Before getting to the Game Boy and why I love it, let’s talk about poetry a minute. Most poems have a purpose or agenda – be it creating an atmosphere, telling a story, providing social commentary, or a little of all of those (kind of what games try to accomplish). Most also achieve this by adhering to some rules – like rhyming couplets or the cadence of the spoken poem (such as haiku or iambic pentameter). At first glance, it seems that the poet achieves the desired effect almost in spite of the rules. But in fact the form provides needed structure to keep the poem on track and give an extra achievement to the finished work. Now pretend that the limited literary form is the technically-limited Game Boy itself. And instead of a poet we have a game programmer (also with an artistic vision) – writing 8-bit assembly code instead of literary words. Both produce timeless classics for our enjoyment.

(The original Game Boy and the later Game Boy Pocket edition – I’ll be covering the evolution of the handheld perhaps in a later article).

As I mentioned, the original Game Boy is a technologically-limited device – having NES controls, a 4mhz clock, 8 kb RAM, and a 160 x 144 pixel LCD display. The 2-bit color palette provides 4 shades of gray and there’s a bit of motion blur. That means the games have limited resolution and colors to represent the developer’s vision. The art style that developers went with give the games a very distinctive feel and charm. I believe the games have aged quite well and the gameplay really still shines through.

(Super Mario Land 2 is a brilliant game, designed to cater to the Game Boy’s limitations)

Despite the limitation in specs, the Game Boy sold over 64 million units by 1997. Classic arcade games (like Radar Mission – a sort of battleship clone) and puzzle games like Tetris and Dr. Mario appealed to adults. And there were also many action and platformer games to appeal to children and teenagers – who could just pick up the system and play it with the intuitive gameplay and simplistic controls. All in all there were at least 733 released titles, spanning from 1989 up to the millennium.

(During its hay-day, there were great action games for kids/teens as well as puzzle games for all ages.)

The Game Boy came out at just the right time with just the right mix of hardware vs cost for consumers. Produced by Gunpei Yokoi (creator of Nintendo Game and Watch – a success in itself), the Game Boy had a signature art style and gameplay. It debuted with Super Mario Land and Tetris – two spectacular games and still beloved to this day. Whereas the Sega Game Gear was truly more sophisticated (with full color and a back-light), it also required six AA batteries (with horrible battery life), and was heavy and large – especially for children. (To compare, the original Game Boy lasted from 10 to 30 hours on its four AA batteries – though requiring an external light source.)

(In the marketplace, the Game Boy held its own place against back-lit full-color competitors. I remember going on school trips and kids bringing along a 20-pack of AA batteries along with their Game Gear. It was also very large for a child – and took up most of their back pack.)

Like the Game Gear, the Atari Lynx similarly suffered in battery life due to the CFL light tube. And, while quite nice and far ahead of its time, the TurboExpress by NEC launched with a $249.99 price tag ($446.00 in today’s money!) and lacked must-have games in the US (Bonk came later). That made the $89.99 Game Boy (sometimes with Tetris) seem like a steal.

I believe that the limited specs, but massive popularity also forced developers to focus on solid game play (and adjusting their art style to the console) rather than focusing on improved graphics and leaving clunky mechanics. There was no need for gimmicks and it was word-of-mouth that sold many of the best-selling titles. This (in my mind) is what makes kept the Game Boy thriving and full of interesting titles with timeless appeal (for gaming on the go or under a desk-lamp at home). The Game Boy is also a rare case where the handheld was so popular that it was developed for well beyond its lifespan (even many later color titles were backwards compatible). Inventive and quirky titles were feasible for the system because of the audience’s size and because titles could be priced low enough to allow companies to take the risk.

(During the interim between Game Boy and Game Boy Color, games were backwards-compatible – meaning you could still play them on an original Game Boy in black and white vs. the Game Boy Color with color. A common example of this is the original Pokemon games – a series which started here on Game Boy and grew into a massive franchise.)

Nintendo pushed out many of the most-beloved Game Boy games (as expected for any of their consoles), until the library grew with more third-party developers (Konami, Irem, Squaresoft, Hudson). And as the hardware was widely distributed over time, it received many ports of existing games from other consoles – some old (like the Midway classics) and some more-current releases (simplified for the handheld, like Bonk’s Adventure from TG-16).

Over time the Game Boy (with its gray tones) became a sort of expected old-school form to which game developers adhered (often a discounted version of a popular console game). And often these simplified titles shadowed their console releases or followed shortly thereafter. People sort of knew what to expect from the Game Boy – from over-sized character sprites (even on original games like Mario Land 2), to always-centered characters and a zoomed-in screen (to help motion-blur), to limited, but fun levels (like the 4 robot masters on the Mega Man games). And that was fine at the time because the games were both portable and affordable (usually about 2/3’s the price of Nintendo games on shelves if memory serves).

(Mega Man 5 box art and Mega Man 3 in-game screen)

When preparing to collect this handheld, the best way to think of it is not so much as a game console as much as a genre of games (with the resolution and battery-life having driven the games’ designs). Despite it being 8-bit like the NES, the games are vastly different in design (due to the limited resolution). Some of the titles are reminiscent of Game and Watch – where the achievement and appeal is more to do with artistic achievement and simple-yet-fun gameplay in the medium. Other titles (like the Mario Land and Zelda series) are fully-fleshed-out adventures worthy of a complete play-through. And there’s the games that are fun in the short-term (familiar to those that collect Atari), but might not offer deep enough gameplay to keep you going.

(The Game Boy was so popular that Nintendo released a SNES cartridge – with the Game Boy hardware inside. The Super Game Boy allows playing originally black-and-white games with color palettes and sometimes with special borders downloaded from the cartridge. So you can enjoy Game Boy games on your TV with a SNES controller if that’s more your style.)

And that my friends is the original Game Boy. It came, it conquered, and its legacy remains today. Try it out for a wonderful retro-gaming experience.

(It is also possible to back-light an original Game Boy for gaming around the house without a direct light source. And one can also play original cartridges on a Game Boy SP in a pinch.)

Now for shameful self-promotion:

I sell hand-made (or modded) items (like back-lit custom Game Boys) here (etsy).

And I also sell extra used games and manuals I pick up here (ebid) and here (ebay).

Also, please follow me on Twitter and Instagram (@UrzasRage) for pics and announcements.

Proceeds from my shops either go back into my collection as game purchases (so that I have more to write about), for more game-chasing, or are given to gaming-related charities.