eCard Reader for the GBA?

[Technosis]

I managed to pick up a few of these things sealed for the GBA. They seemed to have a very short support period. I remember you could buy packs of cards to swipe through the reader and they were typically Mario style games.

Did Nintendo support this device at all or did it have a shorter life than the Virtua Boy?

Tx
Technosis

[davepesc]

From wiki:

All NES titles released include:

* Balloon Fight
* Baseball
* Clu Clu Land
* Donkey Kong
* Donkey Kong Jr.
* Donkey Kong 3
* Excitebike
* Golf
* Ice Climber
* Pinball
* Mario Bros.
* Tennis
* Urban Champion


And some extra levels for a few gba games.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_e-Reader

I don't remember this lasting very long. I don't think people wanted to go through all that trouble to play Ice Climber. And, as I understood it, you didn't get a complete game in card packs. You had to buy multiple packs in hopes of getting the card you want, like with baseball cards. This may be false, but the commonly-held perception (at least among those I knew) couldn't have helped.

[CapnCrunch53]

Yeah, I don't think they were very popular, for pretty obvious reasons. That said, I'd love to get my hands on one cheap if I could find one, just for the sake of having some of those oldschool NES games on the GBA.

Not sure how long they supported it, but I remember most of the GBA games I got new would have ads for it in them IIRC, so I think its something that was around for awhile, but just wasn't very successful.

[joshnickerson]

And, as I understood it, you didn't get a complete game in card packs. You had to buy multiple packs in hopes of getting the card you want, like with baseball cards. This may be false, but the commonly-held perception (at least among those I knew) couldn't have helped.

In the case of the NES games, you got all the cards you needed in the pack; they weren't separated out into random booster packs. Just before it died in the US, there were plans to release a Game & Watch series, which would consist of randomly selected cards in booster packs, though I kinda doubt games of that size would have required more than one card.

Mainly, it was a number of problems; since the e-Reader had no save memory, you had to swipe a bunch of cards each time you wanted to play a game, which could quickly become tedious; the e-Reader could be rather touchy and require you to swipe a card multiple times before it would read it; and in the case of games like Super Mario Advance 4: Super Mario Bros. 3 (God, that's a long title), you had to have two GBAs, one with the Mario cart and the other with the e-Reader inserted, as well as a link cable, in order to scan in level and item data.

It was a great idea, and in the days before the rise of DLC, an ingenious way of downloading new content into games, but sadly it just wasn't executed too well. I believe it lasted quite a bit longer in Japan compared to the states... I'm pretty sure both Pokemon Colluseum as well as Pokemon Emerald accepted e-Reader cards to obtain new items and trainer battles.

[Emperor Megas]

Super Mario Advance 4: Super Mario Bros. 3 (God, that's a long title)

I use to think so too, until they released Shin Megami Tensei Devil Summoner 2: Raido Kuzunoha vs. King Abaddon Special Edition.

[T2KFreeker]

The e-reader stuff was cool. Plus, once you scan the game into the system, it is there until you scan a new game in. Hence, you scan Donkey Kong in and turn the system off, the next time you turn it on without scanning, Donkey Kong is still there. I never had trouble getting my e-reader to read my cards. Then again, my cards do look brand new. You just have to be patient and not slow, but don't whip them through like I see poepl do with Credit Cards on those readers.

[Sabz5150]

Yeah, I don't think they were very popular, for pretty obvious reasons. That said, I'd love to get my hands on one cheap if I could find one, just for the sake of having some of those oldschool NES games on the GBA.

Not sure how long they supported it, but I remember most of the GBA games I got new would have ads for it in them IIRC, so I think its something that was around for awhile, but just wasn't very successful.

That would be because the Gameboy Advance SP was released not too much after the e-Reader. The cartridge port was moved in relation to the link port making the e-Reader impossible to use on an SP. The lit screen sealed the deal on the SP, leaving the original GBA (and subsequently the e-Reader) in the sands of time.

[CapnCrunch53]

Didn't know that the game would stay in its memory. That makes it a bit cooler. I'd like to get my hands on one if I could find one.

That would be because the Gameboy Advance SP was released not too much after the e-Reader. The cartridge port was moved in relation to the link port making the e-Reader impossible to use on an SP. The lit screen sealed the deal on the SP, leaving the original GBA (and subsequently the e-Reader) in the sands of time.

Ah, that makes sense. I remember the SP's were awesome when they came out; I actually saved up and bought the NES Special Edition one!

[joshnickerson]

The e-reader stuff was cool. Plus, once you scan the game into the system, it is there until you scan a new game in. Hence, you scan Donkey Kong in and turn the system off, the next time you turn it on without scanning, Donkey Kong is still there. I never had trouble getting my e-reader to read my cards. Then again, my cards do look brand new. You just have to be patient and not slow, but don't whip them through like I see poepl do with Credit Cards on those readers.

It's been a while since I last used mine, but yeah, you're right.

That would be because the Gameboy Advance SP was released not too much after the e-Reader. The cartridge port was moved in relation to the link port making the e-Reader impossible to use on an SP. The lit screen sealed the deal on the SP, leaving the original GBA (and subsequently the e-Reader) in the sands of time.

Actually, the e-Reader works just fine on the SP. The link port at the top of the e-Reader was just a pass through for the link cable when you wanted to link to another GBA or the Gamecube.

[BetaWolf47]

What are these "obvious reasons" that e-Reader stopped being supported? I'm confused. It was really popular in Japan up until GBA died.

Also, it's compatible with any device that has a GBA slot bar DS Phat. You just can't link using DS Lite.

I thought the idea was awesome... I personally wished they had seen it through to the end in the US.

[CapnCrunch53]

What are these "obvious reasons" that e-Reader stopped being supported? I'm confused. It was really popular in Japan up until GBA died.

Also, it's compatible with any device that has a GBA slot bar DS Phat. You just can't link using DS Lite.

I thought the idea was awesome... I personally wished they had seen it through to the end in the US.

Hmm, well if it did work on SP, and you could keep a game loaded in memory, I guess my reasons were invalid. I assume the main complaints would be that it could be kinda tedious, and the games were rather simple, but if I had the $ I would have bought it, so I guess I don't know. And I think it was around for awhile, so maybe it did better than I thought? Anyone know how much of a success Nintendo considered it to be here?

[BetaWolf47]

The main thing I liked about it was being able to scan Pokemon cards and get the Pokedex info and activate some of their card abilities on there. You could even play minigames if you scanned the right cards.

There weren't really any original games besides what was packed in. The thing is, games were only about the price of a VC NES title, and you actually got physical material. Unfortunately, the most complex games took 5 cards to activate, and that was Donkey Kong Jr. I think.

[Jorpho]

I thought Mario Party-e looked like a really good idea, but apparently it got terrible reviews.

[j_factor]

In the case of the NES games, you got all the cards you needed in the pack; they weren't separated out into random booster packs. Just before it died in the US, there were plans to release a Game & Watch series, which would consist of randomly selected cards in booster packs, though I kinda doubt games of that size would have required more than one card.

The e-Reader came packed with Manhole (a Game & Watch game) on one card. So yes. Except I never heard that the Game & Watch packs were going to be random booster pack selections, I thought they were going to be fixed sets.

I have an e-Reader and several games for it. The game selection is kind of lackluster. It just suffered from an overall lack of support.

What are these "obvious reasons" that e-Reader stopped being supported?

They were only charging 5 bucks a game. They killed it so they could come out with the "Classic NES Series" at 20 bucks a pop.

[Blitzwing256]

Don't forget the animal crossing cards, those were the most popular back when it was available.

also japan got a bunch more cards released for mario 3 then we got overhere.

[BetaWolf47]

They were only charging 5 bucks a game. They killed it so they could come out with the "Classic NES Series" at 20 bucks a pop.

Hah, I highly, highly doubt that. Any idea how much more carts cost to produce than cards? Not only that, but they knew very well that releasing games like Castlevania and Metroid on e-reader would take too many cards to be convenient for the consumer.

[Baloo]

I remember getting the e-Reader when it first came out for Christmas whatever year that was, and enjoying it. The little games are fun, I have baseball, Donkey Kong Jr., and Mario Bros.

The best part was when back in like 07 or 08 when K.B Toys was still around, the one near me had a ton of leftover Animal Crossing packs of cards that I bought for like .99 cents each, and they were probably the best part of the e-Reader, getting all those bonus items.

I still want to try out the SMB 3 ones, just to see what the bonus levels are like.

[Purkeynator]

I worked at EbGames when the E-reader came out and I can tell you there was almost zero interest in the thing. In fact I don't remember selling any in the time I worked there. People would see it on the peg and ask what it was. I would explain it to them and show them the demo unit and swipe the Air Hockey game card to show them what it could do. Most people would say "hmm, that's kinda neat" and then put it down and go buy some Playstation or Gameboy Advance games.

I personally thought it was cool and immediately bought one and all the card games over time. Eventually Gamestops all over clearanced out the games for around $1 to $2 per card set. I managed to get the starter set that came with the reader, all the NES games, Air Hockey, a complete set of Animal Crossing cards series 1, and the Mario Party set for around $5 on clearance at a K-mart. At the time I really believed they would support it and release more games but they never really did. Nintendo stopped supporting the thing well before a year. Probably 6 months if that even.

In fact here is proof the thing didn't sell well. You still buy a brand new E-reader on Nintendo's website for $40 here
http://store.nintendo.com/webapp/wcs...encyPreference

[Jorpho]

I still want to try out the SMB 3 ones, just to see what the bonus levels are like.

It really blows that they actually included features that can (technically) only be activated by e-reader cards. You can get an SMW-style cape feather, for example, or fill levels with SMB2-style vegetables.

New SMB3 level hacks are hardly difficult to come by, but I doubt anyone's going to be making hacks quite that extensive to NES SMB3 anytime soon.

[fahlim003]

They were only charging 5 bucks a game. They killed it so they could come out with the "Classic NES Series" at 20 bucks a pop.

I was only ever interested in the e-reader games thanks to Donkey Kong 3, which I quite enjoy. It's lame it never made into the Classic NES or Famicom Mini series. Hopefully one day I can find an e-reader on the cheap.