Happy 20th Anniversary Gameboy!
20 years ago, in Japan, Nintendo released what it would be the world’s most famous portable console ever: the Gameboy.
Today any cell phone can do 1000000 times more a GB could do at the time, but I’m yet to find a cell phone that amuses me as much as the Gameboy did.
The original Gameboy was my first console and even today it’s my favorite portable system. Playing with the first Gameboy, 20th years ago (well, not 20 because it was only launched on Europe in the 1990) was an exciting experience. It was like playing in a portable NES, since Nintendo ported almost all the major successes of the NES to the GB. It had a screen the size of a sticker, gray and green, but playing Super Mario Land was huge. The sound was lousy compared with today’s standards, the screen was sometimes blury, but it had multiplayer games, a camera add on and a printer that printed the photos on stickers. It sold like hot cakes and the evolution of the system was what made Nintendo what it is today, and it saved the company when the home systems like the SNES and the Gamecube were selling poorly.
The Gameboy was replaced by the Nintendo DS, taking down the name that made the thrills of many gamers but even today it’s still remebered and recognized by the world. I hope one day Nintendo will release another Gameboy console, a new system that takes the DS to a next evolutionary step, a console that will be as innovative as the Gameboy was 20 years ago.
Happy Birthday Gameboy!