The Nintendo Gameboy

The Gameboy is not only the most successful (some might say the only successful) hand-held game system ever, it is one of the most successful game consoles of any kind. Now over nine years old and still in production, it has surpassed even the NES and the Atari 2600 in longevity.

The Gameboy practically created the hand-held system market when it was released in 1989. The only other successful hand-held systems were the Sega Game Gear and the Atari Lynx. Both were color systems, as opposed to the Gameboy's weak black and white LCD display. But both were also larger and more expensive. The Game Gear, released not too much later, was only a little bigger, but it was just large enough to be inconvenitent, and it cost around twice as much as a Gameboy. The Gameboy's other primary competitor, the Atari Lynx, had graphics quality far superior to that of the other systems, but it was considerably more expensive and much bulkier. (Perhaps it was also cursed by being made by Atari, for by the Lynx's time, Atari's business skills seemed nonexistant.) But at any rate, only the Gameboy achieved prolonged success.

The Nintendo Gameboy: Technical Details

Classic Games on the Gameboy

Gameboy Links