Gaming

Konami, legendary game house turned pachinko-maker pivots to gaming PCs

The developer of “Metal Gear Solid” and “Castlevania” is getting into PC hardware. Ultra-expensive gaming PCs.

As Sony and Microsoft gear up over a new console war this holiday season, Japanese game developer Konami of hit franchises like Metal Gear Solid, Castlevania, and Silent Hill, is going to sell its first gaming PC (via Engadget) and accessories under the "Arespear" brand.

The what? Arespear stands for "advanced revolution for esports" which basically tells you who Konami is targeting. Arespear doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, but it'll join other gaming PC brands like Asus's Republic of Gamers (ROG) and Lenovo's Legion, when the lineup launches in December.

The Arespear tower comes with a metal(?) or metal-like case adorned with holes on its front, presumably for airflow like the Mac Pro.

You like that cheese grater look?Konami

Arespear C300 — Intel Core i5-9400F, NVIDIA GTX 1650, 8GB of DDR4-2666MHz RAM, 512GB of SSD storage (PCIe NVMe/M.2).

Arespear C700 — Intel Core i7-9700, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 Super, 16GB of RAM (2x 8GB of DDR4-2666MHz), 512GB of SSDstorage (PCIe NVMe/M.2), 1TB HDD (SATA)

Konami's also got a C700+ tower, which has the same specs as the C700, but with RGB and a transparent cover side panel.

Gaming PCs are new territory for Konami. While the company has experience making pachinko machines (a huge business in Japan), they're not exactly traditional computers.

Is the cable management good?Konami
Looks super messy when you take off the cover...Konami

Kind of pricey — The Arespear C300 starts at about $1,750 and the C700 at $3,200. That's a lot of money for these PC specs. You could easily build your own with similar — if not better — specs for less. Slap a Konami sticker on it if you're that big of a fanboy.

Keyboard and headphones — Konami's also going to sell matching gaming keyboards and headphones. The keyboards are called K100F and K100L. The F model has a number pad and the L version doesn't. They're black and look like keyboards. I'm sure you already have a keyboard. But if you want one with a Konami logo on it, go for it.

The K100F is a mechanical keyboard.Konami
A black keyboard.Konami

Here's the H100 gaming headphones. They, too, look like other headphones, but with the Arestear branding on the cups.

Kinda plain TBH.Konami