On this day in 1989, Nintendo released the Game Boy in Japan. It was the company’s first handheld device since the Game & Watch series and it was built and designed by those same developers, headed by the chief designer, Gunpei Yokoi.
The Game Boy sported a 160×144 LCD, 2-bit colour, a chunky off-white form factor, and the ability to run for hours on 4 AA batteries. It did what Sega and many others couldn’t and outlasted other handhelds despite having inferior graphical capabilities. Yokoi gave gamers longevity and simplicity and defined a generation with his creation (even if Nintendo did him dirty towards the end)
I didn’t get a Game Boy until 1998 when it was closer to it’s deathbed but I cherished it for years (until my cousin lost it forever—but don’t worry, I got a Game Boy Color for my birthday in 2000). Now, I have FIVE Game Boys, some of which I added a backlight mod to. That’s how much I love this thing and that’s why I decided to write this post. As with my other birthday posts, I’ll list some other retrospectives and birthday celebrations as well as some cool Game Boy videos and articles for you to enjoy.
- Game Boy World Bonus Episode #01: Gunpei Yokoi
- Game Boy – Gaming Historian
- Waiting for the Zapping of Nintendo
- The Game Boy at 35 – and six of the best Game Boy games
- Inside the company making 35-year-old Game Boys look and work like new
- The Game Boy Is 35 Years Old Today
- How the Game Boy Shaped Nintendo’s Future
- Why the Nintendo Game Boy Relied on Those Strange “Green Graphics”
- Gunpei Yokoi Discusses The Struggle To Make The Game Boy In One Of His Last Interviews
- Why Nintendo’s Game Boy is a design classic
