Chapter 1
The spark in your pocket
Chapter 2
The grey brick that conquered the world
Chapter 3
The double screen and the power trip
Chapter 4
The modern hybrid revolution
Ch 2 · The grey brick that conquered the world
nintendo The durable, low-priced device used a green-tinted, non-backlit screen to run for 30 hours on four AA batteries.
Quiz
How many hours of battery life could the original 1989 Nintendo Game Boy achieve on four AA batteries?
nintendo Nintendo bundled the Soviet puzzle game with the Game Boy to hook adult players.
Quiz
Who was the Soviet software engineer who originally created the puzzle game Tetris in 1984?
Quiz
Which publisher traveled to Moscow in 1989 to secure the handheld rights of Tetris for Nintendo?
Fun Fact
Game Boy spaceflight: Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Serebrov took his Nintendo Game Boy to space on the Mir TM-17 mission in 1993.
Quiz
What major hardware drawback prevented the Sega Game Gear from defeating the monochrome Game Boy?
Quiz
Which 1989 handheld was the first ever to feature a color liquid-crystal display (LCD) screen?
Glossary
game boy (noun)
A handheld electronic console designed for playing video games. Nintendo released this iconic portable system in 1989, bundling it with the popular puzzle game Tetris.
A handheld electronic console designed for playing video games. Nintendo released this iconic portable system in 1989, bundling it with the popular puzzle game Tetris.
Quiz
Which award did the creators of Tamagotchi win in 1997 for diverting millions of hours of human work into virtual pets?