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Forums - Nintendo Discussion - Best Nintendo handheld

 

I think the best is...

Gameboy 3 4.55%
 
Gameboy Advance 13 19.70%
 
DS 30 45.45%
 
3DS 20 30.30%
 
Total:66
Thechalkblock on 19 May 2020

the switch is the obvious answer here, but if it’s excluded... i’ll go with the gba. it’d be easy to make a case for any of them though.



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Jumpin on 19 May 2020
curl-6 said:
d21lewis said:

It still had a "wow factor", though. Even though I had a Vita, the 3DS held its own. I guess, even though it was around GameCube level in power, it felt fairly modern. 

-The original Gameboy offered crappy 2D at a time when we were used to great 2D games at home.

-The GBA offered great 2D at as time when we were playing good 3D games at home.

-The DS offered crappy/good pixelated 2D/3D at a time when we had great 3D at home.

-The 3DS offered great 3D experiences at a time when we had great 3D experiences at home.

I enjoyed all of them but 3DS just made me feel like we'd finally arrived.

Well, for most of 3DS's life we were playing 8th gen games at home while 3DS essentially offered 6th gen graphics on the go.

Also, I don't find his assessment to be accurate as to where the handhelds fit in their respective generations: Gameboy, GBA, and DS all offered the best handheld experiences of their generation, the 3DS was the only major Nintendo handheld that didn't, since it fell behind iOS in terms of offering compelling software; and the sharp decline in handheld sales reflect this.

The Switch, while not a pure handheld (it's a handheld/home console hybrid) took Nintendo hardware back to the top of handheld gaming, compelling software availability has resulted in a sharp increase over 3DS for Switch hardware.

The Switch isn't perfect, it misses out on top quality casual experiences - including Nintendo's own titles in the genre, like Fire Emblem Heroes - but that is mainly because of the lack of a proper pipeline of approval and implementation for these games, it's something that can come in the future with new updates, though they should wait for new hardware (a glass capacitive touchscreen with a higher tap density would help). Of course, Switch MUCH more than makes up for this omission with games like Breath of the Wild, Mario Kart 8, and Animal Crossing... which, in a way, is Nintendo exploring the casual games genre with one of the highest quality casual games (if not the highest quality casual game) ever created.



I describe myself as a little dose of toxic masculinity.

theRepublic on 19 May 2020
RolStoppable said:
curl-6 said:

Yeah I was surprised to see a mere 2 votes for the original Gameboy given its iconic status.

It could be that the audience here started gaming in later generations and never owned one, or simply that some folks feel it hasn't aged well. I'm not a handheld guy but NES for example I rate fairly low as despite it revolutionizing gaming I feel it's aged poorly.

You got it right, curl.

This is a single answer poll, so the Game Boy suffers from it because later handheld consoles had more refined and polished games, just like the NES would suffer in the same kind of poll. If it was possible to tick multiple boxes in the poll, the Game Boy would fare a lot better.

The Game Boy could barely handle ports of NES games which is why they weren't done until the GBC revision; before then, developers opted to design games specifically for the GB's restrictions, but those games released at a time when home consoles were already 16-bit. The GBA and later handhelds could handle ports of SNES games which have maintained a reputation of being timeless classics, so at that point it's a lot less important that concurrent home consoles had much better technology to offer.

The other issue is that the GBA had backwards compatibility, so it could play every Game Boy and Game Boy Color game.  Why bother voting for the Game Boy in that case?  You get the complete library with the GBA.



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Jizz_Beard_thePirate on 19 May 2020

I have decided on my choice. It's the 3ds cause you can view tits in 3d fap fap fap



                  

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d21lewis on 19 May 2020
Jumpin said:
curl-6 said:

Well, for most of 3DS's life we were playing 8th gen games at home while 3DS essentially offered 6th gen graphics on the go.

Also, I don't find his assessment to be accurate as to where the handhelds fit in their respective generations: Gameboy, GBA, and DS all offered the best handheld experiences of their generation, the 3DS was the only major Nintendo handheld that didn't, since it fell behind iOS in terms of offering compelling software; and the sharp decline in handheld sales reflect this.

The Switch, while not a pure handheld (it's a handheld/home console hybrid) took Nintendo hardware back to the top of handheld gaming, compelling software availability has resulted in a sharp increase over 3DS for Switch hardware.

The Switch isn't perfect, it misses out on top quality casual experiences - including Nintendo's own titles in the genre, like Fire Emblem Heroes - but that is mainly because of the lack of a proper pipeline of approval and implementation for these games, it's something that can come in the future with new updates, though they should wait for new hardware (a glass capacitive touchscreen with a higher tap density would help). Of course, Switch MUCH more than makes up for this omission with games like Breath of the Wild, Mario Kart 8, and Animal Crossing... which, in a way, is Nintendo exploring the casual games genre with one of the highest quality casual games (if not the highest quality casual game) ever created.

It's all just opinions. 🤗

I've only owned Nintendo handhelds until Sony made their play at the market. I wouldn't say Nintendo ever offered the best experience (aside from GBA) but they offered the best games for the best price and the best battery life until the 3DS.

I'm a big fan of features, too. Maybe that's part of my problem. I don't know. But with all of the useless little features that the 3DS offered (Nintendo video, Netflix, AR games, Spot Pass, Miiverse, and more), I always felt like I needed my 3DS with me, even if I wasn't playing games.



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Kaio_felipe on 04 June 2020

I really like 3DS (remakes of two Zelda games from N64, first generation of 3D Pokémon games, Smash Bros., great Virtual Console etc.) and GBA (it was like a revival of SNES, and thanks to it I discovered Tactics Ogre), but DS had an amazing catalogue (the biggest number of Pokémon games for one single console, Chrono Trigger, The World Ends With You, one of my favourite Mario Kart games etc.) and - at least until DS Lite - it had the backward compatibility for GBA, so it was two handhelds for the price of one.

Last edited by Kaio_felipe - on 05 June 2020

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Jumpin on 04 June 2020
theRepublic said:
RolStoppable said:

You got it right, curl.

This is a single answer poll, so the Game Boy suffers from it because later handheld consoles had more refined and polished games, just like the NES would suffer in the same kind of poll. If it was possible to tick multiple boxes in the poll, the Game Boy would fare a lot better.

The Game Boy could barely handle ports of NES games which is why they weren't done until the GBC revision; before then, developers opted to design games specifically for the GB's restrictions, but those games released at a time when home consoles were already 16-bit. The GBA and later handhelds could handle ports of SNES games which have maintained a reputation of being timeless classics, so at that point it's a lot less important that concurrent home consoles had much better technology to offer.

The other issue is that the GBA had backwards compatibility, so it could play every Game Boy and Game Boy Color game.  Why bother voting for the Game Boy in that case?  You get the complete library with the GBA.

Because GB could play GB games in 1990, GBA, not until 2001.



I describe myself as a little dose of toxic masculinity.