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The Gameboy Micro Reviewed

Posted by Zonk on from the pocket-sized-hardware dept.

Advtg writes "Ars Technica has a great review of the Gameboy Micro, which is now shipping in North America. The thing is amazingly small, but it looks as though worries about the screen being too small and too dim aren't true. But will it sell? From the review: 'You'd think at this point the portable market would just be saturated with Nintendo products, and the Micro carries a price tag of US$99.99. For just US$30 more you can get a DS, and for US$20 less you can get an SP with the newly brightened screen. It occupies somewhat of an awkward place in terms of price point and features.'"

2 of 266 comments (clear)

  1. You can overanalyze it from a feature/function by joeflies · · Score: 5, Insightful
    perspective, but as the iPod Mini made perfectly clear, people will pay for "small is cool". How many people on this very board says "but for only $100 you get 16G more storage". Yet it was the mini in different colors that sold.

    How many people bought a Nano even though they had a perfectly fine player at home anyways?

    People don't buy on need or feature/function alone.

  2. Re:Innovation! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "Neither the rain nor the wind nor consumer opinion will stop Nintendo(TM) from trying to sell us ANOTHER copy of an already existing product it seems..."

    Funny that you should mention consumer opinion. Consumers (more respectfully known as "customers," BTW) vote with their wallets. And they have voted for Nintendo's handhelds in their various forms time and time again.

    Hoover updates their vacuum cleaner lines every once in a while. Sometimes prices change. Sometimes form factors change. Sometimes features change. Go pick the nits out of their hair. Because, just like vacuum cleaners, just maybe it's only in your silly little dreamland where you think people are expected to own EVERY SINGLE KIND. Besides, some might, and if they do, who are you to care?

    After all, the PSP grew the market to include pseudo-hipsters. The GBM is targeted at that same market. And in the same way that PSP sales HAVE NOT dented the DS market (PSP sales are by all measures separate and/or complementary to DS and GB sales), the GBM is not intended to cannibalize DS and GBA SP sales. It is intended for those who, for whatever reason, have not purchased previous GameBoys. Nintendo has very explicitly pronounced as much in public. How much clearer do you need things to be amde for you?