Etrigan

Greetings!
Please help out an old school gamer,who is a complete noob to the "next Gen." consoles and games.
I love the simple games from the NES days (Donkey Kong/Castlevania/Excitebike/Dr.Mario) Etc...etc.

I see these,and others are now being released for the GBASP under the "classic nes series"

I'm interested in these,as well as a gbasp(for work/travel)/gameboy player &
Gcube to play these at home.

My Questions are-
I understand the gbasp is a widescreen device,also-the newer games made for it,take advantage of this format-No problem here!
but what happens to the games mentioned?(not originally widescreen)
are they stretched out-left to right? and squished from top to bottom?
Do they look silly/strange on the gbasp screen?

And how about the gameboy player on a regular 4:3 screen?
What happens to Newer games for the gba that are widescreen and the older games that are not? are there settings etc to compensate for the differences?

The main reason for me to buy a GC would be for the gameboy player(not really interested in newer gc games,except for the retro arcade compilations and such) Too many buttons/complicated,not much fun,as I have to keep looking down at the controller to see buttons

One more ? is-
If I was lucky enough to get a GC with the component connections,OR even if I didn't,and hooked it up with an S video/audio cable as opposed to the composite that comes with it--would the games thru the gameboy player
benefit from the better connection or would only the gcube games themselves benefit?

About the only thing I'm sure about is a Wavebird

Thanx for all your help,It is appreciated!

CHEERS! jefff

PixyJunket

The NES games are squished down a bit to fit the screen. You'll be better off hitting eBay, pawn shops and flea markets and getting an actual NES and NES games. Once properly cleaned 98% of the carts will work like new, and you won't be limited to the 10 or so games they've released on GBA. Not to mention the money you'll save buying a Gamecube AND Gameboy Player just to play games you can get the originals of for $2-$3 a pop.

Etrigan

Thanks again for your help Pixy!
But I have two nes's and one snes as well as a sega genesis/colecovision and my son has a n64.

I would really like a time killer at work/travel so the gbasp is a given,and those are some of the carts I would get,just curious how they will look.

My son will enjoy the Gcube,and I'm not against at least learning some new gc games (I love creepy,so eternal darkness is right up there if I can learn how it operates) as well as some of the new gba games (new Castlevanias come to mind-etc.)
And would like to play these at home on a bigger screen w/ a wireless w'bird,as well as on the go.

How about my connection questions-will the gbplayer benefit from the s video
or just the cube?

Any and all help/suggestions are welcome.
Thanx again!

PixyJunket

If you want good NES wireless controllers look into Play Messiah's 2.4GHz NES controllers.
http://play-messiah.com/

Since the GBA NES games have a lower resolution, squished graphics and will be window-boxed on a GB Player, they're going to look worse than the originals no matter what video source you use. To answer your question though, the GB Player will use whatever video your Gamecube is currently using.

The only reason I could see investing in new gear for the old games is the portability of the GBA-SP, but due to the severely limited selection of games and that they are single cart releases as opposed to collections, I wouldn't even bother.

Honestly, it sounds to me like you're trying to find an excuse to spend some money and buy some new toys. If you are genuinely interested in other Gamecube and Gameboy games, I'd say go for it; but trying to justify it by being able to play games you most likely already own on a new machine is a bit much.

Etrigan

Thanx for the advice and the link (although I can't get it to work)
But I would like to check into those controllers,If they work well,I'd love to try 'em out

Thanx Pixy!
CHEERS! jefff

PixyJunket

Oh, I wrote that from memory.. looks like there is no dash.

http://www.playmessiah.com/

milo bloom

It's been awhile, but I think I looked up the resolution specs of the GBA and calculated the aspect ratio to be 1.66x1. The only "classic" NES game I have is the original Legend of Zelda, and it doesn't look to bad. I wish they had windowboxed these games though, like when you play a classic Gameboy game on a GBA. It's just blank screen to the left and right. I think these classic NES games are pretty much shovelware though. The Zelda game I have seems to be less a port, than simply an emulation. There are spots of slowdown that a GBA shouldn't even sneeze at, like when there's several spear throwing bulldog soldiers on the screen at once. I think it would have been nice if they had left the screen ratio, and put your stats like your health and items in the sidewindows.

It's still fun though, and I now can play all the topdown Zelda's on my GBA SP.

PixyJunket

Yes, they are emulations not ports, therefore nuances from the original NES version will be present.

Here's is a good write-up on NES to GBA resolutions with examples of how the games proportionally scaled down would look.
http://www.pocketnes.org/res.html

azeledge

Another Option. And I apoligize for sounding like a commercial is

Portable Emulation! Especially since you legally own an NES and games.

I have a Palm PDA called a Tapwave Zodiac. It's equivalent to a Palm Tungsten but built for gaming! It uses the Palm Os so you can use the
thousands of Palm Apps for it. You can of course get games etc specific to it.

On cool item is a FREE emu made for it called LJZ (Little John's Z)

it emulates NES SNES GB Genesis Wonderswan TG-16 NeoGeo Pocket. Just get the roms and put them on an SD card or internal memory.

Here's some links for ya.

www.tapwave.com (maker of it they also sell at compusa)
www.tapland.com (has a link on front page to LJZ)

A pretty comprehensive review of it:

http://www.the-gadgeteer.com/tapwave...c2-review.html

Anyways just an idea!

Good luck with whatever you decide to get!