New six-button/backlit GBA? [Archive]

duffer

13-Oct-2002, 17:05

More buttons sounds unlikely. Unless they're "turbo" buttons of some sort. How would a developer support both the old and new versions? Most devs would just ignore the new buttons.

A better screen sounds possible.

A back light is less likely, since it would cut into battery life.

I don't know about the other ideas. They sound more like wishful thinking based on how PDAs are becomming available in tons of configurations. Nintendo tends to stick with simple mono-purpose designs. And with good reason: Their last attempt at diversification, the Panasonic Q, is the only console in Japan that's being outsold by Xbox.

CaptainHowdy

13-Oct-2002, 17:21

I think the two new face buttons would be the most important part, its hard to port SNES games truely without them..

they say in edge magazine if this is true, the rumor states there is going to be an upgrade option for current GBA owners, dont know how that is going to work, but I am hopeful.

Grall

13-Oct-2002, 17:25

"(Woops, Grall totally changed his post between when I first read it and now.)"

What are you talking about? It's exactly the same now as when I first posted it. Mebbe you should get some reading glasses instead, huh? :)

Anyway, as for backlight cutting into battery life, that kind of would be the reason for the new battery, plus most likely a general revision of the hardware to bring down power consumption. Figures of 10 hours of use WITH backlight have been rumored, which is comparable to the current GBA.

As for buttons going unused, why don't we wait and see before speculating...? I assume Nintendo would encourage/enforce use of those buttons in new titles if they do appear in a new version of the GBA.

*G*

duffer

13-Oct-2002, 17:47

Yeah, sorry Grall -- my mistake. :oops:

Regarding the "let's not speculate", what's the point of posting a rumor if not to encourage speculation? :D

Dave Baumann

13-Oct-2002, 17:57

I flicked through this edition of edge, and saw the images (although didn't stop to read it - I may yet purchase this months issue) and it looked reasonably good. It struck me later that this is kind of a hark back to the 'flip lid' 'Game and Watch' games in one sense.

WRT to the back light, I wonder if it would be possible to have a swithc for it? Turn it off in good light for longer battery life, trun it on in poor light.

I didn't take noteof whether there were extra buttons or not, but one thing does spring to mind is that positioning of the shoulder buttons could be tricky if it were flip lid. However, the MegaDrive (Genesis?) successfully transisitions from 3 buttons to 6 in its lifetime so I don't see why it couldn't be done again.

I wonder if the extra room will also allow them to put two speakers on there for onboard stereo.

Although this does seem a neat little upgrade, I'd rather they forgoe this in favour of a new ARM/MBX 3D capable handheld gaming system....

PC-Engine

13-Oct-2002, 18:33

Rumor aside, There's no reason said features aren't possible or even practicle. Why would having more buttons, hence functionality for newer games not make sense? Existing games will use two buttons for backwards compatability while new games will use the extra buttons and extra cpu power etc. Makes perfect sense actually.

Regarding the backlit LCD. Ever heard of illuminated reflective LCDs? The backlight is only on when it's needed so if it used some kind of rechargable battery pack it should last for many hours with backlight use and 10 hours without.

Regarding the Panasonic Q, that product was never meant to sell huge numbers. It's a niche supplement to the regular GC and costed twice as much. It was for people who wanted DVD included in a single unit. If the only version of GC that was available was the Q then you can bet it would be outselling Xbox in Japan on better looks alone :lol:

Clashman

13-Oct-2002, 20:01

Rumor aside, There's no reason said features aren't possible or even practicle. Why would having more buttons, hence functionality for newer games not make sense? Existing games will use two buttons for backwards compatability while new games will use the extra buttons and extra cpu power etc. Makes perfect sense actually.

I think what is being referred to here is that new games which did this would make the *old* GBA obsolete rather quickly. With the amount of people who've already bought GBA, there could be a rather long list of upset customers who paid all that money for a console which was selling excellently, had a growing library of games, and was then canned within two years. This would be similar to when the gameboy switched to color, only the non-color gameboy had much longer to mature and develop before it was renderred obsolete.

Teasy

13-Oct-2002, 20:37

I don't see how this would make GBA obsolete. There are already GBA games that use button combinations so any new games using the extra buttons could just use button combinations on the original GBA.

CaptainHowdy

13-Oct-2002, 20:50

yea, many took the time to make games for GBC that still worked on original greyscale models, I think supporting both button layouts would be a snap

Clashman

13-Oct-2002, 22:10

However, when you get into fighters or similar games where combos are prevalent, button combinations could be extremely difficult. Hypothetical situation:

a=low punch
b=low kick
x=medium punch
y=medium kick
r=high punch
l=high kick

now on a 4 button GBA, you could emulate a medium kick by pressing b and l. What happens however, when you want to do "whirlwind kick", which is done by pressing medium kick and low kick?

Also, there is talk about a more powerful CPU, and so games that took advantage of that would end up choking on an earlier model, if they were able to run at all.

Teasy

13-Oct-2002, 22:17

Good point, but then you have to think how would the original GBA do a game like this anyway, even without considering the new GBA? As you say you can do low, medium and strong kicks and punches in some figthers. So in the GBA version you'd likely miss out one of those strength levels anyway. So this would just mean that the new GBA would allow low, medium and strong while GBA would only be allowed medium and strong or low and strong. So the old GBA would have the same as it always would have in this type of game just with the addition of an extra strength level when played on the new GBA. The more powerful CPU, if its true, would certainly cause problems though.

Eminem

13-Oct-2002, 22:39

I just bought a GBA friday. I hope this isn't true.

Oh, well. If it is true then I'm sure I can find some defect on my GBA to take it back.

clem64

14-Oct-2002, 04:39

My question here is, aren't Nintendo destroying their GBA userbase? Most people won't be happy to hear this knowing their 1 1/2 year old GBA might no longer be supported in a few months from now when devs switch to this "GBA2". Who's gonna want to pay for another handheld when they've had their GBAs for only a year?

Now they say an upgrade might be available for regular GBA owners. How exactly would that be possible? If we are to believe edge, the GBA2 would have 2 extra buttons, a backlight, faster CPU, more RAM, a new battery.

How could an upgrade be placed on the GBA to make all these things possible?

zurich

14-Oct-2002, 05:14

Havent used this expression since my QW days, but it seems fitting;

GG Nintendo :roll:

zurich

mkillio

14-Oct-2002, 08:01

I think that the GBA should run atleast a 3 year cycle 4 would be better though. Don't forget taht GBC was well supported for over a year after GBA came out. I find it to almost be like GB->GBC. GBA definetly needs 6 buttons though better graphics would be great to but I want SNES games ported exactly the same. HOwever if this "GBA+" came out tomorrow I would buy it, I imported my GBA. I can't remember what year GBA came out, was it 2000?

cybamerc

14-Oct-2002, 11:52

duffer:

> Nintendo tends to stick with simple mono-purpose designs.

I wouldn't say so. NES and SNES were used for non-gaming purposes in Japan.

Nintendo is currently making GB (GBA?) chipset for mobile phones.

> And with good reason: Their last attempt at diversification, the
> Panasonic Q, is the only console in Japan that's being outsold by Xbox.

As you say yourself Q is made by Panasonic - it is hardly Nintendo's attempt at anything. Sales can't be that bad either as Panasonic is working on a new version of Q (which will compliment the existing model rather than replace it).

Brimstone

14-Oct-2002, 15:09

Nintendo just might be preparing itself if another competitor enters the market. They have a very lucrative monopoly on the portable hand-held market and I'm sure they don't want to lose their dominance. Say if Sony released a hand-held Nintendo could easily counter with a updated version of the gameboy that is backwords compatible. It would make it hard for a competitor to break into the market.

Teasy

14-Oct-2002, 17:14

Now they say an upgrade might be available for regular GBA owners. How exactly would that be possible? If we are to believe edge, the GBA2 would have 2 extra buttons, a backlight, faster CPU, more RAM, a new battery.

How could an upgrade be placed on the GBA to make all these things possible?

What if an upgrade means trade in GBA for half price GBA2?.. or quarter price GBA2 or whatever.

Nintendo just might be preparing itself if another competitor enters the market.

Yes this could be the reason, after all isn't someone planning on introducing a handheld using a PowerVR MBX chip + SH5 processor? That thing could pump out DC quality visuals on a small screen!

14-Oct-2002, 19:00

What if an upgrade means trade in GBA for half price GBA2?.. or quarter price GBA2 or whatever.

That would be nice but somehow I doubt it. I also doubt the notion of an advanced GBA2 (so soon) as well. Nintendo would take major flak from the millions of consumers who already own the GBA(1). I'm thinking Sega with their 32x -> Saturn fiasco which probably spilled over into poor DC sales.

I don't doubt however, a backlit version. Any 'minor' upgrade is plausible but beyond that I think stretches the probability. The GBA has zero (real) competition and this situation is not likely to change imo for the next couple of years so I don't know why Nintendo would bother.

Yes this could be the reason, after all isn't someone planning on introducing a handheld using a PowerVR MBX chip + SH5 processor? That thing could pump out DC quality visuals on a small screen!

Is this confirmed that this is a dedicated gaming handheld? Otherwise the price alone may push it out of competition with the GBA. In addition, bleeding edge technology never really mattered much in the handheld area imo; looking at Gameboy vs. Lynx vs. Game Gear, it just seems that technology played a minor role.

Tagrineth

15-Oct-2002, 14:28

Yes this could be the reason, after all isn't someone planning on introducing a handheld using a PowerVR MBX chip + SH5 processor? That thing could pump out DC quality visuals on a small screen!

Is this confirmed that this is a dedicated gaming handheld? Otherwise the price alone may push it out of competition with the GBA. In addition, bleeding edge technology never really mattered much in the handheld area imo; looking at Gameboy vs. Lynx vs. Game Gear, it just seems that technology played a minor role.

Correct.

Lynx was amazing, played well... but it had the Atari brand which nobody wanted to trust :(

Game Gear has a horrendous screen - last time I used one (a week ago), I had to keep my finger on the brightness dial so I could adjust it CONSTANTLY. And for reference, I have almost no problem with my GBA's screen at all :P

Game Boy won out because it had a very high-quality black and white LCD for its time, it was about a third of the size of a Game Gear, and got more play time out of four batteries than Game Gear got out of six :lol: Hooray for back lights... :roll:

zurich

15-Oct-2002, 18:00

PC-Engine

15-Oct-2002, 20:56

TurboExpress owned them all :)

Even though it guzzled 8 AA batteries in a matter of hours and cost $400, it was waaaaay before its time. In some cases, its graphics rival that of the GBA now.

zurich

Yep, way before it's time. High res active TFT LCD! I still remember playing the Japanese version of SFII CE on that thing way back then too, and that version was even better than the SNES version! It ran in non-compressed graphics mode unlike the SNES. It only used 6 AA batteries though and if you had rechargables...

zurich

15-Oct-2002, 21:11

It was Military Madness that made me fall in love with the Turbo Express (I still think its a much much better game than Advance Wars). Even with rechargables it gobbled batteries like mad, but thats the price to pay for a handheld a decade before its time :)

zurich

16-Oct-2002, 00:39

TurboExpress owned them all :)

zurich

Agreed. It was an awesome handheld not just because of the relative 'power' of the handheld itself but rather imo due to the great library of titles you instantly had at your disposal upon the launch of it.