All these acronyms are pushing me way further away from the rabbit hole. :biggrin:
Fine, just go pick up S/NES, TG-16/PCE, MD, and PSX minis, oh and let's not forget ZX and the C64!
Pretty much what I've been doing the last few years (although I skipped the NES and have yet to talk myself into a C64). And the ZX Spectrum Next doesn't really count, as a limited production, fairly expensive, and FPGA-based device. Speccy emulation (and other FPGA, I think) devices exist but vary wildly in quality.
My Turbografx-16 mini arrived today. I forgot that they also included a bunch of PC Engine games. I was really surprised to see Snatcher, too bad it's in Japanese. Otherwise, pretty cool so far.
The TG16 mini really isn’t all that mini, is it? Got mine yesterday but didn’t have much time to play around with it after work. Turns out that even with a receiver and 3 way HDMI switch I have too many devices on one TV. PS4, Switch, Raspberry Pi, NES mini, SNES mini, Genesis mini, TG16 and a partridge in a pear tree.
Oh and it’s kinda lame this doesn’t come with an AC adapter. I had no idea. What is this, a Nintendo portable? And of course they’re sold out. Fortunately I knew it could be powered by plugging in to my TVs USB. However that’s part of the reason I didn’t get much time to play, I had to rework my whole setup. Even then I had to unplug the Genesis from the HDMI switcher. Sorry Sega, you go first. Shouldn’t have talked smack about Nintendo.
The TG16 mini really isn’t all that mini, is it? Got mine yesterday but didn’t have much time to play around with it after work. Turns out that even with a receiver and 3 way HDMI switch I have too many devices on one TV. PS4, Switch, Raspberry Pi, NES mini, SNES mini, Genesis mini, TG16 and a partridge in a pear tree.
Oh and it’s kinda lame this doesn’t come with an AC adapter. I had no idea. What is this, a Nintendo portable? And of course they’re sold out. Fortunately I knew it could be powered by plugging in to my TVs USB. However that’s part of the reason I didn’t get much time to play, I had to rework my whole setup. Even then I had to unplug the Genesis from the HDMI switcher. Sorry Sega, you go first. Shouldn’t have talked smack about Nintendo.
I'm ok with the no AC adapter part since I hooked all my other minis up to a USB switch for power like I did with my HDMI switch. All these damn minis!
Unless Nintendo surprises with an N64 mini I think this is my last. Even if Nintendo did N64, I won’t be interested without Rare’s games. Realistically, Nintendo 64 doesn’t have much of an appealing library without them.
The game menu is a complete rip-off of the NES/SNES classic, but it works. No AC adapter is slightly annoying, but I do have a lot of them that it wasn't much trouble to find one and use that.
Unless Nintendo surprises with an N64 mini I think this is my last. Even if Nintendo did N64, I won’t be interested without Rare’s games. Realistically, Nintendo 64 doesn’t have much of an appealing library without them.
The other problem is the controllers. I wouldn't think they'd be cheap to replicate, and with games like Mario kart, you need 4 inputs.
Good news is you can play most these games on the classics out now.
Unless Nintendo surprises with an N64 mini I think this is my last. Even if Nintendo did N64, I won’t be interested without Rare’s games. Realistically, Nintendo 64 doesn’t have much of an appealing library without them.
The other problem is the controllers. I wouldn't think they'd be cheap to replicate, and with games like Mario kart, you need 4 inputs.
Good news is you can play most these games on the classics out now.
Unless Nintendo surprises with an N64 mini I think this is my last. Even if Nintendo did N64, I won’t be interested without Rare’s games. Realistically, Nintendo 64 doesn’t have much of an appealing library without them.
The other problem is the controllers. I wouldn't think they'd be cheap to replicate, and with games like Mario kart, you need 4 inputs.
Good news is you can play most these games on the classics out now.
I thought these things weren't powerful enough for proper N64 emulation. I thought PS1 was about the limit of what they can run adequately.
Like I said, it's hit or miss. Mario 64 seems to work fine, along with some other games. There are plenty that run terribly. They even made a memory booster mod which requires using expanded storage and creates a page file on the drive so that some games don't crash. I had N64 games running for a time, but I got rid of them because none of the games I actually want to play work well.
Unless Nintendo surprises with an N64 mini I think this is my last. Even if Nintendo did N64, I won’t be interested without Rare’s games. Realistically, Nintendo 64 doesn’t have much of an appealing library without them.
Assuming there's no N64 mini to come, what else could realistically even come out? As much as I'd be first in line for a Saturn mini, yelling "shut up and take my money" like Fry, it'll never happen; and Master System, Dreamcast, Xbox etc are even less likely. The only other real angle would be new versions of existing ones with different game selections, which is kind of pointless given the hacking scene around these things.
I think it's safe to assume this is the swansong for the minis. But, as Eldon Tyrell said in Blade Runner, they burned so very brightly.
Unless Nintendo surprises with an N64 mini I think this is my last. Even if Nintendo did N64, I won’t be interested without Rare’s games. Realistically, Nintendo 64 doesn’t have much of an appealing library without them.
Assuming there's no N64 mini to come, what else could realistically even come out? As much as I'd be first in line for a Saturn mini, yelling "shut up and take my money" like Fry, it'll never happen; and Master System, Dreamcast, Xbox etc are even less likely. The only other real angle would be new versions of existing ones with different game selections, which is kind of pointless given the hacking scene around these things.
I think it's safe to assume this is the swansong for the minis. But, as Eldon Tyrell said in Blade Runner, they burned so very brightly.
Nintendo very directly said they're done with minis, so yeah, this is probably it.
I personally would like a Gameboy classic, but I sincerely doubt we'll get that.
3DS has (almost) every good Game Boy game you could possibly want to play available at good prices. It's different from the NES and SNES where maybe the controller was a part of the good feelings. The original Game Boy was awful. Bad battery life, terrible screen, no buttons, etc.
+1
Options
Zonugal(He/Him) The Holiday ArmadilloI'm Santa's representative for all the southern states. And Mexico!Registered Userregular
I would personally love a Gameboy Classic mini.
I think it would sell well enough, as some people don't want to have to go purchase the game for their systems & such.
Just a smaller, more comfortable Gameboy with fifteen games? Yeah, sure.
I personally would like a Gameboy classic, but I sincerely doubt we'll get that.
3DS has (almost) every good Game Boy game you could possibly want to play available at good prices. It's different from the NES and SNES where maybe the controller was a part of the good feelings. The original Game Boy was awful. Bad battery life, terrible screen, no buttons, etc.
Wait, I swore that my original GameBoy would last forever on batteries. A whole hell longer than any of my newer handhelds. The worst was the Game Gear though. Man that thing sucked batteries like a kid with a soda can.
So my copies came in this weekend and man the TG-16 is so awesome!!!! The Genesis is flawless as well. I loved the little cartridge flaps, volume slider and expansion port. Those little details make it really awesome.
So here are my photos to share.
Also a comparison of the two TG-16 together.
I love how the mini has the expansion cover (which is a pain to open and plug in the power) and the lock slider when you power on the unit.
Game Boy Classic would either be inauthentic or terrible. What I mean is, would people expect it to come with no backlight? A monochrome screen with no resolution? A requirement for AA batteries? No wireless because you have to use a link cable for all of the multiplayer games they felt like including? Because all of those were shitty things that we should be glad to not see again. And if you do include all those things... that's just a 3DS with gimped capabilities.
I even tried to think of 15 good original Game Boy games and had to stop at 10. Three of those were in the same series (Mario Land), which the Classic series hasn't been good about including sequential games.
Game Boy Classic would either be inauthentic or terrible. What I mean is, would people expect it to come with no backlight? A monochrome screen with no resolution? A requirement for AA batteries? No wireless because you have to use a link cable for all of the multiplayer games they felt like including? Because all of those were shitty things that we should be glad to not see again. And if you do include all those things... that's just a 3DS with gimped capabilities.
I even tried to think of 15 good original Game Boy games and had to stop at 10. Three of those were in the same series (Mario Land), which the Classic series hasn't been good about including sequential games.
Tetris
Zelda Links Awakening
Metroid II
Contra
Kirby
Kid Icarus
Turtles: Fall of the Foot Clan
That soccer game that was done by the river city ransom people
Castlevania II
Kirby II
Wario Land
Wario Land II
Both Pokemon games
I mean you can do it, I could keep going even. And it's not like there haven't been questionable choices on the devices we have now. It's also not as if many of those games aren't available on modern nintendo consoles or even the PC. There's a cute and nostalgia factor in the retro devices that's as important as the games themselves.
I don’t have the same nostalgic love for Gameboy games that others seem to. A lot of people love Link’s Awakening because it was their first Zelda. I can understand but I don’t think it’s all that. Donkey Kong is legit fantastic, but I struggle to think of many others that hold up. Even as a big Metroid fan I know that Metroid 2 aged poorly. The big elephant in the room is Tetris. Could Nintendo even get it? If not, why bother?
As for N64, I agree that the controller is probably a big reason it won’t happen. Not that Nintendo is above selling overpriced controllers. As with Gameboy the games are the bigger concern. Without Rare, why bother?
Wario Land 2 isn't an original Game Boy game. Maybe you meant Mario Land 2? And Wario Land is technically Mario Land 3.
I am curious how Pokemon would be handled. Would they create a way to trade between the two games on your own system so you could get to 150? If not, having both is not actually very good, it's a duplicate game that they're counting twice. Of course, if you just picked one, that would get very thorny, very quickly.
Also, your list isn't 15 either and includes some real bad stuff (Turtles and Contra for GB are not good. Castlevania is... yeah also not good.) My list included Dr. Mario, Donkey Kong '94, and all three Mario Land games.
Game Boy Classic would either be inauthentic or terrible. What I mean is, would people expect it to come with no backlight? A monochrome screen with no resolution? A requirement for AA batteries? No wireless because you have to use a link cable for all of the multiplayer games they felt like including? Because all of those were shitty things that we should be glad to not see again. And if you do include all those things... that's just a 3DS with gimped capabilities.
I even tried to think of 15 good original Game Boy games and had to stop at 10. Three of those were in the same series (Mario Land), which the Classic series hasn't been good about including sequential games.
Ah yeah for the younger generation a GameBoy Classic wouldn't be that enticing. Heck my friend bought a SNES Classic and his kids hate it compared to their Switch.
I'd have to think about a list of games that could be on it. The biggest problem I find is that most are done better on the NES or other color consoles. Unfortunately for me I never had any of the Nintendo consoles so the GameBoy was my only system to play Nintendo titles. Metroid, Wario Land, Zelda, Super Mario, etc. were THE games for me. I have a list, but yeah a lot seem to be portable versions of console games. Still doesn't matter since I'd love a GameBoy Classic warts and all. Although all I have to do is turn on my original and play it.
I personally would like a Gameboy classic, but I sincerely doubt we'll get that.
3DS has (almost) every good Game Boy game you could possibly want to play available at good prices. It's different from the NES and SNES where maybe the controller was a part of the good feelings. The original Game Boy was awful. Bad battery life, terrible screen, no buttons, etc.
Wait, I swore that my original GameBoy would last forever on batteries. A whole hell longer than any of my newer handhelds. The worst was the Game Gear though. Man that thing sucked batteries like a kid with a soda can.
Yeah, original Game Boy had solid battery life by any standards; at least 20 hours out of four AA Duracells. It was helped by its only comparison being the Atari Lynx, then later the Game Gear, and for the hardcore, the PC Engine GT (TurboExpress), all of which would demolish a set of six AA Duracells in 3-4 hours. (Funny how that battery life became so much more acceptable much later on as handhelds got more powerful, but also, crucially, rechargeable as standard. But I digress.)
As well, two buttons put it on a par with the NES, which was fair since it predated the SNES by two years. So those are some really weird attempts at criticism. The screen wasn't great, of course, but a) contributed massively to the battery life, and b) was generally being compared to the Game & Watch at best. A dot matrix LCD in a small, affordable, portable console that could play multiple games was still somewhat impressive in 1989. So long as it wasn't actively scrolling (which its latency would turn into a smeary blur), it was good enough for the time. (Game Boy Pocket many years later was a huge improvement screen-wise, even if it stayed monochrome.)
I agree, getting into more subjective territory, that the game line-up for the Game Boy was basically crap. Tetris was a masterpiece, of course, and the original black & white Game Boy version remains one of the best versions, remarkably - and it was definitely the best version at the time. The Metroid fan I've become in more recent years would have to mention Metroid II. Zelda hit in '93 (before getting its colour "remaster" of a sort in '98). And Mario Land has its fans, I guess. But beyond that I'd have to look many years hence, really to the Game Boy Color era a full nine years later, before I find anything I'd have even been interested in back then, let alone now. (I should note here that Pokemon never grabbed me, although the Game Boy was already seven years old by the time they came out.)
Back in the day when they were the new hotness, I was lucky enough to have a Game Boy and a Lynx. And I will absolutely defend the Lynx for having more good games than the Game Boy, and for giving me a lot more entertainment overall. The Game Boy may have had the likes of Tetris, and the big Nintendo franchises - even if there were far fewer of them then, I will admit you can't discount Mario, Zelda, Metroid, and later Pokemon, but for various reasons most of those passed me by back then - but at the time, it didn't take long before every new Game Boy game I tried was disappointing, but the Lynx kept me well entertained for a long time.
Just, you know, had to keep the AC adapter handy...
Now a GBA Classic, that might be worthy of note. Plenty of good stuff on the GBA, and Nintendo have been incredibly weird about not re-releasing most of it unless you happened to be a very, very early adopter of the 3DS.
I’m an old fart and the GB isn’t enticing to me. Most of those games were simple and shallow out of necessity. I was good with that when I was a kid but it’s not enough now. You can see everything there is to see in Mario Land in like 30 minutes. I suppose that’s not what it’s about. I have a row of Arcade 1Up machines and their gameplay doesn’t amount to a whole lot. I don’t own them because I plan to sink a ton of time in to them. So I guess there’s a good argument to be made for Gameboy Classic.
I still have my model 2 Lynx tucked away in the closet. I sold my original Gameboy for it. I ended up getting a Gameboy again for Donkey Kong but I upgraded to a Gameboy Lite. I liked the idea of portables back then but ended up having a hot and cold relationship with them. Now I realize that even then I was gravitating towards consoles. That’s where my nostalgia is.
Wario Land 2 isn't an original Game Boy game. Maybe you meant Mario Land 2? And Wario Land is technically Mario Land 3.
I am curious how Pokemon would be handled. Would they create a way to trade between the two games on your own system so you could get to 150? If not, having both is not actually very good, it's a duplicate game that they're counting twice. Of course, if you just picked one, that would get very thorny, very quickly.
Also, your list isn't 15 either and includes some real bad stuff (Turtles and Contra for GB are not good. Castlevania is... yeah also not good.) My list included Dr. Mario, Donkey Kong '94, and all three Mario Land games.
I said I could keep going on games but I couldn't be bothered to, and the second castlevania is legit good. It's not like there aren't some stinkers, or questionable choices, on the other mini consoles.
more to the point every game I really care about on the mini consoles, I own on multiple other platforms as well already. tg-16 being the exception here. (I'm also not going to include the fact that I pretty much own all those on the originals as well).
most everyone I know who owns the mini's falls into two major groups
1.) they got it for nostalgia and because it was cheap, played it for a bit and then never touched it again. it's cool and it sits on the shelf and maybe comes out when people are over drinking a few times a year for a brief bit at best. but they aren't really gamers to start with.
2.) they got it for nostalgia and because it was cheap. played it for a bit, and then went back to playing all those games on other platforms because they already owned multiple copies. it's a cool little trophy and add on to their collection, but that's not where they are going to be playing those games. these people are actually gamers.
these things are first and foremost nostalgia engines, display items, and collectors things. from that matter there's more than enough in the GB library and it's more than old enough to justify. I'd buy it. I'd buy a mini gamegear as well.
Posts
The UI is lovely. I only added some more SNES games to mine, though, nothing else, and not enough to warrant extra storage.
Pretty much what I've been doing the last few years (although I skipped the NES and have yet to talk myself into a C64). And the ZX Spectrum Next doesn't really count, as a limited production, fairly expensive, and FPGA-based device. Speccy emulation (and other FPGA, I think) devices exist but vary wildly in quality.
Steam | XBL
Yes and yes.
Oh and it’s kinda lame this doesn’t come with an AC adapter. I had no idea. What is this, a Nintendo portable?
I'm ok with the no AC adapter part since I hooked all my other minis up to a USB switch for power like I did with my HDMI switch. All these damn minis!
Selling Board Games for Medical Bills
The other problem is the controllers. I wouldn't think they'd be cheap to replicate, and with games like Mario kart, you need 4 inputs.
Good news is you can play most these games on the classics out now.
Wait, what classic has N64 games?
Any one that you hack.
(although N64 games are very hit or miss)
Like I said, it's hit or miss. Mario 64 seems to work fine, along with some other games. There are plenty that run terribly. They even made a memory booster mod which requires using expanded storage and creates a page file on the drive so that some games don't crash. I had N64 games running for a time, but I got rid of them because none of the games I actually want to play work well.
Assuming there's no N64 mini to come, what else could realistically even come out? As much as I'd be first in line for a Saturn mini, yelling "shut up and take my money" like Fry, it'll never happen; and Master System, Dreamcast, Xbox etc are even less likely. The only other real angle would be new versions of existing ones with different game selections, which is kind of pointless given the hacking scene around these things.
I think it's safe to assume this is the swansong for the minis. But, as Eldon Tyrell said in Blade Runner, they burned so very brightly.
Steam | XBL
Nintendo very directly said they're done with minis, so yeah, this is probably it.
That and the Switch being a money-making machine, which is lessening the need for plan Bs.
If it is from Amazon they will deliver it since they still have the contact with USPS.
Steam: betsuni7
3DS has (almost) every good Game Boy game you could possibly want to play available at good prices. It's different from the NES and SNES where maybe the controller was a part of the good feelings. The original Game Boy was awful. Bad battery life, terrible screen, no buttons, etc.
I think it would sell well enough, as some people don't want to have to go purchase the game for their systems & such.
Just a smaller, more comfortable Gameboy with fifteen games? Yeah, sure.
Wait, I swore that my original GameBoy would last forever on batteries. A whole hell longer than any of my newer handhelds. The worst was the Game Gear though. Man that thing sucked batteries like a kid with a soda can.
So my copies came in this weekend and man the TG-16 is so awesome!!!! The Genesis is flawless as well. I loved the little cartridge flaps, volume slider and expansion port. Those little details make it really awesome.
So here are my photos to share.
Also a comparison of the two TG-16 together.
I love how the mini has the expansion cover (which is a pain to open and plug in the power) and the lock slider when you power on the unit.
Steam: betsuni7
I even tried to think of 15 good original Game Boy games and had to stop at 10. Three of those were in the same series (Mario Land), which the Classic series hasn't been good about including sequential games.
Tetris
Zelda Links Awakening
Metroid II
Contra
Kirby
Kid Icarus
Turtles: Fall of the Foot Clan
That soccer game that was done by the river city ransom people
Castlevania II
Kirby II
Wario Land
Wario Land II
Both Pokemon games
I mean you can do it, I could keep going even. And it's not like there haven't been questionable choices on the devices we have now. It's also not as if many of those games aren't available on modern nintendo consoles or even the PC. There's a cute and nostalgia factor in the retro devices that's as important as the games themselves.
As for N64, I agree that the controller is probably a big reason it won’t happen. Not that Nintendo is above selling overpriced controllers. As with Gameboy the games are the bigger concern. Without Rare, why bother?
I am curious how Pokemon would be handled. Would they create a way to trade between the two games on your own system so you could get to 150? If not, having both is not actually very good, it's a duplicate game that they're counting twice. Of course, if you just picked one, that would get very thorny, very quickly.
Also, your list isn't 15 either and includes some real bad stuff (Turtles and Contra for GB are not good. Castlevania is... yeah also not good.) My list included Dr. Mario, Donkey Kong '94, and all three Mario Land games.
The GBA would have the problem of the SNES. Too many games I would hate to cut.
Ah yeah for the younger generation a GameBoy Classic wouldn't be that enticing. Heck my friend bought a SNES Classic and his kids hate it compared to their Switch.
I'd have to think about a list of games that could be on it. The biggest problem I find is that most are done better on the NES or other color consoles. Unfortunately for me I never had any of the Nintendo consoles so the GameBoy was my only system to play Nintendo titles. Metroid, Wario Land, Zelda, Super Mario, etc. were THE games for me. I have a list, but yeah a lot seem to be portable versions of console games. Still doesn't matter since I'd love a GameBoy Classic warts and all. Although all I have to do is turn on my original and play it.
Steam: betsuni7
Yeah, original Game Boy had solid battery life by any standards; at least 20 hours out of four AA Duracells. It was helped by its only comparison being the Atari Lynx, then later the Game Gear, and for the hardcore, the PC Engine GT (TurboExpress), all of which would demolish a set of six AA Duracells in 3-4 hours. (Funny how that battery life became so much more acceptable much later on as handhelds got more powerful, but also, crucially, rechargeable as standard. But I digress.)
As well, two buttons put it on a par with the NES, which was fair since it predated the SNES by two years. So those are some really weird attempts at criticism. The screen wasn't great, of course, but a) contributed massively to the battery life, and b) was generally being compared to the Game & Watch at best. A dot matrix LCD in a small, affordable, portable console that could play multiple games was still somewhat impressive in 1989. So long as it wasn't actively scrolling (which its latency would turn into a smeary blur), it was good enough for the time. (Game Boy Pocket many years later was a huge improvement screen-wise, even if it stayed monochrome.)
I agree, getting into more subjective territory, that the game line-up for the Game Boy was basically crap. Tetris was a masterpiece, of course, and the original black & white Game Boy version remains one of the best versions, remarkably - and it was definitely the best version at the time. The Metroid fan I've become in more recent years would have to mention Metroid II. Zelda hit in '93 (before getting its colour "remaster" of a sort in '98). And Mario Land has its fans, I guess. But beyond that I'd have to look many years hence, really to the Game Boy Color era a full nine years later, before I find anything I'd have even been interested in back then, let alone now. (I should note here that Pokemon never grabbed me, although the Game Boy was already seven years old by the time they came out.)
Back in the day when they were the new hotness, I was lucky enough to have a Game Boy and a Lynx. And I will absolutely defend the Lynx for having more good games than the Game Boy, and for giving me a lot more entertainment overall. The Game Boy may have had the likes of Tetris, and the big Nintendo franchises - even if there were far fewer of them then, I will admit you can't discount Mario, Zelda, Metroid, and later Pokemon, but for various reasons most of those passed me by back then - but at the time, it didn't take long before every new Game Boy game I tried was disappointing, but the Lynx kept me well entertained for a long time.
Just, you know, had to keep the AC adapter handy...
Now a GBA Classic, that might be worthy of note. Plenty of good stuff on the GBA, and Nintendo have been incredibly weird about not re-releasing most of it unless you happened to be a very, very early adopter of the 3DS.
Steam | XBL
I said I could keep going on games but I couldn't be bothered to, and the second castlevania is legit good. It's not like there aren't some stinkers, or questionable choices, on the other mini consoles.
more to the point every game I really care about on the mini consoles, I own on multiple other platforms as well already. tg-16 being the exception here. (I'm also not going to include the fact that I pretty much own all those on the originals as well).
most everyone I know who owns the mini's falls into two major groups
1.) they got it for nostalgia and because it was cheap, played it for a bit and then never touched it again. it's cool and it sits on the shelf and maybe comes out when people are over drinking a few times a year for a brief bit at best. but they aren't really gamers to start with.
2.) they got it for nostalgia and because it was cheap. played it for a bit, and then went back to playing all those games on other platforms because they already owned multiple copies. it's a cool little trophy and add on to their collection, but that's not where they are going to be playing those games. these people are actually gamers.
these things are first and foremost nostalgia engines, display items, and collectors things. from that matter there's more than enough in the GB library and it's more than old enough to justify. I'd buy it. I'd buy a mini gamegear as well.