Marcel Winatschek

Game Boy, Again

Five euros at a flea market, years ago, got me a Game Boy with Tetris on it. I don’t regret that purchase for a second. That gray box is still a time machine. Super Mario Land, Link’s Awakening, Pokémon—stuff that holds up.

The SmartBoy is an iPhone case that turns your phone into a Game Boy. You slot in cartridge modules and play Metroid II, Gargoyle’s Quest, Harvest Moon on your current device. The appeal is immediate.

But you’re carrying your iPhone and a thick Game Boy case. Both devices. The actual Game Boy is thinner. You could carry the original instead. I don’t entirely see the logic, though the draw is obvious—playing these games without needing to dig out old hardware. It’s a compromise that makes sense if you want everything on one device. The real fix would be Nintendo releasing these games on iOS, something they should’ve done years ago. Until then, the SmartBoy exists as a workaround.