Game Boy Advance is still alive

Apparently Kotaku woke up in the middle of the night thinking it was still 2002, and ran immediately to the phone to ask Nintendo what had happened to the Game Boy Advance.

It was able to go immediately and peacefully back to sleep when Nintendo said that the GBA is in fact alive and kicking. Apparently, last year Nintendo shipped 420,000 GBA units worldwide, with the classic system still performing admirably in Asian and developing markets.

This actually isn't unusual. Brazil and other South American countries are systematically ignored by the major hardware players, though not because the people there don't play games. Brazilians in particular are an incredibly discerning bunch of gamers - completely unswayed by fancy graphics or massively multiplayer guff.

The Sega Mega Drive and Saturn are still manufactured there, since it's a system the locals decided was worth playing, and given the established awesomeness of the presumed forgotten Game Boy Advance, this is a strong candidate for the portable weapon of choice in such territories.