The Nintendo Game Boy, circa 1980s. Photo courtesy of Nintendo.

In a move sure to make a lot of Generation Xers feel old, not to mention their boomer predecessors, Nintendo’s Game Boy has been inducted into the National Toy Hall of Fame.

The Hall is part of the National Museum of Play in Rochester, N.Y., and features items that have “inspired creative play and enjoyed popularity over a sustained period,” the museum explains.

Forty-four items now are ensconced in the Hall of Fame, including the stick, the skateboard, the kite, jigsaw puzzle, jump rope and G.I. Joe. This year’s inductees, besides Game Boy, were the ball and the Big Wheel tricycle, beating out nine other finalists such as the paper airplane, playing cards and Cabbage Patch Kids.

So, how did Game Boy rate a nod in the same breath as a ball (an item Game Guy thinks should have made it in about 43 inductees ago)? According to the museum’s announcement, the Game Boy “transformed the electronic games market by popularizing handheld gaming.”

“No video game platform did more to put gamers ‘on the go’ than this invention,” the museum said. “Over the past two decades, Game Boy has become synonymous with handheld gaming fun” because of its portability and efficient design.

Of course, you could say the same thing about any ball.

Game Boy, introduced commercially in America in 1989, becomes the second tech gadget to win induction into the Hall (unless you count the Easy-Bake Oven). The Atari 2600 second-generation game platform was admitted to the Hall in 2007.