Final Fantasy in your pocket – coming soon
New handheld to enter the ring to take on the awesome Gameboy Advance
If you’ve had your ear to the ground over the past year, you will have picked up on a few ripples in the handheld shark-pit, caused by Bandai. Aimed at a niche market of handheld gamers, WonderSwan has received phenomenal support from developers, boasting titles from, among others: Taito, Activision, Data East, Capcom and Sega.
It would be fair to say that Nintendo is flexing its muscles and laughing, after watching SNK return from the West with its tail between its legs. SNK even mentioned that the reason for its withdrawal from Europe and the States was the market dominance of the Gameboy.
While all this was going on Bandai kept its head down, stayed in Japan, and now the WonderSwan has a massive 8% (Gameboy takes up 90%) of the handheld market there.
To coincide with the Japanese launch of the WonderSwan Color in December, Bandai have announced a deal with Squaresoft to bring you Final Fantasy. If the handheld market were a boxing ring, this is a well aimed upper-cut, landing somewhere below the belt of Nintendo. For those of you who don’t know, Square dumped Nintendo and slipped immediately into bed with Sony. The Final Fantasy series saw massive popularity with its new audience and next-generation platform. Bad blood all round. For them to now back the GBA’s only serious, competition is really rubbing in the proverbial.
Another revelation has been that the WonderSwan Color will be compatible with the Playstation 2 via its USB port. The exact application of this has not yet been disclosed, but keep your eyes pealed on the Blockbuster web site and we’ll keep you updated as soon as the news is out.
It would be fair to say that Nintendo is flexing its muscles and laughing, after watching SNK return from the West with its tail between its legs. SNK even mentioned that the reason for its withdrawal from Europe and the States was the market dominance of the Gameboy.
While all this was going on Bandai kept its head down, stayed in Japan, and now the WonderSwan has a massive 8% (Gameboy takes up 90%) of the handheld market there.
To coincide with the Japanese launch of the WonderSwan Color in December, Bandai have announced a deal with Squaresoft to bring you Final Fantasy. If the handheld market were a boxing ring, this is a well aimed upper-cut, landing somewhere below the belt of Nintendo. For those of you who don’t know, Square dumped Nintendo and slipped immediately into bed with Sony. The Final Fantasy series saw massive popularity with its new audience and next-generation platform. Bad blood all round. For them to now back the GBA’s only serious, competition is really rubbing in the proverbial.
Another revelation has been that the WonderSwan Color will be compatible with the Playstation 2 via its USB port. The exact application of this has not yet been disclosed, but keep your eyes pealed on the Blockbuster web site and we’ll keep you updated as soon as the news is out.
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