All Things Great and Portable

I'm going to take this opportunity to express my love for all things portable! This isn't a tonne of reviews, it's simply the story of my experiences and desires with portable gaming machines. Ever since I first lay hands upon my very own Gameboy Colour I fell in love with portable gaming!

There have been so many incredible pocket-sized machines produced since the release of 'my first' fully portable gaming device, the Gameboy Colour, it's staggering to think how much has changed...

The headaches I brought upon myself from solidly playing Pokemon Red under my covers (with my bendy light attatchment of course!) would be enough to put any normal nine year old off gaming forever, but I powered through! And I'm glad I did, that level 99 Pidgeot serves me to this day!

I wasn't lucky enough to own one of the super awesome first gen Gameboy Advance, I hadn't finished with my Gameboy Colour yet! (Pokemon games are just timeless...) But I did manage to pick up a Gameboy Advance SP on release day. Along with, would you guess it? Pokemon Ruby! Now this beast served me for many years, and took rather a beating being taken to and from school. The back light was a much needed addition that lead to even more playtime under the covers! (No pun intended)

The next announcement from Nintendo in 2003 revealed something innovative, different and gosh darn beautiful! Or so I thought, perhaps I was blinded by my love affair with portable consoles... But the DS didn't quite live up to promises made by the leaked images (will I ever learn?). Still, I received my American import of the DS that Christmas, and couldn't have been happier! (Even though I was stuck with nothing but the Metroid Hunters demo for at least 3 months) As soon as Mario 64 DS came through, I started realising that what I really wanted in a handheld was a simple emulator to play all those classic games I grew up with...

Upon the release of the Sony PsP in 2005 I had become a diehard DS fan, and the thought of owning a 'chavy' psp was laughable. The moment I saw one in action, I knew what I was missing! But the pricing was rather ridiculous, which resulted in my not buying one until 2007 for the meager price of £25 from eBay (The old Phat model mind you, after the slim models had been released). I proceeded to enable homebrew apps and fired up the Daedelus N64 emulator, to my suprise it was in fact playable! Barely... However using PoPsLoader I was able to relive original titles from the Ps1 like Final Fantasy XIII and IX, Vagrant Story, Monster Rancher, Little Big Adventure (You'll probably hear me reference this game rather a lot) and quite a few other brilliant but nearly forgotten games.

So, I've got a PsP that can run my favourite N64, GBA, GBC, SNES and Sega Megadrive games with no effort other than switching SD cards involved, with a library of 50+ games on each card. But my craving for more portable games consoles grew ever larger, and the sub-par framerate of the N64 emulator was rather frustrating. But the PsP was the most powerful handheld on the market, totally overshadowing the DS in terms of game quality and ease of use (That analogue stick was a much needed godsend). With the release of the PsP Go and the promise of a slightly faster processor, higher resolution, a more robust analogue stick and the icing on the cake - even more compact! Luckily, my girlfriend saw the glint in my eye, and bought me one for my birthday!

I still use the PsP Go near enough every day now, mostly replaying old Ps1 games (which is essentially all I want the system for anyway). A lot of these games are just plain better than the newer releases, especially for the PsP. Impressive high budget games for this console have somewhat disappeared in the past 12 months or so. Still, the Ps Vita is set to wow everyone, and I don't expect that to be an overstatement.

The latest itteration of Nintendo's DS was a near enough instant buy for me. I was most likely sucked in like most other early adopters of the 3DS with the promise of old games being re-mastered and re-released. To myself, the 3D feature was just a bonus. "The day that I can play Ocarina of Time (flawlessly) on the train will be the day I never need another handheld gaming device!" I used to say... Let alone in 3D! Well that day has been and gone, and indeed I dare say I will never need another handheld gaming device. But that doesn't mean to say I won't be running out on release day and purchasing the PS Vita to add to my handheld family.

The truth is, every second of my life I have to spare is taken up by gaming of some kind; and what's cooler than whipping out a 3 inch screen and cracking on with some? Nothing, that's what. With each and every new portable console that is released, I fill up with excitement just like I did in PC World when I was nine. It's a brilliant feeling I'll tell you now, and it's something that I'll never forget.



So that's my life in the form of portable gaming machines! And I'll leave you with yet another quote from inside the gaming industry -

                                         "Do weird and difficult things."

              -Masaya Matsuura (Musician and Games Designer on games such as - Major Minor's Majestic March on Wii)

Finally: I didn't include mention of iPhones, iPods or iPads for the same reasons I didn't include comments on the Samsung Galaxy, Xperia Play or Motorola Xoom - They are not dedicated gaming machines. However much I love my iPhone, and the incredible games pumped into the App Store, I don't believe they deserve a position in the handheld gaming machine family... Yet.

Thanks for your valuable time, you beautiful people.