For you to think the Hydra Console Game Dev Kit is incredibly awesome (which it is), you have to be real geek. The reason I say you need to be a geek is because this dev kit lets you create your very own 8-Bit video games, and by create I don’t mean make a little hello word program that flashes different colors, you do all sorts of programming stuff.

The included guide/book is the key part, without it, you’d pretty much be lost. It gives you the information you need to develop the games and everything in them (graphics, sounds, etc.). Plenty of examples are in there that will give you a good starting point for your own game dev. Rather than painfully typing out hundreds of lines of BASIC code for the examples, you can just use the included CD and do a quick copy and paste. Also on the CD is Hydra Tiny BASIC which lets you create programs directly from the Hydra (the console) itself rather than doing it on a PC.

The kit includes more than just the console, guide, and CD, as it also includes all the other necessities for gaming: mouse, keyboard, gamepad, A/V cable, USB cable (for PC hookup I think), AC adapter, 128K (yes K!) re-programmable game card to store your games, and the blank “experimenter” card to design your own add-on hardware. If that doesn’t sound ridiculously awesome to you, well, don’t buy it. Otherwise, spend the $200 for the Hydra Console Game Dev Kit. I know I’m seriously considering it, although it’ll probably suck up quite a bit of free time.

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