The Game Boy Advance SP: A Timeless Console with a Few Quirks

One of the downsides to the Game Boy Advance SP was its design, which featured a small left and right trigger, but these weren't used in most games. However, there were still some accessories available for mounting on the back of the console.

The back of the Game Boy Advance SP was quite simple, with only a few places for accessories to be mounted. The charger and link cable also needed to be plugged in, as did the rechargeable battery. To access the battery, one screw had to be removed.

As you can see, the screen on the Game Boy Advance SP was very nice, and it was actually one of its standout features. When turned on, the backlight worked fairly well, although there were some limitations to using it. The directional pad, A and B buttons, and speaker were all easily accessible on the front of the console.

The folding design of the Game Boy Advance SP was another notable feature, making it easy to fit into a pocket or hand. However, the rechargeable battery and backlit screen were what really set this console apart from its predecessor, the original Game Boy Advance.

In terms of audio, the Game Boy Advance SP did lose one important feature: the 3.5 millimeter audio jack. This wasn't a major issue for most games, but it was still a bit of an annoyance. Overall, however, the Game Boy Advance SP was a great console that offered many improvements over its predecessor.

Personally, I have very fond memories of playing on this console, and it remains one of my favorites to this day. The Game Boy Advance has so many amazing games, and the ability to play in the dark without worrying about batteries running out is a big plus. If you're looking for a great way to play any Game Boy game ever made, I highly recommend the Game Boy Advance SP.

One thing to keep an eye on with these consoles is the rechargeable battery life. Despite their robust design, they do run out of power fairly quickly - about 45 minutes per charge, according to my own experience. However, replacement batteries are relatively easy to find and aren't too expensive, so it's not a major concern.

Overall, the Game Boy Advance SP is a solid console that may have some minor flaws, but its design and features make up for them.

WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enhey you guys so today i'm here with a review of the game boy advance sp now the game boy advance sp was a marginal upgrade from the original game boy advance of course they do play the same games they support all the same sorts of things the main difference however was that the gameboy advance sp had a lot of key improvements uh namely the fact that it did have a flip out screen with protected controls it also did have uh well it was fairly well not fairly it was quite a bit smaller as you can see here but also did have two other major things namely the fact that it did have a backlit screen which was a huge huge help in addition to the fact that it does take rechargeable batteries so all this really conspired to make the gameboy advance sp a really really great console so let me go ahead and just break down exactly why as you can see here the gameboy advance sp was a definite departure from previous gameboy design you know with the folding clamshell design with the backlit screen with all the different improvements that they made in fact very similar to what they did with the nintendo ds um indeed the 3ds as well you know it's they had very similar designs although of course the ds wasn't identical but you can definitely see the similarities so i'll go ahead and give you guys a little walk through of the sp here um top not a whole lot um made out of that same sort of game boy plastic she here mine's scratched up just a little bit but considering i played this thing like every day for like three or four years i kind of expect that um over here you do have two indicator lights for when it's on for the ones for the battery so it'll either be green or orange depending on how the battery is and the other one will just go ahead and show you if the battery is charging or not over here we do have the on off switch and over here we can go ahead and pull out the game boy game now this is where you go ahead and insert the game card does support game boy advanced games as well as game boy and game boy color games although the older games do protrude out a little bit but not a big deal i'm coming around here you'll see there's a volume slider again there's a first for game boy however one thing you'll definitely notice is missing is a 3.5 millimeter audio jack so no way to plug in headphones to the gameboy advance sp which was one of the only real downsides to the console i'm coming around on the back you'll see and go ahead and just flip it over this way you'll see that very small left and l r triggers uh they weren't the greatest but most game boy games weren't uh really relying on it so it wasn't the biggest deal you have a couple of places for accessories to mount and then go ahead and flip it back over here you'll see that this is where you plug in the charger and this is where you go ahead and plug in the link cable um not a whole lot on the back uh you know you should go ahead uh this is where the rechargeable battery is that's pretty simple you just need to go ahead and undo one screw to get at it let's go ahead and open it up you'll see here it's got a nice size screen definitely a very nice sized screen um it was very very good in fact i'll go ahead and light it up for you as you can see here the back light go ahead and turn it on and off uh it does work fairly well um go ahead and down here we do have a light that does enable and disable the backlight and then newer versions of the sp now there's really no easy way to tell immediately um i do have one of the older versions but this would actually go ahead and go through different mode selectors as far as on the screen and lastly you have the directional d-pad the a and b buttons these start and select and finally the speaker as you can tell the game boy advance sp was more of an evolution than a revolution now of course it did bring a lot of really important enhancements namely that screen uh the really nice folding design as you can see here it's a bit chunky by today's standards but it does fit nicely in your hand easily you know fits in a pocket no problem however the rechargeable battery the folding design and the backlit screen really were the hallmarks of why you want to buy a gameboy advanced sp over the original gameboy advance everything else like i've said still applies although you do lose out on that three and a half millimeter audio jack but uh for game boy games there's very rarely you know the music not really going to be good enough that you're going to want to listen to on headphones however you know it was kind of a bit annoying that they removed it um so there you go guys that's about it there's not a whole lot to say about the gameboy advance sp that hasn't already been said personally it remains to be one of my favorite consoles ever uh i've played this thing to death it's just such a great console the gameboy advance in general has so many great great games and you know it just was really really great to be able to play in the dark you don't have to worry about buying you know two three four sets of rechargeable batteries a week you know if you really want to start playing through a game um you know there's so many great things about the game boy advance sp that i have no problems whatsoever and recommending this to you as probably the best way to play any game boy game ever made now there's not a whole lot to look out for on these uh you can go ahead obviously for the standard you know wear and tear this one's not perfect but yeah i've used it a lot um one thing you do want to keep pay attention to is the rechargeable battery see how long it lasts now i will say that the rechargeable batteries were pretty robust on these i've used this one like i said i got this one back in 2003 and i'm still on the original battery of course it doesn't last all that long maybe about 45 minutes per charge still that's very impressive considering the hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of hours i've logged on this so you can't go ahead and pick up uh replacement batteries they aren't too hard to find and they're not all that expensive but definitely do keep that in mind if you're going to go ahead and pick one of these up otherwise there's not a whole lot to worry about the game boy advance sp is a very very solid consolehey you guys so today i'm here with a review of the game boy advance sp now the game boy advance sp was a marginal upgrade from the original game boy advance of course they do play the same games they support all the same sorts of things the main difference however was that the gameboy advance sp had a lot of key improvements uh namely the fact that it did have a flip out screen with protected controls it also did have uh well it was fairly well not fairly it was quite a bit smaller as you can see here but also did have two other major things namely the fact that it did have a backlit screen which was a huge huge help in addition to the fact that it does take rechargeable batteries so all this really conspired to make the gameboy advance sp a really really great console so let me go ahead and just break down exactly why as you can see here the gameboy advance sp was a definite departure from previous gameboy design you know with the folding clamshell design with the backlit screen with all the different improvements that they made in fact very similar to what they did with the nintendo ds um indeed the 3ds as well you know it's they had very similar designs although of course the ds wasn't identical but you can definitely see the similarities so i'll go ahead and give you guys a little walk through of the sp here um top not a whole lot um made out of that same sort of game boy plastic she here mine's scratched up just a little bit but considering i played this thing like every day for like three or four years i kind of expect that um over here you do have two indicator lights for when it's on for the ones for the battery so it'll either be green or orange depending on how the battery is and the other one will just go ahead and show you if the battery is charging or not over here we do have the on off switch and over here we can go ahead and pull out the game boy game now this is where you go ahead and insert the game card does support game boy advanced games as well as game boy and game boy color games although the older games do protrude out a little bit but not a big deal i'm coming around here you'll see there's a volume slider again there's a first for game boy however one thing you'll definitely notice is missing is a 3.5 millimeter audio jack so no way to plug in headphones to the gameboy advance sp which was one of the only real downsides to the console i'm coming around on the back you'll see and go ahead and just flip it over this way you'll see that very small left and l r triggers uh they weren't the greatest but most game boy games weren't uh really relying on it so it wasn't the biggest deal you have a couple of places for accessories to mount and then go ahead and flip it back over here you'll see that this is where you plug in the charger and this is where you go ahead and plug in the link cable um not a whole lot on the back uh you know you should go ahead uh this is where the rechargeable battery is that's pretty simple you just need to go ahead and undo one screw to get at it let's go ahead and open it up you'll see here it's got a nice size screen definitely a very nice sized screen um it was very very good in fact i'll go ahead and light it up for you as you can see here the back light go ahead and turn it on and off uh it does work fairly well um go ahead and down here we do have a light that does enable and disable the backlight and then newer versions of the sp now there's really no easy way to tell immediately um i do have one of the older versions but this would actually go ahead and go through different mode selectors as far as on the screen and lastly you have the directional d-pad the a and b buttons these start and select and finally the speaker as you can tell the game boy advance sp was more of an evolution than a revolution now of course it did bring a lot of really important enhancements namely that screen uh the really nice folding design as you can see here it's a bit chunky by today's standards but it does fit nicely in your hand easily you know fits in a pocket no problem however the rechargeable battery the folding design and the backlit screen really were the hallmarks of why you want to buy a gameboy advanced sp over the original gameboy advance everything else like i've said still applies although you do lose out on that three and a half millimeter audio jack but uh for game boy games there's very rarely you know the music not really going to be good enough that you're going to want to listen to on headphones however you know it was kind of a bit annoying that they removed it um so there you go guys that's about it there's not a whole lot to say about the gameboy advance sp that hasn't already been said personally it remains to be one of my favorite consoles ever uh i've played this thing to death it's just such a great console the gameboy advance in general has so many great great games and you know it just was really really great to be able to play in the dark you don't have to worry about buying you know two three four sets of rechargeable batteries a week you know if you really want to start playing through a game um you know there's so many great things about the game boy advance sp that i have no problems whatsoever and recommending this to you as probably the best way to play any game boy game ever made now there's not a whole lot to look out for on these uh you can go ahead obviously for the standard you know wear and tear this one's not perfect but yeah i've used it a lot um one thing you do want to keep pay attention to is the rechargeable battery see how long it lasts now i will say that the rechargeable batteries were pretty robust on these i've used this one like i said i got this one back in 2003 and i'm still on the original battery of course it doesn't last all that long maybe about 45 minutes per charge still that's very impressive considering the hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of hours i've logged on this so you can't go ahead and pick up uh replacement batteries they aren't too hard to find and they're not all that expensive but definitely do keep that in mind if you're going to go ahead and pick one of these up otherwise there's not a whole lot to worry about the game boy advance sp is a very very solid console