I still remember when handhelds were a rare thing… as in not many existed and not many people had one. There were not many on the market and of the few that existed they were quite expensive. Mattel had some sports games like football and I remember my friend had a Sears formula racing game which was quite clunky, the football just looked like some blinking rectangles and the racing game had a mini steering wheel at the bottom and a shiftier for speed. Coleco created a bunch of arcade favorites that looked similar to the actual machines except a heck of a lot smaller, they have since become quite collectable among retro fans today. Those were all great for the time as we couldn’t expect much more during the time when the video gaming phase was just taking off, but then things changed!
Once the Nintendo Game boy hit the scene there was an explosion of mini games everywhere, they came in all shapes and sizes and most would only play one game. Many different electronic companies jumped on the bandwagon and began slapping popular names and movie franchises all over them regardless if the game was any good or fun to play. Nintendo made some of the best like Donkey Kong, Super Mario Bros and Mario’s Cement Factory, they all came under the Game & Watch brand which kind of has that Nintendo controller feel. There where also a ton from Tiger Electronics that seemed to have a handheld for everything, the only good thing about them was that they were quite cheap so almost everyone had at least one. I remember going on a school trip to Quebec and a bunch of us would swap handhelds at each rest stop, most of us had about two or three of them to pass around.
But the real question was… did they fill the void when you really felt like playing a video game?
The answer is quite simple, yes when you didn’t have any other option and no when you did!
What I mean by that is that handhelds we designed for on-the-go usage, they were intended for quick and easy game-play that didn’t require investment of your time. They became very cheap and almost every store you shopped at had them, most were very simple like a basic car racing game, pinball or space shooter. The only problem you would face is that if you owned a whole bunch of them then you would have to decide which ones to take with you, it was usually decided based on your pocket space. Game boy made life a little easier as you only needed to carry one, then fill your other pockets full of tiny cartridges.
I myself went through a phase where I became obsessed with collecting handhelds, even though I had a game boy at the time I still enjoyed the simplicity of the handheld. The ones I liked the most were based on the true arcade classics, games like Donkey Kong and Pac man as well as Atari favourites like Pitfall!. I also collected a ton of random ones like handheld Golf, Monopoly, Scrabble and even one that clams to have over 100 built in games (although most of them are very similar to Tetris). I still don’t know why I was so fascinated by them, and even today when I see them in the toy store I have to refrain myself… its like my tiny obsession. I know that if I were to buy one today it would probably just end up in the same desk drawer with the rest of them, cold and lonely with their batteries depleting… Perhaps its time to show them some love again!
Brian Pudden