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The many iterations of Nintendo's GameBoy have always out-shined the competition. Other handhelds just couldn't get a foothold in the market. While some certainly didn't have what it took to take on the GameBoy, others were undeservedly overlooked. In this installment, we'll take a look the handhelds that may have been prematurely euthanized. Hit the link to read on.
Created by NEC, the Turbo Express was a full-out portable TurboGrafx-16. You may remember it making a cameo in Enemy of the State. The blazing fast system went for $250 at launch and could play any American HuCard. Unfortunately, the system was region-locked, meaning there were little to no decent titles to play. If only it could have played PC Engine HuCards, things may have turned out differently. Still though, the thing was far ahead of its time. A 16-bit portable system with an abundant amount of RAM was unheard of at the time. It even had an optional TV tuner add-on. If it wasn't for the death of the home TurboGrafx kicking the bucket and the steep price, the Turbo Express may have had a chance.
The Turbo Express wasn't the only portable version of a 16-bit system. The Sega Nomad was released in 1995 at $199. The pygmy Genesis could even hook right up to a TV - it could be played at home on the big screen or on the road. While the system was portable, it was also rather large; it was a bit bulkier than the Game Gear. This surely kept some buyers at bay. Another flaw of the Nomad was its appetite for batteries. The only reasonable way to go was to buy a rechargeable battery pack, since the thing would eat your AAs at supersonic speeds. Even the battery was pricey, ringing in at $79. The best workaround was to use a GameGear battery pack, which didn't fit on the Nomad nice and cozy, but did work. Size, battery blood-lust, and the exodus of the Genesis all spelt doom for the Nomad.
People tend to have bad taste. The NeoGeo Pocket Color was released in 1999 for only $70. But no one bought it. The NGPC had a quite a few features that other handhelds didn't. First of all, the stick was micro-switched. While not as accurate this stick feels a million times better than the PSP's nub. It was so good that it made the NGPC the only handheld manageable enough to play fighters on. Before booting a game, users could play around with the PDA functions of the handheld. The NGPC featured a world clock, an alarm clock, a calendar, and of course a horoscope application. The setbacks of the handheld include lack of third party support and the looming cloud of the GameBoy Advance. Even so, the system has many good games - certainly enough to warrant a $70 purchase. What a shame.
This bizarrely-name handheld is probably the most ambitious of all, possibly even more-so than the DS. The WonderSwan featured two button layouts - one normal widescreen layout for side scrollers and fighters and a vertical tate mode for shooters and puzzle games. Designed by the legendary Gunpey, the WonderSwan was a showboat for Namco/Bandai games. Bandai was also able to ink some deals with third parties, specifically Square, who ported Final Fantasy I and Final Fantasy II as well as Front Mission and others to the portable. The innovation of the WonderSwan didn't end with funky button and screen configurations. The device was able to be tethered to a cell phone for email and Internet connection. Infrared communication was around far before the GBA attachment, too, but the WonderSwan used this connection to link up with the PocketStation. WonderSwan could even be used to control a robot, called the WonderBorg. Bandai released something even more out-of-the-ordinary. The WonderWitch was a debugging kit which allowed users to reprogram WS carts using C programming. It sounds like something a modchip company would sell, but this was an official product. Oh, and the WonderSwan ran on one AAA battery. If it wasn't for the allure of the GBA, the WonderSwan may have been able to steal a bit of the market from Nintendo thanks to great technology and a massive library.
While we all love the GameBoy, the system ruled with an iron fist. Competition is good; it spurs innovation and without it, people get lazy. While these handhelds never put much more than a dent in the GameBoy's 8-bit ego, they do deserve some love an respect. Stay tuned for the next installment of The Little Systems that Couldn't to see what handhelds don't deserve your respect and admiration.
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Actually, it's more like "people didn't have a chance to buy it". I remember when this thing was released in North America. Two WEEKS after it became available, SNK closed their North American operations and crawled back to die slowly in Japan. When the news broke out, most of their stock was removed from store shelves, only to be re-released some time later on as combo packs.
For the record, I don't own a NGPC, but I do have a copy of Sonic Pocket Adventure. I had a chance to try out that game, and it was surprisingly solid. No wonder too, since it's from the same team than the great Sonic Advance and Sonic Rush series.