Game & Watch

The Game & Watch series was a line of approximately 59 handheld electronic games made by Nintendo and created by Gunpei Yokoi from 1980 to 1991. They featured a single game that could be played on an LCD screen, in addition to a clock and alarm. Some of the titles available in Game & Watch format were Donkey Kong, The Legend of Zelda, Mario Bros., Mickey Mouse, and Balloon Fight. For a more complete list, see List of Game & Watch games.

Soon enough, every toy company was copying the footsteps the Game & Watch left behind – such as Tiger Electronics and their Star Wars themed games.

The Game & Watch games are getting a renewal with the Game and Watch Gallery series of games for the Game Boy. They feature not only the original games, but new, modernized versions as well.

In 2001, the character that must be saved in Fire and Parachute was given an official name, Mr. Game & Watch, in the GameCube game Super Smash Bros. Melee.

Rise of the Game Boy

Game & Watches were eventually superseded by handheld games such as Game Boy. The disadvantage of the Game & Watches was that each unit was only able to play essentially one game, due to the LCD display being pre-printed with the characters necessary for one game. Game Boys and other successors were able to play many different games, using a more flexible dot matrix display and plug-in game cartridges.