Hands down, the original Game Boy was one of the best things to happen to the gaming industry. Portable gaming was made affordably with interchangeable cartridges at scale.
Many consoles has taken inspiration from the Game Boy since its launch in 1989, and many more concepts too, this one included, made by the talented LFD Official and friends.
This concept shows what a modular Game Boy would look like if it was made today, featuring attachable sections to build the handheld of your dreams. One of the most unique features being the attachable projector.
The projector would amplify the gaming experience opening up not only portable mode, but home cinema mode too. Sync up a bluetooth controller and it can now act as a modern way to play your retro games. Or better yet, the controls of this handheld can actually be removed, and used wirelessly.
LFD official’s ideation states: “What if we created a device that combines portability and expandibility? With this device, you could enjoy gaming on a large screen wherever you are. All you need is a wall or a ceiling in front of you, and you can experience gaming like never before. With this, every surface is an opportunity. Enjoy immersive gaming sessions on a grand scale”.
Each segment of this handheld has a job, featuring a 3.5″ display that features its own modern user interface, alongside bouncy buttons and a large battery pack to keep your gaming experience lasting for hours on end. Maybe it’s following on from the 1:1 retro handhelds trend that we’re seeing this year?
Each can be accessed using a small screwdriver, and the transparent shell gives it a modern feel all while showing off its internal beauty.
“It inherits the design motif of the Game Boy, to reveal the internal design structure. The transparent material highlights the product’s retro aesthetic to the user, while the overall shape gives it a unique personality” mentions its promotional material.
The concept comes in a wide range of colours too, keeping to nostalgic feel using very Pokemon-like colours, but continuing with the slightly transparent materials to pay respect to the Nintendo 64 perhaps?
If you look closely at some of the text amongst the materials you can see some official branding too. The back shows the projector, alongside a speaker and a battery pack that uses USB-C charging. As a concept it’s cool, but I can imagine in reality it would be a hinderance as it would be very common to lose parts of the handheld when travelling.
It features interactive controls too, and because it works with modern Nintendo Switch games it can be used as a joy-con or a touchscreen. The official behance page shows off augmented reality Tennis, and the racket can be moved with the touchscreen. Heck, it will even augment Pokemon onto your trading cards too!
The user interface has been designed with minimal aesthetics too, very much like the AYANEO handhelds, showing what you have last played, your account and also the opportunity to play movies and songs too, turning into a portable media console that can project, heck yeah.
It can show your play time for each game, what achievements that you have unlocked, any updates that are ready to download and what friends are online too.
This is certainly one of the most in-depth concepts we have seen, and although the technology doesn’t exist yet it does give you an insight into what the handheld industry could do in the future, even if it costs a small fortune.
If Nintendo isn’t going to remake the Game Boy, let these guys do it instead, but perhaps make a cartridge reader attachment to go alongside it so that we can play our physical games too?
