Hey all, Scott here! I think I've reached a critical point in my life recently. I feel like I have to actually get up and do something rather than just piss around talking about the Game Boy Color or whatever. So, this is it. I need to decide: do I get up and contribute to society or do I talk about the Game Boy Color? Yes, finally! I can experience the Game Boy in color! The Game Boy line of systems. Honestly the brand most synonymous with portable on-the-go gaming. Oh man, what am I gonna do on this road trip? Throw a couple Game Boys in the back. You'll be fine. This is the original Game Boy released in 1989, it obviously released that year, there was no way you could miss it. Obviously, it was produced with performance and cost-effectiveness in mind. An ass-green screen with no color, just varying shades of... "This is f*cking disgusting." But it lasted forever on four AA batteries, and was at a decent price point comparative to the other handheld competitors at the time. The Sega Game Gear and Atari Lynx had full-color displays, and they were lit up as well. You could actually... see them. Who can possibly fathom wanting this, in comparison to these? Well, Nintendo had an ace up their sleeve. You see- The Game Boy had Tetris, Mario, Zelda, Tetris, Donkey Kong, Tetris, Golf, Tetris, it had Tetris. Basically, you bought this to play video games, you bought these if you had insecurities. The original Game Boy completely solidified Nintendo's reign on the handheld market, and nobody could really top them! They had a solid price point, battery life and the best game library you could ask for. Did you really want to get caught playing Sonic Triple Trouble?? While the Game Boy was a massive success, it obviously warranted a successor or at the very least, an upgrade. You really think Nintendo looked at this and said, "Yeah, that's good." They did. It took them 7 years to admit: "This may not stand the test of time." 1996! We got a redesign: the Game Boy Pocket. More compact, a much clearer screen, but it still wasn't lit or anything. You still needed to bring a lighter if you wanted to play at night. Well, two years later, in 1998, Nintendo released another revision of the Game Boy! The Game Boy Light. Like they started to give a sh*t a decade in?! The Game Boy Light was fundamentally the Game Boy Pocket, but now with a screen you could actually use in the dark. It was only released in Japan. "Nintendo knows what we like over here!" Two revisions, still no true successor to the handheld. All the Game Boy games coming out were still designed for the brick of '89. By '98, this thing was screaming: "I'm 9 years old! Please let me die." It's truly surprising Nintendo was able to make the Game Boy last that long with no true successor in sight. I mean, sure, they released the Virtual Boy in 1995. They sure did! Okay, that was a concept for a product that never should have left the research and development department. Nintendo delayed the Nintendo 64 and needed to release *something.* Which oddly enough, was the working title for this. This wasn't a successor to the Game Boy! In what realm was this a handheld!? But by 1998, things needed to change. The fact was, the Game Boy experienced a resurgence in popularity due to the release of Pokemon. Game developers were getting antsy. They wanted more power, they didn't want to be restricted to hardware from the 80s. But for a true giant leap in technology, Nintendo needed to wait a few more years. They were, in fact, working on a true successor to the Game Boy, but it wouldn't be until 2001 for it to release. To satiate everybody in the meantime, the Game Boy Color came out! The same year as the Game Boy Light, what was the goal there? This is the Game Boy Color! It's the Nintendo console that won the Attendance Award in High School. It happened, it did well, that's all there is to this one. What was its core innovation? The fact it could display something handheld game systems were just playing for decades? Yeah, big whoop- Holy sh*t, that's f*ckin' purple! The Game Boy Color is an odd duck. So many considered to be a true successor to the original Game Boy. I'm one of those swine. But others considered it to be an upgraded Game Boy and nothing more. Something along the lines of the PS4 Pro to the PS4, the DSi to the DS, the New 3DS to the 3DS. Obviously, these were superior pieces of hardware to their predecessors, but they weren't generational leaps in quality. They were fundamentally better running systems to play the same games on. They may have had a handful of exclusive games, They may have had a handful of exclusive games, but fundamentally, they were still that same old system nobody wanted anymore. I think Nintendo themselves have this mentality with the Color, because usually, whenever they spoke about how many units the Game Boy or Game Boy Color sold in their lifetimes, they would usually group them together. Here's my problem with that. Yes, these console upgrades sometimes have their own exclusive games that can only play on them specifically, but they're usually few and far between. I can count on five body parts how many Nintendo DSi exclusive games were released to stores. The Game Boy Color had hundreds of games that only worked on the Game Boy Color! Definitely more than a lot of other systems that were considered "their own thing". So, I don't care! The Game Boy Color, to me, will always be the first true successor to the original handheld. It's its own system. "If I defend a game system this much, do you think it will notice?" So what's the deal with this thing? Well, the Game Boy Color is fundamentally a souped-up Game Boy. It was released in the latter half of 1998 worldwide, because in the background Nintendo was working on a much more advanced handheld to be released later. This was released to keep the Game Boy relevant and stop it from feeling too outdated and obsolete. The design of this handheld is one of the most iconic relics from the 90s, which is crazy considering it's so damn similar to previous models. Everything's laid out in the same way, it's nearly identical to previous designs, but... I don't know how they did it, they made the Game Boy Color have its own unique look. You can immediately look at this and tell it's a Game Boy Color and not an original Game Boy. The shape is slightly tweaked, proportions are a bit different, it's the same general design, but updated in great ways that not only make it a better system, but add to its own character and charm. it does feel a bit more kiddie now, though. See, the original Game Boy, this looks like a tool. This looks more like a toy, especially with the logo! Well in terms of new features the Color has no feature. No more Contrast dial, oh my god! That was my favorite part of the original Game Boy, it gave all games Hard Mode! This was always there because the screens were never great and you'd have to adjust them based on your lighting conditions. Here on the Color, they were so confident with this screen they removed it entirely. And this is a much better screen, but it's still not lit up. Strange, considering the Game Boy Light released before this and the big fancy new one went back to a non-lit display. Nintendo's fire code must have been strict. Now, obviously it wasn't included to keep cost down but under normal lighting conditions It looks fine. It's just not ideal. We only need two AA's to power this bad boy, or you can plug it into the wall with an AC adapter. I've never seen somebody do this with an old-school Game Boy. There's an IR blaster on the top, basically the same thing used on most TV remotes. It's not used in a ton of games, but when it was used it was mainly just a way to transfer stuff like high scores to other players. Thank god the screen wasn't lit for us to get this! The buttons all have a comfortable slightly rubbery feel to them and I like that. They are all slightly smaller than I may prefer, but at the time this was the definitive Game Boy if you hated seeing things! So to quote any parent who picks this up: *What the f*ck is this?* The Game Boy Color works as a regular old Game Boy. You can play all your old cartridges, but some of them having added color to them! Most of the time the color added is literally just... Well now the game's not completely colorless. There's faint color added here and there but it's not enough to really say: Oh wow, all my gameboy games are in color now! They just use different color palettes in these games. They never programmed wheel of fortune to have color, so the Gameboy Color adds a faint dab of it here and there in very smart ways, so it doesn't look out of place or anything. This is still pretty much black and white! But what once were varying shades of gray on the original model are now varying shades of certain other colors. You can actually change the color palettes on the old Game Boy games with different color combinations on the startup screen. Like I said, a nice little bonus, though it's not full color and it's not like it changes any of these games. But hey, have you ever wondered what color the sky was in Mario Land? God, you need this thing right now! Speaking of Mario Land, a few select original Game Boy games had specific colors programmed for them, so if you play them on the Super Game Boy adapter for the Super Nintendo or later on, the Game Boy Color, they'd be more colorized than other Game Boy games. Though, not like that much more. Well, that's just the original Game Boy games. The Game Boy Color also plays special Game Boy games that take advantage of the new hardware. The Game Boy Color Enhanced games are just standard Gameboy cartridges with a splash of color on them, normally black. These played perfectly fine on both systems, but if you have a sense of self-worth you play them on the Game Boy Color to see everything in Crayola flavors! Basically, these are Game Boy Color games that also run on the original Game Boy. But then we have the games that are apparently too good to be seen on the original Game Boy models. These have distinct Game Boy Color logos on the cartridges, are translucent and have convex tops! Easiest way to put it the original Gameboy cartridges you could use as pill organizers. Game Boy Color, not so much. These games take advantage not only of the color but the upgraded hardware as well. But here's what I find really bizarre- Nintendo went though all the trouble to ensure by looking at the game cartridges, you could tell what played on the original Gameboy and what couldn't. But the original cardboard boxes these games came in, They only said Game Boy Color on the front, even if it played on the original Gameboy, you'd have to turn it around to see if it could play on the original. Now the *exclusive* exclusive games generally had *only for Game Boy Color* on the box, but the fact that I just realized that like right now. I am SHOCKED there wasn't nearly as much confusion when these games came out. I mean a lot of these Game Boy Color games that said Game Boy Color on the box, played on the original Gameboy no problem. Now if you tried to play Game Boy Color ONLY games on the original Game Boy, you'd get unique screens telling you to piss out. I always like that many of these games didn't just display generic error messages, and just seeing a logo or special design as a cool little detail. But whatever, what matters is the games on the Game Boy Color and what released on it! So what released on it? So what released on it? Well here in North America, we got four titles that launched alongside the system and it was just a bunch of old sh*t! Tetris DX, so this is Tetris... again! We have full color and some very basic different modes to play in but it doesn't feel really all too distinct from the original Game Boy Tetris and it lacks the iconic tetris theme. Alright, this is going in the pile. Game & Watch Gallery 2 - So the game & watch gallery games were compilations of the old-school LCD Game & Watch units Nintendo would make. They're all very simple games and Gallery took those titles and remade them with Mario characters, and some new twists while also incorporating the original versions as well. I couldn't have thought of anything better to launch with this brand-new hi-tech Game Boy. F*cking Game & Watch games. Centipede. Yeah, that was a graphical showcase. And Pocket Bomberman, which in all fairness is a cool Bomberman title. It's actually more of side-scrolling platformer compared to the traditional overhead Bomberman games. Yup, can't think of better games to launch a system with. These all worked on the original Gameboy. The Game Boy Color has a weird library and I think the launch titles are indicative of that. I know I said how I consider it to be its own system, but so many of the titles that are labeled as Game Boy Color games are just Game Boy games that display in color when you pop them in the system But there are still tons of games that were exclusive to the Game Boy Color that took advantage of the better hardware. But it just so happened around the time the color released, Nintendo got really weird with what they considered publishing worthy. I would scream if they ever decided to publish a game called Little Mermaid 2 - Pinball Frenzy™. Nintendo's output was incredibly strange on this thing. If I had to guess why, I'd say it's because they didn't want to *fully* fully commit to dropping the original Gameboy in favor of the Game Boy Color. So they kept at it with these cross-compatible releases for a while, and by the time they really started to put out Color exclusive titles, the Game Boy Advance was right around the corner. This thing was the new kid in town for only three years, so Nintendo really didn't pour a ton of support into it. Because of this, we got a lot of re-releases, re-imaginings, and games that were companion titles to N64 games. Let this sink in- one of the defining Game Boy Color games, was a re-release of an original Gameboy game, The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening DX It was Link's Awakening... in color. Yep. I get a little miffed when they decide to re-release games on platforms... that could already play those games. You could already play Link's Awakening on the Game Boy Color, which is the Game Boy cartridge. Oh, why not remake Zelda 1 or 2 for the handheld? To be fair, they did add a few things, like a brand new optional dungeon to explore that focused on color based puzzles. And with DX getting the full color treatment it really made this the definitive version at the time. This is a fantastic game. It was just an old one. Of course, this re-release worked on the original Gameboy as well, good for it, but what about something that could have only run on the Game Boy Color? Well, lucky for us, Nintendo put out the original Donkey Kong Country on the system, Holy sh*t this is raw! I mean at the time this was a pretty faithful interpretation of the original SNES game. It was always amazing, seeing what once was a home console game run on a handheld, and Donkey Kong Country on Game Boy Color, it's obviously downgraded and not the ideal way to play, but they did it all right. I mean the original Gameboy had that Donkey Kong Land games and the Game Boy color version of country was definitely a step up from those. This is a neat little novelty, but not much more than that nowadays. What about Super Mario Brothers Deluxe? This was the original NES game, but with so many new features and bells and whistles, you could go backwards in this one! They had an overworld map, a save feature, more modes like You versus Boo, where your race of Boo to the end of the level, the original Super Mario Brothers 2 can be unlocked. We have a calendar?! This is an incredible version of Super Mario Brothers! The one issue... is that the screen is so zoomed in, it can be a nightmare to play. Yeah, because the aspect ratio of the Game Boy Color was so skinny and the screen itself was so tiny, everything is crunched on to the screen and because of that, it does require a bit of getting used to. Back in the day this was the best option to play Mario 1 on the go, but now when I play this... I just think my god, it doesn't have to be this way Nintendo always does this thing where they make the definitive version of one of their games, but it would have like one massive downside. It happens every time. Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D. It includes brand new content, a new difficulty mode, it gets rid of the motion controls from the Wii version, it doesn't look as nice, it runs at half the framerate, come ON! Mario Tennis and Mario Golf released on the Nintendo 64, so in tandem with that they made some Game Boy color versions. These are completely different. Well, the console versions were basically sports party games, these are full-blown RPGs, you play as children! And your goal is to try to beat Mario at sports, IGN gave golf a 10 out of 10! I'm definitely more of a golf guy, but these are both still solid titles. I'd say give them a shot purely based on the fact that they are exactly what you don't expect a Mario Sports game to be. Like who are these people! But what about the wacky or more- experimental side of Nintendo? Well, there was Kirby Tilt 'n' Tumble, a motion control game with a tumor/accelerometer You tilted the Game Boy around to move Kirby. It was incredibly novel and still works best on the original Game Boy Color. It wasn't designed for this hardware's specific build, but you can play it on the Game Boy player on the Gamecube if you're a masochist. Wario Land 2 and 3 were on here with 2 being released for the Game Boy and then being released for the Game Boy Color later. The Game Boy Color release still worked on the original Game Boy. Why is this so confusing to me? Wario Land 3 was a full-on Game Boy Color exclusive though. I don't know much about the meat of Wario Land. I'm more of a bread guy. Basically, I've played one and four. But Nintendo's crowning achievements on the Game Boy Color are obviously... The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons and Oracle of Ages. They are original Zelda titles. These are very much cut from the same cloth as in Link's Awakening. They look very similar, but these... were developed by Capcom and they went for the Pokemon approach of selling two games that were kinda sorta the same. The Oracle games are more-so two chapters of one story where you can play them in either order, whatever one you finish you get a code to enter in the other game and you see how they connect. It's a brilliant idea that was only done this one time for Zelda. But of course if we're talking games that had a dual release ever kind of sort of the same, but not really... Yeah, sure, Pokemon Pokemon Yellow was sort of, kind of, a Game Boy Color game. It had some color enhancements thrown in there, but the core of the game was still a classic Game Boy title. Pokemon Gold and Silver were made from the ground up for the Game Boy Color. They worked on the original Gameboy, are you f*cking kidding me? Well the enhanced version of Gold and Silver Crystal released as a Game Boy Color exclusive, look at that cartridge shape! It can't be anything but a gameboy color exclusive- where the f*ck was the only for gameboy color logo on the box! How was nobody confused? The Game Boy Color was definitely where more and more Pokemon spin-offs are starting to show their head. The Trading Card Game, Pinball, Puzzle Challenge, they were definitely up to do weirder stuff back then. Speaking of which, Yeah, Nintendo didn't do a ton of huge first party stuff on this machine, but they published damn near anything they could. Quest for Camelot? Go for it. Bugs Bunny's Crazy Castle 3? Why not. Beauty and the Beast a Board Game Adventure? F*ck it. Hamtaro Ham Hams Unite? I've heard worse! Little Mermaid 2 - Pinball Frenzy- *screaming* What maybe even weirder is Nintendo's internal American development studio, Nintendo Software Technology, developed the games Bionic Commando Elite Forces and Crystalis, with Nintendo as a whole publishing them. These were Capcom and SNK properties that Nintendo just decided to develop and publish on the Game Boy Color. Like I said, their output was weird on this thing. And not only that, but we got games that nobody ever expected on this handheld. Metal Gear Solid, Resident Evil Gaiden, Tomb Raider, Driver, GTA 2, and many of these actually played fairly well. There were tons of cool games developers tried to bring over to the Game Boy Color and shockingly many of them worked out fairly well. Not only that but series like Dragon Quest and Mega Man came over gracefully and new ones like Toki Tori and Shantae started out here. It's still a weird f*cking handheld. I... may have been wrong about this thing. This system isn't nearly as in-depth as I thought it was. A lot of the games that were labeled as "Game Boy Color titles" were just "Game Boy games with colors programmed into them". Even Nintendo support on this thing was really weird and lackluster. We got a... few original Zeldas, some Ports and Remakes, Mario Sports titles and enhanced Pokemon... ...That's basically it. But still! Original Zeldas and a Pokemon! Those are HUGE games for Nintendo to just put them on a "simple upgraded Game Boy" if it was *only* a "simple upgraded Game Boy'. WHAT THE F*CK WAS THIS THING?! An excuse for me to waste 17 minutes.
Is it just me or did Scott forget to put the end cards at the end of the video?
In which Scott Wozniak comes dangerously close to accepting that the Game Boy Color is not a fully-fledged successor to the original Game Boy
Hooooly shit... I vividly remember 2 of my siblings and 3 of my cousins all had Gameboy Colors, but I'm just now realizing that out of all the games we had, only 4 were actual Gameboy Color games. I always thought the palette swap games were GBC games, but I guess not.
I'm glad he mentioned the Donkey Kong Country port, I loved playing that version when I was little.