Palmer Luckey’s retro gaming startup ModRetro reportedly seeks funding at $1B valuation

ModRetro, the vintage gaming startup by Palmer Luckey, is in talks to raise funding at a $1 billion valuation, according to the Financial Times.

The company launched its first product, a Game Boy-style handheld device called the Chromatic, in 2024. The Verge’s Sean Hollister said it “might be the best version of the Game Boy ever made,” but found it hard to separate from Luckey’s reputation as founder of defense tech startup Anduril Industries.

“If Lockheed Martin made a Game Boy, would you buy one?” Hollister asked.

Luckey said last year that he’d been trying to build a Game Boy-inspired device “off and on as a hobby for almost seventeen years now” and described the Chromatic as the result of “hundreds of irrational decisions”  that made it “an uncompromisingly authentic celebration of everything that made the console special.”

The FT reports that ModRetro is working on other devices, including one designed to replicate the Nintendo 64.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration appears to have embraced Luckey’s vision for autonomous weapons, with Anduril reportedly in talks to raise a new funding round at a $60 billion valuation.