Gizmondo.

[Tupin]

Remember this wreck of a system? Launched in 2005, the same year as the PSP and the year the DS took off, the Gizmondo had no chance in the marketplace, especially at $400 for a unit that didn't play commercials and $225 for one that did. Only eight games were ever released for it, such as Sticky Balls and Pocket Ping-Pong 2005. Sadly, games like Alien Hominid and Momma Can I Mow the Lawn were never released.

It also could play videos, take and store pictures, and access the internet.

However, the system itself isn't the main reason why it failed. The company was headed by a man who was linked to the Swedish mafia and crashed his one million dollar Ferrari going 120 MPH. They were basically bankrupt by the time it launched.

Amazingly, they are trying to bring it back, the Gizmondo 2 was supposed to come out in late 2008 and have new graphics chips. However, at this point it has probably been shelved, due to a lack of investors. A release this year could happen, but we've probably seen the last of Gizmondo and its awesome name, unless some miracle happens.



I swear I actually saw an ad for this when it came out, ironically enough in a Nintendo Power magazine. I guess Nintendo guessed correctly when they assumed the system/company would never be a competitor.  :D

Still better than an N-Gage, though...  ::)

[Macawmoses]

That's oddly amazing. I'd like to see the release of a third party handheld like that, astoundingly. I'm an avid handheld gamer, and that could bring new potential to the marketplace.

[Tupin]

Last gen there was a whole bunch of either companies trying to set foot into an industry they really have no idea how to operate in, such as Nokia and their N-Gage or small companies just trying to compete.

It was the same for consoles too. The Indrema L600. The Nuon. Most infamously, The Phantom.

These systems failed or were never released due to one thing: bad management. Crashing one of the rarest cars in the world while you are drunk driving at 125 MPH isn't exactly good publicity. Neither is blowing all your money on buttering up the media and not actually developing the product. The president of Indrema, 100 million in debt, said it the best anyone could, "Finish the product before talking about it."

The Gizmondo is the posterchild for bad management. Unlike other systems however, it actually came out and actually had a chance. Had it gotten the publicity and distribution of the N-Gage, it would have done decently well.

There was also the Tapwave Zodiac, but no new dedicated gaming handhelds will be made anytime soon. The GP32X and Pandora are both open-source, but will never and were never intended to reach market saturation like the N-Gage or even the Gizmondo, and especially not what Nintendo or Sony has.

So yeah, check out the Pandora. That is, if they don't pull a Phantom.