Digimon, short for "Digital Monsters", is a Japanese media franchise, which encompasses virtual pet toys, anime, manga, video games, films, and a trading card game. The franchise focuses on the eponymous creatures that inhabit a "Digital World", which is a parallel universe that originated from Earth's various communication networks.
Tamagotchi is a brand of handheld digital pets that was created in Japan by Akihiro Yokoi of WiZ and Aki Maita of Bandai. It was released by Bandai on November 23, 1996 in Japan and in the United States on May 1, 1997, quickly becoming one of the biggest toy fads of the late 1990s and the early 2000s. As of June 2023, over 91 million units have been sold worldwide. Most Tamagotchi are housed in a small egg-shaped handheld video game with an interface consisting of three buttons, with the Tamagotchi Pix adding a shutter on the top to activate the camera.
Mario Kart Arcade GP is sub-series of arcade games from Nintendo's Mario Kart series developed specifically for arcades in collaboration with Namco. To date, four entries have been released—Mario Kart Arcade GP (2005), Mario Kart Arcade GP 2 (2007), Mario Kart Arcade GP DX (2013), and Mario Kart Arcade GP VR (2017). The first three entries are considered to be relatively rare outside of Japan, with the fourth title not seeing a release outside of Japan at all. The game's have been generally been well-received by critics, who have praised the game's transition of traditional Mario Kart gameplay into an arcade game format, thought to-date, while lamenting that none of the entries have been released outside of the arcade format onto any of Nintendo's home video game consoles.
Pixel Chix was a handheld life simulation game released in 2005 by Mattel that was aimed at young children. The game was set in a plastic dollhouse and was similar to Tamagotchi in that they have a LCD screen and control buttons, although they are larger. The game is centered around interacting with a digital girl and doing activities with her, which includes feeding her, playing games, dressing her up, going out, sending her to bed and more. As you played, you would unlock new items and activities.
Yoshi's Island DS, known in Japan as Yoshi Island DS, is a 2006 platform game developed by Artoon and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo DS. It was released in North America and Australia in November 2006, in Europe in December 2006, and in Japan in March 2007. It is a sequel to the 1995 SNES game, Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island. Announced at Nintendo's E3 press conference in May 2006, the game was well received by critics, scoring an average of 81% on Metacritic's aggregate. The game was originally to be titled Yoshi's Island 2, though its name was changed one month before its North American release. In April and May 2015, the game was made available for the Wii U via the Virtual Console service, shortly after a Nintendo Direct presentation.
The Digital MonsterJPN is a digital pet created by WiZ and Bandai that spawned the Digimon franchise. It was released by Bandai on June 26, 1997, in Japan and on December 5, 1997 in North America. This pet was a masculine counterpart to the Tamagotchi, which was deemed more appropriate for girls. It was similar to earlier virtual pets with the distinctions of being a fighting pet that could connect with others like it.
Bonk's Adventure, known as PC Genjin in Japan, PC Kid and B.C. Kid in Europe, is a scrolling platform game developed by Red Company and Atlus and released in 1989 in Japan and 1990 in North America for the PC Engine/TurboGrafx-16. The Japanese title PC Genjin is a play on the system's original name, PC Engine, with the European title PC Kid similarly referencing the system's name. The first game in the Bonk series, it was followed by two more games for the TurboGrafx-16 before branching out to other platforms.
The DG834 series are popular ADSL modem router products from Netgear. The devices can be directly connected to a phone line and establish an ADSL broadband Internet connection to the ISP and share it among several computers via 802.3 Ethernet and 802.11b/g wireless data links.
Zatch Bell! Mamodo Fury is a fighting game released on the PlayStation 2. The original Japanese version was published by Bandai at the end of 2004, after merging with Namco but before the formation of Namco Bandai Games. The subsequent international releases and the GameCube versions were published under Namco Bandai Games. The game is based on the Zatch Bell! franchise.
Tamagotchi Connection: Corner Shop 2 is a life simulation video game published and developed by Namco Bandai Games for the Nintendo DS handheld video game console. It is the sequel to Tamagotchi Connection: Corner Shop, also released for the Nintendo DS. It was followed by Tamagotchi Connection: Corner Shop 3.
Tamagotchi's Sparkling President, released outside Japan as Tamagotchi: Party On!, is a party video game developed by h.a.n.d. and published by Bandai for the Wii. The game was originally released in 2006 in Japan as a launch title for the system; it is the only Tamagotchi Wii game released outside Japan, with Namco Bandai Games releasing it internationally in 2007.
Gundam Side Story 0079: Rise From the Ashes is a video game that was released for the Dreamcast. It is based in the Universal Century timeline of the popular Mobile Suit Gundam franchise. It was developed by BEC and published by Bandai. It takes place in Australia, following an elite squad of RGM-79 GMs who are charged with various missions pertaining to the attacks by the Principality of Zeon.
Tamagotchi: The Movie is a 2007 Japanese animated film produced by OLM's Team Kamei division. It is the first Tamagotchi feature film ever produced, officially based on the digital pet franchise jointly created by Bandai and WiZ. It is directed by Jōji Shimura of Pokémon and written by Aya Matsui of Boys Over Flowers and was released in theaters by Toho on December 15, 2007, and on DVD on July 23, 2008 in Japan.
The Tamagotchi effect is the development of emotional attachment with machines, robots or software agents. It has been noticed that humans tend to attach emotionally to inanimate objects devoid of emotions of their own. For example, there are instances when people feel emotional about using their car keys, or with virtual pets. It is more prominent in applications which simulate or reflect some aspects of human behavior or characteristics, especially levels of artificial intelligence and automated knowledge processing.
Let's! TV Play Classic is a series of Japan-only plug & play devices developed and distributed by Bandai programmed on XaviX software created by SSD Company Limited in 2006 that contain arcade games from either Namco or Taito, with Namco's being called "Namco Nostalgia" while Taito's are called "Taito Nostalgia". Each device in the series contains 4 games, with 2 being classic arcade games while the other 2 are new games using the original game's sprites developed by Bandai.
Tuttuki Bako (ツッツキバコ) is a roughly cubic hand-held electronic game created by Bandai in 2008. The game comprises five mini-games, and a resettable alarm clock. While the minigames are rather simplistic, Tuttuki Bako has received international acclaim for its unique means of control and the game has been put forward as an archetypal example of Akiba-kei and Japanese gadgetry in general.
Tamagotchi! (たまごっち!) is a 2009 Japanese fantasy slice of life anime series produced by OLM's Team Kamei division, officially based on the Tamagotchi digital pet jointly created by Bandai and WiZ. It is directed by Jōji Shimura (Pokémon) and written by Aya Matsui, with character designs done by Sayuri Ichiishi, Shouji Yasukazu and Miwa Sakai. It officially aired on TV Tokyo and other affiliate stations in Japan from 12 October 2009 to 3 September 2012, lasting for seven seasons.
Data Carddass is a series of Japanese arcade game machines created by Bandai, which largely focus around the digital use of collectible trading cards. It is an expansion of Bandai's Carddass collectible trading card series, which allows players to use special cards to interact with arcade video games. Many of these machines revolve around various anime and tokusatsu franchises owned by Bandai. The machines first began release in Japanese arcades from March 2005.
Giga Pets are digital pet toys that were first released by Tiger Electronics in the United States in 1997 in the midst of a virtual-pet toy fad. Available in a variety of different characters, each Giga Pet is a palm-sized unit with an LCD screen and attached key ring. To ensure a happy, healthy pet, its owner has to take care of it similar to how one might care for a real animal, including feeding, cleaning, and playing with their Giga Pet.
