Nintendo have lead the gaming revolution since the late 70s.
WAY before the 3DS, before the Wii, before the DSi, DS lite and DS, before the N64, the SNES, the Gameboy and the NES, there were… Game And Watches.
These pocket-sized rectangles of fun were originally single screen LCD games. No colour display, just black and white LCD. No interchangable games, you just bought one device with one game on it. For an 8 year old in the 80s, they were absolutely amazing though.
The first ones, one of which was called Ball, had just two controls – left and right. You had to control the arms of a juggler and help them catch balls as they flew through the air.
Game and Watches soon progressed to using directional controls, using what we recognise nowadays as a D-pad, and a few Game and Watched were made where the action spanned two joined screens, much like the Nintendo DS does today.
I had a few Game and Watches. My first was a game called Apple in which you had to direct a man left or right and help him catch apples that were being thrown by a monkey in a tree while avoiding a bird. I played this for months, just going left and right and catching apples. It was genuinely captivating.
In later years I received a two-screen Donkey Kong game. This had a D-pad AND a jump button! Technology was amazing!
