With Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo battling for the title of “Supreme Console Manufacturer,” newcomers in the field such as Gamepark Holding usually don't have a chance against the might of the three giants. It is the duty of editors such as myself however to give them the benefit of a doubt and present their devices. And since I mentioned Gamepark Holding, let me talk to you about a little handheld console named GP2X Wiz Game System.

The device, like many of its kind, is made in Asia (Korea, to be more precise) and like most such gadgets, it tries to do a lot. What puts it above the majority of such products is that it actually does most of what it promises. This gadget does not only act like an emulator for second or third generation consoles such as the NES or SNES, but can play some newer games as well.

It is powered by a 533Mhz 3D accelerator plus flash engine, has 1GB of flash memory (although expansion through SD card is supported), has a USB chargeable battery, and the best part is that it uses Linux as its operating system. This means that users can do a lot of interesting stuff - make their own games and applications or play homebrew ones. They can read e-books, watch videos or play music if they want to.

The Wiz is the successor to the GP2X, a seventh generation handheld console that sported two 200 MHz overclockable ARM processors and the same open-sourced Linux OS. It was a pretty big hit among emulator and homebrew fans, since it allowed running neo-geo games, NES games, SNES games and so on through a series of emulators.

Will the Wiz be just as successful or be swept away by the three battling giants mentioned in the beginning of the article? With a price tag of 179.90 USD, I am pretty sure it stands a good chance of surviving.


We are just a few, but there are many of you, Softpedia users, out there. That's why we thought it would be a good idea to create an email address for you to help us a little in finding gadgets we missed. Interesting links are bound to be posted with recognition going mainly to those who submit. The address is .