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I did the same, just can't get past the awful early screens. It's only the pc engine handhelds from that generation that I've managed to get much out of.
Underplayed but interesting handhelds
- Thread starter jro
- Start date
I had a nomad in the late 90s/early 2000s. Lovely, chunky machine that I spent tons of hours with (pretty much always with a car adapter or AC adapter, cause Jesus, that power consumption).
I ended up giving it to my brother years later cause I just didn't see myself ever really playing again cause of the screen issues and everything else.
I also had an n-gage qd for a while, when they were getting clearanced out at Gamestop. It was cool, and at one point I had a complete set of games for it, although I ended up selling it all off cause I need to reduce my collection and at the time, it sounded like the hardware was gauranteed to fail with no real way to repair it, and I just didn't want to deal with that kind of stress.
Game.com I had for like, a month in the late 2000s, and it was just too hard to view the screen so I ended up getting rid of it.
My dad was a huge Atari and Sega guy in the 80s-mid 90s, so I was lucky enough to get to play with the Game Gear and the Lynx when they were current. I didn't really appreciate either of them at the time though (I was a pretty stupid kid, and remain a pretty stupid adult). As a grown up, I've come to really love each of them.
The Game Gear effectively being a Master System has resulted in me finding so many more Master System-esque games I never knew of, and while nothing in its library matches the greats of the Gameboy, I've definitely found lots of fun games for it in recent years. Also, I loved the TV tuner for it. I still remember the time my dad was messing around with it years later and hooked up my brother's OG xbox to it just to see if he could. Running Halo through a Sega Game Gear was pretty funny.
The Lynx is super fun too. A lot of its games were unique to the system and there was still so much new old stock stuff for it, with so little demand as of a few years ago, it was pretty easy to find games I'd never played as a kid. With the prices so low, I was happy to pick up a new game and give it a try 30 years later for that cheap nostalgia trip. My largest gripe with its games is that lots of them lack music, or only do music or sound effects at once. It also has way fewer games than its direct competition, and suffers the same issues as the Game Gear in terms of power consumption.
I ended up giving it to my brother years later cause I just didn't see myself ever really playing again cause of the screen issues and everything else.
I also had an n-gage qd for a while, when they were getting clearanced out at Gamestop. It was cool, and at one point I had a complete set of games for it, although I ended up selling it all off cause I need to reduce my collection and at the time, it sounded like the hardware was gauranteed to fail with no real way to repair it, and I just didn't want to deal with that kind of stress.
Game.com I had for like, a month in the late 2000s, and it was just too hard to view the screen so I ended up getting rid of it.
My dad was a huge Atari and Sega guy in the 80s-mid 90s, so I was lucky enough to get to play with the Game Gear and the Lynx when they were current. I didn't really appreciate either of them at the time though (I was a pretty stupid kid, and remain a pretty stupid adult). As a grown up, I've come to really love each of them.
The Game Gear effectively being a Master System has resulted in me finding so many more Master System-esque games I never knew of, and while nothing in its library matches the greats of the Gameboy, I've definitely found lots of fun games for it in recent years. Also, I loved the TV tuner for it. I still remember the time my dad was messing around with it years later and hooked up my brother's OG xbox to it just to see if he could. Running Halo through a Sega Game Gear was pretty funny.
The Lynx is super fun too. A lot of its games were unique to the system and there was still so much new old stock stuff for it, with so little demand as of a few years ago, it was pretty easy to find games I'd never played as a kid. With the prices so low, I was happy to pick up a new game and give it a try 30 years later for that cheap nostalgia trip. My largest gripe with its games is that lots of them lack music, or only do music or sound effects at once. It also has way fewer games than its direct competition, and suffers the same issues as the Game Gear in terms of power consumption.
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Sort of interesting to me at least, Robotron 2084 is far better on Game.com than on Lynx. Joust, Defender, all the other Williams games are easily superior on Lynx but Robotron on Lynx is surprisingly bad. It's good on GC. Maybe just a lack of effort from the conversion devs but it's noticeable.
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I have a game gear.
Doesn't work anymore, powers up but nothing happens.
Friend had a lynx, I don't remember if it was a 1 or a 2.
I kinda recall it being on the chunky side.
Only like 3 games for it tho.
Some kind of jet fighter game.
Blue lightning?
Blue thunder?
It was no afterburner I remember that much.
Summer games or something, it sucked.
And Ninja Gaiden, that game rocked and I played the hell out of it.
Doesn't work anymore, powers up but nothing happens.
Friend had a lynx, I don't remember if it was a 1 or a 2.
I kinda recall it being on the chunky side.
Only like 3 games for it tho.
Some kind of jet fighter game.
Blue lightning?
Blue thunder?
It was no afterburner I remember that much.
Summer games or something, it sucked.
And Ninja Gaiden, that game rocked and I played the hell out of it.
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I have a prison issue MP3 player.
It a SanDisk clip, clear case and all.
It was gifted to me for helping a lady clean up after an estate sale.
It apparently belonged to her son, who was a repeat offender and back in prison for the third time.
Anyway, it is locked in institution mode and I don't have a way to unlock it.
Supposedly I could send it to the place that made the custom firmware to reset it but they charge $30 something to do it and it's not worth that to me.
So it's just a curiosity.
If I find it maybe I'll take a picture.
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My brother has a Game Axe I gave him back in the early 00's. He didn't really like it, but I think he still has it in the box.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.
互換機GAME AXEの代替え基板を作ってみた
GAME AXEはファミコン互換機で当時（今でも？）では一番の互換性で有名？でした。どうせなら互換性120%にしてやろうとGAMEAXE互換基板を作成してみました。bakutendo.net
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Yeah sadly I can’t imagine enjoying it too much without heavy modification. Handheld NES/Fami was always the dream but it never really happened with real hardware.
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Is there a way to get the offical released games on a smartcard? I have trouble finding info on this.
I loved this system but only have like 3 games for it.
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Your Game Gear most likely just needs a new set of capacitors. That would still leave the crappy screen, though.
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Yeah, I suspect that's about all is.
I can solder but I'm not sure if I could do it well enough to fix it
If I knew someone I could relatively trust to do the caps & install an IPS who wouldn't rape me I might have it done.
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If you have an MMC card reader, you can create our own multicarts. There are still people that sell fully loaded GP32 MMC cards.
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Still has the 2nd best handheld golf game on it
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You were like 5 when a Nomad would have been relevant.
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So? I've had one for like 20 years and this entire site is about a system that hasn't been relevant in 20 years.
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I can't really take the criticism seriously from anyone that wasn't playing it when it was current. Every other major handheld except the Gameboy was the same size or larger, with much worse games and screen, and even just playing a good portable version of Street Fighter 2 alone was worth it. You could (and I did) cram the nomad, batteries, and several carts into one of the larger Game Gear carrying bags, which was exactly what I was doing at the time.
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Nomad was breathtaking when it was new. Sure it devoured batteries, but you didn’t have to buy new games which was a huge plus, same thing with Turbo Express. I have to believe anyone who says otherwise either wasn’t there or dropping a hot take for the sake of trolling.