New Pocket Game Boy Not Without Problems

With all the hype surrounding September’s release of the absolutely beautiful Nintendo 64, it was easy to miss the less celebrated kickoff of another new Nintendo system: Pocket Game Boy.

Lest anyone get too excited, this is the same old portable workhorse repackaged. The folks at Nintendo apparently figure there’s plenty of shelf life left in Game Boy. Rather than give gamers something altogether new, as they did with N64, Nintendo just keeps reinventing Game Boy, with its frustrating black-and-white liquid crystal display.

First there was the Play It Loud series, which offered nothing more than multiple colors and higher price tags. Now comes Pocket Game Boy, which boasts a compact, lightweight design and a screen that is much easier to see in poor light--much appreciated by players like me who squandered their 20/20 vision squinting through hours of Tetris and Donkey Kong.

Although a nice little package, Pocket Game Boy loses on a number of fronts. First, it requires AAA batteries, rather than the old AAs consumed so rapidly by older models. Why should that matter? Most important, AAAs are tougher to find. The old AAs are everywhere, but I had a tough time finding AAAs on a recent shopping trip.

And while Pocket Game Boy still plays all the old Game Boy cartridges, none of the peripherals designed for older units work anymore. For instance, the AC power line is different. So players replacing worn-out units should take note that it might be a better value to avoid Pocket Game Boy--which retails around $65--in favor of the cheaper older models.

For those buying their first Game Boy, though, the pocket version is a solid little unit. It’s tough to know how big of a market there is for first-time buyers, though. I mean, even my grandmother has a Game Boy.

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VIRTUA FIGHTER KIDS: In the age of “Muppet Babies” and “Tiny Toons,” it was only a matter of time before someone tried to turn one of videodom’s truly great fighting games into a sweet, G-rated version starring bug-eyed kids with giant heads.

Luckily, no one has tried to do that to Mortal Kombat. (Imagine Sektor’s baby pictures, for instance.) Unfortunately, someone did try it with the Virtua Fighter series.

Virtua Fighter Kids for Sega Saturn takes all the characters from Virtua Fighter 2 and knocks them down into pint-sized fighters who are, no less, as mean and tough as their adult counterparts. Put it this way: I would not want to spend too much time on the playground these kids inhabit.

Most of the action, scenery and play is copied straight off VF2. But instead of adults kicking each other in the head, it’s little kids rendered in the doe-eyed look of Japanese animation.

Although a straight knockoff of VF2, the game obviously is designed to attract very young kids. It even has a “kid mode” that performs complicated combos automatically. All of that raises a disturbing question: Is it such a good idea for little kids to play games like these?

To be sure, I’m no prude. Games are games and that’s that. I’m the first to defend the rights of older kids, teens and adults to play gruesome games where punching and shooting predominate. But the little kids targeted by Virtua Fighter Kids really shouldn’t be playing these kinds of games.

Sega really missed the boat on this one.

Staff writer Aaron Curtiss reviews video games every Thursday. To comment on a column or to suggest games for review, send letters to The Times, 20000 Prairie St., Chatsworth, CA 91311. Or send e-mail to Aaron.Curtiss@latimes.com