Game Boy Advance?

[Butter]

So, I see the GameCube thread, but thought we could start a Game Boy Advance thread?

Does anyone have one of these? I'm looking to buy one for my 2 boys... originally, I wasn't going to. But then, someone brought one to the family Thanksgiving get together, and my son held it for 20 minutes trying to play it. It was a Star Wars game, so a bit out of his league, but he's good at figuring stuff out and was running around with it after a while. So, it looks like I'm buying one of these things now.

Any good games for young kids? I know I'm getting Nemo for my smallest kid, even though he won't be able to do anything with it yet (he's 3 1/2). But the older one is almost 6, and can play games that aren't too complex pretty well. Any suggestions? I don't think he'd like sports games. But I'll probably pick one up for myself to play on road trips when the boys are asleep.

Also, any accessories I should get? What does it come with? Does it run on AA batteries, or come with a built in battery that you have to recharge?

Anything you know about it, post here. I'm interested to see any experiences with this thing, since I'm going to be blowing $100 or more on it for Xmas.

[Raiders Army]

Are you talking about the Game Boy Advance SPs or the new Game Boy Mini?

My kids have the DS and I inherited my daughter's old Game Boy Advance SP. It's an awesome thing to have when I go away. Both the DS and GB Advance SP have rechargeable batteries and come with the recharger. You'll want to get the screen protectors.

As for the games themselves, I have a blast with Super Mario Brothers (from the Nintendo Classics Collection). I played it with my first NES and I enjoy it today. Ironically, my kids like that game as well. I looked for it in our local EB Games but they didn't have it. I finally found it in the Nintendo World in NYC. Your older son could probably play Pokemon. My daughter started playing it when she was about 6 and she spent hours on it.

Just my two cents.

[Raiders Army]

Dola,

And you can get some really good deals on used games from EB Games. It's not like they're CDs, so the cartridges are usually in pretty good condition. The only drawback is no manual, but you can usually find instructions on the internet.

[Butter]

The Advance SP. Not the Micro thing.

[FrogMan]

FOFC is a great place to get advice on this sort of things :)

Can't help you though, one Gamecube in the house will be enough for now... :D

FM

[Raiders Army]

The Advance SP. Not the Micro thing.
Circuit City has the Advance SP for $79.99 with a free case.

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Nintendo-Game-Boy-Advance-SP-AGTSPBA-/sem/rpsm/oid/133772/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do

[spleen1015]

A lot of the classic games are probably suitable for your 6 year old.

[stevew]

Id probably spring for the DS, just cause it has more games available, is online compatable too.

[Raiders Army]

Id probably spring for the DS, just cause it has more games available, is online compatable too.
If you're looking at a six year old, maybe. My daughter (now 8) crapped up her DS because she started playing it before we got the protective screens. That whole "it's okay to touch" with the stylus thing...grrrrr.

[sterlingice]

I started thinking about this and, while I probably play my SP more than my Gamecube, I don't play that many games that are "kid friendly". That said, this is in total hours not number of games. I've got over 100 hours on 4 different generations of Pokemon games as well as a few others (AW, AW2, FFTA all come to mind). I suppose all of those are "kid friendly" in that I don't think they're rated for anything higher than E 10+ but they're very much games for patient, methodical gamers. That said, of course, tons of kids have bought Pokemon games so maybe I'm just misjudging the appeal to a different audience.

There are, of course, tons of Mario entries and pretty much all of them are well done, particularly the remakes of Mario 3 and Mario World. I really like the Castlevania games- Konami has done a great job on the handheld but I'm not sure- that might be a little old for him.

Ultimate Card Games and Ultimate Brain Games are two pretty overlooked games that are really solid entries into the GBA library. They are collections of simple games with a really nice interface for both single and multi-player games. Card has a few different versions of solitaire but also stuff like hearts, spades, gin rummy, etc. Brain has Battleship, Connect Four, Chess, Checkers, etc.

And, of course, the SP can play all Gameboy and Game Boy Color games (except a couple of odd ones like Kirby Tilt and Tumble because the motion sensor doesn't fit on the SP). So go grab a nice old copy of Tetris, too- I still get tons of hours from that :)

Man, there's a ton more stuff out there for Gameboy but nothing's coming to mind right now for younger players. I know they're out there but I just can't think of them right now. I'll mull it over for a bit and see if anything comes to mind.

SI

[mrsimperless]

My daughter is 5 and she LOVES my gba. Every time she comes over she plays it for at least an hour or so, and it's perfect for the car. The mario games are always good choices for kids, but one of her favorites is Harvest Moon. It's kind of like a sim farm game where you have to plant crops, raise chickens etc. May be a little bit complex, but she does fine with it. As long as I tell her how much money she has and how much more she needs to buy that cow...