Game Boy turns 30 this month

Wow, what a run!

To me the Game Boy really encapsulates Nintendo's ability to do less with more.

It says a lot that the best Game Boy games were designed to take advantage of the system's limitations, rather than in spite of them. Games like Link's Awakening, Mole Mania, Donkey Kong '94, Motocross Maniacs, Tetris, Dead Heat Scramble, Avenging Spirit, Pokemon, and Roadster all benefitted from that minimalist design approach - being perfectly designed for single-screen scrolling, or the limited screen resolution and button layout, and not losing any depth from it either.

The other interesting thing about Game Boy was how long-lived the platform was - again testament to the appeal of good design that does more with less. When the Game Boy launched, the NES was the current Nintendo system out there. By the time the platform was replaced with GBA, it was GameCube! It says a lot that these types of games remained appealing despite the dramatic technical shift in the console space at the time. Good design will always triumph regardless of the constraints at play.

I feel foolish for having thought there was no need to revisit the Game Boy library after getting a GBA back in 2001. This year I have been picking up new games, and revisiting old ones, on a Game Boy Pocket, a handheld I didn't own back in the day, but a handheld I appreciate a lot. I think the bloat of modern games - and a lot of modern game design - actually makes the GB even more appealing as a system today than it might have a few years ago. A lot of Game Boy games continue to be very entertaining today while offering an appreciable approachability that does not come at the expense of gameplay depth.

What are your favourite Game Boy memories, or things about the platform?

I've got a lot of time for the Game Boy. It was my introduction to gaming in 1993, and I hoovered it all up in the following eight years. As a wee boy, I really loved those games that were felt technologically-advanced, seemingly dreaming up much more than what those tiny cartridges could accommodate. Stuff like Super Mario Land 3: Wario Land, Pokemon Pinball, Super RC Pro-AM and Kirby's Dream Land stand out in particular as highlights for me.

I was also really into those games that translated from the home consoles. Some were a bit iffy - Mortal Kombat, famously so - but the likes of Donkey Kong Land and Harvest Moon showed me that a game in 1998 didn't need to look like Banjo-Kazooie to be any good.

Even those games that you'd always see for a tenner in Woolworths or Beatties, such as WWF Superstars, F1 Race and Alleyway, I was into them too. I couldn't always justify planing £60 on a new N64 game, but in the meantime, if I just wanted something cheap, easy and fun to have a bash on, the Game Boy had the lot.

It's the ones that happen to be synonymous with the Game Boy that have had the most lasting impression on me. Pokemon and Tetris, both really easy to understand, yet incredibly addictive and deceptively diverse. They hooked me - they still do.

Wasn't arsed with Link's Awakening. And Metroid II was absolute dog shite.

I have strong nostalgia for the GB. Like Cappa, it was my introduction to gaming. Months spent just on SML1, learning every enemy but never playing the game. Then SML2. The next big Game Boy game for me was probably Pokémon, and at that point I was horribly lost. A big red box that took four AAs and could only be played in good light feels horribly antiquated to me now, but I've got a lot of good feelings towards it.

I'm in the same boat as Balla and Cappa in that the Game Boy was my introduction to gaming. It was a lime green Game Boy Colour that I owned which I bolstered with one of these monstrosities:



A port of a NES Star Wars game, SML2 and Pokémon R/B/Y were my introductions into gaming as a whole. Fine machine, although the low light on the screen made nighttime gaming - something I tried to get away with as a sprog - difficult to achieve.

I never actually owned a Game boy until 2011 (my older brother had one back in the 90s but I only got to play with it now & again) when I saw someone I followed on twitter was refurbishing a bunch of them, I even had to set up paypal so I could pay for it and to this day it is still the one and only thing I've bought using paypal.

It's still in top condition as well & I really should look into getting more games for it.

Game Boy was my introduction to Nintendo, having SEGA consoles in the early 90s. It was the only system my dad played (Donkey Kong 94) other than the Master System, and while I owned Link's Awakening, it never clicked for me at the time. The only other game I had was Pokemon Blue when it became a craze in '99, and it was kinda odd seeing teenagers digging out their grey Game Boys at lunch time.

It's a system that I have fond memories of, but haven't really revisited. Do the batteries in the cartridges start failing after all this time? I would love to pick up a GBA and there are some GB games I'd be interested in playing.

@Jas how is that even possible

Anyway I was a SEGA kid but never saw a Game Gear to years later and like everyone else I got a Game Boy instead which was this bundle for either Christmas or a Birthday from my grandparents


I remember really liking the Wario games on it and of course Pokemon

masofdas wrote:

@Jas how is that even possible

Like I said my brother had one and that would be shared about within the family rather than all of us having one, plus I just had more interest in consoles as well.

I was actually talking about PayPal lol like don't you buy things off the internet.

masofdas wrote:

I was actually talking about PayPal lol like don't you buy things off the internet.

Yeah I do, but I tend to stick to sites I know pretty well and just pay directly with my bank card.

Guess it makes sense, just found it really odd but might because of doing eBay stuff since 2002 and I'd buy a game anywhere if it's the best price also I'm often on retro selling sites and groups.

Interesting you bring more into console gaming at the time, as don't you play a lot more Switch now and the likes of Sword of Ditto having to be a great fit on a handheld.

Most of my Switch play time is still docked but there are definitely some games that are more suited to handheld play.