The world of open source handhelds is a strange but exciting place, dominated not by overbearing and cash-hungry manufacturers and publishers, but by the same breed of indie coders who are slowly but surely infiltrating the likes of XBLA, iOS, Android and Steam. Since the first truly 'open' consoles started to appear in the Far East at the dawn of the millennium, we've seen a long line of systems created with the ideals of freedom and experimentation very much at their core. These are platforms on which rules are made to be broken, and the only limitation is how far savvy and resourceful developers can push the host hardware.
One of the most notable examples is the Pandora, a joint venture between an international cadre of open source enthusiasts which was ultimately born out of frustration with the existing crop of portable options.
"I'd been sketching ideas like the Pandora for years," recalls Craig Rothwell, founder member of the Pandora team and one of the driving forces behind the open source gaming hardware scene here in the UK.
"When I was younger I tried to hack the Amstrad e-m@iler, as I wanted a truly portable computer."
Rothwell's interest in modding and hacking would result in him becoming actively involved with both the UK distribution of the GamePark GP32, regarded by many as the grandfather of the current open source gaming scene.
The GP32 was followed by the equally famous GP2X, which offered more power and functionality. The modest success of these products convinced Rothwell - who would later be joined by German tech enthusiast Michael Mrozek - that there was enough consumer interest to justify a totally new product.
"We've always been fans of 'open' devices - especially as more and more systems are becoming locked down," explains Mrozek.
"We wanted a gaming device where the user can install anything they want without the need for any hacking or jailbreaking."
However, Rothwell had no desire to imitate existing hardware.
"We knew it had to be slightly different from anything else on the market," he says.
"We could also see things like the PSP taking away share from the GP32 and GP2X, so we knew whatever we made had to be very different, yet offer similar expanded functionality. Making the Pandora a 'micro laptop' with gaming controls seemed to be a good move."
At first, Rothwell and his team decided to pitch their vision to GamePark Holdings, the now-defunct Korean firm responsible for the aforementioned GP2X.
"We actually went over there to try to convince them that they should join us in the venture, but they weren't interested," he explains, and the fateful decision was therefore made to go it alone, a choice which - initially at least - seemed to be a blessed one.
Rothwell and Mrozek went public with the concept, quickly garnering support from members of the burgeoning open source community, with many individuals stepping up to assume key positions within the team.
"We needed designers for the Printed Circuit Board (PCB) and the case," explains Mrozek.
"Luckily, Michael Weston in the US showed us some of the handhelds he had personally created, and he became the designer of the Pandora. The case designer also came from the community; he created some mods for the GP2X which drastically improved the system's gaming controls. After that, both the PCB and case were designed with features based on input from the community. This was a delicate process; the case had to be small and ergonomic to use, but the PCB also had to fit in properly."
It's the kind of operation that a large company like Sony or Nintendo would literally pour millions of dollars of research and development into, yet the Pandora team did it on a shoestring using the expertise of people who were, at best, amateur enthusiasts.
Best Laid Plans
With a core team established and the design in place, the next step was to acquire funding to actually manufacture the Pandora. This is where the story begins to take on a somewhat chaotic tone.
"We essentially did Kickstarter before Kickstarter even existed... we opened preorders and raised about $1 million in 24 hours, which predictably caused the bank to panic."
"We essentially did Kickstarter before Kickstarter even existed," Rothwell says.
"The plan was to take pre-orders and use the money to fund production. In the UK we had our bank on board and told them the plan, and they seemed to like the idea. However, looking back I really don't think they expected us to succeed. We opened preorders and raised about $1 million in 24 hours, which predictably caused the bank to panic. At first they moved $100,000 in to a 'reserve account' and then a week later totally dropped us, believing it was some kind of fraudulent operation.
"They refunded all customer orders and told us to clear off - we never got a proper explanation about why they did this. So we then had the nightmare task of trying to calm down customers who wondered what the hell was going on, and then to try to convince them to reorder via a bank transfer, as the bank had cancelled our merchant numbers meaning we couldn't accept credit cards for months. Slowly they did come back to us, but it was a lengthy and horrible period. Of course, these days sites like Kickstarter solve this; it's a great resource which I wish had existed back then."
Regaining the battered trust of your consumer base is one challenge, but when you're building unproven hardware from scratch without the assistance of an R&D budget numbering in the millions, the path to market is seldom a smooth one.
"Everything that could go wrong did go wrong," laments Rothwell.
"When you're making a device which is unique and has never been attempted before, you have to think on your feet and be ready for huge disasters. When we started only a handful of companies in the world could handle Package on Package (PoP) work - an essential part of the design and one of the key reasons why we could make the Pandora so small - and only one company was willing to consider our project. Unfortunately, they seemed to under-quote us and experienced difficulty meeting our order."
Despite these setbacks, production lumbered on.
"Everything was ready at the end of 2010," says Mrozek.
"So in February 2011, every Pandora should have been delivered and we should have had them in stock from then on. The company we were using to make the PCBs told us they needed eight months to produce 3000 boards - they'd previously promised us 1000 boards per week. When they arrived, 1000 didn't even work, which was equal to a cash loss of over 300,000 Euros. Considering the resultant sales we lost, the actual damage probably went into the millions."
"When you're making a device which is unique and has never been attempted before, you have to think on your feet and be ready for huge disasters... only one company was willing to consider our project."
Another problem involved the console's analogue slider 'nubs'.
"The first company who designed the nubs went bust just after receiving our payment of about 30,000 Euros." adds Mrozek, the end result being more delays, and having been told several times that the console would be ready soon, customers predictably began to get restless.
"This was where Michael really came into his own," admits Rothwell.
"He is an expert in writing long, calming posts when I'm tearing my hair out at the catastrophe that has befallen us. Generally, if people want a refund, we quickly let them have one. Fortunately, most people realised what a stressful and difficult job we had taken on - and that we were committed to the end - so they stayed on board."
Keen to see the Pandora dream through to completion, the vast majority of customers continued to support the venture.
"Luckily, only a few actually turned hostile," admits Mzorek.
"It's the unique design of the Pandora which makes it sell. The keyboard, the gaming controls and the vital fact that it's open source...we won't cripple your machine just because you torrented a film or played on an emulator."
"It was totally understandable, but still sad to see, as we did our best to provide the units but simply ran into issues. We always were open and honest to the community, so on the whole they understood and supported us. It's really the best community we could have wished for."
