BERLIN, GERMANY -- The best thing about IFA is that it’s only a matter of time before you run into something wonderfully ridiculous. Case in point, the Acer Thronos Gaming Chair. Back in 2018, this motorized gaming throne complete with three panoramic displays and enough room for a full desktop PC blew our minds.
Acer’s hoping that lightning will strike twice with the update to the Thronos, dubbed the Thronos Air. Where the original chair costs an astronomical $30,000, the Air available sometime in Q4 is priced at a more economical $14,000. Which means it’s still out of reach for most of us, but the 1% of gamers who can afford it are getting a sizable discount.
Thronos Air is still as imposing as its predecessor. Encased in aluminum and steel, it’s still more of a cave than a gaming chair. The adjustable monitor arm can support up to three displays –– there’s even a camera mount above the middle display for livestreaming all the awesomeness. You can raise and lower the monitor arm via a handle beneath the central monitor stand.
Inside the cabin, you’ll find modular desk with an adjustable keyboard and mouse rest in addition to the cup holder. That way you can type comfortably no matter what angle the chair is in. Speaking of angles, the chair is still motorized and can be to 130 degrees inside the cabin and 180 degrees outside. It’s not exactly the 360-degree 4D gaming chair of my dreams, but hopefully Acer is slowly but surely working its way there.
But in the meantime, when you’re not rotating side-to-side, the chair can also dole out a bit of massage action. Because after hours of waging war, casting spells and saving the universe, your body needs a nice relaxing rub down. So just kick up your feet on the foot rest, place your headset on the awaiting holder and just let go.
In case you’re wondering where the PC fits in all this, it’s located in the back of the rig with plenty of wire management feng shui going to keep your chair neat and orderly.
We did get some hands-on with the magical chair. Once the Thronos Air's massage balls started to run in circular motions on my back, I felt my eyes start to droop. I seriously did not want to leave. I was jet lagged to hell, and this was my special heaven.
I played Rainbow Six Siege, and despite Ubisoft's new partnership with Acer, Siege was a weird title to show off on the attached display because the game was stretched out and did not scale well whatsoever. And the controls were inverted (a crime against humanity), so that threw me off. Hopefully, the scaling of the game is something that can be fixed in the settings.
We might just have to sneak the Thronos Air out of IFA and keep it for ourselves (a joke). Check out our IFA 2019 hub to see all of the latest tech product news from Berlin.
