I’ve just rediscovered my childhood Gameboys, I grew up in the 90s and had an original, a color, an advance and an sp. My game collection has whittled down over the year to the usual suspects, Pokemons, Zelda’s, Mario’s and some other standards. But I want to dive into some games that 7 year old me would have brushed over. So what’s your favorite game?
Wario land, Metroid 2, Donkey Kong 94 are all great
I second this! Donkey Kong 94 is a must play, and I feel like Wario is the true Game Boy mascot.
Mole Mania also deserves a shout out. Another Shigeru Miyamoto game that gets even better on the Super Game Boy.
I second Metroid 2. Fantastic isolation game and pretty disturbing too.
Buncha youngins with your GBAs.
My favourite OG gameboy game was Kirby’s Dream Land. Played and replayed it many times. Even had one of those attachments to magnify it and light up the screen when it got dark :)
I highly recommend Pleasant Dreams: The Welcoming Play of Kirby’s Dream Land. I got it in one of the mega Itch.io charity bundles and was intrigued. It was the highlight of the bundle for me, unexpectedly.
I’d never played Kirby’s Dream Land, but I loaded it up the next chance I got, and Couture nailed it. It’s an absolutely perfect introduction to gaming for non-gamers.
Ooh thanks for pointing it out. Looks like I have it from a bundle too, haha. I will give it a read.
I remember the day I got my worm light for the gbc. Everyone was peasants.
I still have mine! Found it the other day
I was also going to say MMBN, but since that’s been said, I’ll say Golden Sun. Loved both of those games to death.
Breath of Fire 1 and 2 are also great (although technically SNES ports).
Golden Sun is my all-time favorite! I wish I could relive the thill I felt for the first and second games
Same here! They made a DS one as a third installment, but the story leaves off in the middle, and the sense of awe just isn’t there. Not the same anyway as 1&2. Especially 2, when you [SPOILER] play the “bad” guys
The GBA castlevania games own
I bought the various flavors of Gameboy just to play the slew of those games.
Advance Wars for GBA was up there for me (below any Zelda game). I’ve got my eyes on the Switch remake, but holding until I can find it on sale.
would be the perfect phone game with asynchronous turns
Seriously, it would be great for mobile. I played the OG ones using a GBA emulator but I want more Advanced Wars
I’d say were as likely to get advance wars as we are a Super Mario RPG remaster, but I guess you never know these days.
Wargroove 2 is coming out soon.
That said, while good, it doesn’t capture some of that Advance Wars magic. Losing commander abilities in the first game was a bummer.
I do have a copy of this kicking around. It was my brothers and I never played it. I’ll have to give it a go!
I would recommend that you check out Golden Sun.
Gosh! This takes me back! What a great game!
I saw this thread and immediately felt the need to recommend this game as well! was one of the only games I had the guidebook for as a kid. one of my favorite games for the gameboy.
@NoHardshipInPancakes Link’s Awakening is still my favorite game of all time. I got stuck on the second dungeon for literal years because I didn’t put together that you had to defeat enemies in a specific order to get the boss key. That was way before the Internet had every answer to every question. 😋
It was the first game I got when I was quite young, I played it every year and got little farther each time as my brain developed. I couldn’t beat it until highschool!
You are not alone. Any time a thread brings that game up there’s someone like us who got stuck there because that’s literally the only dungeon in the entire franchise that requires you to defeat enemies in a specific way based on lore that isn’t provided to you by the game. Not even in the manual does it say “This is a stalfos, this is a Pol’s voice, this is a keese.” I found out through an old NES Zelda manual, that does give names and pictures of the enemies - ten years after my initial romp through bottle grotto.
@LoamImprovement Right?? I collected *so* many shells with Bow-wow as a result though. “WOOF *dig* WOOF”.
Big yes! Fantastic game for the time and still holds up today. Surprised i had to scroll down this far… ;)
I know you mentioned Zelda, but there were actually a ton of pretty good Zelda games like Oracle of Ages/Seasons. Advance Wars was pretty fun. Golden Sun too. I also have to agree with MMBN from the other commenters.
Oracle of ages/seasons was waaaay too hard. I tried to play it as a kid, got stuck, and gave up very early on. As an adult, I decided to come back to it just to see what I missed out on. Still had to check guides a few times and abused save states.
I can’t remember the details, but there was some kinds puzzle or something that depended on sound and my adult, hearing impaired self could not complete it without save states galore.
I can’t believe I’m the first person to mention Link’s Awakening in this thread. Still one of my favorite Zelda games. It’s bizarre quirkiness felt just like all the strange aberrations that manifest in dreams.
I had such a hard time with the game cause it took me like 20 hours to find the sword, I was like 8 or maybe 9 years old and it was my first zelda game I played… gave up a bunch until I found the sword…
I had a frickin blast playing golden sun such a fun game!!!
If I could wipe one game from my mind just to replay it, it would be the golden sun series. That’s stayed easily in my top five for almost twenty years now. 90% sure the kolima forest music was even the first mp3 I ever downloaded. Also the first game I ever saw where at least some of the actions you took made a difference to the overall world. If you don’t care enough to save certain NPCs, they canonically just die.
Final fantasy Tactics Advance and Fire Emblem the Sacred Stones
The only thing I disliked about Tactics Advance was I felt like they really cheaped out on Ritz’s plot. I’m thinking maybe it comes off better in the context of a japanese culture where standing out like she does really IS culturally frowned upon, but it made very little sense to me in the west and I still feel like she got done dirty. Everyone else has a really good reason to stay, Doned doesn’t have functional legs, and she’s complaining about her hair.
Other than that one single thing, yeah, still one of the best games I’ve played. I’ve never seen a game tackle it from that angle before or since.
Yeah! I’ve seen a lot of people give it some undeserved grief but I agree, it’s a fantastic game! Totally agree with you about Ritz.
Never sleep on Wario land
- Metroid II is one of my favorite games of all time.
- Mega Man: Dr. Wily’s Revenge and Operation C are both highly polished and fun, but quite challenging.
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Fall of the Foot Clan is a relatively easy, short, polished action game.
- Kirby’s Dream Land is my favorite game in the series. And if you think it’s too easy, turn on Extra Game mode. It will wreck you, I promise. ;)
- Ninja Gaiden Shadow and Castlevania II: Belmont’s Revenge are amazingly polished challenging but fair action games.
Every game I mentioned has excellent music, is an original game (not a port), and I have played in their entirety again and again throughout the years.
Let me know if you’re looking for a genre other than an action game. XD
Dragon Warrior Monsters for the Gameboy Color was fantastic. It was somewhat similar to pokemon, but had some features that pokemon didn’t get for several iterations, like having your monsters follow you around, monster breeding, and multi-monster fighting.
Magi Nation was also good, similar vein to both of them, but felt darker in tone. Although maybe that’s just how it seemed to a much younger me.
I’m so happy you mentioned Magi Nation. I just replayed that game not too long ago and still had a blast with it, though I def had nostalgia goggles on. lol
I had completely forgotten about this game until you just mentioned it. But wow I played this so much it was fantastic.
I remember getting another dragon warrior game and being confused why it wasn’t at all like Pokémon (was more of a jrpg party building game)
If you’re playing Gameboy specifically, and not including Advanced, then I played a ton of Marble Madness. I never beat it, but it is pretty fun physics-y platformer.
If you are including Advanced, then Metroid Fusion is a classic. Atmospheric, and beautiful sprite work. Genuinely scary in parts, and leads right into Dread if you like the gameplay.
Advance Wars
Golden Sun and its sequel, Golden Sun: The Lost Age. Easily my two GBA favourites.
Golden Sun and Fire Emblem were pretty much all I needed.
