Smart Boy: The Nintendo smartphone that will never be

Nintendo has been the king of handheld consoles for decades, but the market for such devices has been severely damaged by the rise of smartphones and tablets. While the smart thing for Nintendo to do would be to release its own game-centric smartphone, that’s not likely to happen, but that isn’t stopping designers like Pierre Cerveau from dreaming. 

We don’t normally find ourselves getting worked up over device concept renders. Sure, they can be fun. But more than often they’re little more than a tease meant to give us Android blue balls. Nobody likes that. Still, we couldn’t help but take notice at a new one by designer Pierre Cerveau making its way around the net. Dubbed the Nintendo Smart Boy, this Game Boy inspired concept design shows us what could have been had Nintendo entered the smartphone race. The concept really isn’t too out there, with the craziest feature being hot swappable modules that mimic the appearance of classic Game Boy cartridges to add bonus battery power, internal storage, or a camera to the device. Aside from an attachable classic game pad that also provides a battery boost, the Smart Boy features a handy power saving black and green “8-bit” mode to cut back on power. Amazing.