That Weird 90s Game Console | Nostalgia Nerd
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- Опубліковано 29 вер 2024
- Remember the 90s? Remember seeing strange games consoles alongside the Master System, NES, Mega Drive or SNES? Because I do, and one which kept re-appearing year after year was the TV Boy, and the TV Boy 2. What in the name of lord almighty were these things? Why were they so cheap? How did they have so many games? Who owned them? Why didn't I own one? All these questions and more will be answered in this very video.
TV Boy for life y'all.
or should that be... Atari VCS for life?
Explore TV Boy listings on eBay nnerd.es/2PgGEVK
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Expect Souljaboy to launch this as the SouljaGame Retro!
Lol
Lol
Yeah, but the Soulja Boy console, would be better then this Poor Man's Atari 2600 plug n play 😅
This was my FIRST ever console! Didn't have much growing up but this thing was awesome to me. Always remember it fondly
Amazing! I still have my TVBoy 2 and have fond memories playing Dentist game!
That Weird 90’s Game Console was my favorite early 2000’s sitcom.
still got mine, bought for me for christmas from the argos catalogue around the mid 90s!
I had one. And acknowledged my desires in the Argos catalogue likewise lol
Remember seeing this in the Argos catalogue back in the day, so wanted it.
This thing always had me curiouse when seeing it in catalogues too...
A mate I used to work with brought me her Super TV Boy from the attic a few years ago, we set it up at mine and her favourite/most-played-as-a-kid game on it was its version of Keystone Kops. And then last year, I saved a boxed TV Boy II from a skip (fully working!), so really it only took 25 years of mild curiosity till I finally found out what was going on with that thing.
It seems pretty cool in a way to be honest. Not half as bad as I expected going into the video.
I got one of these for Christmas as a kid and still have it to this very day I believe! :) It's an awesome system, a mixed bag of games but great fun :)
That sounds like a nice little thing, Thank you for the review. I enjoyed it :)
Jesus. I had one of these, it must have been the original because it had the controller port. I used a Megadrive. It introduced me to Atari games, thought I didn't realise that at the time. I remember putting in every number one by one and writing a name for each game on a pad and paper so I wouldn't forget. Mine didn't come with a game list.
Yeah, remember visiting a friend whose family was quite poor - so no Nintendo's or Sega's (heck the Playstation was out at this point and N64 too I think) but I remember playing Pitfall on their TV Boy.
I still have my TV Game 2600 (Atari Jr 2600 clone) since the 80s, it have the exact same "main menu", awesome memories!.
In Chile was known as "Mega Boy", the rf antenna of a Nes or Snes works pretty good in this piece of pirate goodness. Man, what a sweet memories.
Omg I wanted this sooooo bad when looking in the catalogue. I was a 90s kid and couldn't afford a megadrive. Eventually skipped all that and went straight to PlayStation anyway. But I'm glad I have finally seen this beast in action today. Thankyou!!!
I think I remember having one of these before the Sega Megadrive. Wow what a blast from the past.
2:41 So if anyone would ever want the Nostalgia Nerd dead, all they need to do is send him some game console with metal hand grips, and include an instruction manual stating: “do not connect hand grips directly to mains power.”
I have to give them some respect for not doing this with emulation but with the actual 6507 and Stella chips.
i got the original one with the joystick ports had a lot of fun playing 2 player games with my brother and sister
I have one of these from way back! The thing i found most curious was that the screenshots on the box always looked a tad off, on closer look you can see that they are literally scissor and glue jobs made from craft paper. Must have had trouble taking photos of a screen and resorted to recreating them.
I laughed so hard at this 2:04 😂😂😂😂😂🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 IN THE WILD
And he was dead serious.
Wow! never thought I'd watch a video on UA-cam about the TV Boy. imagine hoping Santa will get you that ps1 all your mates had, and finding this under the Christmas tree. THANKS MOM!
That being said, I notice Argos are selling an "Atari Flashback" with 2600s greatest hits for £80 with 6 less games then this does.
I remember seeing this 'gem' in the Argos catalogue. Do you remember there were still Atari 2600 games being in mail order catalogues in the 1990s?
I remember my sister getting this and looking back I am amazed they were able to actually sell such a rip off of licensed games in high Street stores. But this was really the start of the whole console on a chip being mass released. Probably when this was released there was no precedence for stopping it from being sold more so with Atari being dead as a company at the time and no one was around to stop them.
Great work dude heaps cool
Interesting nostalgia trip
5:20 Defender looked way better on my vcs in the day.
9:42 Greetings and welcome, to an LGR thing...!
Yeeesss!!! I had one of these!
It was so. Bad.
Literally had a nes in the same room. No competition.
This was the first true plug and play
Check out the hols for joystick on the PCB :)
I used to see this advertised in the Gamleys (remember them!) window for years as a kid. I always wanted one but my parents just used to say “no, it’s a piece of shit”. I got a SNES instead for which I’m greatful. I finally fulfilled my dream to own one as an adult and wish I’d saved my money. My parents were right, for once, it was a pile of old shit.
The first ever gaming system I ever had, I had the best childhood playing this 😎 oh yeah vampire attack and wcw I had too 😂
That's a weak but charming little gaming device.
10:17 You could've called this game "Bird Versus Camel" And no one would've argued with you.
Hey Look! It's the new Soulja Boy Console!
i kind of want one now
So this is the father of 50000 games in 1 huh
I forgot all about these. Lol
My cousin bout this from a charity shop in late 90s we made super fun of it then lol
the sweater... phear
I always thought of it like cyst emma
Is there any correlation between the games which did not have their name changed and the ones in bold in the manual? I'm just wondering if they had a handful of legit licenses which were left untouched and everything else was renamed with the intro hacked :o
I grew up with this! My grandparents had it at their place, so when they looked after my brother and I during the school holidays and when we were sick we would play this. This would be around 96-97, I was 6-7. We had the first version since we were able to hook up Commodore controllers to it. We knew it was hopelessly outdated but it's all we had. We eventually got a Sega Master System 2 as an upgrade. Was always a bit behind on console gaming.
Really appreciate this video. This was a fond memory.
I love the British "not in service" message. "The number you dialed _does_ _not_ _exist_ "
twilight zone music starts playing
I'm told the British tend to not sugarcoat things.
So basically it's a cheap plug and play Atari 2600 from the early 90s. Cool.
It is pretty ahead of it's time when you think about it, the current crop of atari plug and plays have fewer games.
@@owllymannstein7113 And has the orginal hardware to boot!
@@Toonrick12 Hacking item?
The bad thing is that all games play with altered colors, because the game ROMs are NTSC versions played on a PAL console.
@@Andros2709 I saw at least one PAL game in this review.
God I totally forgot about this! I loved mine back in the day what a nice trip down memory lane
Yeah, this looks nice.
''It sounds like a Master System in horrific pain'' LOL
I still have one of these bad boys :D
Fancy seein you here, m8. Even if I noticed 2 years too l8.
An Atari 2600 clone without Combat?
*BLASPHEMY!*
You couldn't have played it anyway, because this was a single player console, while Combat was a two players game.
@@Andros2709 Ah, back when plug and play manufacturers cared about compatibility.
Ah, yes. Here's a portable mini LCD famiclone without a controller port or video output. It has Duck Hunt in it... Good luck playing it.
I remember owning and playing this monstrosity, can't remember if I got it from Woolworths or Argos.
Most of the time it was played by my mother as she only played it for space invaders.
My mum bought me this and got completely addicted to Space Invaders too! What is it about that game and ladies of a certain age?! lol She was also addicted to Tetris.
So basically an Atari Flashback before there was a Flashback. Being one that runs on real hardware instead of being an emulator box though is interesting in its own right.
The FlashBack 1 was an NES on a chip, but the FlashBack 2 was a functional recreation of the 2600 hardware, running the original code, and I think the additional sequels were as well.
Sadly the Flashback 3 onwards are all software emulation. Which is a shame.
The hackability of the Flashback 2 was such an amazing development - being incredibly easy to just solder on a 2600 cartridge connector to play real carts.
It's a shame there's not been anything more modern in the same vein… because well, there are some rad modern releases in 2600 land, and playing them on an emulator just ain't the same…
If it helps the Retron77 is an emulator in a box, but it does have a cartridge slot for playing real cartridges and will work with a number of flash carts. Original ataris are also still fairly affordable. Lastly there is rumor that the Flashback 9 will feature an SD card slot, so it may be able to load homebrew.
Yup, the thing was a more authentic clone of the Atari 2600 than every Flashback other than the Flashback 2. Blatantly illegal, but authentic.
I do remember the 9 pin joystick port. It’s funny how most of the copyrights where removed from the games. A classic example of hong kong video game piracy. A large toy store chain in the netherlands sold these around late 1995. I still remember the advertisement and how it was depicted next to a PS1 which was just released at the time.
An Argos staple for years! I swear they reused the case for an Intellevision model as well.
Found you! On to the next video....
All hail Larry o7
Shark Shark FTW!
Larry on his promo tour again...
There's an Intellivision clone?
YES I specifically remember staring suspiciously at this thing in the Argos/Index catalogues with its bargain price and loads of games - it always seemed "too good to be true", my instincts were the same as yours. This is the first clone style "x-in-1" console I ever saw in a "real shop" rather than a market or as a ticket prize in a seaside arcade. Amazing you actually got one after all these years!
Interesting that whilst most of these type of systems are Famiclones, this is a 2600 clone instead. Though I like to collect them for the box art and historic value, I'm not a huge fan of 2600 games save the odd few, so I'm glad I didn't buy it at the time. A Famiclone with Super Mario Bros, Donkey Kong et all would have been a far more exciting prospect for me at the time.
Interestingly he said in the video it was an Atari clone.
@@BobMonkeypimp I never said he didn't. I just pointed out its interesting that most of these type of systems are famiclones, but this is a 2600 clone.
Pixels Ltd And this one has the original hardware as well, unlike most Famiclones!
Yeah! That's erally cool
Probably still one of the cheapest ways going (apart from emulation) to get into the Atari 2600 scene though
The Gakken TV boy only had a handful of games released on cartridge. I don’t think it was related to this console at all.
Yep, it's not. It came out in the early 80s.
I remember my dad having this when i was 3 or 4. This silly little machine sparked my love of video games
Did i take the first high score screenshot
i took one of river raid in 1983 using an old film camera
people used to sy "why would you do that take a photo of your game and its score" how times have changed
Did you send it in and get the belt buckle?
This looks like the awful thing your dad would rent you at holiday inn because it’s raining.
I've heard of Famiclones, but never was aware the Atari VCS had bootlegs of its own.
Actually the VCS used parts that were common back in the late 70s
The Atari Flashback was in fact a Famiclone.
@@wolftickets1969 yeah, that uses recreations of the games, rather than the actual 2600 ROMs
The spirit of these old many in one consoles lives on, definitely.
For my birthday my kids went to Argos or Hawkins Bazaar, the kind of place you go when you don't know what to get someone for a birthday. I got a Red5 Desktop Arcade Machine (Argos number 668/2240 if you're tempted!)... And, well, it's awful. The casing is okay, the controls are okay. Battery life is okay. But there are 200 Atari 8bit - era clone games on there and not one worth playing for more than a few minutes. The games on the TVBoy look much better. Still, I bet Argos sells boat loads of them this Christmas.
I remember in the 80-90's i also used to search the Laminated book of dreams, awaiting birthdays and xmas's making my lists.....
Good ole Bill Bailey
Very cool. I've seen these on and off over the years but had no idea they were 2600 clones.
Yeah, I didn't know the TV Boy had Atari 2600 games on it either.
I got one as a Christmas present back in 1996
Oh man, I feel for you
@@eval_is_evil It's not *that* bad, real Atari games and all.
My Systema lunchbox don't do any of those things. But it fits 8 unbroken sausages.
Pure art.
Sounds like a normal Friday night for me.
even with the copyright issues. I'm surprised nobody's ever made one of these pieces of crap that contains the entire Atari library from one system or the other. Can you imagine little handheld like this crammed with the entire 500 game library for the 2600. Hard to believe that system had 500 games. Not all consoles were nearly that lucky or fortunate.
yeah it does have a massive library but that isn't really surprising when you consider it was being sold in retail outlets for so long 1977-1992. :O
Nowadays I could expect somebody doing it with a sd card slot. So you have to provide the games yourself and they don't fear any copyright issues with the games, only the hardware.
Not really. It was the only counsel available and in those days one person could write a game in a few months. Now you need a team and 7 years for games like GTA 6
@@colinjohnston8519 Only console available? I get it was the most popular by far, but it was also competing against Intelivision, ColecoVision, Odyssey2, and home computers just to name a few.
@@HappyBeezerStudios no ,thats facilitating piracy. If anyone released something like this ,they would get sued to kingdom come or get an injunction or something. That's why stuff like flashcarts cant be legaly sold in shops.
This was technically my first ever Games Console. I got it for Christmas in '97 when I was 11 years old and I remember liking the games. I had no idea they were Atari 2600 games back then. One game in Particular I liked was a platformer where you are a little Elf boy trying to get back home. Also I personally liked the menu theme.
ua-cam.com/video/nhKOWEopxTM/v-deo.html
Well it was well worth its money just for "Atari 2600 Demon Attack"...loved that game..
I like how it describes having retro games, when the thing itself is now retro.
3:17 "Save the swimmers" - sounds like the latest anti-wanking movement
The thing is that the entire Atari VCS No-Intro set is about 30mb, and 52mb for the goodset at most.
The entire Atari VCS library can be stored on a 2gb flash drive and leave room to spare.
A weird anomaly of this console, or at least on the redesigned Super TV Boy version I had, was with the menu music. That tune played LOUD! The times I'd accidentally blasted it out at like 3am and scrambled for the remote to urgently turn it down. But here's the thing... Every CRT I ever played it on, maybe half a dozen, you could never fully mute it. Whether you simply hit the mute button or turned the volume slider down to zero, it was always still clearly audible. I wonder if anyone knows what was going on here? How did it bypass the mute volume level on CRT's? My best, and only, and likely, guess would be that the sets never actually fully disengaged audio to the speakers when muted. Rather turned the volume very very very low. On most content, you'd never notice. But because that TV Boy tune was so loud, having such a high tone and pitch, it exposed the fact that the audio was still minutely present in the speakers. That surely must have been what was going on, but I'd be interested to hear from anyone who could confidently confirm that to be the case. We had my Super TV Boy hooked up to the telly when I shared a house, and it became a running joke as to how that tune was easily the loudest thing in video game history.
Great upload as always matey 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻. For some reason this one slipped through unwatched 🤔not sure how I have the bell on ???
Anyway matey I remember saying you deserve more subs and views feels like years ago and now your starting to really get there. Congrats matey. I just hit 50k subs and that was great so can only imagine the 200k buzz 😆😆😆. Talk soon my friend take care🤘🏻😀🤘🏻🍻🍻🍻
"The Birds: When They Attack, Kill Them!" sounds like the title of a modern day "re-imagining" of Hitchcock's classic film.
That menu screen sounds like an ice cream truck.
Or a dying christmas decoration.
I see the whole modern "retro plug 'n' play" category as basically the legit (and sometimes still not legit) response to these old pirate gadgets. Though I suppose in spirit they're not too different from the old 1970s dedicated pong machines.
Now that's a blast from the past! I had a TVBoy (in fact I think I've still got it somewhere, probably in the loft) and that it did have the extra joystick port on the side. I seem to remember having "fun" playing Frogs and Flies, Combat and Gunslinger with my kid brother on that thing with a Master System joypad hooked up.
I had this from Argos some time in the 90s. Can't remember if it was the 1 or 2 but was identical to yours. I don't remember that much about it, but I almost certainly still have it in my family attic if I look hard enough! You've really brought back some memories here though, not so much with the TV boy, but with Systema. I'd love to see a video on this company some time. Their products were as much my early childhood as Sega were and of course they were portable so came to school with me! Everybody had a Systema product. I had the little red and black racing game you used in this video, along with the yellow and black thing too. Were they also responsible for the Teenage Mutant Ninja/Hero Turtles handhelds too?! These were really popular.
Great vid as ever!
The Internet hey, desktop icon from Windows 95 :)
Fun fact: The original TV Boy is not probably the very first plug & play console ever, but also it, Alongside TV Boy II and Super TV Boy are all emulated in MAME
This would have been the most amazing thing to me when I was a kid. It’s shitty now that I am approaching 100 years old and you see such amazing products but you are immediately sceptical.
I miss that innocent hope that the cheap junk may just be an amazing machine.
Oh to be in my 60s again...
Im not sure what it's called, but there was a system that was just a controller that had built in games. The controller was the exact design of an N64 controller. But it had two wires. A RCA cable and a power cable. It stored about 150 games on it as well. Mostly NES and snes games. Mario, contra, tetria etc. Wish I knew what it was called. It mostly sold at flea markets and bootleg shopping mall kiosks. Not on any legit game store
Wtf??? What is that sh@t on the left page?? Spring shoes??? 0:38
0:31 Forget the TV Boy, check out those trendy stilts!
Now there's some 90s level trouble brewing there.
That was actually pretty decent for 30 bucks
I have one of these an and being in Australia, there is such minimal info on this! Thank you for this video!
“Playing on your bed with your 14 inch portable CRT at the other side of the room.” Oh that’s weird. I’m doing exactly that right now while watching this video. Using a 14 inch Matsui TVR 185 Portable. Man, it’s like the 1990s.
*EDIT:* I’ve now got a beautiful Sony KV-21X5U Trinitron to replace my old 14-incher. I love it so much, it’s mindblowingly bright, sharp, and clear; the colours are just incredible.
The one in my bedroom was a black and white CRT which you had to adjust various nobs to get the vertical and horizontal hold stable - just doing that was a game in itself 🤣
YES
YES.
oh my days! not seen this since I was a kid when I had one 😁 brings back so many memories 👍🏻 unsure as to why my parents got me this as it was after my Atari and c64 days 😁, think my dad may of had a say In it as me and him used to play Atari 2600 all the time together 😁 great video buddy 👌🏻 although I distinctly remember my tv boy had extra controller port 👌🏻
Now mod the hell out of it! Composite, rgb, add another controller port (I bet the connections are all there, just need to tap into them)! 😁
I had one of these as a late teenager, my mates thought it was funny, I seem to remember a burger eating shoot 'em up being one of the better games!
What a weird coincidence! I used to have the exact same thing when I was a child... I don't remember any of the games - but I do still recall being very underwhelmed with the whole thing - even as a child ^^
I had COMPLETELY forgot about this until I saw the name. My cousin had one and out of all the games we only played two... Pacmania and Forest Walk.... sometimes invasion.... not too sure why she had this thig as there was a perfectly working available Mega Drive she had and we would be eventually be on with the TvBoy chucked in the corner.
I have two! My original from the day and one I randomly found in a pawn shop, for a whole $2 about 6 months ago. The original's plastics degraded, it got old and started crumbling away. Awesome seeing you cover one. I recall "Pitfall" was referred to as "Teeth Brush" yes, seriously!
In Seaquest, that last game with the sub, you're supposed to pick up the seamen. (I'm sure there's a lame joke to be made there but it's late and I'm tired.)
Is there a happy ending in this game? ( Get it ? **crickets** )
10:39 "composite out" >shows s-video, not composite connector
I was bought this for Christmas when I was young talk about a blast from past
Shame they didn't get Atari's official blessing and make this in the shape of a woodgrain 2600. A "Mini" console well ahead of its time!
It's pronounced SYSTEMA.
You're welcome.
Never mind the tv boy, what about those potentially leg and knee breaking foot spring things in the catalogue?