Photo: Joe Haupt · CC BY-SA 2.0 · via Wikimedia Commons
Nintendo Game & Watch
Nintendo · Released Apr 1980 · Original (1980)
Nintendo's 1980 single-game LCD handhelds — the very beginning of portable gaming, designed by Game Boy creator Gunpei Yokoi.
Pros
- +The product line that launched portable gaming
- +Astonishing battery life on button cells
- +Truly pocketable and collectible
- +Introduced the d-pad on later models
Cons
- −Plays only one built-in game
- −Primitive segmented LCD
- −No sound beyond simple beeps
What can it play?
Emulation performance by platform, based on real-world testing.
Full specifications
Hardware
- Chipset (SoC)
- Sharp SM5xx 4-bit microcontroller
- CPU
- Sharp 4-bit MCU
- GPU
- Segmented LCD driver
- RAM
- Minimal (on-die)
- Storage
- Built-in Single fixed game (ROM)
- Weight
- 90 g
- Dimensions
- approx. 110 x 70 x 9 mm
- Cooling
- Passive
Display
- Size
- 2.4″
- Resolution
- Segmented (fixed shapes)
- Panel
- Segmented monochrome LCD
- Refresh rate
- 30 Hz
- Touchscreen
- No
Battery & Connectivity
- Battery
- 80 mAh
- Real-world life
- ~100 hours
- Wi-Fi
- None
- Bluetooth
- None
- Ports
- Expandable storage
- No
Controls
- Analog sticks
- 0
- D-pad
- No
- Face buttons
- Yes
- Analog triggers
- No
- Gyroscope
- No
- Hall effect sticks
- No
Software & custom firmware
Ships with: None (single fixed game)
Also plays natively: One built-in game
No third-party custom firmware tracked for this device.
Our verdict
Before the Game Boy there was Game & Watch: a series of credit-card-thin, single-game LCD handhelds that ran for months on button cells and quietly invented the genre. The line introduced the cross-shaped d-pad with 1982's Donkey Kong, a control scheme that endures on virtually every controller today. As historical artifacts they are priceless.