Hardware or software: What matters more?

[TrekMD]

Hardware helped the GameBoy destroy the Lynx. Before anyone says what!

Ask yourself, what did the Nintendo GB have on the hardware side that outperformed every other handheld cart based system.

The only think I can think of is battery life because it didn't hold a candle to the Lynx on anything else hardware-wise.  I think it was the software selection that helped the GB, not the hardware.

[TL]

Hardware helped the GameBoy destroy the Lynx. Before anyone says what!

Ask yourself, what did the Nintendo GB have on the hardware side that outperformed every other handheld cart based system.

The only think I can think of is battery life because it didn't hold a candle to the Lynx on anything else hardware-wise.  I think it was the software selection that helped the GB, not the hardware.

I think the low price had a lot to do with it too.

[TrekMD]

Hardware helped the GameBoy destroy the Lynx. Before anyone says what!

Ask yourself, what did the Nintendo GB have on the hardware side that outperformed every other handheld cart based system.

The only think I can think of is battery life because it didn't hold a candle to the Lynx on anything else hardware-wise.  I think it was the software selection that helped the GB, not the hardware.

I think the low price had a lot to do with it too.

It was indeed cheaper, so people probably didn't care it was B&W.

[onthinice]

Battery life was my answer, TrekMD. It is still funny to think, that Nintendo would not release a true GameBoy Color, until it could match the battery life of the original GB.

I agree. Software and a cheaper price tag could only help sales.

[DreamcastRIP]

Hardware helped the GameBoy destroy the Lynx. Before anyone says what!

Ask yourself, what did the Nintendo GB have on the hardware side that outperformed every other handheld cart based system.

I like this question!

My answer: A Nintendo logo.

[onthinice]

That is true!

[TrekMD]

Hardware helped the GameBoy destroy the Lynx. Before anyone says what!

Ask yourself, what did the Nintendo GB have on the hardware side that outperformed every other handheld cart based system.

I like this question!

[onthinice]

[zapiy]

Software will always be King.. Look at the current Wii U, ok it lacks real power compared to the Xbox One and the PS4 but the first party Nintendo games are out of this world.. A joy to play and view.

[eSovenok]

Tests like that are often nothing more than benchmark tests - and are not really a valid comparison of what you encounter in a real-world test. At least nothing a normal user has to worry much. Even with the newest IE you have no big compatibility issues, so better not worrying too much about

[MadCommodore]

Software, as in the quality of technically, matters more than hardware because you can only play games as good as the programmers talents allows.

For example, if all Amiga 2.5D racing games like Outrun were of the same quality as US Golds piss poor efforts then there would be no point owning an Amiga if that was the type of game you wanted to play. The fact that even a 1985 Amiga 1000 is technically able to play Lotus Turbo Challenge 2 in speed and fluidity Sega's Yu Suziki (developer/lead on Outrun arcade development) would be proud to put his name to is of no consequence had that game never materialised no?

This actually highlights the difference between consoles and home computers in the 8/16bit era of retro gaming, console conversions/games developed by the manufacturer usually were the best the machine could manage however on home computers this was not the case. Look at Afterburner, Outrun and Lotus II/Lotus Recs on Amiga and Megadrive respectively gives you a classic example of the immense difference in quality of Amiga arcade game conversions vs consistency on the Megadrive ones. In the case of Amiga Afterburner and OutRun are not worth the disks they came on