The Game Gear could eat the Micro (or the evolution of handheld sizes)

29 Comments by Blake Snow Oct 23rd 2006 4:25PM
Filed under: Culture, Nintendo DS, Portable, Sony PSP

While obvious, handheld sizes sure have gotten a lot smaller over the years through better technology as seen above. Though the Game Boy Micro uses dated computing power circa early 1990s, even the PSP with its more current processing power is much thinner and lighter than Sega's hefty 1991 entrant to the portable industry (roughly half the latter's size). Funny how some home consoles just keep getting bigger. But alas, things get fatter the more you feed them (read: added multimedia).

Handhelds by the numbers:

Game Boy micro: 5.6 cubic inches
Game Boy Advance SP: 9.81 cubic inches
DS Lite: 12.96 cubic inches
Sony PSP: 17.52 cubic inches
Game Boy Advance: 17.64 cubic inches
DS Phat: 22.01 cubic inches
Game Gear: 50.86 cubic inches
Atari Lynx: 68.53 cubic inches

[Image courtesy of Flickr]

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(Page 1) Reader Comments

Jake B: Oct 23rd 2006; 4:30PM

Game gears were so bad ass though. I had one game, like choplifter or something. It was excellent.

Street Foreigner II TURBO: Oct 23rd 2006; 4:38PM

I still play Streets of Rage 2 on my GG.

David: Oct 23rd 2006; 4:39PM

What about the original GameBoy, the big, grey, brick shaped handheld? I seemed to remember its bulkyness being on par with the GameGear.

And what about the Turbo-Express? It was a viable handheld alternative to the TG-16. It's mentioned on the Wiki page linked in the article and it was massive compared to most handhelds, even the monstrous Lynx.

I've still got my old Turbo-Express and every time I play it I feel like I'm using some 80's styled GPS locator, a la Cliffhanger. I swear that thing feels heavier and bigger than a new-born child.

ill trooper: Oct 23rd 2006; 4:40PM

Is that the original Lynx or the smaller, later model? In a weird way I wish I still had the original one that I sold to buy the newer one...

Warbirds and Todd's Adventures in Slime World were some of my multiplayer favorites, along with Xenophobe. Great system. Weird (but borderline funtional) cartridge shape.

Zebulunite: Oct 23rd 2006; 4:42PM

"# Game Gear: 50.86 cubic inches
# Atari Lynx: 68.53 cubic inches"

Wow...if the Game Gear could eat the Micro, the Lynx could shallow it whole and still have room for a SP.

Does anyone know of any photos comparing all of the handhleds listed above?

Oh, and by the way, the Neo Geo Pocket Color is 17.35 cubic inches.

taliesin-nine: Oct 23rd 2006; 4:47PM

Yeah, Game Gear was fantastic. It's so sad it wasn't more successful. It had color when the Game Boy didn't, and later when the Game Boy Color was around, Game Gear still looked better. Sigh... Ristar was just incredible.

Zebulunite: Oct 23rd 2006; 4:55PM

Here's some more stats (what I could find on Wikipedia, after doing unit conversion)

Neo Geo Pocket Color is 17.35 cubic inches
Sega Nomad is 49.36 cubic inches
Gameboy (brick) is 26.39 cubic inches
Wonderswan (original) is 13.33 cubic inches
Wonderswan color is 14.1 cubic inches
Wonderswan Crystals 14.68 cubic inches
Gamepark 32 is 26.83 cubic inches
GP2X is 19.61 cubic inches

BklynKid: Oct 23rd 2006; 4:55PM

What about the original B&W gameboy? It was smaller than the GameGear (GG FTW BTW -- can't believe I just wrote that) but bigger than the DS Phat?

Dignan17: Oct 23rd 2006; 4:59PM

GAME GEAR!! Oh, how I loved you, Game Gear. Can you ever forgive me for selling you for something I can't even remember now? Please forgive me. I loved your beautiful graphics. I loved your Master System attachment that let me play my 30+ SMS games on the go. I loved your TV tuner that only got four clear channels, but I was the coolest kid on the 4th grade playground when we could all huddle around and watch crappy mid-day TV at recess.

I'll always love you Game Gear, despite your heft (big portables need love too) and your abysmal battery life.

*sob*

Meeeeeeemoriiiieeeeesss......

FSK405K: Oct 23rd 2006; 5:10PM

How about the Game Boy? You know, this old thing: http://museoretro.com.ar/jpg/game-boy.jpg I've got like six of them lying around my place.

Sneak: Oct 23rd 2006; 5:12PM

Am I the only one who played the Turbo Express?

FSK405K: Oct 23rd 2006; 5:13PM

Zebulunite, just the Nintendo ones, but this ought to get you started: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Gameboyline2.jpg

oe: Oct 23rd 2006; 5:29PM

Is that Lynx version 1 or Lynx version 2? I had both, and remember the first one to be ginormous, and the second one extra extra fat, so I'm not sure which you are referring to.

fable2323: Oct 23rd 2006; 5:30PM

I own a Game Gear, and while it does rock, its need to have 6 AA batteries and only 4 hours battery life, not to mention the awful screen blur does not mean I am pulling it out of the garage anytime soon. By the way, people are forgetting about Sega's best handheld. Nomad! It plays ALL Genesis games, has a rechargable battery pack (sold seperately), has a port for a second Genesis controller (2 player action) and last but not least, the machine also accepted the same video input that came with genesis so you could play the Nomad on your TV as well. Oh yeah, I have one of these too...

Zebulunite: Oct 23rd 2006; 5:38PM

Oh, by the way, that's interesting that the (original) GBA is actually (very slightly) more volumetric than the PSP. I wouldn't have expected that (not that I have a GBA original...I just assumed it would have been smaller).

Zebulunite: Oct 23rd 2006; 5:38PM

Thanks FSK405K.

Here's some other random images I found (if anyone is interested):

About 50 systems - http://vidgame.net/grafx/allsystems.jpg

Lik-Sang has some "classic handheld" reviews here. Linked at the bottom are reviews of other handhelds. Pretty much everyone has an image comparison to the GBA-SP (I'd link to each of the images, but Joystiq evidently only allows 3 links per post)

http://www.lik-sang.com/news.php?artc=3040

E.J.: Oct 23rd 2006; 6:32PM

no mention of the excellent, yet battery eating, Sega Nomad and /that/ system's size?

Let's just say it was almost like carrying a late model SNES (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Snes2_sys.jpg)

Rein: Oct 23rd 2006; 6:44PM

I loved all of my Game Gear games (mostly Jurassic Park and Space Harrier). It was just so awesome, and I really wish mine still worked today. Oh, how I wish I could play it again!

Devwar: Oct 23rd 2006; 7:22PM

Game Gear may have been backlit and all pretty colors and all, but I hated having to toss in 6 more AA batteries every 2 hours when I wasn't plugged into an AC jack. Even though I wasn't buying them as a kid, I understood they weren't cheap. My sister and I together could easily go through 2 12-packs on a long car ride. Talk about expensive.

Sponge: Oct 23rd 2006; 8:06PM

The Game Gear had the best peripherals ever, there was one that allowed you to watch TV and another that showed what you were playing on any TV in the area that was picking up off-air TV.

Gamer Jay: Oct 23rd 2006; 9:09PM

The Game Gear ate AA batteries for breakfast...then more for lunch....then more for dinner. It was fun before the low battery-warning light turned on, though.

Tracy: Oct 23rd 2006; 9:53PM

Turbo Grafx 16, Duo, or the Express never get any love.

The ZeroCorpse: Oct 23rd 2006; 10:40PM

This just in: Technology used to be bigger than it is now.

Watch the Disney movie "The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes" and check out the state-of-the-art computer that takes up a large room. Or have a look in my junk drawer and I'll show you a "pocket" calculator from the late 1970s/early 1980s that is about as thick and large as a paperback copy of Stephen King's "Firestarter" (and used four AAA batteries for several hours of calculating power.

Now, you can get a computer that really does fit in your breast pocket, and it's thousands of times more powerful than the room-sized beasts we called computers in the late 1960s/early 1970s.

Yeah. Pretty neat.

Aaron: Oct 24th 2006; 12:54AM

Where the HELL is the TurboExpress?

Cj: Oct 24th 2006; 2:26AM

You forgot the N-gage :P

Techni: Oct 24th 2006; 4:49AM

Nice jab against multimedia/PS3/360 there joystiq, but that doesn't explain why PSP is smaller than the DS

saboola: Oct 24th 2006; 10:03AM

Does anyone remember the hudson prototype for the portable SNES? It looked a lot like a laptop, and had a huge battery. It never came out obviously, but was a cool idea at the time (like 1992-93).

kyle: Oct 24th 2006; 4:11PM

They should make a GG remake, or something, you no, just like gameboy did, id buy like 1.....lol!!! u guys agree?

adria: Oct 30th 2006; 3:05PM

I sooo remember the Game Gear. I saved up all my allowance to buy it, because it was so much cooler than the Game Boy. I really wanted the TV tuner, but my parents wouldn't let me get it. I did have the "Wide Gear" which was basically a magnifying glass that attached to the front of the screen. Pretty crude. For those of you who wish you still had yours, get one on Ebay, they are super cheap. I sold mine for about $15 a few years ago.

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