Do you have a link for the etsy seller please?
EDIT: nvm I located them they are sold out at the moment
Nice post, Dave.
This line brought back memories of an old friend whose father was a huge Sega head — he’d dual wield our light guns when we were getting overwhelmed playing HotD at the arcade. I played all of Sega’s home consoles at their house from Mega Drive onwards. One day, he whipped out a Game Boy, and I gave him a look as if to say ‘why do you have that?’ He just shrugged and replied ‘Tetris.’
Now that I think about it, I don’t remember seeing a Game Gear at their place. It would’ve been cool to try it out, even tethered to a power outlet…
Looks like I’ll have to go on another Game Boy kick later this year - Kirby’s Block Ball definitely wasn’t on my radar before!
Agreed on the sentiment that the Game Boy library is just chock-full of pick-up-and-play gems that play great.
And a lot of them defy our preconceived notions of genres some 30-35 years after the fact - games like Lucle, Aero Star, Banishing Racer and Cave Noire felt incredibly fresh to discover for the first time that I too wish I was around when the system was “current”.
My earliest handheld was a Game Boy Color in the late 90s, and as I’ve mentioned before, with the benefit of hindsight it feels like publishers were taking less risks on GBC:
My guess is part of this is Nintendo, or at least my perception that Nintendo shifted its focus to a younger audience with the Color, going off marketing and its branding.
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Briefly booted up Castlevania: Circle of the Moon on Wii U and was reminded of the early Spaceworld GBA in the manual:
Shame it was never released to the public.
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Interesting.
They got a French designer to work on the original GBA, and he insisted on white as the default colour, maybe this was his first version before it was generalised with grey buttons etc.
You could easily make one today with all the custom parts available though.
A shame they didn’t do a backlit version and went only to the SP too.
I forgot to follow up on this post.
Analogue updated the display filters at the beginning of last year, and they are significantly improved, with blue hues appearing closer to the original, rather than navy and purple, and yellows being less saturated:
Old Analogue Pocket original AGB-001 filter
New Analogue Pocket original AGB-001 filter
Actual AGB-001
…But it’s still not perfect, the darker colours in Castlevania seem to get crushed into black:
Original 40 pin AGB-001:
AGS-001
Game Boy Micro
Analogue Pocket AGB-001 filter
As you can see, some of the blue diamond pattern just isn’t visible
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Can’t you raise the brightness just a bit on the Pocket to get the pattern to appear correctly?
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Alas not, the screen is on max brightness there. Also tried connecting to my monitor via the dock but it looks the same there.
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I’m quite enjoying Hime’s Quest. Fun little Zelda knockoff and has period accurate vibes.
It seems they have removed the link but it was a free ROM download.
I really wish I bought the LRG cart now! I’m regretting this a lot on the Game Boy Color releases.
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A lot of the discussion about Game Boy screens tends to focus on whether games look right or nice, but what about implications for gameplay?
Playing through Kururin Paradise on a Micro, I noticed something during one of the trickier levels:
The spotlight effect is just that — an effect. It’s easy to see the flame in the darkness. This was true even when I lowered the brightness. The only way I could obscure the flame was by viewing the screen from an unnatural angle, like so:
This isn’t quite right either, though. It’s too dark. I think the developers at Eighting wanted this level to be challenging, not cheap.
Anyway, I tried playing on the OG:
In my opinion, this is the effect as intended. You can see the flame outside the spotlight, but not as clearly.
Kururin Paradise was released in 2002, before the GBA SP was available, so it’s likely the game was designed with the original spec in mind.
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Very interesting. I only ever played through Paradise on the Micro, and based on your screenshots that absolutely looks to be the case!
Took my 40-pin 2001-era Game Boy Advance out for some gaming today, don’t think I’ve played on one “on the go” since I got my GBA SP back in 2003!
And honestly, the screen is fine. It requires a more exacting tilt for maximum readability than the SP, but I never once felt like I couldn’t play my game, both when sat by a train window on the way out and sat far from one on the way back.
And the superb motion clarity makes a huge difference over backlit displays.
I still like my Analogue Pocket, but the pendulum has definitely swung back the other way this year, as far as me returning to use original hardware.
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Do you guys recommend replacing a GBA shell when midding it or using the original one? I have heard that aftermarket shells have durability issues.
If something is functioning as designed and meets the requirements of the end user, should it be replaced?
I don’t know. It’s up to the end user and what they view as quality or view as increased quality.
/phaedrus speak …or maybe too much wine 
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What do you think about cutting original shells to use an IPS mod? That’s my main barrier with keeping the stock shell.
There are some good aftermarket shells, and yes these days I’d use the original to restore a stock system.
I haven’t gotten a GBA one from them, but the Game Boy Color shell I got from Funnyplaying is fantastic, as good as originals in quality.
I’ve also gotten some absolutely superb shells for Neo Geo Pocket Colour and Game Boy Light on aliexpress. So good stuff exists.
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I’m glad to hear there are good options! Thanks for the help!
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This was my first ever Kirby game - my old man bought it for me on a business trip. Has a killer OST and the copy abilities are fun as hell.
edit whoops a bit of necroquote but I stand by my opinon lol
Does this GBC and game look real? Both are Japanese. I am worried that the shells have been replaced.
It looks real to me, the wear on the unit likely wouldn’t be there for a reshell.
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