What were technical limitations has become a beloved and longed for aesthetic by players
When the first battle for the portable console market was fought, the marketing with which Sega tried to crush its great rival Nintendo again and again invariably revolved around the colors on the screen. The first ad for Game Gear in the United States showed some sad young people settling for "colorless" video games – in addition to dating a Game Boy in hand, no metaphors – until Game Gear arrived in messiah mode to save them. Also other companies such as Atari with their Lynk tried to play that trick, with little result, the advantage of portability and autonomy, plus the Tetris pylon hammer included by default – a stroke of commercial genius – made competition impossible.
But the monochrome display was still a major limitation, the first thing Nintendo tried to tackle with Game Boy Color. And yet, due to the mysterious mechanisms of fashion, taste or simple nostalgia, that aesthetic has become something desirable today, perhaps because of the uniqueness that results. Today, as we celebrate the 31st anniversary of the machine, we want to review some of the initiatives that exist in this regard.
31 years of Game Boy
For example, a look at Steam and other digital stores can lead us to some modern games created with the limitations of the system. One of the most notable is Squidlit, a nice action platform for PC and Switch created around the characteristics of the machine. Very short, but endearing and with good ratings (very positive on Steam, where you can buy an affordable price of € 1.59).
Squidlit, a modern game for PC and Switch
It is not the only modern alternative, in fact each year the so-called Game Boy Jam is held, a rapid development contest in which the participants send their projects to vote. They have to, of course, respecting the limitations of the machine: multiple screen proportions at the resolution of the original Game Boy, four color palette, four audio channels, an exact control system … things have been done Really great, like the winner of last year's edition, Mystical Samurai, a fun action platform, very careful and with a delicious soundtrack.
More than three decades later, the laptop continues to be strongly present in our imagination, games are produced in the image and likeness of those of the machine, its catalog and the emblematic characters that were part of it are remembered. Even the arrival of new unofficial machines that recover its legacy is celebrated, as is the case of the promising Analogue Pocket, a modern and updated version by the team that has created excellent modern reproductions of other classic consoles such as NES, Neo Geo or SNES. In short, we will have Game Boy for a long time.
