It’s hard to imagine a console having more momentum during the first half of 2022 than Amico has. Everyone else in the video game space seems to be slowing down while Amico only accelerates towards its glorious release. The Switch’s heyday is finally slowing, with Nintendo admitting it won’t sell as many a it did in 2021. Sony can’t keep Playstation 5 in stock, leading to frustration among its fan base and reduced sales for its games. Interest in Xbox has cooled to the point where they are easily available in stores, and we’re likely to soon see a price drop and death spiral for that hunk of junk that comes in two uninspired flavors. The videogame business is tough and 2022 hasn’t been easy. It’s exposed these newcomer pretenders with their flash in the pan franchises like Grand Turismo and Halo, which don’t have the staying power of long-loved blockbuster games like Astrosmash and Cloudy Mountain. Who doesn’t love Cloudy Mountain and think about it all the time? Nobody I know.

All the systems are failing except for Amico. Amico has shown a surge of confidence building developments as we hurtle towards launch. It abandoned the dying Gamestop brick and mortal store to focus on direct sales in the online space, where the future of retail is clearly moving. It raised the price and lowered the number of controllers because demand was so high that they realized it wasn’t fair to offer such a great deal when they weren’t going to be able to make one for everyone who wanted one in a timely fashion. They also stopped processing refunds to prevent people from making a giant mistake. They care about their customers and don’t want anyone who has been with them for this long to not get a console.

Haters and doubters will point to a few minor hiccups along the way. There was the announcement of a coming announcement of a release date that did not, in fact, result in a release date. There was the collapsed fourth crowd funding campaign that was eventually canceled by StartEngine. There have been high profile departures.

Every system has hiccups. The much-praised Nintendo Switch made a big deal about the IR camera on the Joycon and has barely used it. The Xbox Series S often doesn’t hit its targeted 1080p 60 fps frame rate on newer games. Even the PS5 has issue with easily damaged fins and an unreliable game suspend feature (we don’t even have to get started on Xbox’s so-called Quick Resume.)

What matters with a game console is not the names on the team that made it, or when the back end for the online store is finished, or whether the OS is ready, or how well the controllers work, or whether it has cleared FCC testing, or whether there are any finished games, or whether the company that’s putting it out has a finalized manufacturing spec or has the money to actually manufacture the device if it had final specs.

What matters with a console is how much we wish and hope and want it to be real. Consoles are like Santa Clause. If you believe they’re real then they will be, and don’t let anybody else tell you they aren’t. Video games are about the magic of fun, not plastic and computer chips and stolen game assets. They’re about friendship and family fun.

If we want Amico to be real hard enough it will be. And as the fairweather friend Youtubers and dilettantes fall away the average level of belief and love of the remaining core get even stronger. We are fewer but we are more committed, more confident, more fanatical than the hangers-on. AMICO WILL NEVER DIE! WE WON’T LET IT! IT DOESN’T MATTER IF WE HAVE TO CARVE OUR AMICOS OUT OF OUR OWN FLESH AND BONE AND BUILD IT FROM OUR MEAT, TEETH, AND TEARS, LORD AMICO WILL BE SUMMONED TO THIS PLANE OF EXISTENCE AND HE WILL WREAK A TERRIBLE VENGEANCE UPON THOSE WHO DOUBTED HIS COMING WITH DEVASTATING AND JUST CAUSE.

PRAISE BE TO FRIENDSHIP! PRAISE BE TO TOMMY! PRAISE BE TO AMICO! IT’S ABOUT FRIENDSHIP AND THE ANNIHILATION OF ALL WHO STAND IN AMICO’S WAY!

By the end of this year Amico will have come and those who believed will be rewarded with the paradise of Finnigan Fox and Cornhole while those who doubted will suffer a punishment beyond belief. The wheat shall be separated from the chaff and the chaff shall blow away like so much straw upon the wind. The momentum of Amico is unstoppable and it will be more than a revolution, it will be a revelation.

Praise be to Amico.