Game Boy Advance — The Game Boy Goes 32-Bit

The Game Boy Advance (GBA) launched in North America on 11 June 2001, at $99.99. Japan had it nearly three months earlier, on 21 March 2001, at ¥9,800, and Europe followed on 22 June 2001. Nintendo's IR data likewise gives the GBA's first release as 21 March 2001, in Japan.

At the time of the March 2001 announcement, ASCII.jp reported the planned US price as $99.95; IGN's 2013 article gives the launch price as $99.99.

The announcement: 25 launch titles

According to English Wikipedia, Nintendo revealed the GBA's final design and its Japanese and North American launch dates on 24 August 2000. ASCII.jp notes that the GameCube unveiling the same day also showed the GBA plugged into the GameCube's controller port and used as a controller.

On 7 March 2001, two weeks before launch, Nintendo held a press event in Tokyo. According to ASCII.jp, the Japanese launch line-up had grown from the ten titles first planned to 25, and the console came in white, violet and milky blue. Nintendo's own launch games included Super Mario Advance, F-Zero for Game Boy Advance, Kuru Kuru Kururin and Napoleon, each at ¥4,800.

At the same event, executive vice president Atsushi Asada argued that games growing ever larger and more complicated had become a major reason people were drifting away from them, and presented the GBA as Nintendo's answer. He also set a target of 24 million units shipped worldwide by the end of March 2002. Satoru Iwata, then the director in charge of corporate planning, said the GBA was not simply a successor to the Game Boy, and that it would propose new ways to play that did not rely on size or complexity.

32 bits and 2.9 inches

Nintendo's product page describes the machine as follows:

Link play came in two forms: multi-cartridge play, in which every player needs a copy as before, and single-cartridge play, in which two to four players share one cartridge. As ASCII.jp explained, multiplayer on earlier machines needed the same cartridge in every unit; on the GBA, one cartridge in one console was enough for the others to join.

On backward compatibility, Nintendo noted that older Game Boy software had been made for earlier hardware, so some games might not run properly or might look dark on the GBA's screen.

The Game Boy Advance SP, 2003

On 14 February 2003 Nintendo released the Game Boy Advance SP in Japan at a suggested price of ¥9,333 before tax. According to Nintendo's product page, it folded shut and added a front light that could be switched on and off during play. Batteries gave way to a rechargeable pack: about three hours of charging gave ten hours of play, or eighteen with the light off. Nintendo's current product page for the original GBA lists its suggested price as ¥8,800 before tax.

According to English Wikipedia, the smaller Game Boy Micro followed in September 2005, but it could no longer play Game Boy or Game Boy Color games.

81.51 million

Nintendo IR's regional data gives these totals for the GBA family, including the SP:

The Americas took more than half the hardware and Japan about a fifth. More than half of all units were SPs, sold from 2003 onward.

Worldwide hardware sales by fiscal year (Nintendo's year runs April to March):

By the end of March 2002 the total stood at 18.16 million, short of the 24 million Asada had set out. The best year was FY3/2004, the first full year with the SP on sale.

Its successor, the Nintendo DS, arrived in November 2004; the original DS had a GBA cartridge slot and played GBA games directly. In 2011 Nintendo promised ten GBA games to early buyers of the Nintendo 3DS through its Ambassador Program. For the wider story, see the game consoles timeline.