One of the many niche oddball Nintendo peripherals of the ’90s was the Game Boy Printer — a blocky chunk of plastic that could be connected to your little game console’s fellow Game Boy Camera, which would print out some intensely gray-scale portraits. The staticky monochromatic aesthetic of the printer pictures is semi-iconic, and it looks like we almost got a color version of the same product.
The news comes from a datamine of Mario Artist Paint Studio, released on the Japan-only N64DD back in 1999. In the files is a text box that translates to “Color Printer communication has occurred,” along with other elements that confirm that a Pocket Printer Color was almost real, or at least real enough to be implemented in other materials.
"Color Printer communication error has occurred."
Okay so:
– This uses the cut Link cable feature of the Transfer Pak.
– This uses the unreleased, unannounced Pocket Printer Color. pic.twitter.com/LPMN9UsTwe— LuigiBlood (@LuigiBlood) August 16, 2019
Crazy that we find these things out two decades after the fact. What other secrets are just lurking in the code of years-old video games, waiting to be discovered? We’ll be sure to report any others we find.
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Written by Amelia Fruzzetti
A writer and Nintendo fan based in Seattle, Washington. When not working for NinWire, she can be found eating pasta, writing stories, and wondering about when Mother 3 is finally going to get an official localization.
