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NeoGAFs Kent Brockman
Nintendo's Game Boy Color Almost Had Internet, Live-Streaming, and Email
An accessory was planned for Nintendo's Game Boy Color that would have allowed consumers the ability to surf the web, live-stream, and use email.
gamerant.com
Video game historian Liam Robertson details the PageBoy in his newest video, uncovering lost images and information of the unreleased Game Boy Color add-on. Originally, the PageBoy was planned to use radio transmission technology to allow its users to access the web, read gaming magazines, weather reports, sports stats, and even watch live television. It would even allow its users to message and contact others with a PageBoy as well, using the same kind of technology that pagers used, hence the PageBoy's name.
Nintendo was excited by the technology at the time as it would truly put it on the precipice of the tech world, essentially allowing its users access to the first smartphone without the whole actual phone aspect. In 1999, Nintendo worked with a newly created group entitled Wizard to help kickstart and manage the device, working to see if the Game Boy Color add-on could indeed be created and if it would be profitable for the gaming giant.
Ultimately, the PageBoy's reliance on radio transmission tech and its use of radio towers only really widely present in the United States killed any chance of the creation of the device. While Nintendo was extremly impressed by users' ability to send images using the Game Boy camera and the company's own ability to send live video to PageBoy owners, radio transmission was going to severely limit the add-on's appeal. Nintendo was adamant about the Game Boy's universal appeal and simplicity, and the PageBoy would ultimately work against that philosophy.
The Big N ended up scrapping the PageBoy's development in July 2002 after much deliberation.