Another handheld bites the dust

bokmeow · Feb 21, 2003

Just what does it take to survive in the handheld war? Bandai slowly withdraws its support for the Wonderswan now, although in my opinion most of their gameplay was way inferior to Neo Geo Pocket Color despite matching technical specs.
<a href="http://gamespot.com/gamespot/stories/news/0,10870,2911131,00.html" target="_blank">http://gamespot.com/gamespot/stories/news/0,10870,2911131,00.html</a>

I'm still very much committed to the opinion that the handheld needs to capture the children market, because it's a console for the road or for boring class lectures, and no one has more free time than children, adults simply don't have the leisure to be playing handhelds 24/7.

Dean · Feb 21, 2003

Wow. Wonder if the games will become like NGPC games have recently.... I doubt it, since it was Japanese only. Since I haven't dabbled in the Wonderswan yet, what is worth playing/is playable (English available, or not really required)?

Plisken · Feb 21, 2003

I HATE NINTENDO

Tehcno · Feb 21, 2003

Wonder Swan is ok.
The really good games are all in Japanese though, so it is a bit of a problem. The screen is even worse than the GBA.

bokmeow · Feb 21, 2003

There are a bunch of ports of popular simulation games in Japanese that I would love to play, but other than that I found Wonderswan to be severely lacking, the gameplay was just bleh, it kind of looked like Bandai just wasted a bunch of their licenses producing games for the Wonderswan. Rockman on the Wonderswan simply looked terrible, I don't know how they managed to ruin it so badly.

DanAdamKOF · Feb 21, 2003

Wonderswan is my second most fave handheld after NGPC. The games for it are so fun, and also Final Fantasy IV can be had for well under $100 (unlike on the SNES). I love it when I whip it out in public and people are all "Is that a gameboy?" to which I reply "does it look like a gameboy?". Plus, what other handhelds have a port of Pocket Fighter? I thought so.

Tehcno: Seen the SwanCrystal's screen? It puts GBA to shame IMO.

CapcomFanConverted · Feb 21, 2003

What he said ^_^

Brittney · Feb 21, 2003

It's a shame about the Wonderswan. Nintendo really needs some competition because the GBA is getting pretty sloppy. It seems like it took the Afterburner light along with 13+ years to get them to backlite the new GBA SP. Plus GBA games just aren't that great, Nintendo always relies on old franchises *cough*metroid-zelda-mario*cough*

Kemps · Feb 21, 2003

Oh yes, lazy-ass Nintendo needs some serious beatings in sales to wake up and stop porting SNES games, not to mention letting 3rd party companies make absolute crap. I had a GBA for about a month and a half now, and I still haven't bought any games for it. Compare that to NGPC where it seemed like I was buying a game every week. Sigh...if only NGPC was still alive and kicking (Nintendo's ass).

<small>[ February 21, 2003, 07:50 PM: Message edited by: Kemps ]</small>

Nesagwa · Feb 22, 2003

Guilty Gear Petit looks pretty good. It uses a simlar style to the NGP fighters, all chibi and stuff (instead of the style that the GBA game uses, which is kind of boring if you ask me).
There are alot of Digimon games if you are into that stuff. Mr. Driller is fun (better than a tetris clone anyway). It also has a really cool version of Rockman and Forte.

Here is a site with a list of games and stuff too.
<a href="http://www.j-fan.com/swansong/" target="_blank">http://www.j-fan.com/swansong/</a>

Liquid Snake · Feb 22, 2003

I don't like Wonderswan that much and there aren't so many worth-buying titles on it.

Nintendo is still the king of handheld...

Ahchay · Feb 22, 2003

There are a few quality games on the wonderswan and the SwanCrystal screen is the best non-backlit screen on any handheld. Ever. And I love the portrait/landscape mode...

Top 5;

Mr Driller

Gunpey (Ex or mono)
Guilty Gear Petit 2
Pocket Fighter
Digimon (The english language one)

A lot of the really interesting looking stuff (Final Fantasy, Blue Wing Blitz, Gundam) is pretty unplayable without Japanese language skills but if you can live with that... (I did manage to play quite a way into FF2 with the aid of a walkthrough)

It's a shame. I like the 'swan

And it means that now the only choice is GBA (ugh) or GP32. Unless Red Jade (or whatever it's called) turns out to be a real product of course...

Cheers
Chris

striderpunk · Mar 3, 2003

DEATH TO NINTENDO OBLITERATE THE OPRESSORS GET EM WHERE THEY HURT THE GAMEBOY ADVANCE

I SUGGEST A BOYCOTT OF NINTENDO

CapcomFanConverted · Mar 3, 2003

I heard beatmania is good fun too. check IGNpocket's review of it

John · Mar 5, 2003

striderpunk:
DEATH TO NINTENDO OBLITERATE THE OPRESSORS GET EM WHERE THEY HURT THE GAMEBOY ADVANCE

I SUGGEST A BOYCOTT OF NINTENDO

Dude, easy on the caps. Say what you will about Nintendo, but they earned their spot. They had a 2-on-1 (Atari and Sega) assault on them in the portable market, and they still stood tall.

Plus, Bandai is probably one of the worst developers ever. They made such abominations unto gaming as Final Bout and Rockman and Forte for Wonderswan. While Nintendo certainly needs competition, Bandai wouldn't have provided it.

Furthermore, try boycotting Microsoft instead--if for nothing else, for Microsoft Bob.

bokmeow · Mar 5, 2003

Yeah, Rockman and Forte was terrible on the Wonderswan. I don't know how Bandai managed to screw up such a title, but they did and the result was horrendous. Neo Geo Pocket Color had to be the best competitor to the Nintendo's Gameboy but the developer support for some reason just wasn't there, I don't know what happened exactly although at one point SNK had Sega, Namco, Capcom as well as Success developing for their console, and every one of them was a hit, even Pac-Man, although new modes would have been greatly desired for Pac-Man.

John · Mar 5, 2003

bokmeow:
Yeah, Rockman and Forte was terrible on the Wonderswan. I don't know how Bandai managed to screw up such a title, but they did and the result was horrendous. Neo Geo Pocket Color had to be the best competitor to the Nintendo's Gameboy but the developer support for some reason just wasn't there, I don't know what happened exactly although at one point SNK had Sega, Namco, Capcom as well as Success developing for their console, and every one of them was a hit, even Pac-Man, although new modes would have been greatly desired for Pac-Man.

I never played Pac-Man for NGPC; in fact the only Pac-Man game I've ever gotten was the GBA collection, because that had Pac-Man Arrangement. (And I think it was only about $20) But yeah, they had some pretty good games from those guys. I guess it was just a matter of momentum...

striderpunk · Apr 1, 2003

John the only reason I wish death to nintendo is so the constant advertisments would end

evil wasabi · Apr 2, 2003

I have a GBA and something like 8 games...
Among those games, something like 1 or 2 were worth buying.

I haven't played my GBA for ages, whereas I use my NGPC almost everyday...
Oh well.

It would have kicked so much ass if SNK would have made a 32 bits handheld to compete with the GBA. Not that SNK *REALLY* needed that, since our good old NGPC already puts the GBA to shame when it comes to games.

Another handheld bites the dust

bokmeow

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Dean

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Plisken

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Tehcno

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bokmeow

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CapcomFanConverted

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Brittney

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Kemps

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Nesagwa

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Ahchay

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striderpunk

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John

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bokmeow

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John

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