Angry Miao's AM RGB 65 Borrows the Nintendo Game Boy Aesthetic, Shines with 200 RGB LEDs
Inspired by Nintendo design trends of the 1980s, this retro throwback keyboard includes some very modern technology.
Angry Miao has launched a crowdfunding campaign for a retro-futuristic mechanical keyboard that borrows some 1980s Nintendo styling and pairs it with an LED matrix display for custom animations: the AM RGB 65.
"Nintendo is often hailed as one of the most playful companies in the world. Its iconic classic gaming console, the Game Boy, has brought us countless fond memories," Angry Miao's Nan Li explains of the company's inspiration for the new keyboard. "As a team that values creativity, innovation, and community-driven development, we have taken the ideas from our community and spent almost three years bringing the classic Game Boy back to life. This product that carries these memories is the AM RGB 65."
The keyboard itself is a standard 65" layout in a chunky aluminum chassis, angled at eight degrees. An unspecified Nordic Semi microcontroller drives the board, with customisation available through Angry Miao's in-house AM Master software, while also providing USB Type-C, Bluetooth, and 2.4GHz wireless connectivity. For wireless use, there's a 10Ah battery inside.
It's not the keyboard, or even what's inside the housing, that makes the AM RGB 65 interesting though: it's what's above it. 200 individual RGB LEDs on a dedicated lighting panel shine up through a gridded diffuser, acting as a low-resolution 40×5 display for downloadable or custom graphics and animations.
Elsewhere on the keyboard, which uses Icy Silver Pro V2 switches with per-key RGB LED lighting, a "deco panel" at the rear serves a double purpose: creating a hole in the metal housing to improve wireless signal strength and offering a decorative flair inspired by the LCD dot-matrix display of Nintendo's original Game Boy — replaceable with your own graphics, if you'd prefer, Angry Miao says.
This isn't the first mechanical keyboard we've seen boasting an LED matrix: back in June Machenike launched a crowdfunding campaign for the KT84, which included a higher-resolution 490-dot RGB LED matrix for custom animations along 1.47" color TFT panel. The campaign raised over $70,000 from 304 backers — a figure Angry Miao's campaign has already beaten, less than a day after it launched.
Angry Miao's campaign is now live on Kickstarter with "base kit" keyboards lacking switches and keycaps starting at $413 USD for early bird backers, in a choice of Game Boy-style Cloud White, Cyber Grey, or Violet Fury finishes; bundles including switches and keycaps are priced at $513 for early-bird backers. All hardware is expected to arrive in October, the company has confirmed.