The Video Game Critic

There is a Lynx LCD and VGA out mod offered by a member of Atari Age that is amazing: http://atariage.com/forums/topic/233632 ... by-mcwill/

Looking over this thread so far, I think the Game Gear is suffering from the fact that it's an enhanced Master System attempting to keep up with the Genesis, and it's place in the ecosystem was completely replaced by the Nomad. But back in the day? C'mon, Pitfighter vs. MK2, Fatal Fury Special, Samurai Showdown, and Power Rangers? Sonic Chaos and Triple Trouble and the Disney titles and Ristar vs. ScrapYard Dog and Gordo 106? Streets of Rage 1&2 vs. A questionable port of Double Dragon and Kung Food?

And I've not even covered the Shining Force titles. Or Monster World. Or the Shinobi games. Or the Aleste series.

The Game Gear's library is deceptively deep - so much cheaply made trash gives it the reputation of a failed console, but look for buried treasure, and it represents some of the best developers in the world taking advantage of polished 2d design. It's sprites weren't as big as the Lynx's, but they made better use of the playfield. It couldn't scale those sprites, but Road Rash was a thrill to play all the same, in a visceral way that Atari's many arcade ports can't begin to match. .

If it were just the two systems fighting each other now, without Tetris, Mario, Link, and Pokemon? The Lynx puts up a better fight than anyone could expect from an Atari branded system.

But you need to be a fan of cheap and easy arcade thrills. And you need to make peace with the fact that Atari was never going to seriously challenge the competition with it's original titles.

Design: Game Gear. Not nearly as wide and a far sleeker look.
Graphics: Lynx, it's scaling is fantastic, and the colors are far more vibrant. Absolutely mind boggling for a 1989 handheld system.
Audio: Lynx. The Game Gear had the master systems audio, which means it sounds like a medieval Japanese car alarm.
Size/Portability: Game Gear. Though both are huge, and neither were really portable.
Durability: Both systems screens die over time, sometimes mods might be the better way to go.
Battery Life: Game Gear. It lasts a couple hours longer I've noticed. Still pathetic however
Media (cartridges): Game Gear. It is far harder to lose them, as Lynx cartridges are paper thin, and kind of flimsy.
Packaging (game boxes): Tie. Both used cheap ass flimsy boxes that weren't good for much of anything, except tossing away.
Games: Game Gear. While both systems consisted mostly of first party titles, most Lynx games are boring duds. The GG had a far more worthwhile library.
Collectability: Game Gear. The games are far far cheaper and more easy to come by. The systems might cost you a mint though, for one in good condition.
Innovations: The Lynx had the first color screen. Whereas the Game Gear could play console games on the go, and had a TV tuner.

Winner: Game Gear.

Thats really great!!

Most Lynx games were duds? You're killing me w/that! I think the Lynx has an excellent signal to noise ratio in its library. Rygar. Awesome Golf. Rampart. California Games. STUN Runner. KLAX. Classics!

I owned both back in the day and I only ever ended up buying a handful of GG games whereas today I have a complete Lynx set. As mentioned the hardware was far ahead of its time. The screen resolution is admittedly a bit odd and the GG does have some excellent titles for the system. It's just they're scattered among a ton of garbage games which is probably why you can get most GG games for next to nothing.

There are certainly great games to be had for both systems, but for my money the Lynx wins overall.

I'm progressing with these reviews but I have a few questions.

Were both of these systems considered a success?

Is there really any different audio-wise between these two?

It seems like while the Game Gear had more high-profile games (Mortal Kombat, Sonic, etc), most of its games were just scaled down console games. The Lynx on the other hand didn't have the big names, but had a lot of original titles that might be more interesting to collectors. Agree?

By the way, that Lynx upgrade looks awesome and I intend to pursue it at some point.

Maks wrote:Most Lynx games were duds? You're killing me w/that! I think the Lynx has an excellent signal to noise ratio in its library. Rygar. Awesome Golf. Rampart. California Games. STUN Runner. KLAX. Classics!

Rygar can be played on the Game Gear with the Master Gear, but that doesn't really count. Same with Rampart. And California Games for that matter. Klax was on the Game Gear though. But the game gear had a lot more to partake in in terms of exclusives. Whereas most of those games are on multiple systems.

Were these two even competing against each other or the GameBoy? Meaning was Atari and Sega more worried about each other or Nintendo? Maybe just getting the leftover market share?

The Atari Lynx did make a guest appearance on an episode of Full House. All about bragging rights in the 90's.

I always thought the TurboExpress had the best screen of the three color competitors to the Game Boy.

ThePixelatedGenocide wrote:Looking over this thread so far, I think the Game Gear is suffering from the fact that it's an enhanced Master System attempting to keep up with the Genesis, and it's place in the ecosystem was completely replaced by the Nomad. But back in the day?

Completely agree. The Lynx suffered the same issues as the 7800, lots of out dated arcade games no one was interested in at that particular time.
It looks better retrospectively because of those well known arcade titles and therefore appealing to retro gamers but at the time of release those games seemed stale.