Today is the 20th birthday of the Gameboy, the little Tetris-playing machine that swept the world and showed that portable game consoles could actually be popular.

I never owned an original Gameboy when I was younger, but I did spend many a bus ride home from school swapping turns with a friend who had one, making our way through Super Mario Land.  The first one I actually owned was when I was older, picking up a Gameboy Color before leaving for my semester abroad in Japan.  I really only used it to play Pokemon at the time, but that was more than enough to keep me occupied.

In the years since, the Gameboy family moved on to become the Gameboy Advance, and then onward to the DS (which does not share the Gameboy name, but we all know is a direct decendant).  I use my DS daily on the trainride to work, and I think at this point I own more games for it than I have for any other console.

So, let’s raise a toast today to the original giant gray brick that started everything, and if you’ve still got one laying around, fire it up and play some Dr. Mario or something.  Happy Birthday, little friend!