A lazy afternoon project installing CR1616 holders in my gen 1 & 2 Pokémon games.
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I read some knowledge about the conception of the GBA that I only see in french, so maybe it can be interesting to share.
It’s linked to his visual designer Gwénaël Nicolas, french so this explains it.
It’s reported that Nintendo wasn’t satisfied with the first prototypes of the GBA, too conventional, too close to the other products like Neo-Geo Pocket and Lynx. So they hired the service of this arty french designer installed in Japon, who hadn’t any experience in video games and worked for many prestigious brand. He made dozens of prototypes, very original (one had the shape of a flower). Nintendo retained the Panda model, whose shape evokes the head of a panda.
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Sounds cool, do you have a link?
I remember the original GBA being controversial due to having a horizontal configuration, and only ‘failed’ handhelds had used that while the vertical Game Boy was ‘proven’ the superior model.
It’s notable that the SP was a vast change of form factor, rather than just adding a frontlight to the old design.
The story comes from wiki fr, but there aren’t reel sources for some details like the dozens of prototypes with the flower one.
https://www.lafautealamanette.org/post/2008/07/06/705-french-touch-generation
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Great thanks! And interesting white was the original design.
The original GBA is certainly different from most Nintendo hardware to that point.
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