Soulja Boy
Image: Microsoft

We pride ourselves on only listening to music recorded before 1999 here at Nintendo Life, so prior to being chained to a desk and forced to write this story, we had absolutely no idea who Soulja Boy was, what songs he'd done or why he's such a big deal. A few minutes of slack-jawed research later, and we now know that he's currently peddling a line of games consoles that essentially run a bunch of emulators and come packed with (we can reasonably assume) unlicenced ROMs.

That's right, Soulja Boy – whose real name is [checks Wikipedia] DeAndre Cortez Way – is basically selling a pair of cheap Chinese gaming machines and is passing them off as his own unique vision. To make the whole situation even more amusing, he's charging more for the device than it costs to buy them directly from the manufacturer.

Both machines – a handheld and a console – are made by Chinese firm Anbernic, and usually cost $60 and $90 respectively. Good old Soulja Boy is charging $100 and $150, although he's kind enough to point out that currently, these prices are $50 less than the $150 and $200 he'd normally charge, presumably after smoking some of those funny cigarettes we've heard rappers like.

You can check out these amazing slices of tech below. We're almost certain that Soulja Boy asked Bandai Namco for permission to employ Tekken's Jin Kazama as 'brand spokesperson'. Almost certain.

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The portable system can apparently run "Switch/3DS/Vita/NEOGEO/GBC/Gameboy/GBA" games and comes with 3,000 (count 'em) pre-loaded, with the ability to download more. Let that sink in for a moment; this thing is being marketed as running Switch games.

The console has 800 games, but can run (it says here) “PS/NEOGEO/PC/SEGA/GBA/NES" as well as the mysterious "SOULJAGAME". We assume that piece of software involves buying up a bulk load of terrible emulation-based Chinese consoles and selling them at a premium to your gullible fans. We can't wait to play that one.

The handheld model is hilariously a rip-off of the Revo-101, which just makes the whole situation even more amusing. If you're not laughing already at the thought of millions of fans snapping up these pieces of junk just because they love a bit of Soulja Boy, then check out the equally chuckle-worthy SouljaWatch (which looks nothing like the Apple Watch, honest!) and the SouljaPods (Apple Air Pods? Never heard of 'em, mate).

The truly bonkers thing about all of this is that Soulja Boy's fans are gobbling up this cheap plastic tat like it's coated in gold and comes with a bag of diamonds as a bonus:

https://twitter.com/RealLifeKaz/status/1070568704960839680

Now if only we could get some of these people to buy these magic beans we've got clogging up the cupboard in the Nintendo Life office.

Some people have been getting in on the act, including Atooi's Jools Watsham:

This whole episode may be unintentionally hilarious, but it looks like Soulja himself will be having the last laugh – he says he has taken more than $250,000 in orders already.

Perhaps he's not so crazy after all?

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