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Portables (Games) Entertainment Games

GBA To Pioneer Movies On The Run? 30

Posted by simoniker from the itsy-bitsy-screen-squint dept.
Thanks to the New York Times for their article discussing the rise of movie-playing add-ons for Nintendo's GameBoy Advance (registration required). The piece says that "portable video players are beginning to change where and how people watch movies, cartoons and music videos," and points to multiple GBA movie devices in development, such as Majesco's Game Boy Video Pak and TuneIn's Pocket Cinema, which will have an interface to a 3-inch CD player. With other products like 4Kids' GBA-TV in development, and the Sony PSP and Tapwave Helix portables promising movie availability, has this idea come of age, and is it reasonable to expect the public to watch "video on a screen the size of a dollhouse window, with a resolution that is no match for even a standard TV set"?
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GBA To Pioneer Movies On The Run? More

GBA To Pioneer Movies On The Run?

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  • And then ... (Score:3, Funny)

    by torpor ( 458 ) <ibisum AT gmail DOT com> on Thursday July 17, 2003 @07:44AM (#6459845) Homepage Journal
    ... there are these things. [www.sony.jp]

    Portable video is here to stay. Once you've had a wank on a mountaintop with your favourite porno, you'll never look back.

  • GP32! (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    And don't forget MoviePark for the GP32; the GP32 can play DivX encoded films among other formats..

    (nkt to mention Palm OS and Pocket PC and Zaurus..)

  • MoviePark (Score:3, Informative)

    by ronfar ( 52216 ) on Thursday July 17, 2003 @09:03AM (#6460129) Journal
    Ahem, I'm not sure that GameBoy is the pioneering platform as far as movie playing is concerned. Below is a page about the GamePark 32 movie player:

    MoviePark Guide [207.44.176.77]

    I would be pretty shocked if a closed platform like the GameBoy, which goes out of its way to restrict development, would have a better movie playing system than a relatively open platform like the GP 32.

    I suppose one of these days I'll have to go to the trouble of comparing the two, just for kicks, but I've yet to have a need to play movies on my portable game machines (I have a Powerbook for that).

  • Old Idea (Score:3, Informative)

    by i8urtaco ( 663163 ) on Thursday July 17, 2003 @09:06AM (#6460145)
    Does anyone else remember the Game Gear and Turbo Grafx 16 (portable) t.v. tuners?

    • Re:Old Idea (Score:2, Informative)

      by lafiel ( 667810 )

      Yeah, but neither of those markets were anywhere as popular as the current gameboy (which basically owns the handheld gaming market)

      Anyhow, it looks almost like these are cassettes, not tv tuners... 20 dollars for only 90 minutes (5 episodes if lucky) of a cartoon is pretty steep though. If they could drop the price or fit more content, they might really be on to something...

      Imagine all the kiddies watching pokemon on their gba, then playing the actual game. Definitely a good idea for business.

      • Ha, they already have flash kits that can hold up to 4 times the maximum cartridge space of a GBA game, if this flys, i haven't a doubt that within the first week of the movie playing GBA software's release cartridiges capable of holding full legnth 2 hour movies will be on the rise
        • Unless I miss my guess, the movies appear to actually be held on 3" CDs, and so they are strictly limited, only a better codec could allow more space. (I don't know what they use, but if they are using MPEG2 (DVD), switching to MPEG4 (DivX) would help)
    • Bought it from Liksang a while ago. It was designed for the original GBA so I had to do a little dremelling for my SP, but it works.

  • Ok for some.. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by gl4ss ( 559668 ) on Thursday July 17, 2003 @10:25AM (#6460594) Homepage Journal
    .. Type of video, like simplistic humour cartoons, and you can use low bitrates, watching adultswin stuff is quite ok even on 3650, and mmc card provides the memory. I wouldnt watch any live actor stuff though with the same bitrates. Athf and sealab rule:)

  • Overrated. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Flack405 ( 634566 ) on Thursday July 17, 2003 @10:27AM (#6460615) Homepage
    As a GP32 owner, I'd say watching movies on a handheld is a bit overrated. First of all, you have to buy and install MoviePark (which, btw, has pulled their product from online sales -- if you don't own it now, you can't get it). Then, you've got to compress your video to Divx 4.12. Once that's finished, you've got to copy that file to your GP32 SMC.

    Other than the "neat-o" factor, it seems pretty worthless to me. If I've got an hour to kill, I'd much rather play some C64/Atari ST/Atari 800/Atari 2600 roms than watch a movie on a 320x240 4 inch screen.
  • There have been bunch of ads lately in the Toronto area about all these great new games available for cellphones. I don't see how people can have fun playing games on a cellphone with a display the size of a postage stamp, but perhaps I'm just too old. I would imagine that the same people using cellphones for games would like to watch movies on a GBA.

    I am one of the only people I know who doesn't own a cellphone, GBA, PDA, etc. And I don't even want one. I was offered a free cellphone through work and

    • I used to be like you (in fact, still am, largely) I have no cell phone, and no desire to get one. However, since I got my PDA, and have been using it to read ebooks, I'd be hardpressed to give it up.

      Yeah, you can buy 100 books for the price of a GBA, but can you carry them all with you at the same time? :)

      Thanks to Blackmask [blackmask.com] I've got a bunch quality reading material available to me for the price of a free download.

      I still wouldn't watch a movie on a handheld. -- "Is that Gandalf's staff, or is he just h

    • Games on cell phones are not about killing 1-2 hours like a film (or even a half-hour TV show).

      Cell phone games are for killing time standing in a 15 minute line at the football game just so you can get a $6 personal pizza.

      Reading a book is not very practical in a lot of places - nor is reading a book for only 15 seconds at a time before being moved/jostled/etc very enjoyable (you become very familiar with the same single sentence and lose thought continuity). But I can play my little snake game on my c

  • Interesting (Score:4, Informative)

    by David_Bloom ( 578245 ) <slashdot@3lesson.org> on Thursday July 17, 2003 @12:16PM (#6462063) Homepage
    (random brag-about-how-my-system's-better fact)the SEGA Game Gear has had a TV tuner [classicgaming.com] for ages. It works well, and consider this: compared to a portable TV, the GBA's screen resolution is awesome. Unfortunately, the GBA only displays 512 colors/line, so that could be a problem. The GameGear had built-in circuitry for the TV tuner, so the tuner could get around the GameGear's 32colors/line limitation.
    • The portable version of the Turbo Grafx 16... The Turbo Express had a "Turbo Vision" TV tuner addon also. I knew a kid that had one... from what I recall, it was ridiculously expensive and could eat up a brand new set of batteries in about 4 hours. Turbo Vision [www.vghq.de]
    • I don't understand how it can "get around" the game gear's 32colours/line limitation.. Isn't the limitation in the actual screen itself?
      • No - it can do a total of actually 65,335 colors - just 32/line at once. The TV tuner uses special hardware in the gamegear to display more colors. The games, however, have to be palletized.
  • Actually the GBA resolution is comparable to a standard TV set. This is because the standard TV is interlaced, which means the number of horizontal lines is the same as GBA
  • For those who do not want to register: Here [nytimes.com]
  • Hiroshi Yamauchi already stated that Nintendo's next handheld will AT LEAST be 320x200 and have a higher color palette.
  • http://www.lik-sang.com/info.php?category=210&prod ucts_id=3397& google is your friend :-D
    • If you plan on getting this thing, keep in mind that it requires more batteries than what are just in the base unit.

      There are two of these tuners out there. One gives you an input jack, and the other only lets you use the antenna. Both require another GBA cart be in the slot to provide the boot code.

      As for me, I'm waiting for the PSP. P:
  • And yet movie clips on your cell phone are the Next Big Thing (at least thats what the cellphone makers claim)?

    Personally, I'm in the bigger-is-better camp when it comes to video. I'd rather just wait until I was at home instead of trying to watch a movie on a laptop (or those tiny portable dvd players. eww). Right now, I'm torn between getting a really large rear-projection TV, a 50" plasma tv, or a really nice projector. (Whatever I choose, it will have to wait until I have a place to put it)

    That sai
    • I love to watch movies while laying down in bed.
      • I can do that just fine on my couch in the living room with the TV there

        Though, a laptop... I've been thinking of getting the 17" Powerbook. Nice widescreen aspect display perfect for movies. I could live with 17" as a mobile movie-watching platform.

        Now if only I could find a battery backpack I could hook up to it for 'round the clock entertainment.

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