Underplayed but interesting handhelds

jro

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I'll start with four-ish, from popular to not so much:

Sega Game Gear - the tech capabilities of this thing never cease to impress me. The Treasure stuff, the Aleste games, PD Mini, a bunch of others I'm forgetting. It was/is awesome.

Atari Lynx - graphics capabilities of it are still pretty cool in a lot of cases, though there are very few titles with any depth at all (that one homebrew RPG is kind of cool though). I break out the Lynx 2 on occasion for the arcade ports but that's mostly it. I can't help but wonder what devs could have done with the hardware if they had really tried, though.

Bandai Wonderswan (Color) - an IPS-modded system runs on a single triple-A battery for longer than most others run on 4 or 6. Lot of really solid games as well, though, yeah, they're in Japanese. The auto-TATE functioning is fun also. I'm not gonna spend $2,500 for an original copy of Judgment Silversword but $60 for a repro is still fun.

Tiger Game.com - I am fascinated by this thing. I managed to get one with no lines, and I have all of the library other than Quiz Whiz (which is a weird case, there are like three versions), and I keep coming back to it. Sonic, MK, RE2, Fighters Megamix, Indy, they're all bizarrely bad in their own ways but I still like trying to make progress in them (no I don't whip my own back) and the fact that they exist is just so odd. Batman, the game show games, Jurassic Park, also oddly compelling to me. It's a bad system with bad games but I can't help but keep trying it/them. I think I'd consider the Game.com the CDI of handhelds. Oh, and it kills 4 batteries in around 90 minutes max.
 
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Yoshi

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I'm not gonna spend $2,500 for an original copy of Judgment Silversword but $60 for a repro is still fun.
 

100proof

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I mean NGPC may be old hat here but among the wider game-playing public, it's the definition of "underplayed but interesting" handhelds. It runs laps around all non-Nintendo handhelds and 95+% of people who play games have no idea it exists.
 

JoeAwesome

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I have a nostalgic soft spot for the Lynx model 2. Back in 2000, my brother picked up one for me with three games, the only three I had: Batman Returns, Pit-Fighter, and Hard Drivin’.

All three were hard as nails, game overs instantly (no hyperbole), with HD being shit, PF being less shit, and BR being decent, if cheap.

Ngl, in all of my rose-tinted nostalgia, it’s one I miss highly, probably because it was the only game system I had at that point in time.
 

jro

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Yeah left NG Pocket Color off on purpose since it's got plenty of other coverage, but to be very short on it here, it reminds me most of Wonderswan. Lots of really nice color, lot of sprites, good framerates, very nice form factor. I got one in one of those late-stage blister packs with some games at Babbage's around 2000 whenever and got some carts for (mostly CIB from a glance at the shelf) it at Game Force Boulder and kept it all ever since. Took it to about every Gamestop midnight launch that I wasn't working from around 2011-14 and had a few people go wait is that what I think it is and I was like, well, yeah, if you like Biomotor Unitron.

IMO it's closest to Wonderswan in terms of tech capability and feel. And yes I am also entirely too lazy to explain why other than saying that it just is.

Lionel Richie is playing on my tv right now no wait Ike drew a schlong on Kyle's forehead.
 
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pixeljunkie

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I bought a Lynx the first year they released. That Blue Lightning demo in Toys R Us blew my tits clean off. I was obsessed with that damn system well into college. Some games still hold up, but I played it so much back then, it's hard to revisit most of them. Last game I bought for it was Zaku back when that came out and that was damn fun.

Game.com - jesus, I used to be addicted to bad hardware and consoles and also had one of these these. I also had all the 99X handhelds they made, which the LCDs on those died so fast. But Crash Bandicoot was super fun on those. Game.com is so bad and so weird.
Wonderswan was badass, I wish I had held onto my copy of Judgment Silversword, sold it for like $100 way back. :sweaty: Wonderswan also has an amazing golf game that plays vertically. So good.
 

famicommander

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I have a Lynx, Game Gear, Wonderswan Color, NGPC, N-Gage QD. All solid systems in their own rights.

I also have a Watara Supervision. Don't buy one of those. The screen is not visible to human eyes, so I bought the TV Link only to discover that the TV Link inverts the colors so it's not playable on a TV either. An utterly worthless system.
 

BlackaneseNiNjA

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Nomad was criminally underrated. Having a whole ass portable Genny was way ahead of it's time.
This. Since NGP/NGPC is a given, though I enjoyed my Game Gear and Lynx back then, I gotta agree that the Nomad was simply amazing for its time. The hours I spent playing 16-bit games on the train back in the 90’s was unbelievable lol
 

famicommander

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I have a Nomad, but c'mon, that shit ain't portable. Needs an external battery pack and the carts stick out even farther than GB carts from a GBA.
 

NeoSneth

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I recently pulled out my GP32 BLU.
The screen and controls are very solid. The clicky might even be better than the NGPC.

Dont forget, the Virtual Boy had a battery pack option. I had a lot of fun with the VB back in college.
 

prof

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I have a Nomad, but c'mon, that shit ain't portable. Needs an external battery pack and the carts stick out even farther than GB carts from a GBA.

I certainly wouldn't stuff it in my pocket to pull out on a flight, but I have taken it along on extended trips before. There's something awesome about being able to play the entire Genesis library on a proper handheld, and the d-pad is excellent.

As far as the charger goes, they make a modern one that takes lithium batteries and has a usb-c charging port...



The original Sega battery pack from the 90s is about the same size, but it uses 6 AA batteries. Honestly though, with good modern rechargables, the battery life isn't terrible. I haven't tested it officially, but I'd estimate around 2 1/2 hours or so on a charge. Mine has a modded screen though. With that original backlit screen, the battery life was atrocious.
 

sc

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Love the Nomad. I also remember clipping an article about the Game Axe (Famicom Clone) many years ago. A few years back I found one NIB but the screen was so fucking awful I just sold it. There is a Japanese modder that once made a whole new board for it using a real PPU and CPU but the whole thing is just pure unobtanium.



IMG_0291.JPG
 

Hattori Hanzo

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I recently pulled out my GP32 BLU.
The screen and controls are very solid. The clicky might even be better than the NGPC.
I have the successor GP2X but they kind of fucked up the stick. It still works and I still have nostalgia for it. The Linux handhelds kind of started with it.
 

pixeljunkie

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I have the successor GP2X but they kind of fucked up the stick. It still works and I still have nostalgia for it. The Linux handhelds kind of started with it.

The Canoo? I had one of those too, I actually really liked it at the time, but yeah, the stick was meh.
 

pixeljunkie

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Canoo came later. There were 2 versions of the GP2X. My OG and the later GP2X F200.

Nice, I just had the Canoo and the Wiz. I really liked the Wiz.

Those handhelds were all awesome, considering we didn't have the onslaught of chinese handhelds back then.
 

terry.330

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I had a Nomad in the early 00’s back when you could find them for like $20 and remember being really hyped to fuck around with it. Think I ended up playing it maybe 4 hours total before selling it off. It just never felt right to me, the OG screen certainly didn’t help any. That was the days before IPS screens and Everdrives though.

I ended picking up another one at some point and the same thing happened. I think I’m just not much for handhelds.

Owned a Wonderswan as well but again before Everdrives and flashcarts.
 
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