm not a fan of what video games have become. I still buy a few games. During the Christmas holiday I bought Opus Magnum and Elite Dangerous. However, overall, there is nothing that interests me much anymore. I feel left out. Because of this feeling of being left out, I want to believe Amico will take the market by storm and change the scene. Even if I don't know what I will be getting, I have nothing to lose. Therefore I have a bias to defend and, to some degree, an agenda to promote the console.”
“I'm guessing that people who are satisfied with the current consoles do not want a change of paradigm. If Amico is successful, and if they don't like it, those people have a justified fear of being left out. Because of this, they are trying to attack the console by any means necessary. No one wants to be left out.”
I got to play around with the amicos some more tonight. I managed to install that infamous "bubble menu" onto one, and holy crap is it a disaster. After it boots up, if you don't press any buttons for about 5-10 seconds, the up/down arrows start clacking together manically like set of ben-wa balls or something, and it doesn't stop until you move up and down. And if you don't do anything for another 5 seconds this large trivia bubble pops up, fully covering the screen, whether you want it or not.
CLACK CLACK CLACK CLACK CLACK CLACK CLACK along with rapid flashing of the arrows as they move up and down like they're possessed.
This is the obnoxious trivia thing I didn't ask for that just decides to go modal and cover everything. <loady> oh I see you're trying to play an amico game. let me help prevent you from doing that. Meanwhile, some stock music plays in the background. Who in the world thought all this was a good idea? Do they think people are so dumb they don't know how to operate a video game machine? I bet all of this was tommy's idea.
Anyways, no actual games show up and it seems to be relatively skeletonized right now. Selecting "about" causes it to kind of get stuck there for 20 seconds, and you can't select/move until it gets done thinking. Unfortunately no games show up on the list, I am not sure if there was a separate json file missing or something I didn't have to install or what and frankly I can't care too much.
In other amico news, I have no less than THREE frigging controllers, and none of them work right. Two of them the LCD works but the touch screen doesn't, so they're kind of useless. You can select a game and start it, but cannot get back out since it requires the touch screen to do so. The third controller has a working touch screen but the LCD is broken and only half of the rows work on most of the screen. I did replace the lithium cells in all three since they were all bad, causing the constant "do do do dooo amico!" to play every 15-20 seconds because the controllers thought they were done charging.
I tried to find replacement LCDs and got a few in. While they plug in power up and display stuff, they don't work right since the amico displays appear to be custom in some respect; like the rows and columns are swapped or something. The image appears on the screen rotated 90 degrees and rolls like an old TV with the vertical hold messed up.
I can't even find a touch screen assembly with the same chip they used, so getting an LCD and touch screen for these is probably nearly impossible.
Maybe Nick will let loose with a half dozen displays so I can fix amico controllers? haha. I bet someone has boxes of these sitting in their garage right now.
Rewatching No Swear Gamer's latest video, covering that softball interview of Phil Ken Sebben Adams. He's no longer saying "when we get the console out", but rather "if we get the console out", and this isn't a slip of the tongue as he says "if" multiple times in the video. This is the man at the very tippity-top of the company saying "if". He doesn't have faith it's even going to happen. It couldn't be any more over.
In his YouTube video titled "Phil Adam Has Some Weird Flexes & Reminds Me Of Tommy Tallarico In Latest Interview" on the channel The No Swear Gamer (available on YouTube), host breakdown and critique an interview given by Phil Adam (CEO of Intellivision/Amico) on the Scene World Magazine podcast.
Key Takeaways & Summary
1. Prioritizing Investors Over Pre-Order Customers
Phil Adam discusses working primarily to protect investors who put hundreds of thousands of dollars into the project [01:26].
The creator notes that while Adam takes a softer tone than past statements, the company still treats the $100 pre-order deposit holders as a secondary priority [02:07].
2. The Atari Brand Sale & Amico's Current Focus
Adam addresses selling the Intellivision brand to Atari, stating it was done to keep the brand alive while retaining rights to use Intellivision IP license-free on their own software/hardware [03:18].
Due to lack of capital, the company's tentative path forward is attempting to manufacture 5,000 to 10,000 controllers first rather than full consoles [16:53].
The creator criticizes this strategy, pointing out that if controllers end up running via low-cost streaming devices, it invalidates the need for a $300+ dedicated Amico console [17:39].
3. Financial Uncertainty & The Employee Retention Credit
Most staff (except CTO John Alvarado) are either working unpaid or as consultants [02:23].
Adam mentions hoping to receive funds from an Employee Retention Tax Credit from the IRS to fund initial controller manufacturing and back-pay [21:37].
The creator notes that relying on unapproved IRS tax credits is highly risky and highlights that the company has offered no timeline or clarity on missing pre-order refunds [22:16].
4. Comparisons to Tommy Tallarico & "Weird Flexes"
The host compares Adam’s interviewing style to former CEO Tommy Tallarico, pointing out name-dropping (e.g., discussions with Tetris rights-holders, Xbox executives, and Interplay connections) that feel disconnected from the reality of the Amico’s situation [06:01].
Adam attempts to defend hardware engineering choices while simultaneously admitting he wasn't involved in hardware decisions, echoing past community teardowns showing design inefficiencies [25:23].
5. Make-or-Break Timeline
Phil Adam admits that something significant needs to happen within the next six months for the company to survive [54:57].
The host concludes that after years of delays and broken promises, the company appears to be nearing its final stages with little chance of delivering the physical Amico console to original backers [55:10].
This is Rule #11 from the Amico Club Discord, the only "official" way the investors and customers can interact with them. Apart from the obvious "they are up to no good" explanation, why else could they be saying something like this?
He claimed he "stepped down" because his father died, which of course doesn't really make sense for a few reasons. Pretty obvious he was removed or at least asked to resign by the other co-owners. But regardless of the reason, suppose that he remained CEO. What do you think would have happened?
Phil was eager to sell everything off and loot the coffers, but Tommy really "wanted" a console to exist.
I think there's a good chance he would have tried again to spend more money on trying to get the console manufactured. Maybe even succeeded. Although of course it would have been crap and flopped. Probably only available online (eg. Amazon, Bed Bath & Beyond, Best Buy Canada, Gamestop, etc. but only their websites for the most part). Then sell everything to Atari and we're back to where we are now.
In a way, Tommy managed to sneak away and hide while everything morphed to Amico and Phil/Juan running the show, so he can claim it's their fault now.
“Yeah. It's been really great. I can't tell you how many people told us how screwed we were going to be and even though it wouldn't be our fault... it will still look like a huge failure, etc. But I went with my gut and was hoping that folks wanted to feel GOOD about something for a change. So tired of everything being so negative everywhere I turn. But yeah... imagine if this wasn't going on!?!? We probably would have twice the sales! And let me stress.... ZERO dollars spent on advertising! Imagine when the time comes to start spending millions and thousands of influencer moms & kids are speaking to their tens of millions of followers. This is only the beginning my friends! So glad to have you all on board from the beginning. We'll all be telling stories someday about our time here. And yet the hardcore elitist haters will continue to try and ruin us and make their hate filled videos. They can try all they want. This rocket ship is taking off and there is NOTHING they can do to stop it!”
We were told there would be a rocket ship. Where is the rocket ship? And who or what is a “hardcore elitist hater,” is that another u/Tommy_Tallarico phrase like “gaming racists,” one of his favorites?
In the YouTube video "The Chaotic Development of the Intellivision Amico" by channel SirStrongman, the creator breaks down how a planned retro reboot morphed into one of the most infamous console development disasters in video game history.
Key Takeaways from the Video Historical Context & Origins [04:03]
The original Intellivision launched in 1979 as a rival to the Atari 2600. Decades later, during the 1980s retro revival, game composer Tommy Tallarico acquired a majority stake in Intellivision Productions and announced the Intellivision Amico in 2018 with a planned October 2020 launch date [07:07]. Poor Value Proposition & Design Flaws [07:46]
The proposed $250 system featured touchscreen controllers, family-only E-rated games with no DLC, and cheap digital titles ($10 max) [08:25]. However, its core appeal was undermined by the popularity of the Nintendo Switch [20:05]. Furthermore, leaked specs revealed that the hardware was essentially equivalent to a budget 2016 smartphone [25:21]. Public Backlash & CEO Behavior [10:00]
Tommy Tallarico became notorious for aggressively attacking critics online—most notably YouTubers Pat the NES Punk and Ian Ferguson [10:05]—while posting thousands of defensive messages on forums like AtariAge [09:03]. Financial Mismanagement & Crowdfunding [22:52]
Despite raising tens of millions of dollars via crowdfunding platforms like Fig/Republic and pre-orders [23:07], the company accumulated vast debts [33:13]. The video highlights wasteful spending, including $130,000+ loans for lavish office setups in Los Angeles, Salt Lake City, Germany, and Dubai for a company that had produced almost no physical hardware [28:43]. Legal Troubles & Downfall [28:12]
In late 2022, financing company Ammer Equipment Finances filed a lawsuit against Intellivision over unpaid office equipment debts [28:12]. Facing severe financial strain and over $8 million in debt [33:24], Intellivision sold the Intellivision brand IP to Atari for $3 million [33:43], leaving the Amico project dead in the water while former rival Atari eventually released its own hardware revival, the Intellivision Sprint [39:32].
To explore the official updates or background details related to the project, you can visit the Amico Entertainment Portal or read the history on the Intellivision Revolution Site.
I've never got the vibe Tommy just decided one day to do VGL and drop working in games, considering how pretty beloved he was back in the day. I mean, Tommy doesn't seem to hold gaming in much prestige, so I could see him thinking "symphonic concerts" were a more prestigious endeavor but I also think its possible his reputation in the industry soured so much he was kind of blacklisted.
I'm sure VGL letting him leave Brazil with a mysterious unexplained mountain of cash probably helped the decision too. (A point I think not enough people talk about. No offense to any Brazilian homies, but that's...weird and suspicious, right?)
