Game Boy

Lore & Background

The Game Boy was designed by Nintendo Research & Development 1 (R&D1), the team behind the Mario Bros. and Donkey Kong arcade games and the successful Game & Watch series. By 1983, sales of Game & Watch in Japan had begun to decline, pressuring R&D1 to innovate. Division director Gunpei Yokoi informed R&D1 on June 10, 1987, that Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi wanted a successor to Game & Watch priced under ¥10,000. The project was codenamed Dot Matrix Game (DMG), later reflected in the model number DMG-01.

Within R&D1, Yokoi championed a design philosophy that eschewed cutting-edge technology in favor of innovative uses of mature technologies. This led to clashes with assistant director Satoru Okada, who pushed for a more powerful system with interchangeable cartridges—essentially a portable NES. Yokoi eventually relented, approving Okada's vision. The team chose a Sharp CPU, and Okada personally developed the Game Link Cable technology, enabling multiplayer connectivity and data transfer. The Game Boy also retained the Game & Watch D-pad.

Early in development, R&D1 evaluated dot-matrix displays from Sharp but found them unsuitable. They approached several companies; Citizen offered a monochrome screen for ¥1,000, which the team accepted following Yokoi's philosophy. However, Yamauchi canceled the Citizen deal and awarded the contract to Sharp. Sharp's unpreparedness caused delays, and early prototypes with low-quality twisted nematic screens sparked internal mockery, with some calling the project 'DameGame' (hopeless). Yamauchi canceled the project in summer 1988, but Yokoi continued refining the display. He secured a super-twisted nematic (STN) display prototype from Sharp, and three months later, Yamauchi approved the console for sale, though the target price of ¥10,000 was not met.

Reader's Guide

The Game Boy's significance lies in its market dominance and lasting impact on handheld gaming. Despite its monochromatic display and technical limitations drawing criticism, the Game Boy's low price, long battery life, and extensive game library drove strong sales worldwide. In North America and Europe, it was backed by a large marketing campaign and bundled with Tetris, which increased its appeal beyond traditional video game audiences. The success of Nintendo's Pokémon series helped maintain its popularity late into the 1990s.

Nintendo released multiple redesigns, including the smaller Game Boy Pocket (1996) and the Japan-exclusive, backlit Game Boy Light (1998). Nintendo continued to support the Game Boy following the 1998 release of the Game Boy Color (GBC). The Game Boy is forward compatible with many GBC games, while the GBC and its 2001 successor, the Game Boy Advance, are backward compatible with Game Boy games. The Game Boy and GBC sold an estimated 118.69 million combined. They were the bestselling console at the time of their discontinuation in 2003, and remain the fourth-bestselling console as of 2025. Journalists credit the Game Boy with establishing handheld gaming as a mass-market category and for introducing video games to a generation of players.

Did You Know?

• The Game Boy was codenamed Dot Matrix Game (DMG), reflected in its model number DMG-01.
• Satoru Okada personally developed the Game Link Cable technology, which later enabled Pokémon's battle and trade mechanics.
• The project was nearly canceled after president Hiroshi Yamauchi deemed a prototype's display too poor, but Gunpei Yokoi continued development in defiance.
• The Game Boy and Game Boy Color sold an estimated 118.69 million units combined, making them the bestselling console at the time of discontinuation.