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 |  |  | | | | Neo Geo Pocket VS Game Boy Color
A Portable Game Fanatic's Opinion
By Jason Cirillo
 | It was a pleasant spring day in Yokohama…and it would be the beginning of a torturous dilemma…it was the day I bought my Neo Geo Pocket Color. Since then, I feel I've come to a definite decision…but at that time, I just couldn't make up my mind…which system was better? Thus, we come to the showdown of the ages: The Neo Geo Pocket vs. The Game Boy Color.
First, we'll look at the facts. The GBC system uses an 8-bit processor, and the NGPC uses 16-bit. Both systems have a reflective color, TFT display. The display of the NGPC is slightly bigger, and can display twice as many on-screen colors at a time than the GBC, though recently we have seen breakthrough coding which allows 2000+ colors to be displayed on the GBC.
The NGPC has built in Calendar, Time, Alarm and Horoscope functions as well as a multilingual option for most games (English and Japanese) while the GBC has none of the features.
Given all these facts, one would probably guess that I have fallen for the NGPC over the GBC. I'll be frank; I think the NGPC is an outstanding portable…probably the only one that will ever give the GBC a run for it's money (in it's class, anyway) but I still am drawn to the GBC…and I'll tell you why. | | |  | |  |
| | | | | | The Games | The NGPC offers very well polished titles with beautiful animation, sharp control and beautiful graphics, but the biggest problem is that in the almost 1 year of availability, the NGP hasn't stacked up nearly as many titles than what the GB can in a year.
For example, I like Samurai Spirits. The versions which are available on the NGPC are wonderful, probably even better than those available for the GB. But, Samurai Spirits isn't the only game I like. All the mega-popular titles that hit consoles these days always seem to make it to the GBC, for example: Resident Evil, Street Fighter Alpha, Duke Nukem and so on. I think the thing that really puts the GBC over the top is availability. Licensing is just so important for the survival of a system.
Now, I really don't see the demise of the NGPC anywhere in the near future, but I think it's important to look at facts. In the ranking of system sales in Japan, the GBC is #3 (under PSX and Poketstation) and the NGPC is #7, this is including home consoles.
The newly released WonderSwan even outsold the NGPC, which is cold, hard proof that color isn't everything. (Game Gear vs. Game Boy anyone?) One of the reasons that the WS outsold the NGPC is because of Beatmania, thus defending the idea that availability of hot titles will make a console the system of choice.
Over the years, the GB has put out the titles that people want to play…Tetris, Pokemon, SMBDX, even Beatmania and hundreds of others. The big problem with NGPC's library is that it caters to a very specific niche of hard core gamers. Unfortunately, right now it's ignoring various consumer groups, such as young children, women/girls, and salary men. | | | | | |
| | | | | | A Ball With A Mouth Explains It All | | Of course, title availability isn't the only reason a system wins with the public. Let's examine one particular title ported to both the NGPC and GBC: Pac-Man.
The NGPC version is very well ported from the arcade…it even has the character intro screen…and you can see the ghosts’ English or Japanese names. The full screen mode isn't hindered by the score or any other data and is visually more pleasing in this way. 
Pac-Man running on both systems. NGPC (left picture) looks better,
but GBC's got Pac-Attack.
The GBC version doesn't have the intro screen, and the full screen mode is cut a little by playing data. This makes the playability suffer only slightly from that of the NGPC. But…and this is a really big but…the GBC version comes with a separate game, Pac-Attack!
In my opinion, there is really no contest here…2 games for the price of one always wins in my book. I use Pac-Man as an example, but this is certainly not the only time the GBC comes through with the extras. Just look at Super Mario Bros. DX. Of course, this title is exclusive to the GBC, but it's also 2 (maybe even 3, depending on how you look at it) games in one. Once you've beaten the original version, you get to play the Japanese version of Super Mario Bros., which is a completely different game all together.
This trend of stuffing the games full of options and extras seems to have surfaced recently with the dawn of color games, and it certainly has made GB titles better than ever. | | | | | |
| | | | | | Tech-Specs | Now, lets finally look at the technical ups and downs of each of our little friends. First off, I have always been a big fan of good sound in a game. I have to say right off that when I first played the NGP, I was very disappointed with the sound. It seems that the NGP has far less audio channels than the GBC, and it is certainly unable to play sampled sound over music tracks…this is apparent in Puyo Puyo for NGPC, in which you can chose to have voices OR music, but not both. Also, the music is quite squeaky and with little depth.
Game Boy is capable of playing multi-channels of music, as well as overlaying sampled-sounds. In Duke Nukem, for instance, the music will not silence when there is a scream or a gunshot.
Many people think the “clicky” controller of the NGPC is actually quite nice, while they might think the GBC's “plus-shaped” pad is a bit stiff. I originally thought this to be the case, but when I tried to execute special moves in Samurai Spirits, I often found my character jumping or moving in an undesired direction.
In the fore-mentioned Pac-Man, this is painfully evident. Pac-Man will often move in the wrong direction, unless you apply a special plastic ring (packaged with Pac-Man) to the joystick to prevent it from moving erratically. I don't know about you, but I don't need to fumble with little extra pieces just to play Pac-Man.
The “plus-shaped” controller of the GBC is perfectly tailored for all types of games, weather you need 4-way movement for Pac-Man or 360 degree motions for Street Fighter (I can't imagine Zangief's Spinning Pile Driver on a NGPC controller). Also, GBC has one extra function button over the NGPC, making more games playable.
Communications is an important feature these days in gaming systems. The GBC brought us the excellent upgrade of IRDA (infrared) to exchange information and have head to head battles. Also, the GBC retained the traditional RS232 port for communications. The NGPC has a standard port like the GBC, but the wireless link is sold separately. I guess it's just nice to have everything in one, small package. | | | | | |
| | | | | | Final Word | All in all, each system has something very important to offer to the portable gaming community, and honestly, I wouldn't want to be without either system.
As a matter of fact, I wish the NGPC all the success in the world. But, given all these factors, if somebody asked me, “Jay, you're going to a holding cell somewhere in the Galapagos Islands where you will be forced to eat insects and will be beaten with reeds on a daily basis…but you can take one game system with you,” I'd definitely opt for Game Boy Color, but hopefully, I won't have to make a decision like that. | | | | | | |
