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Next-gen Game Boy to Hit Stores This Year?
Jason writes "CNN's always enjoyable Game Over column has an interesting story up about Nintendo's plans to launch its next generation Game Boy in 2005, as opposed to the expected 2006 release. The column predicts official word on the new GBA will come during Satoru Iwata's keynote at GDC. As yet, no features are known, but author Chris Morris speculates this could just be an incremental step, rather than a full-fledged generational leap."
Nintendo is flooding the portable gaming market with their Original GBA, the flip GBA, and the DS.. The DS is a strong unit, but lacks games. The GBA has like 5 different flavors. There are only so many people who are willing to upgrade their game libraries for a new Gameboy unit every year or two.
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It was announced very early on that the DS was NOT meant to be a replacement for the GBA - reading between the lines indicates that it was intended almost solely to be a way for Nintendo to maintain their handheld hegemony in the face of the imminent release of the PSP. That being the case, it should be no surprise to anyone that Nintendo has another handheld in the pipeline. Again, they as much as said so when the DS was announced.
I already have a SP and DS. If Nintendo expects me to buy their next system, too, they're going to have to give it some really nice features, and a really promising game lineup.
Or make it shiny.
It's an analyst.
This is based on nothing but an analyst making stuff up. This should be given as much credence as "some guy on the internet thinks there will be a next-gen game boy this year". Only less, because at this point, given the previous track records of video game industry analysts, when they say something I for one consider it automatically less likely. If analysts were to be taken seriously, Nintendo by now would have gone bankrupt, become a third party publisher, began selling internet-playable games, and been selling VoIP software for the Nintendo DS.
But anyhow. Even by itself this is incredibly unlikely. Nintendo tends to have a really really strong bond between its handhelds, both functionally-- the Gamecube was practically a peripheral for the GBA-- and from a marketing perspective. The Gamecube and GBA were released at nearly the same time, were they not? I am told developers got the dev kits for both at about the same time. But jumping the GBA2 way ahead of the Revolution, as this analyst predicts, would make it hard to establish "synergy" between the two, or whatever. Nintendo will probably be pushing the Revolution (their new console, which will be unveiled at E3 and probably ship sometime next year) and the GBA2 at the same time.
The prediction then becomes even less likely because Nintendo is still right now smack dab in the middle of a major promotional push for the DS, and will be continuing this push for most of the year. They've still barely begun building that brand, and the games they originally promised would be out by the end of Q1 won't be all out until like the end of the summer. Developers still aren't all the way on board, and I don't think consumers will consider the DS fully "here" until all that originally-promised stuff, plus Mario Kart are out. So putting out a new GBA before this process is done would totally undermine any attempt for the DS to truly take root. "Pillars" or no, Nintendo doesn't have the PR resources to sell the public on two new handhelds at the same time. They'll need to get the DS established before they can start pitching the GBA2.
Finally the specific plan this article is speculating on is way, way less likely than even the idea itself, since they claim the GBA will remain in stores after the GBA2 hits. Selling the GBA and GBA2 simultaneously would make no sense whatsoever. Among other things that would mean totally abandoning the "three pillars" whatsit they keep babbling about; they'd have four pillars.
What would not surprise me is Nintendo announcing the GBA2 at E3 this year. But I think we'll see it at earliest simultaneous with the Revolution, and probably a little afterward.
I think we might see it a little later than the Revolution for two reasons: first off, there's been vague and shadowy rumors about developers being shown the Revolution. Nothing about the GBA2. Second off, the GBA2 has a problem the DS doesn't. It has to justify itself. It's obvious why people with a GBA would buy a DS; it's got all this stuff, it's got the touchscreen and the 3D and it's just generally fucked up. It's obvious why someone buying a new handheld might choose a GBA rather than a DS; it's smaller and cheaper. What isn't obvious why anyone with a GBA or a DS would buy a GBA2. Nintendo is going to have to pull out a serious graphical update, something at least better than the PSP, while retaining both the small size and the position of best battery life, in order for the GBA2 to really make any sense (unless Nintendo's satisfied with just it being the GBA 1.1 and it almost entirely appealing to new purchasers rather than upgraders). I don't know how long it will take the technology to get where it needs to be for that to be possible.
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Backwars compatability. The DS had it and its most likely the next Gameboy will have it. Nintendo has already started the trend of backwards compatable on handhelds and I dont see it going away because this is their biggest market in which they can't afford to fail.
But I do agree flooding the market with hardware is not the answer, this is exactly how Sega DIED. Sega CD, 32X, Saturn, etc.
Kotaku has the analyst's entire report. Check it out for all the nitty-gritty.
There's a better chance that I'll win a million dollar lottery. Please please please...
The DS just came out, and while Nintendo is 'all about' the third pillar, throwing up the next-gen GB this year would really be disasterous. The DS is selling strong, partly because it can play the GBA games, so it's limited DS software offerings aren't as big of a hold back.
Plus, the GBA is still selling strong. Nintendo has no real reason to pop out the sixth itineration of the GB line this soon.
Regardless of what happens, where exactly can they go with the next GameBoy? Better graphics is an obvious answer, but then what happens to backwards compatability?
Will the next GameBoy have three chips to play next-gen, Advance, Color, and regular games? Or will Nintendo just say "No one plays color or below, so no more support for that!" After all, with the re-releasing of a lot of Gameboy games on the Advance system (such as FireRed/LeafGreen), the use of the regular carts has dwindled. Plus, if you can't use the regular carts, that will give Nintendo extra incentive to release anthology carts (similar to Super Mario All Stars for the SNES, or the Zelda bundle for the Gamecube) for the new system.
Aside from graphics, what else can be expected? We already have our 'backlight'. The chances of Nintendo going with a true backlight (ala PSP or GameGear) seem nill to me, as it eats up batteries fairly quickly. What they devised for the SP will stick around for some time.
What about buttons? D-pad is a given, and maybe we'll get a third (or four!) regular buttons. I doubt the shoulder buttons will change at all (well, maybe they'll stick on two extra ones, but don't bet on it.)
I think the big hurdle they'll have to work on for the next GameBoy is 3D games. The GBA can emulate 3D systems to an extent, and as '3D realistic' games become more and more popular, it would be good to have it on the next GameBoy as well. However, to do 3D well, they would definately have to have more buttons, as you have to worry about a z-axis now. If they could come up with one pad that accounts for all three axes, though, that would be very keen (and would likely be copied by many people.)
Nintendo would be suicidal to play it any other way. The new Game Boy should use the DS chipset without the frills (touch screen, microphone, wireless, second display) with the same cartridge form factor. That way, existing DS owners will have "forward" compatibility with the new Game Boy offerings and Nintendo doesn't end up segmenting their market.