I organize my ROMs by release year and put hardware releases product codes in parentheses.
NPK is Neogeopocket. I like how WonderSwan product code went from SW to WSC, to SCT for swancrystal.
SHVC-XX is the Super Gameboy & Super Game Boy 2, which used Super Famicom product codes, somewhat to my dismay.
After doing this, it becomes clear that 1997 was a good year for Gameboy Pocket owners. SNK and Bandai tried to get in on the Gameboy Pocket tech and each had to release color hardware within a year. Poor lil guys.
Not pictured:
- 2001 (AGB, DOL)
- 2002 (SCT) which had like 3 games release for GBC, one of which was Shantae, hahah
What a time to be alive. GBC didn’t fall off completely until just 3 years before the PSP would be released. Shortly after that, around 2009 is when “Retro Games” became a thing and Gameboy obsession started to hit the mainstream. That’s my own anecdotal perspective, cause I was there, and I was really into it before that and saw it becoming a thing.
Now we’ve come full circle, big time. Not gonna gripe about that.
For how prominent gameboy has been in my life, you’d think I’d have organized my ROMs like this by now, but nope! I think the first console I had organized by year was GBA.
There was a whole 5 years between the release of GBC and the Gameboy Player that consumers had no way of playing their GBC games on TV, Pokémon crystal being the sole exception using Pokémon Stadium 2. That was also how many years the DMG was out before Super Gameboy released. Useless info!
Thought it was interesting to post here since I went as far as to include non related products like Swan and NPK. Part of why I can’t say this is anything but my personal preferred organization is because it’s up to the individual to decide where to draw the line as to what other consoles they feel are relevant to remember when choosing a ROM.
I wanna be reminded every time I play a GBC game from 2001 that it is the year fricking 2001, GBA and WSC GCN were happening and so was FFX. Crap do I need to add ATARI LYNX? Nah
I wanna be reminded that ‘99 was IM NOT BOY times as well.
It’s also crazy seeing SNK’s pre-NPK attempts at portable fighting game ports.
