Palmer Luckey is betting that the best gadgets of the future will look and feel like the work devices of the past. Speaking onstage at CES with Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian, Anduril’s founder dismissed the idea that retro-inspired design and bespoke hardware are merely nostalgia-ware for a declining empire; it’s actually the best model he believes exists for products to come.
Luckey wasn’t railing against progress. He also complimented AI on speeding up workflows. His critique was aimed at the design language of modern devices, which he says have abandoned the intentionality and tactile satisfaction that characterized earlier tech eras.
- A Nostalgia Pitch, With Strategic Game Theory
- Signals from the market for retro-inspired devices
- Luckey’s retro bet beyond games and into hardware
- Defense roots inform his perspective on rugged design
- Why old form factors continue to win in modern devices
- What to watch next as retro design influences tech
A Nostalgia Pitch, With Strategic Game Theory
“Old” in Luckey’s sense is a matter of physicality and focus: clicky buttons, clear affordances, and a leaning toward single-purpose experiences. He cited the commitment of building a music library or creating a mixtape as design virtues, not just sentimentality.
Ohanian agreed with the sentiment, saying there are a few classic products that are “objectively better” for their intended uses. The couple’s thesis debuted in a cultural moment when Gen Z cleaves to cultures and eras it never lived through — not so much as memory, but as a response to eternal feeds and feature bloat.
Signals from the market for retro-inspired devices
Consumer behavior supports the vibe change. The Recording Industry Association of America noted that in 2022, something unusual happened — sales of vinyl records had, for the first time since 1987, eclipsed those of CDs and had continued to do so into 2023. In the United Kingdom, cassette sales were at a 20-year high as of late. Physical formats do well specifically because they come with scarcity, persistence, and ritual.
Hardware tells a similar story. Retro-inspired handhelds, including the Analogue Pocket, are now multiple production runs deep. Sweeping in behind it is a wave of minimalist phones and add-ons that have all the technology one might need, but not all the technology anybody wants — see here: the Clicks Communicator announced this year at CES, which offers a keyboard-first design to channel BlackBerry muscle memory for those aching types lamenting touchscreen fatigue.
Luckey’s retro bet beyond games and into hardware
Luckey has effectively commercialized the thesis. His ModRetro Chromatic, introduced in 2024, priced at $199, runs original cartridge games and embraces the Game Boy lineage with contemporary construction. Reviewers have hailed it as among the finest, and one of them was brandished onstage by Ohanian himself, who made passing reference to his own nostalgia for vintage-style game making.
The formula? Offer reliable, tactile experiences with modern-day reliability. It’s not anti-innovation; it is innovation by subtraction — taking away the layers that slow down first-pixel-to-fun, the ones that kill delight.
Defense roots inform his perspective on rugged design
The fact that Luckey’s day job might give his design philosophy an edge. Since 2017 he has turned his attention to Anduril, which attained a $30.5 billion valuation after a Series G investment round; the company name is a reference to J.R.R. Tolkien and is working with big tech players on head-worn systems for the U.S. military, where ruggedness, simplicity, and human factors have no slack at all.
He also drew a grim picture of geopolitics, describing the end of long-term intimacy between China and the United States and calling for changes to supply chains. And that sentiment echoes wider industry trends toward reshoring and de-risking, from defense procurement preferences to Western inducements for homegrown manufacturing.
Why old form factors continue to win in modern devices
There is a practical case for going retro. Specialized devices minimize the burden on the user of having to switch attention and context. Analog controls provide speed and precision; consider the latency-free inputs of a handheld versus the context-switching of a smartphone. Batteries last another hour when hardware isn’t playing shuffleboard with a dozen deities conjured by the background.
Regulatory winds also favor longevity. With right-to-repair policies making headway in the E.U. and several U.S. states, as well as standardized connectors such as USB-C, manufacturers are encouraged to create devices that factor in durability and modularity. That’s naturally a good fit with classic form factors designed to be serviced rather than thrown away.
What to watch next as retro design influences tech
If Luckey is correct, look for hybrid products that mix throwback ergonomics with contemporary compute:
- Cartridge-ready handhelds that save to the cloud
- Keyboards that snap onto phones without slaying pocketability
- Audio players that respect albums as first-class citizens while handling lossless streaming
The bigger picture is less aesthetic than intentional. Commercially, the opposite approach is gaining ground: design that puts a premium on clarity and control. In a market packed with everything devices, the business proposition might be to make the best something — and to have it feel unmistakably authentic in your hand.
