Home consoles came into our lives in the second half of the 70s of the last century, and it is quite possible that the number of models that have reached the market is overwhelming. Only in the early days of the Pong, the absence of a patent on the invention encouraged hundreds of companies to market their own designs, with adaptations so rare that it is impossible to list them all. And the mythical Atari 2600, or the CBS Colecovision, or the Intellivision, the Vectrex and Philips Videopac had not yet arrived.
What do we consider a rarity?
In general, talking about strange consoles is quite abstract, open to personal considerations because if we look carefully at some machine designs that were enormously successful, some we could consider as rare. This is the case of the first PS3, the fetus, or the Mega Drive 32X, or the PS2 itself, which inaugurated this desire to put the consoles upright with an aspect that was reminiscent of a wall radiator. Were they pretty? Well for tastes...
So we decided to further refine the concept of strange console and what we have done is mark the territory clearly. We are not going to put only rare designs (objectively reprehensible) but also the bet itself. That is to say, what company it comes from, its tradition in the world of video games and how bad the conception and start-up processes were until reaching the final mess. That is to say, what in a quite rational way we could consider as an absolute disaster no matter how you look at it.
As it is, let's start that journey through the gallery of horrors of video game history. Are you ready?
What paint these companies here?
In this category we will explain the most bizarre projects that have seen the light throughout the history of video games. almost all of these fails They are created by companies that nobody could guess what they were trying to achieve in this sector and that, with all the reasons in the world, ended up abandoning them after a resounding failure. Although in some cases they saw the danger coming and chose to back off as if nothing had happened, hoping that history would forgive them. And they are the following:
Apple Pippin
In the turbulent years of Apple's Newton, those in Cupertino came to think that they could launch a console in full multimedia boom in the mid-90s. Specifically, in 1996, when the Americans decided to develop a console from which some units could be seen at the E3 of the time. The poor thing was going to have a Power PC processor, which is almost certainly one of the worst Apple has ever used. Luckily, someone must have realized the failure that was waiting for them around the corner and they canceled it. Today Pippin is practically a myth... luckily.
Nokia N-Cage
In full success of Nokia phones with Symbian operating system, the Finns tried their luck developing a model of mobile phone that they called portable console. It kept the screen in vertical aspect ratio, some ability to play 3D games (the tomb raider wasn't bad) and an SD card system to distribute your games. The close to 0 euros that it cost (in 300) made it a rare bird, although with the second generation they managed to lower the cost of it significantly to make it more popular. Obviously it failed, and a lot, and no one remembers her right now. It was one of the failures prior to the beginning of Nokia's decline against the smartphones that began to be sold in 2007, with the first iPhone in the lead. A disaster of an idea or ahead of its time?
Game.com
Tiger Electronic, a company that in the 90s developed a large number of LCD slots such as the classic Game & Watch, There came a time when he thought he could overshadow Nintendo and put his own Game Boy on the market. As expected, the project lasted just long enough for the partners Those who believed in it saw the few sales achieved and, most importantly, the scant projection of what would come in the following years. In the end, it placed just over 300.000 units with games like Resident Evil 2, Duke Nukem 3D, etc. He cost just under $70 at the time.
LaserActive
In 1993, at the height of the multimedia boom, and with 3DO looming on the horizon with optical formats, the sound giant decided to make the leap to the console market hoping to gain a foothold. In this case, the chosen format was the mythical LaserDisc of the old arcades like Dragon's Lair y Space AcAnd although the way to bring the project to the stores was somewhat... absurd. Pioneer priced their machine at nearly a thousand dollars, which was crazy back in 1993. And that's despite the fact that it received accessories that allowed it to play games from the Mega Drive, Mega CD, or the original TurboGrafx 16. Not even that managed to lift a device that had neither head nor tail.
Why did you do that?
Now it's the turn to the consoles that some renowned companies launched video gamer who, on paper, knew exactly what they were doing because, somehow, they already had experience in the field and knew where they were going. But in view of the results, it is evident that not and that those responsible for those messes must have ended up all making bow ties in some office at their headquarters. Here are the most prominent:
Virtual Boy
It is one of the great fiascos of the Japanese. An attempt to create a 3D console (no, it's not virtual reality) before the sensational 3DS and which had some unspeakable misconceptions. The first, that we could only use it on a table, well supported, because if we tried it between our legs, the whole would end up on the floor in pieces. In addition, the rolo color chosen to tint the screens of their games was hellish and a break every 15 or 20 minutes was as necessary as it was recommended for the health of our corneas. And if that was not enough, its distribution was quite limited despite having a price of just under $200, since it went on sale in Japan and the US, leaving out Europe. Viewing the Virtual Boy with the perspective of time, it seems incredible that Nintendo would risk so much. But he did it and he paid for it.
Sega Megajet
This contraption was actually a portable Mega Drive, with a built-in six-button controller and which only lacked the screen. He could read cartridges, he had a video output, a power connector and an extra one for a second controller in case he wanted to play anything with a friend. It was not a good idea and its appearance did not help either because the users who saw it did not understand the concept very well. Also, it belongs to that dark time of SEGA when it went crazy throwing the Mega CD and Mega Drive 32X like it didn't cost. If you see one, hug it tightly to give it all the love it deserves in the face of so much misfortune that it experienced almost 30 years ago. Strange no, the following.
Nomad
Proof that SEGA didn't get it right the first time was that they tried it a second time, so they took the concept of the Mega Jet and put a screen on it to, yes, turn Mega Drive into a real laptop. It kept the second port for an extra gamepad, video connector to project the image on television, power connector and an extra compartment to place the batteries that, by the way, drank them (literally). It never reached Spain and many users missed it because the idea was not bad. A revision capable of consuming less batteries would have been extraordinary, but that never happened because SEGA in 1995 was already involved in the battle against Sony for PSX. And we also know how Saturn ended up.
Philips CDi
Although Philips was present at the origin of the home console market in the late 70s with its Magnavox Odyssey (in the US) and Philips Videopac, it took almost a decade before returned to the charge in full swing of the CD format. The Dutch came to think that with a multimedia console, capable of playing movies and launching applications, they were going to turn our television into a smart device, and they did not succeed. In the video game part, we witness glorious outrages like Hacendado's Zelda (three each worse) or that Mario with the appearance of a little boy's scribble. Several models were launched, in different price ranges with a common denominator: they looked like vintage video players from the 80s and were still at the beginning of a market that has only really materialized in the last ten years.
Atari Lynx
Muchos experts put Atari Lynx as one of the strangest consoles ever released and it may be so, but only because of the design, which It was too bulky for what the competition was wearing. Game Boy especially, and Game Gear, were more compact, more plastic unlike a Lynx with a very good finish. It wasn't too popular, but at the gaming level, it has a good collection of little gems thanks to its enormous graphic power, which left the portable games from SEGA and Nintendo in their infancy. Even so, they hung the rarity label of video games on him and, with great respect, we have no choice but to slightly disagree.