The "General Games Chat" forum, which includes Retro Game Reviews, has been archived and is now read-only. You cannot post here or create a new thread or review on this forum.
Okay, here's a re-post of my Gameboy Advance review from the GBA forum...
It's true. I've finally played what will be the best console available in the UK this year (no, not the PS2) The Gameboy Advance. I was lucky to visit a friend who had his import GBA delivered today, along with Mario and Castlevania, and I was amazed that he let me even touch it!
So why is everyone getting so excited about a handheld console that doesn't seem to be much of a step up from the Gameboy Color? Well, I'll tell you.
Because it's fantastic.
The dimensions, as you now know, are not much bigger than the older Gameboy Color and this means that it will fit in to those nice black nintendo zip cases, great news for people who don't want to have to buy another case! The cartridges look like a gameboy cart that has been cut in half lengthways, so old gameboy games will poke out of the top of the console quite a way! The console itself has two fire buttons on the face, plus two shoulder buttons and the usual start, select and direction pad. The colour of my mate's GBA was the nice clear blue that appears in all the pictures.
The screen is lovely and clear, all the graphics are so much easier to see than the previous gameboys (just as well, as it doesn't have a contrast button) and this is even more evident when playing your old gameboy games on it. The sound is much improved as well, sounding even better than the SNES! Mario Brothers contains lots of speech and some lovely music and Castlevania's background music is just superb.
The console is so easy to grip as well, the A and B fire buttons on the right feel so natural, although the direction button could have been designed to be more analogue it does the job well enough.
Playing older games on the Gameboy Advance is a dream. The console immediately puts them in a higher resolution, while keeping them the same width as a normal Gameboy screen. Don't like that? Well, with a flick of the top left shoulder button you can make the game 'widescreen' and fill the GBA screen with the picture. This obviously distorts the picture slightly, but sometimes makes it easier to play a game.
So you can probably guess my overall opinion, it's a great piece of kit and when I eventually get my hands on my own one, it won't leave my side! I would really urge everyone to put in an order for one of these babies, it's the future of portable gaming and Nintendo have excelled themselves again. No wonder no-one else can beat them in the handheld market.
It's true. I've finally played what will be the best console available in the UK this year (no, not the PS2) The Gameboy Advance. I was lucky to visit a friend who had his import GBA delivered today, along with Mario and Castlevania, and I was amazed that he let me even touch it!
So why is everyone getting so excited about a handheld console that doesn't seem to be much of a step up from the Gameboy Color? Well, I'll tell you.
Because it's fantastic.
The dimensions, as you now know, are not much bigger than the older Gameboy Color and this means that it will fit in to those nice black nintendo zip cases, great news for people who don't want to have to buy another case! The cartridges look like a gameboy cart that has been cut in half lengthways, so old gameboy games will poke out of the top of the console quite a way! The console itself has two fire buttons on the face, plus two shoulder buttons and the usual start, select and direction pad. The colour of my mate's GBA was the nice clear blue that appears in all the pictures.
The screen is lovely and clear, all the graphics are so much easier to see than the previous gameboys (just as well, as it doesn't have a contrast button) and this is even more evident when playing your old gameboy games on it. The sound is much improved as well, sounding even better than the SNES! Mario Brothers contains lots of speech and some lovely music and Castlevania's background music is just superb.
The console is so easy to grip as well, the A and B fire buttons on the right feel so natural, although the direction button could have been designed to be more analogue it does the job well enough.
Playing older games on the Gameboy Advance is a dream. The console immediately puts them in a higher resolution, while keeping them the same width as a normal Gameboy screen. Don't like that? Well, with a flick of the top left shoulder button you can make the game 'widescreen' and fill the GBA screen with the picture. This obviously distorts the picture slightly, but sometimes makes it easier to play a game.
So you can probably guess my overall opinion, it's a great piece of kit and when I eventually get my hands on my own one, it won't leave my side! I would really urge everyone to put in an order for one of these babies, it's the future of portable gaming and Nintendo have excelled themselves again. No wonder no-one else can beat them in the handheld market.
Page:
Personally I think that it was a great move to revamp the Game Boy, and it made some nice sentiment to a machine that has defied all odds and perhaps been the longest lasting popular home videogames console of all time, even though technology has gone forward leaps and bounds in the last 10 years. I think that the Gameboy Advance is kind of a tenth anniversiary edition of the Gameboy.
The one thing taht is good about the machine is that it is just like the Sega Gamegear in shape, which I thought was a great handheld console and ergonomically was a great design. The only problem with it was that it was too bulky, which was definately due to the less advanced hardware than we have now. Nintendo used a tried and tested design strategy- take the old, rework it and reissue it, as improved older designs are always better than coming up with completely new designs that may not work.
The multiplayer features of the GBA are simply unique and very clever- using a kind of PC hub system similar to those used in LANs in order to connect up to four GBAs together was ingenious and what I believe to be the best feature that will make the machine sell is that you only need one cartridge to share between them. Simply brilliant idea, but we will have to see whether third party software developers will grow to the idea of limited sales of their software, espically of multiplayer games, because of this reason. There is a double edged sword here though- it can also make for some great multiplayer fun, espically if the rumours are true about Doom being developed for the GBA. Also, a problem that could arise here would be to do with connection issues, which would probably be in the same guise as LANs, but who cares if you can link 4 GBAs together for cloud nine multiplayer fun!
It is amazing that Nintendo have effectively managed to get equal to Playstation power hardware into a unit just a few centimetres bigger than the original Gameboy, which completely puts to shame the effort Sony are trying to make the the PSOne, their screen for it and the in car adapter. An interesting idea though, especially with the huge catalogue of games for it, but wont Playstation discs jump when you go over road humps? Thats what make the GBA so good. At least now Nintendo have grown to the fact of backwards compatibility, taht fact that all GB and GB Color games can be played on it, as well as some really good games(Mario Advance, F Zero and Mario Kart all spring to mind) specifically for the GBA.
All in all, the GBA cant lose- it has a 10 year back catalogue of games(even Sony cant boast that), 4 player multiplayer capabilities that you can play in a people carrier with ease, unlike having to cart 4 PSOnes in with 4 games and a multitap, and the same battery life as the original Gameboy and to me you have a winning formula. Happy 10th birthday Gameboy and with the GBA, lets hope you have many more.
The one thing taht is good about the machine is that it is just like the Sega Gamegear in shape, which I thought was a great handheld console and ergonomically was a great design. The only problem with it was that it was too bulky, which was definately due to the less advanced hardware than we have now. Nintendo used a tried and tested design strategy- take the old, rework it and reissue it, as improved older designs are always better than coming up with completely new designs that may not work.
The multiplayer features of the GBA are simply unique and very clever- using a kind of PC hub system similar to those used in LANs in order to connect up to four GBAs together was ingenious and what I believe to be the best feature that will make the machine sell is that you only need one cartridge to share between them. Simply brilliant idea, but we will have to see whether third party software developers will grow to the idea of limited sales of their software, espically of multiplayer games, because of this reason. There is a double edged sword here though- it can also make for some great multiplayer fun, espically if the rumours are true about Doom being developed for the GBA. Also, a problem that could arise here would be to do with connection issues, which would probably be in the same guise as LANs, but who cares if you can link 4 GBAs together for cloud nine multiplayer fun!
It is amazing that Nintendo have effectively managed to get equal to Playstation power hardware into a unit just a few centimetres bigger than the original Gameboy, which completely puts to shame the effort Sony are trying to make the the PSOne, their screen for it and the in car adapter. An interesting idea though, especially with the huge catalogue of games for it, but wont Playstation discs jump when you go over road humps? Thats what make the GBA so good. At least now Nintendo have grown to the fact of backwards compatibility, taht fact that all GB and GB Color games can be played on it, as well as some really good games(Mario Advance, F Zero and Mario Kart all spring to mind) specifically for the GBA.
All in all, the GBA cant lose- it has a 10 year back catalogue of games(even Sony cant boast that), 4 player multiplayer capabilities that you can play in a people carrier with ease, unlike having to cart 4 PSOnes in with 4 games and a multitap, and the same battery life as the original Gameboy and to me you have a winning formula. Happy 10th birthday Gameboy and with the GBA, lets hope you have many more.
FZERO GBA
Managing to pull the Gameboy Advance back from the clenched grasp of my friend's hands, I got to play the fabulous Fzero today.
Based on the old SNES hit (which spawned a fairly nice little N64 sequel) this port of Fzero is a perfect racing title for the tiny wonder-console. The concept is simple, race along futuristic tracks against many other speeding vehicles, trying not to incur damage from hitting the walls or other cars. Each lap gives you another power boost that you can use at strategic moments in the game to give you a sudden rush of speed and repair your damage by running along a flashing strip of ground. If your damage becomes too much then you will explode spectacularly and automatically lose. Try to get in the top three so that you stand a chance of making it to the next set of circuits.
When you power up the game, it starts with a lovely little rock soundtrack and a set of options to change the difficulty and type of race. Once you've chosen the right vehicle the track appears and you’ll find yourself revving up ready to zoom off around the neon lit raceways avoiding other cars and trying to navigate all the tight corners at super high speeds.
The game has really been ported over well from the SNES, losing none of the addictive playability and gaining something special from being able to play this game on the move. The in-game soundtrack is unfortunately not up to the SNES original, but is still pretty good and goes well with the racing action.
The good news is that this is due to be a Gameboy Advance launch title, along with Mario Advance, Castlevania (both reviewed earlier) Ready to Rumble Advanced, some Disney games and Tony Hawk’s Skateboarding 2. It will certainly be to Nintendo’s advantage as this is one of the prettiest and most playable handheld games to date.
Managing to pull the Gameboy Advance back from the clenched grasp of my friend's hands, I got to play the fabulous Fzero today.
Based on the old SNES hit (which spawned a fairly nice little N64 sequel) this port of Fzero is a perfect racing title for the tiny wonder-console. The concept is simple, race along futuristic tracks against many other speeding vehicles, trying not to incur damage from hitting the walls or other cars. Each lap gives you another power boost that you can use at strategic moments in the game to give you a sudden rush of speed and repair your damage by running along a flashing strip of ground. If your damage becomes too much then you will explode spectacularly and automatically lose. Try to get in the top three so that you stand a chance of making it to the next set of circuits.
When you power up the game, it starts with a lovely little rock soundtrack and a set of options to change the difficulty and type of race. Once you've chosen the right vehicle the track appears and you’ll find yourself revving up ready to zoom off around the neon lit raceways avoiding other cars and trying to navigate all the tight corners at super high speeds.
The game has really been ported over well from the SNES, losing none of the addictive playability and gaining something special from being able to play this game on the move. The in-game soundtrack is unfortunately not up to the SNES original, but is still pretty good and goes well with the racing action.
The good news is that this is due to be a Gameboy Advance launch title, along with Mario Advance, Castlevania (both reviewed earlier) Ready to Rumble Advanced, some Disney games and Tony Hawk’s Skateboarding 2. It will certainly be to Nintendo’s advantage as this is one of the prettiest and most playable handheld games to date.
How much?!?!?!?! I think i'll wait for them to be released over here.
Sorry for the double post by the way, not quite sure what happened there.
Sorry for the double post by the way, not quite sure what happened there.
£200, he said.
pb, i may be interested in importing one, do you know how much they cost?
The games I've tried out so far are the Mario, Castlevania and Top Gear games (castlevania being the best) and a few gameboy games to see what they would play like on the advanced.
There will be more information when I try to grab the machine back again off my friend and when his next lot of games come through from Japan.
If anyone else wants an import machine I can supply them with the number of his shop, but not on this site, otherwise it would take trade away from SR, and none of us want that!
There will be more information when I try to grab the machine back again off my friend and when his next lot of games come through from Japan.
If anyone else wants an import machine I can supply them with the number of his shop, but not on this site, otherwise it would take trade away from SR, and none of us want that!
Whats all this about the GBA being able to play SNES games? Anyone got any more info on that?
Who Grix,me?
You couldn't be more wrong, actually... perhaps unless you thought it was capable of time travel as well.
What games did you play altogether?
Page: