Just In: Nintendo Power, September/October 1989

There is a particular thrill in holding a document from the exact moment something began. This arrival is one of those: the September/October 1989 issue of Nintendo Power, the magazine Nintendo of America used to introduce its club members to the newly launched Game Boy.

A document from the exact moment the Game Boy landed in America.

What It Is

The issue presents the Game Boy, its early games and its accessories to American readers just as the console arrived, the handheld designed by Gunpei Yokoi having reached the United States that July. As Nintendo's own club publication, it is not outside coverage but the company's first pitch to its home audience, capturing exactly how the Game Boy was framed at its US launch. That makes it one of the earliest and most significant publications in the whole collection.

Nintendo Power Magazine 1989 - Introducing the Game Boy in the US

Why It Joined the Collection

Launch-moment publications are among the most valuable things a collection can hold, because they freeze a first impression before anyone knew how the story would unfold. This issue pins down the American beginning of the Game Boy with a precise date and Nintendo's own words, a primary source for how the console was born in the biggest Western market. Set beside the collection's other early catalogues and magazines from around the world, it helps map how the same machine was launched, country by country, in 1989 and after.

This Nintendo Power issue is documented, with photographs, on its own page in the collection.