Old handheld games, Tiger and stuff

[Tanooki]

I was wondering if any of you new or old timers here were ever much into the handheld games of the later 70s, 80s and earlier 90s at all? I'm talking stuff like the huge line of Tiger LCD games that ripped off the NES, arcades, movies, etc to the stuff Konami and various others like Nintendo with the Game & Watch series.

Back in the 80s I had this old Mattel Electronics Hockey game that used just a buzzer and little red LED dots, tough game but it was fun even if it was ugly. I also had a few Tiger games like Castlevania, Karnov and Baseball plus access to a few others with kids at the boys and girls club. That pretty much died off aside from random stuff to mess with due to the Gameboy. Later in the 90s I did snap up some Game & Watch games too as I wanted them but couldn't have one as a kid. Fairly recently I came across 4 Tigers (Castlevania, Karnov, Baseball and Football) all with the books and they were only a buck a piece and one was free which got me interested again. WIth that I ended up also buying the old D&D handheld which is tricky but fun.

I also never knew that Tiger did some Wii-like light gun games with their LCDs, just a few were made but one was Virtua Cop which I bumped into and I'm surprised how well the thing works as long as you don't have a badly positioned light to screw up the LED detection. I keep it on my desk as it's pretty amusing with its little detachable pistol.

DId any of you get into much of this or keep any of it around anymore?

[SpaceHarrier]

I put a good deal of time into the Tiger Electronic Pinball handheld, it was my first (I didn't even know what pinball was in 1987, I thought it was a baseball game at first sight) but sadly it disappeared ages ago. I swear most of these things got swallowed into a black hole, I never see them at swap meets or independent used game stores, heck, even most of mine up and vanished.

I also recall enjoying the Sonic the Hedgehog handheld, though I never could beat it. I had the TMNT one too... uh, yeah. 'Nuff said on that particular unit. One last handheld I remember having a lot of fun with is Radica Bass Fishin'. It looks like a rod and you actually reel your 'line' back in. When I was younger, my grandfather would take me and my cousins fishing every summer, and I have many good memories of that. One year when I went, in between fishing trips, we took turns playing the Radica Bass Fishin' handheld. Eventually, I caught the 25 lb. lunker. My mother later got me my own and because it was kept in her care, it's the only LCD handheld I've got left.

[StealthLurker]

Had some things like that back in the day like a bunch of the Coleco Tabletops, Game & Watches, some of the Gakken LCD games, some of the nintendo keychain LCD games, etc. However no longer have any of those, maybe some of the 90s stuff in storage somewhere.

Been picking up a few lately here and there. Got 3 boxed japanese Konami LCD games (Contra, Gradius & Top Gun). Looking to get more of the japanese Konami LCD games boxed as I find them.

Also got a brand new pocket LCD game of MaiKaiMura (Ghosts n Goblins). Looks like it came out in the 2000s.

[FrankSerpico]

It amazed me how long those Tiger games stayed on store shelves even after the Game Boy, Game Gear and other far superior handheld options were released. That Virtua Cop one you mention was released in like '96 or '97, they also released Independence Day and Duke Nukem "ports" with that similar light gun set-up. I remember I nearly bought the Independence Day one at Wal-mart back when I was a lad with some birthday cash, but changed my mind after I walked down the next aisle and saw that Age of Apocalypse themed X-Men figures were now available.

[Tanooki]

I had NO idea there was a makai mura (GnG) LCD game, I'd so so want that. I know there's a Burgertime from overseas but just never pulled the trigger on it.

I don't think the light gun got Duke it was Area 51. I was so impressed with the one I started looking and saw two others were done (ID and A51) and couldn't confirm any others. It's fun because despite being LCD it still has that fast twitch action you get from a light gun game which usually a Tiger game just can't copy well enough like with all those NES and arcade ports. Speaking of, I really need to stop slogging and replace my MM2 one that croaked as it's still a favorite.


Since it was brought up I was thinking of doing another topic, but whatever, I do have some tabletops too. Back in the earlier 90s a friend gave me a DK that was thrashed but functional and I let one just ride for like a decade or more and eventually got a partner to it the DK Jr title which is kind of cute. Ultimately my dumb ass sold them off and ended up regretting it eventually but was going to just let it go. About 5 years back found a Pac-Man with the power cells in it for $12 at a flea and I enjoyed it so much I kept an eye out for more and I ended up buying back a DK that was stunning with the book and after that I found locally a Q-Bert which crazy enough feels really right. About a month or so back for a buck I found the Entex Crazy Climber game boxed still at a half price books but it wouldn't work, ended up having to ghetto patch a wire inside and apply some glue(busted screw holders) and about two weeks ago finally got a soldering gun and I did a proper repair to it and it's solid.

Of the Game & Watches I said I had, I used to have like a dozen but all that remains is SMB, Zelda, Club Nintendo Ball and a Zelda (black) wristwatch nelsonic game. 2 weekends ago for a quarter I got one of those keychain G&W's for DK Jr, long ago I had the SMB and Zelda of those and they're gone. I still want to get more mini arcades and DK Jr is on my list and I think Zaxxon and Galaxian would be worth it too, not so much Ms Pac Man and Frogger. Frogger I have the excalibur games decade old remake CIB and I like the battery save scores and mute button on it.

[turboexpress]

Definitely was into Tiger games. They were awesome and fun. I remember Dragon's Lair, TMNT and a ton of sports games as well. Tiger games lasted forever and were very good quality. I bet most of the ones that survived in decent condition still work perfectly.

[Steve W]

This is a small amount of the stuff I scrounged up out of storage just to take a picture of, and I took this photo several years ago. I've found a lot more since then. The Big Trak tank was mine from back in the day, everything else was thrift store and flea market finds.

I love those old handhelds. Not the Tiger ones specifically, since I was in my late teens and early 20s by the time those rose to prominence (and I had an Atari Lynx by then), my era was the late '70s and early '80s handhelds. I first got a Mattel Football handheld back in the day, my brother the year or so before had gotten Tomy's Hit and Missile. So much fun back then. I used to just go to thrift stores only for old video games, but once I found a Coleco Donkey Kong tabletop, I was hooked and started checking out the toy racks every single time religiously. I think nowadays I spend more time looking through the toys for old board games and handhelds than I do looking for game cartridges.

Looking through my Photobucket pages, there's lots of handheld games taken after this picture, so I've created a little collage of stuff I've found since then. One of these days when I get the drive to do it, I'd like to track down all the electronic games and toys I've picked up through the years and take a full collection photo. But until then, this will have to do.

Edit: if you recognize that blue boxed Pair Match device in the picture above from somewhere but can't quite place it, someone at Paramount decided they were futuristic looking enough to use a bunch of them as set decorations for all the tables in Ten-Forward on Star Trek: The Next Generation.

[Tanooki]

Wow it's like you're the handheldmuseum.com guy or something with all that. You've got a few I keep an eye out for, a few I know I have, and I did long ago in the 80s have that DnD boardgame in your first image which was I think remember being fun.

[Atarileaf]

These are really cool. I have a boxed BLIP since it was my first handheld game as a kid. Not really a video game, more of an electro-mechanical game. Being a Tandy Color Computer guy, I'd really like to get some of the Tandy handhelds. The only one I have is a Tandy Cosmic 1000 Fire Away which I did a video of years ago

One of my favorite non-video game pieces in my collection is a boxed Tomy Atomic Arcade Pinball game. Not a handheld but this topic made me think of it. Love this thing

[8-Bit Archeology]

I love running across old handhelds.
I still have my original Pin*Bot that I got for my 10th Birthday.
I sadly sold my other 3 when times got bad. Pin*Bot was my favorite so I kept it.

The ones I sold and miss are.
Paperboy
Lights Out
And the pistol grip game Duke Nukem 3D

The DN3D one was neat since I never saw one as a pistol grip. Plus it had a pretty busy screen.

[Tanooki]

How good is that Tiger pinbot? I've been waffling for over a month on buying one or not. The old Nintendo and original Tiger pinball LCD games were kind of sketchy so it has me on the edge but it looks pretty slick.

[8-Bit Archeology]

In terms of old handhelds it plays pretty well. I have a very nostalgic view on it. The sounds are cool and the ball movement is easy to follow.
I love it. And yes the handheld itself is a very slick design.

[Tanooki]

I'm curious if they bothered to attempt copying any of the sound or talking of the pinball game or if it's just basic beeps and bloops which would be fairly lazy as this is a later LCD of theirs.

[FrankSerpico]

Have you seen the prices people are trying to get from some '80s and '90s Tiger handhelds on ebay? It's pretty ridiculous. especially in the case of stuff with a license people think may have collector value. Someone was trying to get over $100 for an MC Hammer handheld

[Steve W]

I have a boxed BLIP since it was my first handheld game as a kid. Not really a video game, more of an electro-mechanical game.

They were an interesting design, weren't they? I don't know about BLIP since mine doesn't work, but Hit & Missile and Digital Derby use little motorized film strips with light bulbs behind them. Pretty ingenious design, and amazingly noisy!

The only one I have is a Tandy Cosmic 1000 Fire Away which I did a video of years ago.

I've actually got one, but I never took a picture of it. I love a lot of their designs, they look like futuristic movie props.

One of my favorite non-video game pieces in my collection is a boxed Tomy Atomic Arcade Pinball game. Not a handheld but this topic made me think of it. Love this thing

My brother had one when we were kids, and then he stupidly dismantled it to see how it worked and never figured out how to put it back together again. I bought one in a thrift store years ago, and then I started noticing something odd. There are several other pinball tables that came out after Tomy's, and a lot of them use that exact table design and layout, I was finding a few of them in thrifts too. Some that were only on the market maybe five or six years ago, from generic toy companies. I wonder if Tomy licensed the design out, or if Chinese pirate companies just knocked it off.

I used to see handhelds and things in thrifts, but as of late I rarely come across them now. It might be because I don't go to thrifts that much anymore, since they're all so heavily picked over around here. But I had a good run with handhelds for a while, before all the eBay resellers wiped the local stores clean.

[jammajup]

I used to own a few hand held and table top games before getting my first console (Atari 2600), I have an interesting book on these hand held games and if you have an interest in them you should look out for it.

[Ozzy_98]

Have you seen the prices people are trying to get from some '80s and '90s Tiger handhelds on ebay? It's pretty ridiculous. especially in the case of stuff with a license people think may have collector value. Someone was trying to get over $100 for an MC Hammer handheld

I think $100 would get you the real Mc Hammer