General Gaming Chatter Box

Well, I don't have to explain, do I? Let's chat!!!

Hmm.. The E-Reader for the Gameboy Advance. I got it, and a few card-games.

MY REVIEW:

The E-Reader is actually very well designed, even if it IS just a scanner. It doesn't use an actual barcode, just a thin matrix of very tiny dots. The scanning is easy: You can scan either from left to right, or right to left, with no problems. You can scan the codes in any order you want to, and the game can handle it. However, you must go VERY slowly.. otherwise you'll be hearing "Read Error" many, many times.

If you have Animal Crossing, you might have some of these games on the GC anyway, so it would not be worth it. Still, I played these games back in the day, and I love being able to play them once again. Especially DK Jr.

Each NES game that I have has 5 cards to it, so it's important not to lose even one card. With enough games, you'll be carrying around a small deck of NES delight.

There are Game And Watch games available, too.. those only take 1 card for the game (2 codes, one on the top and bottom). Fun, and simple.. these were real men's games. These get nearly impossible once time goes on.

Pokemon E-Cards? I guess if you collect Poke' cards, they would be cool, since you scan the code on the bottom and you get information about that card. Strategies, evolution... it's in that small strip. If you collect all the cards in an evolution series, you get a game. The game comes with Machop, Machoke, and Machamp, and the game that you get from this is simplistic and boring. I assume all the games to be like this (The game and watch games take 2 codes, and this one takes three.. and these are okay graphics, so that would eat up the code space.)

The Reader comes with one Animal Crossing card... you scan it at the post office, and you get a K.K. song. You can only scan it once a day, but if you scan it the next day, you'll get.. the same K.K. song. That's right. These would probably be a complete waste of money, unless you really REALLY want to pay for one thing.

Is it worth the money? I guess if you either: Collect Pokemon cards or: Grew up playing NES games and want to play them again, it's worth it.

It seems pretty cool, but I dont really understand how it fully works.

All the data is on little strips of dots.. (I'm guessing that they're zeros / ones.) That's the programming for the game. The E-Reader takes all of the information, puts it in order, and executes the "Application".

It's just like any other program.. And I bet that if you could "decode the codes" somehow, you could program your own games onto your own cards. Just looking at the lines of code, though, it would be nearly impossible, given just how tiny those dots are and their proximity to each other....