Back in The '70s, videogame consoles were invented. But unlike subsequent generations, First-generation consoles did not store games on removable media that could be swapped out to play different games: Instead, game(s) were stored (or hardwired) directly into the console itself. The obvious consequence was that you never purchased games separately: Just buy the console, hook it to your TV and power, plug the packaged-in controllers if they're not already connected, and you're all set.
With the popularity of the Atari 2600, this practice fell in disuse and most game consoles from the second generation onwards have accepted games stored on removable media,note with the only "dedicated" consoles remaining being handhelds (from Game & Watch to Tiger Electronics to Tamagotchi).
However, in the early 2000s, dedicated consoles found a renewed opening in the market, as system-on-a-chip technology got less expensive and more powerful, allowing for units easily capable of playing nostalgic retro games, many of which were packaged directly into their game controller and powered by batteries.
These are commonly called TV Games after toy maker Jakks Pacific's ubiquitous line of them. Jakks began the line with units containing compilations of classic games like Pac-Man and vintage games by Atari. It soon expanded to include original games based on licensed properties, and other companies got into the act as well. Name an IP that was popular with children in the first decade of the 2000s, and it's almost guaranteed that Jakks or some other toy company created a unit with newly developed retro-style games for said franchise. Some of the later ones even feature motion controls in response to the popularity of the Nintendo Wii.
These sorts of plug-and-play battery-powered controllers petered out in the early 2010s. Instead plug-in units with separate controllers and larger licensed game libraries (that drew on later generations of games) became fairly common. The later part of the decade saw a new wave of retro consoles from the original console makers themselves, instead of by licensees. These are much more advanced devices than the previous generation, containing dozens of authentic game ROMs being emulated while allowing saves on games that never had them, rewinding of play, and other deluxe features.
The other form of plug-and-play systems are cheap knock-offs made to look like well-known consoles but nothing like them in reality. Unlicensed bootlegs of older games are often included on some of these consoles, especially if they're mimicking the NES or the Wii. There are dozens of these consoles in existence, each with different selections of games to play.
Hardware
The hardware used in the early 2000s plug-and-plays varies greatly, as these were largely built with whatever commodity parts were cheapest for manufacturers. Many use systems-on-a-chip nicknamed "Famiclones", which are based on NES hardware, as many of the original Famicom patents expired in 2003 allowing for the legal making of compatible chips, though some of these chips feature minor hardware changes that allow for more colors and improved sound than the original NES. They've mostly been used for plug-and-plays containing vintage NES games, though new versions of classic games and entirely original games (albeit generic filler) can and have been sold on these devices, which technically means new games are still being made for the NES to this day, even if they aren't exactly on a proper cart. These sorts of Famiclone chips are still in common use in retro handhelds (many of which contain the same games as the plug-and-plays).Others, notably most of the Jakks Pacific units, used an obscure 16-bit system-on-a-chip from a Taiwanese company called SunPlus that required the creation of all-new ports of classic games along with the new games, making it a system architecture with a surprisingly large library of games, though no single console on which to play them (and no chance of rerelease as they were all either older games licensed from the original publishers or new games based on IPs for which the licenses expired years ago).
The more recent official mini consoles typically use ARM-based chips running a stripped-down version of Linux as an operating system, with custom emulators atop of it. These are fairly powerful machines and have been found to modable by users poking around under the hood.
Tropes associated with plug 'n' play games:
- Game Mod: Knock-off consoles containing unlicensed bootlegs will usually change the graphics or other minor features of the games being copied, likely in an attempt to avoid copyright issues.
- Licensed Game: Several children's series have received plug 'n' play games. Many of these were made by Jakks Pacific. These games are usually marketed as toys rather than full-blown consoles. Many retro consoles are officially licensed by the original manufacturers.
- Recycled Script: The bootleg console makers will often use the same no-name games over and over on every model they make.
- This also happens within the consoles themselves; a single console might contain Bomberman, Bomberman 3, Bomberman 9, and Bomberman 24, even if they are all the exact same game, being the same bootleg version just with different title screens.
- Retraux: Usually, these consoles contain 32-bit hardware at best, and the most common consoles are either 8-bit or 16-bit. Because of this, the new games often feel reminiscent of older-generation video games, despite being produced much later.
- Shoddy Knockoff Product: Many bootleg consoles imitate the aesthetic of the Wii or the PlayStation 3, despite having vastly inferior hardware. The latter are often called PolyStations.
- Updated Re-release: Some of the plug-and-plays use entirely different commodity hardware than the original games, so they actually contain all new ports of the games.
Examples of plug 'n' play games:
First generation systems
- Atari's earliest consoles used this system, with games such as Pong and Arkanoid.
- An early example is the Color TV Game series of consoles by Nintendo. The first consoles included clones of Pong, but other games were included with the later consoles.
TV Games era
- Jakks Pacific produced dozens of plug 'n' play consoles that included licensed retro games and new games based on franchises like Shrek, SpongeBob SquarePants, Star Wars, and more.
- In the mid-2000's, Radica produced a series of Plug N' Play games that featured built-in Sega Genesis games, namely first-party titles from Sega and Capcom. Most of them had one controller, but there was one that had two controllers to play Street Fighter II and Ghouls and Ghosts. There was also a Light Gun variant that had games designed to work with the Sega Menacer peripheral.
- In 2003, they released a Tetris plug and play console. It was controlled by twisting a square block.
- Tiger Electronics, best remembered for their LCD handhelds in the 80s also produced some of these consoles.
Later "mini" consoles.
- Atari has their series of Atari Flashback consoles which let you play Atari 2600 games. The second version even used actual recreations of Atari hardware, allowing one to add a cartridge slot to play actual 2600 cartridges (and use actual vintage controllers). From the third version onwards, they emulate the 2600.
- AtGames has produced officially licensed plug 'n' play consoles under their "AtGames Flashback" label (this includes the Atari Flashback line since 2011).
- Nintendo released its "Classic Edition" series, which are plug 'n' play consoles that emulate retro Nintendo titles that look like miniature versions of the original. The NES version was an unexpected hit, and the Super NES version a year later also sold out. They're credited with keeping the company afloat after the failure of the Wii U until the release of the Nintendo Switch.
- Sega:
- Sega released their own plug 'n' play console, the Sega Genesis Mini, with help from game developer and emulation experts M2. The device comes with 42 Sega Genesis games, including a few that had limited releases the first time around. A second version, with a new slate of games (including some Sega CD titles) and modeled after the second-model Genesis, was released in 2022.
- The Astro City Mini, released in 2020 (by Sega Toys), focused on the company's arcade output and came with 37 preloaded games. While it has HDMI output, the Astro City Mini's screen is fully functional and can be played by itself. Sega later released a successor in 2022 through the Astro City Mini V (the "V" marking its focus on vertical-oriented games).
- The TurboGrafx-16 Mini was released by Konami in 2020 with a selection of 58 games for the Japanese version (PC Engine Mini) and 57 games for the international versions. (Konami acquired Hudson Soft, the designer of the original hardware, in 2012, giving them the rights as successor.)
- Capcom's foray into plug 'n' play games was the Capcom Home Arcade, released in 2019 with a selection of 16 games from their CPS1 and CPS2 libraries. The console wasn't a "mini" recreation of an arcade machine, but was housed in a two-player joystick controller shaped like the company logo.
Notable knock-offs
- The Samuri is a plug 'n' play console made by Hummer Team. It features Hummer Team's mascot, The Hummer, in some of its games, including a hack of Somari.
- The Sport Vii is a 16-bit plug 'n' play console and one of the first to be modeled after the Wii. It features various arcade and sports games with motion controls. Some of its games were later used on the Zone 60 console, which was developed by the same company.
Plug 'n' play games in media:
Video Games- WarioWare: The aforementioned Color TV Game was included as one of the microgames in WarioWare: Smooth Moves.
Web Video
- JonTron: In the episode "Plug and Play Consoles", he reviews several of these consoles and the games included on them. In the end, he decides that none of these consoles are worth playing. He reviews Star Wars consoles in the episode "Star Wars Plug and Play".
- Rerez: Shane has a series titled "The Worst Ever Series" in which he a reviews a console and most, if not all of the games contained on it. He always hopes that he'll find at least one good game on the console he's reviewing, but he usually only finds shovelware titles and hacks of existing games.
- Vinesauce: Vinny has a series titled "Plug & Plague" where he plays plug 'n' play consoles that are sent in from viewers. He has played both unlicensed consoles, such as the Zone 60, and licensed consoles, such as the ones by Jakks Pacific.
Western Animation
- Voltron: Legendary Defender: At a Space Mall, Pidge finds a shop dealing in items from Earth, which includes a gaming console and video game Pidge absolutely geeks out over. Upon scraping up enough money to buy the game and escaping the overzealous mall cop, Pidge and Lance return to the Castle of Lions, ready to play their new game. . . only to find that, amidst all the hyperadvanced Altean Magi Tek, there's nothing with the requisite AV ports. Pidge eventually MacGyvers a workaround.
