Hello everyone, and welcome to day 12 of my 31/31! Today’s blog is another entry in my memories series, where I am taking a look back at many of the gaming memories that helped shape the gamer that I am today. Today’s entry focuses on one of my earlier gaming systems; my Game Boy Advance SP.
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I received my Game Boy Advance when I was 7 years old. I had owned my Game Boy Color for a little while at that point, and we had recently adopted my younger brother. So, I got a new Game Boy Advance, and my brother got my Game Boy Color. My Game Boy Advance was a red SP edition, and was a great handheld for many years. I have a lot of good memories of that system, many of which stemming from the great game library it had.
My first game for the system was Pokémon Ruby. It was my first foray into the series, and was one of my favorite games for a long time. The addiction of the Pokémon series continued with FireRed and Emerald, not to mention the underrated Pokémon Mystery Dungeon Red Rescue Team. Pokémon was not the only game series that went into my library.
After getting hooked on Pokémon, my game library for the series slowly diversified, and included great games like The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap, (although I didn’t fully appreciate and enjoy this game until a lot later on.) Metroid: Fusion, Fire Emblem, Golden Sun, Mario vs. Donkey Kong, and many others.
Along with having some fun games, the system also was very easy to carry around, and was a convenient hand-held to have. With a simplistic, yet functional design, the SP was easy to take to a friend’s house after school. In fact, I still remember many days where me and 3 friends would use either our link cables or wireless adaptors in order to play some games. The two most common multiplayer games were Pokémon and Mario Kart. We thoroughly enjoyed each time playing, so much so that it became a habit for all of us to play after school. I would be Yoshi, Mario would be taken next, then Luigi, and finally Peach. The four of us would always then race against each other on all of the tracks. After that, it would switch over to Pokémon, which was a lot more competitive. See, Pokémon is a bit misleading when it says that you are the Pokémon master. We all knew that not all 4 of us could be the real Pokémon master. So we constantly battled each other. Even if a new game came out, we would all rush to get it as soon as possible in order to play each other while we were going through the gyms. Alliances were formed sometimes, adding more fun fuel to the fire. The best part was that although some of us were better than others, it was generally close enough that a new person would win every other game or so. The only time anybody won for more than a week in a row was when my friend traded me his Swampert, so I had the deadly combo of Swampert, Sceptile, Salamence, and Metagross.
The DS came out fairly quickly after the SP came out, and with its innovations, the SP was quickly deemed irrelevant. However, for its role in Nintendo’s history as a simple, yet effective handheld, the SP should be looked back at fondly. I know it will be in my eyes.
That’s all for today’s blog everyone. What are your memories of the SP? Did you have a favorite game for it? Sorry it’s so short, I was traveling, and I only had 20 minutes of internet time to finish this blog. Also, I just gained 3 new step-siblings, so today’s been a pretty hectic day. Stay tuned to the rest of the 31/31 though, for I’ll try to keep trying my best to work through this surprise event. I think I have some really good blogs coming up next week, and I hope you stick around to see them. Until then, have a good weekend everyone!![]()
I received my Game Boy Advance when I was 7 years old. I had owned my Game Boy Color for a little while at that point, and we had recently adopted my younger brother. So, I got a new Game Boy Advance, and my brother got my Game Boy Color. My Game Boy Advance was a red SP edition, and was a great handheld for many years. I have a lot of good memories of that system, many of which stemming from the great game library it had.
My first game for the system was Pokémon Ruby. It was my first foray into the series, and was one of my favorite games for a long time. The addiction of the Pokémon series continued with FireRed and Emerald, not to mention the underrated Pokémon Mystery Dungeon Red Rescue Team. Pokémon was not the only game series that went into my library.
After getting hooked on Pokémon, my game library for the series slowly diversified, and included great games like The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap, (although I didn’t fully appreciate and enjoy this game until a lot later on.) Metroid: Fusion, Fire Emblem, Golden Sun, Mario vs. Donkey Kong, and many others.
Along with having some fun games, the system also was very easy to carry around, and was a convenient hand-held to have. With a simplistic, yet functional design, the SP was easy to take to a friend’s house after school. In fact, I still remember many days where me and 3 friends would use either our link cables or wireless adaptors in order to play some games. The two most common multiplayer games were Pokémon and Mario Kart. We thoroughly enjoyed each time playing, so much so that it became a habit for all of us to play after school. I would be Yoshi, Mario would be taken next, then Luigi, and finally Peach. The four of us would always then race against each other on all of the tracks. After that, it would switch over to Pokémon, which was a lot more competitive. See, Pokémon is a bit misleading when it says that you are the Pokémon master. We all knew that not all 4 of us could be the real Pokémon master. So we constantly battled each other. Even if a new game came out, we would all rush to get it as soon as possible in order to play each other while we were going through the gyms. Alliances were formed sometimes, adding more fun fuel to the fire. The best part was that although some of us were better than others, it was generally close enough that a new person would win every other game or so. The only time anybody won for more than a week in a row was when my friend traded me his Swampert, so I had the deadly combo of Swampert, Sceptile, Salamence, and Metagross.
The DS came out fairly quickly after the SP came out, and with its innovations, the SP was quickly deemed irrelevant. However, for its role in Nintendo’s history as a simple, yet effective handheld, the SP should be looked back at fondly. I know it will be in my eyes.
That’s all for today’s blog everyone. What are your memories of the SP? Did you have a favorite game for it? Sorry it’s so short, I was traveling, and I only had 20 minutes of internet time to finish this blog. Also, I just gained 3 new step-siblings, so today’s been a pretty hectic day. Stay tuned to the rest of the 31/31 though, for I’ll try to keep trying my best to work through this surprise event. I think I have some really good blogs coming up next week, and I hope you stick around to see them. Until then, have a good weekend everyone!