Look right, I can remember retro g*mers making jokes about the Game Gear being 2big and 2heavy back in the day, probably in the 2000s. Classic Game Room watchers remember. Same for the Lynx. The Wii U's tea tray controller was derided for being beeeeg. I can also recall people saying that the PS Vita was kinda large back when it came out, which tbf it is pushing the definition of "pocketable" for the boys and takes up a lot of purse space.
It sort of felt like reality broke down in 2017. The first thing I did when the Switch was announced was make a joke about putting a Game Gear in your pocket, but suddenly nobody else gave a damn that the Switch is like ten inches long. Most dildos are not that long.... 
I get that it's a hybrid, but suddenly the dynamic shifted from "if it can't fit my dude pockets it's no good!" to "aw yeah bruh just get a hardcase and throw it in a backpack!" I do support backpack gang, but you almost may as well get a laptop at that point.
Handheld size has become progressively more comical over the years though, with my favourite example being the Steam Deck which is actually considerably longer than a Wii U Gamepad at an XL 13" 
Tell ya what, I couldn't fit that!!
I'm not really against the existence of larger handhelds on its own, I have long fingers and a DS Lite or PS Vita will give me handcramps sometimes. But it's like a weirder version of when all phones became "phablets" and impossible to use with one hand, suddenly all handhelds are as big as the Wii U pad. (Switch Lite excluded, though it's still larger than a Vita) It also seems like the PS Vita and 3DS primed everyone to accept hilariously short battery life? The PSP 3000/Go and DS Lite/DSi could get anywhere from 8 to 20 hours depending on your settings, that was awesome. The 3DS and Vita won't hold out for more than three hours under duress, though. Most modern portable PCs have worse battery than that, even...
I guess I'm just wondering wha happun??? I know there's a large contingent of people who never take handhelds outside the house anyway (based) and just use them on the couch, but I don't think the Deck would be much more pleasant to handle in an armchair or whatever. That's one thicc-ass boi.
The GBA was peak handheld tech. I had the SP too but honestly still preferred the OG over it.
The SP had a vastly superior screen, but the ergonomics were way better on the OG for my gorilla hands
The OG was comfy but MY GAWD was it ever impossible to see ANYTHING in Castlevania…
Konami's team really did just say "Skill issue. Why don't you have night vision? Nerd."
“Just twist that screw underneath the WARRANTY VOID IF BROKEN seal to make it brighter dawg it’s easy”
Oh dang can you actually turn up the brightness/gain on an original GBA? Today I Learned!!
Ou dude you can but it’s DAMGER! It changes the depth of the screen to the back of the unit, which makes the image much more see-able. It voids warranty and it super touchy. BUT NOW YOU CAN PLAY CASTLEVANIA
Bro, dude, broseph. All GBA warranties are void, it sounds like it'd be more worthwhile to just do an SP swap though.
Oh I was talking about warranty voiding in-lore, like when it first came out and I sold almost all of my Pokémon carts and GBC to get one.
i’ve made some mistakes in my life but
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Do you just not remember the screen at all? Or the cost of all those AA batteries? The SP's screen and rechargability was a huge deal at the time
Did NiMH rechargeables exist back then? As a kid I made so much landfill fodder killing batteries with my GBC, but rechargeables would have helped so much...
They existed but they sucked real bad. They were really expensive and didn't last very long, and took way longer to charge than discharge.
Sucks, nowadays I run exclusively on cheap NiMH rechargers and you can charge four 1200mah AAs in two hours, they're only 1.2V but they're good for all kinds of stuff
I think the only device I still use that has non-lithium batteries is the stylus pen for my laptop that takes AAAA.
AAAA
Yeah they're not good.
Fun fact: the inside of a 9V battery is literally just six AAAAs in series.
I don't understand this meme :/ the GBA is more comfy than an SP but that's not saying much. The GBA itself had enough graphical and processing capability to go around but its sound setup suuuuucked. I think the DS was probably better tbh.
the sp was clearly superior to the gba in almost anything, but it was a pain to play with (for me at least). i could have long sessions on a gba without any problem, but playing with the sp for long time was painful and uncomfortable. it was okay for rpg or games that did not require high reflexes or button mashing
The SP was a handcramper, those tiny lil shoulder buttons... Trying to play Megaman Zero on that thing...
It's my nostalgia talking. I never had the DS but I probably would have liked it better, granted I've never played any DS games yet.
To be fair the GBA's actual games library is pretty fuckin sick