Feature: More Than Just Pokémon – Japan’s Secret World Of Game Boy Color

Hidden handheld happiness.

The Game Boy Color was the immensely popular home of a wide range of handheld classics, from multi-million sellers such as Pokémon Gold and Silver and Link’s Awakening DX to the now painfully expensive Metal Gear Solid, not to mention the non-Color original Game Boy library it played, too. Its international success and huge user base ensured the entire gaming industry was willing and able to supply players of the portable with an endless stream of high quality titles, including a staggering selection of oft-forgotten Japanese exclusives.

Some of these were lavish handheld extensions of preexisting console series: as we all now know, Nintendo’s handhelds are the perfect home for a game like Shiren the Wanderer, and Shiren the Wanderer GB2 (not to be confused with the similarly titled Shiren the Wanderer 2) is no exception. From the sweeping desert sands of the intro to the animated monsters Shiren must learn to deal with inside the twisting labyrinths, the game never looks anything less than stunning on the hardware, and as anyone familiar with this longstanding roguelike would expect, Shiren GB2’s a moreish adventure filled with sneaky traps and terrifying monster houses that was very well-received at the time and was once again when its (again, Japan only) DS remake appeared in 2008.

Read the full article on nintendolife.com

Hidden handheld happiness.

The Game Boy Color was the immensely popular home of a wide range of handheld classics, from multi-million sellers such as Pokémon Gold and Silver and Link’s Awakening DX to the now painfully expensive Metal Gear Solid, not to mention the non-Color original Game Boy library it played, too. Its international success and huge user base ensured the entire gaming industry was willing and able to supply players of the portable with an endless stream of high quality titles, including a staggering selection of oft-forgotten Japanese exclusives.

Some of these were lavish handheld extensions of preexisting console series: as we all now know, Nintendo’s handhelds are the perfect home for a game like Shiren the Wanderer, and Shiren the Wanderer GB2 (not to be confused with the similarly titled Shiren the Wanderer 2) is no exception. From the sweeping desert sands of the intro to the animated monsters Shiren must learn to deal with inside the twisting labyrinths, the game never looks anything less than stunning on the hardware, and as anyone familiar with this longstanding roguelike would expect, Shiren GB2’s a moreish adventure filled with sneaky traps and terrifying monster houses that was very well-received at the time and was once again when its (again, Japan only) DS remake appeared in 2008.

Read the full article on nintendolife.com

* This article was originally published here