Tag: 1989 Page 1 of 2

– 1989 –

An index of all Game Boy releases for the year 1989.

Game Boy World 1989 (revised print edition)

The first book compiling articles and photography of all Game Boy releases has been revised into a larger format to better match up with upcoming volumes. (1990 Vol. 1…

Master Karateka

Master Karateka The final Game Boy release for 1989 was also, fittingly, one of the final games released in the 1980s. In many ways, it makes for a neat summary…

The Sword of Hope

The second RPG ever released for Game Boy was even more unconventional than The Final Fantasy Legend. Square’s game at least adheres to the general structure and format…

Boomer’s Adventure in Asmik World

The vexing thing about Boomer’s Adventure in Asmik World is that, while it’s a perfectly entertaining action puzzler in its own right, it’s best described in terms of a…

Q Billion

Nobody loves Seta. In the annals of gaming history, Seta is one of those easily-forgotten little guys. They never published a timeless classic, but neither do any of their…

Battleship

  A popular trick among Western video game publishers during the late ’80s and early ’90s in particular was to buy up a popular license — whether for a toy,…

Fist of the North Star: 10 Big Brawls for the King of the Universe

Here’s what you need to know about Fist of the North Star, if you’re unfamiliar with the concept: It’s based heavily on the Road Warrior/Mad Max movies. And…

Shogi

Shogi was the third Game Boy release to revolve around an endemic Japanese pastime, and the third Game Boy release never to see a release in the West. It’s…

The Final Fantasy Legend

Kawazu: The man, the myth, the legend Akitoshi Kawazu may be my all-time favorite video game auteur. He’s not your typical Hideo Kojima or David Cage, though — no film-obsessed…

Golf

The testament of a great game: Even if you don’t care about the subject matter or genre, a player can still appreciate its quality and refinement. So it goes…

Kwirk

When you think of Atlus, you obviously think of the Shin Megami Tensei games, or maybe just Persona, or — if you are a righteous and god-fearing human…

Malibu Beach Volleyball

Volleyball is one of the worst possible sports you can turn into a video game. That’s probably why there are so few of them; to the best of…

Castlevania: The Adventure

Back in the ’80s and early ’90s, no series could sell me on a platform like Castlevania. I loved the NES trilogy, and when early screens of sequels…

Revenge of the Gator

In the early days of the Game Boy, one of the biggest challenges facing developers was the question of how ambitious to make their games. Portable gaming, new…

Hyper Lode Runner: The Labyrinth of Doom

How circular gaming has become. Over the past couple of decades, portable and PC gaming have essentially existed on opposite ends of the medium’s total spectrum; handheld systems…

Motocross Maniacs

To be realistic about it, there were only so many ways you could make a racing game in the days before true 3D graphics came around: Top-down, isometric,…

The Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle

Nyeah, what’s up, doc? Released in September 1989 in Japan, The Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle stands as the Game Boy’s first licensed release (that is, the first to…

Boxxle

The classic puzzle game Soukoban has gone by many names here in America as it’s seen release by countless publishers hoping to put a unique face on the same idea…

Shanghai

It took a couple of months, but we finally have the first third-party release for Game Boy… though only just barely. These days, Shanghai publisher HAL Laboratory is…

Tetris

So. Tetris. Has any game ever defined a platform so clearly? Wii Sports, probably. Possibly Halo. But Tetris didn’t merely move systems – though it certainly did that – it established…

Tennis

Nintendo is not simply some monolithic entity when it comes to the actual creation of games. There is no slab-like “Nintendo” object that stamps out games on an assembly line. (Also,…

Alleyway

You can see the Game Boy’s roots in the Game & Watch series on clear display in Nintendo’s first generation of releases for the system, and nowhere more…

Yakuman

When Game Boy launched in Japan, it arrived with four games (each sold separately, of course). Most of them made their way to the West – as did…