Swan Song: The WonderSwan 25th Anniversary Special
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 3 ก.พ. 2025
- Today, to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the WonderSwan, I take you on a long-overdue tour of the system's history and hardware.
This episode features two songs (six months in deep space, lost and found) by arcologies (arcologies.ban...) licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license.
About Swan Song
Swan Song is a chronological survey of the Bandai WonderSwan's game library, produced by Yanik Magnan.
#wonderswan #bandai #swansong
A youtuber entirely dedicated to the Wonderswan? At this time of year, at this time of day, at this part of the country, localized entirely within my kitchen?! ( subscribed!) Takes me back! I bought a used Wonderswan with the Evangelion angel breeding game ca. 2000. The only game I ever owned for the system, but I kind of loved that thing. It felt quirky and different. And just nicely a step above the OG DMG. As a LSDJ musician, I would love it, if the Wonderswan had a tracker program like it. The vertical orientation would be ace for it.
Good luck with the rest of the series! We'll be watching. It's worth noting that the Neo Geo Pocket was released right around the same time as the WonderSwan, and even though it was released internationally, the WonderSwan easily beat it in sales. Also worth nothing, the WonderSwan requires an adapter to plug in headphones.
Damn, I could have sworn I had a joke about the lack of a headphone jack in the script 🥲
Love so much that this channel exists. Wonderswan is damn cool. I'm a developer for the Playdate and I think the Wonderswan feels much in the same vein, only 20 years earlier. Love it so much.
Edit: Made this comment before you mentioned Playdate in the video, nice! Lol.
I appreciate all you've been doing on your channel over the years. This video is a wonderful introduction to the system and its historical context. Happy to see some Wild Card footage in here (my favourite WonderSwan game). Thanks for your hard work!
and with this I'm finally done binging the backlog in this series! didn't know a lot about the wonderswan outside of what I read in magazines or online in the earlier internet days. so when I heard about the series in an interview (with someone who was doing the same for the famicom, it blew me away how much work he'd put into it over the past three years!) I admit I didn't think much of it at the time, but then I was in retro pals' neck of the woods when they got a raid from someone playing the WS version of lode runner, then I happened to look it up and your series had popped up, so here I am. definitely looking forward to seeing what the rest of the library looks like!
It’s kind of a small world, I shared the announcement that Hexagon was going live with her Lode Runner stream on cohost the other night so I assume that’s who it had to be
Didn’t know I was namedropped in that Famidaily interview, that’s pretty cool. Will have to finish reading it later
I legitimately bought a WonderSwan to go with my Kamen Rider collection back when I was 16 and watching Ex-Aid, and I still have it and all the games I bought (specifically the skeleton green one, like Emu Hojou had in the series). I love the little thing, honestly.
The cute aggression I felt seeing those cartridges, though. I love that the handheld actually shows off the art sticker, something about that feels intentional. Like it's intended to be seen by other people on the train, that they might tell you "same hat".
The Atari Lynx is the only other one I know of which shows off the full label. The Game Gear and Game Boys prior to the GBA show part of the label. Though it doesn't seem like it was particularly common for label designs to take that into consideration. For example, the Japanese version of Link's Awakening puts "The Legend of Zelda" at the top, but Link's Awakening DX puts the copyright info at the top and the title logo at the bottom.
I'm just so dang hungry for an Evercade system that can fully embrace the Swan.
Or even just cartridges with some one-handed controls on them, so they double as a handle for tate mode.
Which would be perfect to extend Super Pocket into big boy size, but then I guess the screen could stand to be bigger. I would love Super Pocket as a bit of an L shape with a goofy extending screen to the left, above your left hand. Then a glorious TATE big screen if you could attach more controls on the top and flip the system.
This is a great addition to the series! I'm glad you are so thorough
An incredible Raizing inspired STG known as Fire Lancer has been in the works for this platform for years now. There's a demo on the site.
75 Hz does look great... Swan Crystal FTW!
youre a legend
Great series and what an appropriate ‘intermission’ celebration for 25 years. Thank you!
I feel like even some of the anime licensed games have value to fans of those series. Haven't played every single one yet, but the Cardcaptor Sakura game on Wonderswan is genuinely really good.
Excellent overview of the WS family and excellent video in general!
Happy 25th anniversary to the WonderSwan! Sweet video. Too bad Bandai only used their own WS emulator for one or two games on the Nintendo Switch; I thought they would go a bit harder on WS nostalgia after the release of MonoEye Gundams as a bonus pre-order DL.
It's a shame but kind of understandable. If TH-cam is anything to go by, the system isn't exactly beloved by Japanese retro gamers. And many of the best games for the system were ported from and/or to other systems. That leaves a pretty narrow niche of Japanese retro gamers who want the WonderSwan experience on a modern system. Plus there's the refresh rate. The only way to get perfect output is to use a system and monitor which support >70hz variable refresh rate. That's stacking a lot of niches.
@@SnakebitSTI True. But I expected at least many future Gundam or One Piece releases would use this emulator for other pre-order bonuses. I guess they were deemed not enticing enough compared to the hassle and cost of production.
I came across a Medarot collection for Switch while I was in Japan that looked like it might have the WonderSwan versions on there, maybe worth looking into
@@Sakurina It doesn't sadly, only the GB/GBC/GBA games. Also the developers got in hot water for using mGBA code without credit in that collection so it's just as well they didn't add a Wonderswan emulator too. 😭
Gundam SEED (aired 2002) has one scene with a glimpse of WonderSwan-like handheld system with "WonderHawk" name written on it
Good to know! I went to see SEED Freedom in Japan a few weeks ago not having seen the original, and it really made me curious so there’s another reason to sit down and watch it!
I love this
After the line about the battery, I'm somewhat tempted to buy a swan color without a cover and 3d print a replacement. Sounds like a good enough usage for 3d printing if you ask me!
I always wanted a Wonderswan for Guilty Gear 1 & 2... seeing gameplay footage and screen grabs it seem it was stronger than the original gameboy, lynx, game gear and definitely the Tiger Game Com. But it doesn't come close NGP, Gb Color, and GBA... It still be cool to have one even if the entire library is in Japanese I learn #GoogleTranslate ... I would get one in this life or the next. Thanks for upload brotha...
Excuse me, did you say you are doing a series on playing every Wonderswan game? How have i never seen this? Subbed. I'm in.
The WonderSwan hardware is an interesting example of minimalist design. It has a single PCB, almost exclusively populated on one side. The button, audio, and networking interfaces are all plated contacts on the PCB. The NEC V30 variant CPU was based on the Intel 8088, released in 1979. It really exemplifies Gunpey Yokoi's design philosophy, and the much greater simplicity than the Game Boy displays the difference a decade made in electronics technology.
That said, I think the WS coming out as late as it did put it between a rock (low price point) and a hard place (the GBP and GBC, which also followed Yokoi's design philosophy by way of the GB). To that end, I think the WS was really let down by the cheap screen. GBC games on a GBC look better than WS games on a WS, despite the generational gap between the systems. And they sound better, too. To put it into context, the GBC and Link's Awakening DX came out in 1998, WS in 1999, WSC in 2000, GBA in 2001, and SwanCrystal in 2002. And as if that weren't dire enough, the DS came out in 2004 while the GBA was still going strong.
I kind of love the SwanCrystal hardware. It has a clearer display than the GBA, manages to make the GBA feel bulky, and has more than twice the battery efficiency. But it doesn't compare well head to head. Replacing 2 AAs vs 1 isn't nearly the deal breaker a dozen vs 4 was in 1990. It supported a much smaller library (headed by Bandai vs Nintendo and friends at that). And, well, it put a 1979 vintage processor design (8088) against a 1993 design (ARM7). The SwanCrystal would have been awesome in 1995, but in 2002 it was completely and utterly doomed.
Maybe if Yokoi had come up with the SwanCrystal instead of the Virtual Boy... It would have been a massive step up from the Game Boy and would have offered a far better value than the Nomad. There would have been no WS-WSC split in the install base. Also, a Nintendo WonderSwan could have used Nintendo's D-pad patent. Also also, the WSC and SC have a design flaw in the power button contacts which makes them unreliable - not something I think Yokoi or Nintendo QA would have overlooked. And maybe we would have gotten a built-in audio jack.
Though realistically, Nintendo was never going to greenlight a 16bit handheld. By 1995 they were already working on an ARM7 based handheld, which they canceled due to lack of competition for the Game Boy.
Great video. I have the clear blue black and white one. It's a great system but mostly I play Gunpey since I cant speak Japanese. I've played some of the baseball games for it on emulation and they're really very good. I would love to be able to play the Digimon games for it. I got my wonderswan in 2014. It cost me about 15 bucks.
Prices sure have inflated since then… 🥲
good stuff
I love my swan crystal. Riviera is one of my favorite rpgs, and while i love the gba version, the wsc version is quite unique
I own a clear blue WonderSwan and the only game I have is Digimon Ver WonderSwan and still play it from time to time
I played digimon world on a wonder swan emulator in the early 2000s on a windows 98 PC
too bad that Bandai never release the wonder swan here in the states. i would have bought one myself
ngl id love a wonderswan color with rechargable battery mod and backlit but even tho this is cool the thing i really wanted it for mp3 player*cough cough* that never got released there are some cool games on it but its definitly not worth the current price people put it up as
Its actually a really good system imo, better than the Game Gear if you factor in stuff like Judgement Silversword, Dicing Knight, etc.
I'd say it gets beaten a bit by NGPC and of course the actual Gameboy but I think its still up there with some good games.
How did you learn Japanese so quick?
I’ve covered the method I used on this page on my website: r-ch.net/kb/learning-japanese.html
I love playing my systems to this day but so much goes unplayed as I don't like animation series :D
th-cam.com/users/shorts_z1b1m0XBc0
In 2006 I would go by a store clearing out a huge stock of SwanCrystals in Akihabara for the equivalent of $30 each, new in box... I snatched up so many to put on eBay, sending to the US, with a Buy it Now price of about $50 because I am not a gouger... I wonder how many people there still enjoy playing one of the ones I got for them :)