It's 2026, and I'm sitting here (when I should be standing at my desk) writing about a brand new Game Boy game. Amongst some of the rubbish happening in the world, there's a new game that you can play on your original hardware that pays homage to the original Game Boy and the era of Pokémon, Zelda, and Super Mario on the best handheld ever made. And it's making me laugh, which means it's already a winner.
I've been playing Chauncey and the Videotic Quest by David Vorves after he popped up in my inbox. I'm always open to checking out new Game Boy games and supporting the retro gaming scene, and it's brilliant to see people still making games for a handheld that came out in 1989. Some are good, some are great, and some are spectacular, and the latter is where the Videotic Quest sits.
Despite the game being set in the 2010s, it just reminds me of my childhood with my friends. Playing games, messing around, and trying to beat boredom by doing cool and strange stuff. It's set in a time where doomscrolling didn't exist, and where kids actually went outside to play and get up to no good.
One thing I love about this game is that it's based on Sonny (David) and his friend Chauncey, along with Chauncey's brother Dew, who constantly seems to be fawning over a girl who got caught kissing her cousin. There are jokes about everything in this game, with a lot of teenage boy humour (yeah, there's definitely some dirty jokes in here too), and it's had me laughing and reminiscing in equal measure.
The game definitely has feels of Zelda, Mario, and Pokémon about it. There's even a dungeon where you have to get a sword and thwart a fantasy creature that feels like it was taken straight from Link's Awakening, as well as a level where you have to jump side-on like Mario. And the whole interaction and collecting part of the gameplay feels like a cross between Zelda and Pokémon too.
So far, I've had to watch as Chauncey's brother is put out with a fire extinguisher, played as Spider-Man and defeated my mate in a battle at a Domino's pizza place, and evaded weird children while rollerblading. Oh, and watched their dad fix a table - dads even do boring stuff in games!
The dark joke of Chauncey wishing the road had more cars got me good, as did his mum writing a song on the guitar about the time she had sepsis - this game is definitely for adults reliving their teenage years as well as being a love-letter to the days of 8-bit handheld games.
David explained that this whole thing started as a bit of a gift for his buddy of 20 years.
Last year my buddy of almost 20 years loaned me his DMG from when he was a kid. It was dirty, missing the front bezel, and didn't even turn on. I secretly gave it an IPS screen and a total makeover with the goal of gifting it back to him, but not before making a whole new game for him to play! Thus, Chauncey and the Videotic Quest was born! It's a game inspired by when we were teenagers, and it's loaded with inside jokes and references to the good old days, when we used to make videos for fun. And though it was conceived as a gift for a friend, Chauncey and the Videotic Quest is still written and designed in a way to be funny and enjoyable to any player!
The pic above of Sonny and Chauncey just chilling (not the bit with Dew and 'Emuhly' playing tonsil hockey) was just what me and my mates used to do back in the day. We'd play some GameCube, watch some Wrestling, go build a den, then suggest playing more GameCube. Those were the days.
Honestly, Chauncey and the Videotic Quest might not be the world's longest game, and it might have started off as a present to celebrate a long-standing friendship, but it's definitely a game you should check out just for comedy value alone. It's well put together, and the fact that you can play it on original hardware via a flashcart is a big win. It also works on emulators too, as you can see from the pictures of my laptop and the game running on Afterplay, but physical is always best.
Thank you, David, for informing me of your awesome game. If you want to go check out David's work, then head to the official Itch.io page for Chauncey and the Videotic Quest to download it for just $3.99 or by making an optional extra donation to support David's future projects!
