The Game Boy inspired Key Boy keyboard might be rubbish to type on, but it sure looks great
It’s a me, repetitive strain injury!
Quick question — what’s more important to you? A lifetime of pain-free typing, or a cramp-raddled but nostalgia-fuelling clickity-clackity experience?
If the answer is that second option, welcome to the club, and keep on reading — we’ve got something just for you.
YouTube creator The Lesser The Besser has Frankensteined together one of the most-fun looking keyboards we’ve seen in a long time, taking the design of the old-school DMG Game Boy and fusing it with a tenkeyless scale keyboard.
3D printed, it’s actually a wrap around casing for an existing Logitech keyboard — the outer shell sits on top of the Logitech device, and lines its red plastic and grey rubber buttons up with the alphanumeric and function keys underneath, respectively. Flip it over, and it's even got a spot for a fake cartridge. Nice!
Is it going to be a comfortable typing experience — now, we’ve not touched it, but we’re going to go out on a limb and assume no. Those Game Boy buttons might be perfectly sized for spinning a Tetris tetromino or stomping on a koopa, but I’d wager you’re going to miss that deadline if this is your only way to tap out a project.
Still, full marks for ingenuity and style. It’s a prototype only, so you won’t be able to buy one of these — but check out the YouTube video series from the channel to see how it was put together if you fancy trying to do a DIY job at home.