Coleco Head-To-Head Plug & Play.

[Atariboy2600]

Today I found one of thouse Plug&Play unit at a thrift store call Coleco Head-To-Head video game system for $1.99 and it seem that its kind of fun to play even if the games are some what primitive seem they used the old Coleco Handheld overlay for the game field but insted of the little Red Dot as the player they use a cut out player shape to give it a "Real Life" gaming or what ever.

 

Here's the game list.

 

Football

Baseball

Basketball

Sea Defender (Missile Command Rip-off)

Wall Breaker

Kung Fu Fly Catcher

Hockey

Boxing

Deep Sea Madness (Space Invaders Rip-off)

Soccer

Car Racing

Racquetball

 

WHat do you guys think of it?

Edited February 1, 2006 by Atariboy2600

[MacbthPSW]

WHat do you guys think of it?

1010889[/snapback]

For $2, seems pretty good to me. I just got mine a couple nights ago for $11 CDN at Walmart, marked down quite a bit. I had seen it at other stores for $30 or so, but had read unfavourable reviews, so I held off until the prices dropped substantially.

 

I expected *very* little, so I had some fun with mine - I only tried a few games so far:

 

Wall Breaker amused me for a while - I was surprised they took the effort to add some Arkanoid style power-ups and stuff.

 

Deep Sea Madness was a bit of fun once the "aliens" got moving quickly.

 

Hockey was disappointing, because I was hoping for more of a real hockey game, instead of a small subset (just passing back and forth to try to get a good shot on goal).

 

Kung Fu Fly Catcher was a surprise - as absolutely simple as a game can get Once I got my time down to 0.04 there was nothing left to do though - so I guess it amused me for a minute or two. Unless 0.00 is possible somehow, by guessing... but I wasn't having *that* much fun to try...

 

Selecting and starting a game is a bit of a frustration since you can't just use "A" or "Start" the whole way through - you have to alternate buttons to make your selections. And the controller isn't great, but it was good enough for the games I played. Certainly worth $2, or even $11 CDN imo.

 

Any idea who coded these games? The ideas aren't original, but afaik they are newly coded. I guess it's a NES-on-a-chip in there. Wish I could get more jobs like that

[Prodos8]

Any idea who coded these games? The ideas aren't original, but afaik they are newly coded. I guess it's a NES-on-a-chip in there. Wish I could get more jobs like that

 

Most probably some anonimous Chinese programmer earning $1.50/hour or less.

 

I was thinking, too, that at ~$2 per unit Wal-Mart is either selling them at cost or taking a small loss. If they're selling them at around cost that means this thing was originally marked up 1000% when it was initially priced ~$20. What a profit margin.

[MacbthPSW]

Most probably some anonimous Chinese programmer earning $1.50/hour or less.

Probably. Still better than what Manuel and Thomas earn with their 2600 games?

 

I was thinking, too, that at ~$2 per unit Wal-Mart is either selling them at cost or taking a small loss. If they're selling them at around cost that means this thing was originally marked up 1000% when it was initially priced ~$20. What a profit margin.

Yeah, the majority of these plug & play games are made as cheap Chinese toys at the lowest price possible, with very little thought or care to the actual playability or lastability of the product. As long as a bunch of moms and grandmas buy them for their kids, the manufacturers are happy, even if the thing is just played once and put away or thrown out.

[Pixelboy]

Hockey was disappointing, because I was hoping for more of a real hockey game, instead of a small subset (just passing back and forth to try to get a good shot on goal).

Yeah, the Hockey game actually feels more like a Game & Watch game than anything else, and there are several sports games like that.

 

 

Selecting and starting a game is a bit of a frustration since you can't just use "A" or "Start" the whole way through - you have to alternate buttons to make your selections. And the controller isn't great, but it was good enough for the games I played. Certainly worth $2, or even $11 CDN imo.

Overall, I have to disagree. These kinds of plug-&-play devices would have been interesting in the early 90s, but this is the 21st century. Having actual arcade games like Pac-Man or Galaxian built into a plug-&-play joystick is one thing, but a device with a selection of such cheap games won't keep any kid over six years old interested for more than a few minutes, with the possible exception of the Wall Breaker and Sea Defender games. It's really the kind of toy that you buy and then dump into the bottom junk drawer less than 24 hours later. A seriously lame abuse of the Coleco brand if you ask me...