Game Boy Advance

Reviewed by:
Ryan Boyce

If you’ve ever endured a long flight or airport lobby wait, then you probably know how valuable a handheld gaming system can be. Twelve years after its inception in 1989, the Game Boy has become one of our nation’s favorite ways to kill time while on the go, second only to the Mile High Club. And it’s just gotten better.

Nintendo’s Game Boy Advance might not look as distinguished as a PalmPilot, but its more powerful engine makes it a hell of a lot more fun. Armed with a 32-bit processor (running eight times faster than the Game Boy Color), stereo sound (with headphones), and a screen capable of displaying 512 colors, the Game Boy Advance is light-years ahead of any handheld device when it comes to gaming. It’s still as light and compact as its predecessor, with only one major change: You hold it horizontally instead of vertically. This shape shift allows for two new PlayStation-style “shoulder” buttons to be added and a 50 percent increase in the size of the playing screen. Also, the Game Boy Advance will be able to plug directly into Nintendo’s new GameCube console, allowing you to transfer data between two games.

Even though this new technology makes your Game Boy seem like a paperweight, don’t use your games as firewood just yet. The Advance is compatible with all Game Boy software and can even “stretch” their video to fit nicely on its bigger screen (although, like ex-girlfriends, it’s hard to play with the old ones after messing with the prettier new ones).

At 99 bucks, the Advance seems too good to be true, but Nintendo is charging up to $45 for each Advance game—more than double the price of Game Boy Color software. Also, the dark screen isn’t back-lit, making it very hard to see unless you can play it under direct light. A few cheap light attachments are available (such as the Light Boy Advance) that will alleviate the problem for less than the cost of dinner, but there’s nothing that can be done about the cramped buttons, short of getting a smaller pair of hands. When you total it all up, you can expect to shell out 200 bones to get your Advance up and running well. Is it worth it? Hell, yes.

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