Game Boy Virtual Console: Apparently Never a Possibilty
Recently, Wired's Game|Life had an interview with Nintendo's Reggie Fils-Aime about a whole bunch of topics. There was, expectedly, a lot of cooperate double-speak coming from Reggie, but there was one question that caught my eye. The question had do with whether there would eventually be some form of a Virtual Console on the Nintendo DSi. The answer was informative, if a bit disappointing:
Fils-Aime: The concept of Virtual Console on DSi is not something that we've talked about, nothing that we've commented on. I know it's something many of your readers would like to see, but it's not something that we've talked about.
I'll confess that I haven't been paying attention to DSi news much, so for all I know this is an issue that's been addressed previously, but it doesn't make it any easier to take.
You see, the Game Boy was my very first video game console and as such, I have a lot of nostalgia for it. I still own most of my favorite titles, so it's not like I need a GB Virtual Console for myself. However, I wanted to see one exist so that people could play some of the titles I grew up enjoying. I want other people to be able to experience classics like Link's Awakening and Warioland, which they might have missed because they never touched a handheld before Pokémon came out.
It doesn't help that Nintendo routinely shafts Game Boy games when they start ladling out nostalgic goodness. For example, did you know Nintendo actually made a sequel to Balloon Fight that wasn't a blatant Joust clone? Or how about a true sequel to original Donkey Kong, that came out six months before Donkey Kong Country? You wouldn't know from Nintendo, that's for certain.
It's just depressing that Nintendo will go to great lengths to preserve and make available obscure titles for small systems on the Virtual Console, but they leave a significant portion of their own back catalog out to dry rot.
Interview via Wired: Game|Life