Game Boy games belong to Nintendo Switch Online

Celebrating 30 years of Game Boy

I remember the very first time I experienced the terrible phenomenon known as FOMO, or "fear of missing out". It was in college. At the time, I was obsessed with the WWF and my family had recently traded our SNES for a "much cooler" PlayStation. This was the center of my game world for the next few years and my brother and I took the opportunity to try an endless range of games from the local rental store. But for every unforgettable experience I've had with the system, I missed one because we did not have a Game Boy.

In fact, I do not remember seeing an incarnated Game Boy before 1998. None of my friends had one. For a very long time, we thought of the "children's console", even though my friends and I were very young at the time. I know I had an apology for never asking for Christmas: the screen was small, it had no color, SNES games are better, yadda-yadda-yadda. Excuse after excuse, my little fool has prevented me from being one of the richest libraries of all games. In this eighth grade of school, these excuses have prevented me from doing the experiment Pokémon when he was at the forefront of the game's spirit.

To my knowledge, there was a person at the school who was deeply in love with the game. I would see him play his Game Boy Pocket at lunch, on the bus, in the hallways before school. He was delighted and I was jealous. In 1998, the PlayStation was getting bland for me. My brother's insistence on playing only Madden slowly, I moved away from the game. I did not have the impressive moments that I had with the medium of previous generations, so I threw myself into my ephemeral struggle fandom. I could not bring myself to buy a Game Boy for Pokémon – which, at that time, was also considered only as a "child product" – and I would have missed almost everything the system had to offer, if it was not Nintendo 3DS and its wonderful virtual console.

Until the release of the Nintendo 3DS, the only two Game Boy games I had played were Link's Awakening and Oracle of the seasons. The latter I bought at the first grip of my Game Boy Advance – immediately becoming fully aware of what I had missed – while it was in my GBA SP a quiet night in college . At that time, I had begun to appreciate the works found in previous generations on console as evidence of the technology available, rather than as mere stepping stones to higher quality and more powerful consoles. But beyond these two titles, nothing of the past of the handheld game has penetrated into my collection.

Then I had my 3DS, the original turquoise model, about a week before the release of The legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D because I convinced myself to get it before the price cut to be able to play these Games of the Ambassadors Program. I still have not played all these games but I played the hell of Ocarina of Time 3D and Link's Awakening DX, the first game I bought from the virtual console. I was happy to let my VC purchases at this game and maybe the Oracle titles should they ever arrive at the service, but there was a game every publication that I read online told me to play: Donkey Kong. So I paid the five dollars or the cost, and I downloaded it a day before work. An hour later, I had downloaded five other Game Boy titles, because at that time, playing this wonderful title, I realized how bad my child was about the platform .

It was not just about missing the boat Pokémon. It was just about all the titles, big or small, that could have pleased me during the years I had abandoned the game. Donkey Kong, Super Mario Land 2, Wario Land, Mole Mania, Shantae, Pokémon Challenge, Pokémon Trading Card Game, Toki Tori, Lufiaand more still showed me how timeless these 8-bit games were and how stupid I was to reject the platform.

The many NES and SNES games that I bought on my Wii were for the sake of nostalgia, games that I remembered having enjoyed when I wanted to own them, even if I had no concrete plan to play them . The Game Boy and Game Boy Color games I bought on my 3DS were not related to my past. I wanted these games because I knew I had missed something spectacular. So I bought them and I played them and beat them, even the one I did not really like.

I do not know why the virtual console for 3DS has never reached its full potential. I do not know if it's about licensing issues, third-party developers who do not want to participate or something else that goes beyond my knowledge of how Nintendo works, but the game selection Game Boy and Game Boy Color for service is ridiculously sweet. . Only 50 Game Boy games have been released in the North American virtual console store. The Game Boy Color has only seen 31 of its games on the service. In comparison, 64 NES games went on the handheld. I do not know what will happen in 2012 to slow down the deployment, but there are a lot of classic titles that we missed. All of Final Fantasy Adventure the Star Fox-precursor X at Kid Dracula jumped up.

The 3DS Virtual Console has not seen a new title since last year's release of Pokemon Crystal and as he enters his twilight, I doubt that other lost classics will come to the system. Rumor has it – although I think it's more wishful thinking than anything else – the Game Boy Mini has not materialized yet, so the Nintendo Switch Online service has become the best plan for this treasure trove of titles. Subscription service has a lot to offer, but the call for "more games" sounds the loudest above all else. If this service is to be as it should be, Netflix games for Nintendo's classic games, the company must expand its selection much wider and much faster than today.

Again, I do not know the ins and outs of how Switch Online works. This could be more complicated than I think, as are most aspects of this industry. What I do know is that offering these titles to the players opens up a world of discovery for the youngest Switch owners, who may have never experienced the sheer joy that Balloon Kid.

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