The end of the Game Boy
An era ends? At least for now.
It survived the Lynx, Gamegear, Game.com, Nomad, Turbo Express, Neo Geo
Pocket and even the PSP. Between the Original, Pocket, Color, Advance,
Advance SP and Micro, it has sold over 230 million units, spawned
massive franchises like Pokemon, and dominated handheld gaming for 16
years. But in classic Cain and Abel style, Nintendo's long running Game
Boy line may finally have met it's end at the hands of it's younger
brother, the Nintendo DS.
In an interview with news agency Reuters, Nintendo CEO Satoru Iwata
had this to say about Nintendo's former plans to work on a successor to
the GBA line: "I would have a second thought about using our resources
on what would be the next generation of Game Boy Advance, considering
the strong support DS is now enjoying."
Of course, the DS plays GBA games, and Nintendo are continuing to
build the current backlit GBA SP and Micro models - they'd be crazy not
to - the GBA outsold the DS and PSP combined in the US last year,
remaining the #1 handheld that region. However, at least for now,
Nintendo's resources are with the DS name, and they have no current
plans to work on another Game Boy.
"The Japanese game market is now evolving around DS," said Iwata.
"We don't need to do something that will pour cold water on the
situation."
Written by David Low
Source: Palgn Handheld