As much as I love modern-day gaming hardware, it's all a little too safe for my liking.
Platform holders like Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft have a stranglehold on the industry now, and, outside of the likes of Valve, AYANEO and ROG – all of whom are producing the same basic product in the form of handheld PCs – there's little in the way of leftfield experimentation taking place.
Contrast this with the '80s, '90s and 2000s, and it was perhaps the exact opposite problem; there were so many companies attempting to break into the games industry that most hardware ventures flopped.
Still, it's these also-rans which I find the most fascinating, and there's none more interesting than the Gizmondo, which holds the dubious record of being the lowest-selling handheld games system of all time. In 2007, it was also voted the "worst console of all time" by GameTrailers.
This system turned 20 this year, and seeing that I've finally managed to bring my dusty unit back from the dead, I thought it was the ideal time to dig into its history – which, to quote Edmund Blackadder, has more twists and turns than a twisty-turny thing.
Getting Things On Trac
Back in 2005, a tiny Swedish electronics company honestly believed it could take on the might of Nintendo and Sony.
That company, Tiger Telematics, came up with the Gametrac, and, according to its boss, Carl Freer, the concept was originally focused on allowing concerned parents to keep tabs on their children. In the wake of 2002's horrific Soham murders and the days before smartphones could pinpoint your location 24/7, this was actually quite a noble cause.
Quickly rebranded as Gizmondo, the console was designed by the late Rick Dickinson, who famously created the ZX Spectrum's iconic casing. Built around a 2.8-inch, 320 × 240-pixel screen, the Gizmondo was envisaged as a 'convergence' system from the outset; in addition to running games, it could play movies and music, act as a satellite navigation system, and even take photos via its JPEG camera.
Compared to the hardware of the period, it was also impressively potent; powered by a Samsung S3C2440 ARM9 processor running at 400 MHz and boasting an Nvidia GoForce 3D 4500 GPU, the Gizmondo was certainly capable. Outside of gaming, the headline GPS functionality was impressive, and was supported by the ability to send and receive text messages, compose emails, and even go online – all of which made the device feel suitably futuristic, even when compared to the Nintendo DS and Sony PlayStation Portable.
Looking back today, it's remarkable that Tiger Telematics was capable of whipping up so much hype for what was a totally new and untested product, but much of this was down to how the company portrayed itself in the media.
A lavish launch party was held in 2005 at London’s Park Lane Hotel, which attracted celebrities such as Busta Rhymes, Pharrell Williams and Sting, while the opening of the Gizmondo store on London's Regent Street (annual rent: over $330,000) brought traffic to a standstill and gave the impression this was a smash-hit in the making. Well, what else would you expect when luminaries such as Verne Troyer, Lennox Lewis, and (ahem) Dannii Minogue are in attendance?
This groundswell of hype was clearly having an impact, as third-party publishers flocked to support the console. In April of 2005, Ubisoft announced that it was bringing Rayman to Gizmondo as well as three other titles, and was joined by the likes of Sega (Sonic the Hedgehog, OutRun, Golden Axe, Altered Beast and Shinobi), Microsoft Game Studios (Age of Empires, Mech Assault), Team17 (Worms World Party) and SCi (Carmageddon, Battlestations: Midway). 89 games would arrive in 2005, Tiger Telematics subsidiary Gizmondo Europe Ltd confidently announced.
While many of the games wouldn't have looked out of place on rival systems and didn't make use of the Gizmondo's unique features, one title, Colors, aimed to be the console's killer app. A third-person action title not dissimilar to Grand Theft Auto, it was referred to by Gizmondo Europe as "The world's first ever GPS-enabled handheld game" (it was never released, but footage exists online).
The Gizmondo's £229.99 (over $400) price tag meant that it was significantly more expensive than the Nintendo DS in the UK at launch, and higher than both the PSP and Nokia N-Gage. Despite claims from Freer that 560,000 pre-orders had been taken, the console would ultimately sell less than 25,000 units during its lifespan.
This was despite a somewhat innovative approach to hardware pricing, which included an option called 'Smart Adds'. Costing £100 less than the standard version of the console, it would display three advertisements at random points every 24 hours. In this age of ad-supported freemium mobile gaming that doesn't actually sound that intrusive, but it was certainly unique for 2005.
However, this service was never actually activated, which meant that anyone who picked up this variant of the Gizmondo got it at a lower cost – not that it mattered in the long run, as the price of the system would be massively reduced over the subsequent months as the dream quickly began to crumble.
How To Lose $300 Million
I'm not going to recount Stefan Eriksson's story – this utterly amazing piece on Eurogamer does a far better job, so go and read that instead – but ultimately, things began to fall apart in October, mere months after the console's release, when Swedish news outlet Aftonbladet revealed the criminal activity of several executives involved with Gizmondo.
It transpired that Eriksson, head of Gizmondo Europe, was involved with the Swedish mafia, while Johan Enander and Peter Uf (also mafia members) were both employed within the company. The timing couldn't have been worse, as the Gizmondo's US launch was just taking place. Freer resigned alongside Eriksson, Enander and Uf, throwing the entire operation into disarray.
It was later revealed that Gizmondo executives had been paying themselves insanely high salaries as well as purchasing luxury items such as sports cars, watches and even a racehorse. A Securities Exchange Commission report shone a light on the company's dire financial plight; in the first half of 2005, its operating loss was in excess of $200 million.
Subsequent dodgy deals came to light, including one where a licensing fee of $4 million was paid to Game Factory Publishing, a company directed by a close friend of Freer’s; no games were ever produced as part of the deal.
Following the exit of Freer and the other executives, Gizmondo Europe eventually slid into administration in early 2006. It had managed to rack up $300 million / £160 million of debt by this point. A representative of one of the companies brought in to liquidate the business and make sense of the mess expressed the opinion that, even wirth all of the perks, cars and luxury items, it would be impossible to burn through that much cash in such a short space of time – lending further credence to the suspicion that Gizmondo's executives were involved in shady practices.
The Gizmondo Today
Despite having read about the Gizmondo's spectacular rise and dramatic fall over the years, the console faded from my view. Oddly, the first time I saw one in the flesh was at a local car dealership, long after the company behind it had disappeared. The dealership was selling it not as a gaming device but as a cheap in-car navigation system.
Years later, I finally got my hands on one in 2018, when Extreme Gamez, a nearby video game store in Ashby-de-la-Zouch, closed its doors for the final time.
The store owner was selling various items that had previously been used for display purposes only. He had a boxed 'Smart Adds' version of the Gizmondo he was willing to part company with. It even came with the Co-Pilot navigation software and a set of (rather cheap) Gizmondo-branded headphones. I couldn't resist, despite the console's unenviable reputation.
I purchased it out of morbid curiosity more than anything; it was sold as faulty, as, despite having the power supply, it would turn off after a few seconds. The issue was related to the rechargeable battery, which, after years of sitting idle, had given up the ghost and was beginning to show signs of swelling.
This unit sat largely untouched in the Hookshot Media office for years until I realised that this year marks the 20th birthday of the Gizmondo. Keen to get it operational again, I did a bit of research and discovered that the long-dead battery could be replaced with one originally designed for Motorola phones.
With a now-operational Gizmondo at my fingertips, I could finally put it through its paces. First up, the device's infamous rubberised texture is horrible. Some have likened it to 'dead flesh', and it's not uncommon to find some second-hand units covered in mould. Yuck.
Thankfully, there are ways of removing this texture from the unit, which apparently makes it a lot more agreeable. I've not decided if I have the confidence to perform such a procedure yet, but it's nice to know the option is there, at least. One of the key motivations for doing it would be to actually, you know, play this thing, but that's where things become a little more sticky (no pun intended).
You see, with only 14 games, the Gizmondo library is pretty small, and it's not like it has any killer apps which make it worth owning.
Out of those titles, Trailblazer is one of the most appealing; it's an update of Shaun Southern's 1986 home computer title of the same name, and has a nice pick-up-and-play feel to it. As for the other games, the prices can be pretty high – which isn't all that shocking when you consider the low print runs some of these titles must have had. Outside of official releases, homebrew is also possible; you can run Mega Drive games on this thing, for example.
Is the Gizmondo worth seeking out to actually use as a gaming system, though? Given the low number of units out in the field, it's hardly surprising to learn that they're now changing hands for quite high prices. Fully boxed examples now cost more than the console's £229 launch price tag, while sealed units with all 14 games are being sold for thousands of pounds on eBay. Clearly, as time goes on and units begin to fail, the value is only going to rise.
With this in mind, I'd argue that, just as was the case 20 years ago, Gizmondo really isn't worth your time, unless you get a kick out of owning failing technology (which, I'm ashamed to admit, I totally do).