Tag Archives: handheld

Tales of Phantasia, Game Boy Advance

This 2003 remake of Namco‘s SNES classic Tales of Phantasia was the first time the game had been officially translated into English.

While much of the game remains the same, there are a few differences.

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Final Fantasy Legend III, Game Boy

As Final Fantasy Legend games go this third instalment in the series is a little weird. It plays just as good as the previous two games (maybe even better because it has the advantage of refinement), but the way it’s presented is somewhat strange.

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Final Fantasy VI Advance, Game Boy Advance

Final Fantasy VI Advance was released in Japan in 2006, and 2007 in English language territories. It’s a remake of the Super Nintendo original, developed by a Japanese company called Tose.

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Final Fantasy V Advance, Game Boy Advance

Final Fantasy V Advance is the third Tose-developed remake for the Game Boy Advance and was first released in 2006.

Again: it uses the same refined interface and beautifully-drawn and coloured graphics of the previous two Tose remakes and somehow manages to make the Super Nintendo original look a little drab in the process.

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Final Fantasy IV Advance, Game Boy Advance

In the mid Noughties Japanese developer Tose undertook the task of converting and updating the early Final Fantasy games to the Nintendo Game Boy Advance for Square Enix (as they were known then).

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Etrian Odyssey, Nintendo DS

This pioneering Japanese RPG was first released in 2007 and paved the way for one of the greatest series in the history of level-grinders… The Etrian Odyssey series.

Number three is my favourite, but one and two are excellent too (see also the Nintendo 3DS fourth instalment), and all follow the same credo. Which is: to base a game around exploration, mapping, and turn-based combat. And to make the party system flexible, so that adventurers can take out different parties and experiment with character skills.

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Final Fantasy I & II: Dawn of Souls, Game Boy Advance

Dawn of Souls is a GBA remake of the first two NES Final Fantasy games, and they take advantage of the Game Boy Advance‘s enhanced capabilities (enhanced over the NES, anyway).

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Chip’s Challenge, Atari Lynx

The Atari Lynx version was the original version of Chip’s Challenge. It was developed by Chuck Sommerville at Epyx and first released in 1989.

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For The Frog The Bell Tolls, Game Boy

Known in Japan as Kaeru no Tame ni Kane wa Naru, this intriguing monochrome adventure game was developed by Nintendo and Intelligent Systems and released on the original Game Boy in 1992.

While it never got a release outside of Japan, a fan translation into English was released in 2011, finally making the game playable for non-Japanese-speaking gamers.

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The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap, Game Boy Advance

Released in Japan in 2004 and everywhere else in 2005, The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap was developed by Capcom and Flagship, with Nintendo overseeing the project. The result is: a fantastically fun handheld adventure game, with beautiful 2D graphics and captivating gameplay.

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