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Gakken Compact Vision TV Boy

The is a second generation home video game console developed by Gakken and released in Japan in 1983 for a price of ¥8,800.

The system was made to compete with the Epoch Cassette Vision, which had a market dominance of 70% in Japan.

The console was released months after the Nintendo Famicom and Sega SG-1000 which, although more expensive at ¥15,000, were more advanced and had more features as well as bigger games libraries; furthermore, Epoch had just launched the Cassette Vision Jr. revision for ¥5,000. These factors made the system obsolete from the start, with a high price tag, few and comparably rudimentary games, and a strange form factor, leading to poor sales. As a result, it is now a rare collector's item among some retro gamers.

In January 2024, the Gakken Compact Vision TV Boy game console hardware and six games were ROM dumped, scanned and preserved. This console could only be played on the MAME emulator.

Technical specifications

  • CPU (cartridge): Motorola MC6801 (8-bit) clocked at 4 MHz
  • RAM: 2 Kb
  • Internal graphics: Motorola MC6847: 128 × 192 pixel; 9 colors (only four at the same time: white, orange, green and magenta or yellow, green, red and blue)

Games

There were only six games officially released for the system, each being sold for ¥3,800, and designed for a single player.

References