The 10 Worst-Selling Handhelds of All Time

o1s1n

What we need is Sega back in the picture with a huge budget and their over the top innovation. I mean they were doing mental stuff with extremely limited technology back in the 90s. I can only imagine the insanity they'd be up to now!

Hygro

Yeah, the way to go would be a 3D game with a VR tracker device!!

probably end up looking like this though ...

ambro25

Hygro wrote: »

probably end up looking like this though ...

Not these days, by the look of things

(linky to the Japanese 'hack' I was on about in my earlier post - he has since turned it into an FPS prototype, with a Wiimote taped to a Marui P90!)

I mean, if a bedroom coder can do that, how hard would it be for M$ to do an affordable 'official version'

VR920 are around the £300 mark or thereabouts. So, I'm aware the market-o-nomics would probably lean against it for now, but when you consider the success of hardware addons like HD-DVDs, move, kinect, drums, guitars and whatnot (completely against the historical model of addon failures on the scale Sega, Nintendo and others experienced in earlier generations), IMHO they would be bound to sell enough to at least break even.

EDIT (to keep the flagrant off-topicness sufficiently Retro )

o1s1n wrote: »

What we need is Sega back in the picture with a huge budget and their over the top innovation. I mean they were doing mental stuff with extremely limited technology back in the 90s.

You mean, like that? Are you sure you did not mean Atari instead?

CiDeRmAn

Like Touchscreen Ninty will have all the best implementations for the first wave of software, then, hopefully, we will see everyone else get the hang of it.

I can see movies being a massive draw on the 3DS, I think that a deal with Netflix or some other movie streaming/download company is obvious.
I would rather be free to watch my own stored 3D movies, but don't think they will open the system up like that.

Retr0gamer

I still don't see 3D adding anything to the experience other than aesthetics. Good point about Netflix though.

amacachi

Off the top of my head the 3D could be used for stealth-type stuff, peering around corners and the like. That's the impression I got from mock-up videos on youtube.

EDIT: Would it not suck for movies one the square screen though, once they're either stretched or zoomed to fill the screen or only use half the screen.

o1s1n

ambro25 wrote: »

Are you sure you did not mean Atari instead?

I don't just mean VR. Things like the Activator, Sega Action chair and consoles jammed into other consoles/devices/computers. Plenty of other companies are innovative, I just think most of them lack Sega's sheer crazyness for releasing absolutely every idea they think of into the market.

I can imagine the board room meetings -

'How about the Sega Pogo Stick? It works like a controller for platformers. You bounce on the pogo stick and then the character will jump over holes/obstacles'

'You're a genius! here, take this wad of cash!'

'How about the Sega..'

'You're a genius! here, take this wad of cash!'

'Which way is it to the toilets?'

'You're a genius! here, take this wad of cash!'

Retr0gamer

I wish Sega would release the Seaman games on the new consoles. I want to teach my pet fish to talk.

amacachi

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emAZL77hkmM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfxaiZKGAC8

Dozen Wicked Words

o1s1n wrote: »

I don't just mean VR. Things like the Activator, Sega Action chair and consoles jammed into other consoles/devices/computers. Plenty of other companies are innovative, I just think most of them lack Sega's sheer crazyness for releasing absolutely every idea they think of into the market.

Case in point? :pac::pac:

CiDeRmAn

It took me ages to get a maracas set for my Samba and even then I had to settle for a 3rd party set!
But isn't this the most bonkers controller ever?


And this is the worst controller ever, it simply doesn't work, tries to injure you when you use it, really hurts the thumbs,


But this controller is awesome, perhaps even stupendous!

o1s1n

Steel Batalion has nothing on the Sega Action Chair for bonkers controllers!

pdbhp

o1s1n wrote: »

Steel Batalion has nothing on the Sega Action Chair for bonkers controllers!

looks easy to get out of!!

Dozen Wicked Words

o1s1n wrote: »

Steel Batalion has nothing on the Sega Action Chair for bonkers controllers!

I think that chair has featured in "specialist gentlemens" :eek: videos. Looks horrific!

DinoRex

dooferoaks wrote: »

Case in point? :pac::pac:

Sigh. Unfortunately dinos lose out to monkeys when it comes to maraca operation.

littlejp

I had a Tapwave Zodiac for a few years but I have since sold it. Was pretty cool. Really good video playback. Was able to put episodes of TV shows on it and watch them on the train.
There's a huge online community based around this machine bringing out lots of neat software for it. I even found a SNES emulator which worked very well.
Kinda regret selling this on now

Syferus

I got a GBA Micro off eBay about 18 months ago. The most surprising thing about it is the quality of the unit, almost unique for a handheld in that it the shell is most some sort of metal or metal composite. It's dinky and not completely comfortable but the smaller - and fantastic - screen means GBA games look spectacular on it.

It was one last push to get some GBA sales - announced over six months after the DS had been released - and I think the write up there is a big disingenuous as painting it as not succeeding as I'm sure the sales weren't far off Nintendo's expectations. It was Nintendo hedging their bets in case the DS flopped, but when it took off there was no need to continue pushing a revision of the GBA.

EDIT: Wooh nelly. I didn't check how many pages were in this thread before posting - the above is in reference to the OP, if it's not clear.

CiDeRmAn

I have to say the GBA micro is a remarkable machine, I believe the idea was to produce a gameboy that would compare with the mobile phone games that seemed to be about to take over.
I know they made it at exactly the wrong time, as games for the system were cancelled all over the place.
Beautiful screen though.

pdbhp

I'm glad this has turned into the GBA micro love-in thread:D
The micro was a victim of it's release date, IMO it wouldn't have sold so bad if it was realesed 6 months earlier sure the internet was buzzing when they announced it and I for one was really excited about it.
I have and will always have a soft spot for that machine it is totally awesome, the screen just blew me away when I first got mine it is so bright and crispy clear and if it got scratched up all you had to do was buy a new faceplate:)
As for the control layout it is by far the best D-pad ever and the buttons will take a serious mashing and never complain.
There is no better console to enjoy the Mario series of games on either it's like Nintendo made it especially for them games, I found that when I started playing Mario 4/SMB3 I could just blast through the levels.

On reflection of this post I believe I've caught the ghey for the GBA micro
see what I did there:p

o1s1n

It's so bloody small too. And the battery seems to last forever. Great machine alright. And when you combine it with a flash card it's mental to think so many games are ready to go on such a small device.

pdbhp

o1s1n wrote: »

It's so bloody small too. And the battery seems to last forever. Great machine alright. And when you combine it with a flash card it's mental to think so many games are ready to go on such a small device.

True the battery refuses to die which is great for on the go gaming.
I have a flash card for the GBA but it wont work on the micro for some reason:(
Still though the micro is a totally amazing piece of kit and shall remain my favourite handheld ever!

Retr0gamer

I'm still kicking myself that I never picked one up when smyths were selling them for 20 euro.

pdbhp

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I'm still kicking myself that I never picked one up when smyths were selling them for 20 euro.

I have 2 of them and if I ever see them at the correct price I'll snap one up again as they're fantastic

ghostchant

I compulsively buy them on sight, have 5 of them now, including the lovely famicom one, bought it sealed in a gamestop in the states a year and a half ago, where it had been sitting unloved for 4 years

o1s1n

Boxed Famicom ones sell for a nice tidy sum on ebay these days. The faceplate on mine has some knocks on it. It's a good thing in a way though, as it means I don't feel as bad using the thing :pac:

CiDeRmAn

I have a pink one here somewhere, picked it up...
May part with with it someday....

My flashcard works fine, but holds few GBA games.
Holds tons of Gameboy games though, and they don't natively run on a GBmicro, so thats cool!

o1s1n

The flash card I got for mine doesn't have an internal memory..it just had a slot for micro SD carts. 2gb can fit a hell of a lot of GBA games

Dealextreme sold them for a while but I think they may be gone by now.

pdbhp

My flash card holds about 5 GBA games even though it says its 256mb:D holds literally hundereds of gameboy games though which is nice, the main issue is I have to write all the roms to it and that takes a few minutes, oh and it needs a new battery but I'm too lazy to change it

Myrddin

I want a Gameboy Micro

o1s1n

pdbhp wrote: »

My flash card holds about 5 GBA games even though it says its 256mb:D holds literally hundereds of gameboy games though which is nice, the main issue is I have to write all the roms to it and that takes a few minutes, oh and it needs a new battery but I'm too lazy to change it

Ah, you see flash memory is measured in bits, not bytes.

So that's 256Mb(bits) not 256MB(bytes)...the difference being one has a small b and the other a large B.

8 bits in a byte. So to find out how much space is really on it (!) devide by 8.

So it's a 32MB flash cart. 5gba games sounds about right.

EnterNow wrote: »

I want a Gameboy Micro

They really are lovely. A standard one shouldn't cost too much. The flash cards are a bit harder to hunt down though.