Easter is here to give a moment’s pause to catch one’s breath in the first half of the year and to “warmly” beckon in Spring. While Good Friday and Easter itself are not celebrated/recognized by everyone, it is a holiday in the United States. Religious-based holidays, like Easter and Christmas, often have associated traditions that may include family gatherings, or specifically for Easter, dyeing eggs and having an Easter egg hunt. Because of this pomp, holidays can serve as memory markers that crystallize moments to stick with you for a lifetime, which is certainly the case for one of my Easters of yore.

It was Easter Sunday early 1990’s, and I woke with the sun to see what goodies awaited in my Easter basket, diligently delivered overnight by the Easter bunny. While subsequent Easters would deliver some top-notch treats like The Presidents of The United States of America cassette (yes, I said cassette, because I had to rock it in my Magnavox portable cassette player), which is stocked with ear worms and is, consequently, one of my favorite albums of all time, they fail to move the needle in comparison to the greatest Easter basket surprise of my life: Nintendo’s Game Boy.

Seeing the Game Boy’s box art sitting within the basket amidst candy and pastel colored grass ignited excitement and joy that exuded “Nintendo 64” vibes. I did not know much about the device itself, but I could just sense the possibility contained within. This was going to be something special. The Game Boy ended up being one of the top five most transformative items from my childhood. It completely changed the traveling experience and showed me the value of AA batteries and proper lighting. While there were subsequent Game Boy models, the original is iconic and the one I appreciated the most. Long car rides were no longer daunting but rather opportunities to game. Spending the weekends with relatives no longer ran the risk of being a chore, as the Game Boy could provide an escape at any time. If the TV was occupied, the little gaming handheld that could swept in to save the day. Game Boy was more than a gaming handheld, it was a sturdy childhood companion, which I unintentionally tested by dropping it on the kitchen floor within five minutes of being out of the box.

I have not played my Game Boy in decades, but cracking open the carrying case today, I look upon it fondly as memories erupt forth of frantic Tetris saves, frustrating Duck Tales missteps, and how many hours and miles passed by while playing Kirby’s Pinball Land. Continuing the trip down memory lane, here is my complete list of games, in no particular order:

• Pokémon Red
• NFL Quarterback Club II
• NBA Jam
• Paperboy
• Arcade Classic 3: Galaga and Galaxian
• Game & Watch Gallery
• Tetris
• Kirby’s Pinball Land
• Street Fighter II
• Ken Griffey Jr. Presents Major League Baseball
• Robocop 2
• Donkey Kong
• Big Hurt Baseball
• The Hunt for Red October
• NFL Quarterback Club
• Play Action Football
• Duck Tales
• Desert Strike: Return to the Gulf

In that list, there are some absolute classics, there are a few brutally difficult games, and there are a couple certified duds. Now, the brutally difficult games may only be categorized such because I, admittedly, was never very good at classic Nintendo and Super Nintendo games; they always felt more difficult. I appreciated when games had fantastic opening levels, because those are typically the ones I got to experience. In the above list, I would have to put Paperboy, NBA Jam, Robocop 2, and The Hunt for Red October in the difficult category. Paperboy is naturally challenging, and the Game Boy’s sometimes challenging screen did not make it any easier. NBA Jam has punishing CPU difficulty, and again, the screen could make it tough to follow the action. Robocop 2 was made by Ocean (which has a history of publishing subpar movie adaptation games) and simply has classic platformer cheapness, while The Hunt for Red October fills the screen with overpowered enemies and makes Red October a giant target. You can trust, however, that I still lovingly played those games. My gluttony for punishment back then likely helped prepare me for adulthood.

My favorite games, and this would likely be reinforced by play time if that had been tracked, are Arcade Classic 3: Galaga and Galaxian, Game & Watch Gallery, and Kirby’s Pinball Land. This does not mean I disliked any of the games in my library, even the duds, but these three dominated my attention, with Kirby’s Pinball Land (KPL) taking the gold medal for my all-time favorite Game Boy game. I love pinball, and KPL perfectly implemented the feel of pinball with sounds, visuals, and appropriate challenge that coalesced into an immersive dopamine high. Thinking of KPL today still brings back some of that feeling – I can feel the tingles in my brain. Funny enough, Arcade Classic 3 and Game & Watch Gallery did not provide “new” gaming experiences, being ported and, in the case of Game & Watch Gallery, updated entries for Game Boy, but they still tapped into the experiences that made them classics. I cannot say Galaxian is a favorite, but I adore Galaga, despite being mediocre at it, and Game & Watch Gallery took Nintendo’s old Game & Watch properties (some of which you can now buy new as their original Game & Watch handheld) and gave the player the option of playing with the traditional animation or updated with Mario-verse characters like, well, Mario, Toad, Yoshi, etc. The games were just plain fun and created frenetic moments that quickened the pulse and made the palms sweat. That is really all we ever need our games to be, and those games were perfect.

With another Easter just around the corner and having now taken the time to reminisce about our time together, I need to say “thank you”. So, Game Boy, oh Game Boy, you changed my childhood. Thank you for giving me a distraction in the backseat of the family minivan as we barreled past mile after mile of farmland and plains. Thank you for giving me Ken Griffey Jr. Presents Major League Baseball in the palm of my hand, even though it was a terrible port of the GOAT. But truly, thank you for giving me hour upon hour of fun diving into your pixelated worlds. Your presence unlocked a string of core memories and created the greatest Easter basket of all time.

P.S. – If you have not already watched Tetris on Apple TV+, you should. It is wildly entertaining, unless you do not like the game Tetris, in which case, you have my sympathy.