Looks a little like MacOS X
A simple “operating system” is pulled up on the screen with the press of the Z button. From the menu on the bottom, you are able to adjust various settings:
![Nintendo Game Boy Player Review [ Camo frame @ 800 x 600 ] > View Full-Size in another window.](images/16-s.jpg) Camo frame
|
|
![Nintendo Game Boy Player Review [ There's that filtering option @ 800 x 600 ] > View Full-Size in another window.](images/17-s.jpg) There's that filtering option
|
|
![Nintendo Game Boy Player Review [ The answer is 42 @ 800 x 600 ] > View Full-Size in another window.](images/18-s.jpg) The answer is 42
|
|
![Nintendo Game Boy Player Review [ Presto change-o! @ 800 x 600 ] > View Full-Size in another window.](images/19-s.jpg) Presto change-o!
|
|
![Nintendo Game Boy Player Review [ Now why would anyone want that? @ 800 x 600 ] > View Full-Size in another window.](images/20-s.jpg) Now why would anyone want that?
|
|
![Nintendo Game Boy Player Review [ Would you like to super-size your screen? @ 800 x 600 ] > View Full-Size in another window.](images/21-s.jpg) Would you like to super-size your screen?
|
|
Frame: similar to the original Super Game Boy, the Game Boy Player features a selection of 20 frames to border the gameplay display area. Doesn’t affect the game in any way, but can have adverse effects on your eyes if you stare at the hot-pink for extended periods. We prefer the darker shades.
Screen size: the normal view places your selected borders around the image, reducing the visible display area by about 25%. If that reduction annoys you, then full view mode expands the image to fill up your display while preserving the GBA’s native aspect ratio (so 4:3 TVs will see slight letterboxing).
The smaller, normal view is the default choice for a reason. Unless your TV is 20 inches or smaller, full mode will look pixilated and blurred.
Controller: lets you choose between two preset button schemes, one of them intuitive and the other confusing. But hey, when you feel that your games are getting too easy…
Screen filter: three settings: soft, normal, and sharp. Most of the time, you’ll want to leave this setting on normal. On the soft setting, all games exhibited a very noticeable afterglow effect on the onscreen images. Think of playing a fast paced game on an LCD flat-panel with a slow response time. From our testing, there wasn’t much of a difference between the sharp setting and the normal setting.
Then why bother having three settings when we clearly preferred using just normal? Some games use special tricks designed specifically for the LCD display on the GBA. Some of those tricks don’t translate over well to the TV and end up making certain parts of the picture scrambled, flicker, and jitter. In these instances, use of the different filter mode may fix all problems.
Timer: this is a neat little feature. You can just set the number of minutes you wish to play before a message and sound will pop up alerting you of the elapsed time. Perfect for all those times you wish to play only 42 minutes, as we all know that the answer is always 42.
Change game pak: exactly what it sounds like. You hit this whenever you want to pop in another cartridge. This feature can also be activated by pressing and holding the Z and Start buttons. The Game Boy Player even has a handy eject slider on the right side to shoot-out the game pak when you’re ready for a change.