My new Wonderswan

After a bit of dilly dallying on eBay, trying to catch a bargain, I decided to just go and buy a SwanCrystal from a nearby video game retailer. SwanCrystal was the third Wonderswan incarnation, with a brilliant TFT screen. The one I got was in a Blue/Violet casing, and still in its original box.

Inside the box was the console, wrapped in a plastic bag, a Panasonic AA battery, an instruction manual and a registration card. My Japanese is a little rusty, so the instruction manual made no sense to me, although there was some intriguing screenshots showing some personal information screen where the user can store their details, including their Bloodtype. This thing is practical too! I hope to find out more about this personal information screen sometime soon.

Pictures below show the box and the console.

Don't Panic! Don't Panic!

I put the battery in and gingerly pressed the yellow power button. The power button was a new feature to the CrystalSwan with previous versions using a switch mechanism. I waited for a Gameboy like bell, or a nice reassuring splash screen but all I got was a few lines on the screen that quickly faded away. I pressed it again, same thing happened. Hmm I thought - this battery that came with it must have been several years old, so I tried a new Duracell that I had. Same thing. My heart sunk, as I started to contemplate the possibility that I'd bought a dud. Feeling dejected and like I wanted make the world to go away, I put my CrystalSwan away and resigned myself to taking it back to the shop. But before doing so, a Google search brought heartening results. It seems that without a game cartridge in the system, the behaviour I saw was entirely normal. Rejoice rejoice, all I need now is a game to test my new Wonderswan.