One of the first surprises for anyone collecting vintage handheld games is how often the same game turns up under a different name. A tabletop bought in a British high street in 1981 might have been made in Japan, sold in America under another title and given a third name in Australia, with only the sticker and the box changed.
Most of the games were designed and built by a small number of Asian makers, among them Epoch, Tomy, Bandai and Gakken in Japan and VTech in Hong Kong. In Britain they reached the shops through importers and retailers who put their own badge on the case.
Grandstand
Grandstand was the brand of Adam Imports, founded in Harrogate in 1973 as a mail-order firm. Within a year it was said to be Britain’s biggest calculator supplier, and by the early 80s it was importing and renaming games from Epoch, Tomy and others.
- Astro Wars was Epoch’s Super Galaxian in Japan, and was sold in America as Galaxy II.
- Munchman was Tomy’s Puckman, and reached North America as the Tomytronic Pac Man.
- Mini Munchman came from a different maker altogether: it is Epoch’s Pak Pak Man, known in America as Epoch-Man.
- Crazy Kong put a gorilla on the box, yet the game inside is Epoch’s Monster Panic, a climb through a haunted house with no ape in sight.
CGL
Computer Games Ltd of Loughton, Essex, sold games from Gakken, Tomy, Hanzawa and others under its CGL badge, alongside Nintendo’s Game & Watch.
- CGL’s Frogger is the same machine as Gakken’s Japanese Frogger, and its leaflet keeps Gakken’s “LSI Game” tag.
- Cosmic Scramble was designed by Hanzawa of Tokyo and sold elsewhere as Cosmic Free Fire, Super Cobra 2 and Raid Cosmique.
Tandy, Entex and the rest
Radio Shack’s shops abroad traded as Tandy and sold games under their own names. Bandai’s Packri Monster became Hungry Monster in America and Ogre Eater in Tandy shops elsewhere. Entex’s Galaxian 2 became Astro Invader in Europe, where the “2” had meant two players rather than a sequel. Even Dixons had its own label, Prinztronic, which sold VTech’s Invaders as Galactic Invaders.
Tips for collectors
- Look past the sticker. Two games with different names may be identical inside, so a cheaper badge can be a bargain.
- Check the back and the battery compartment for the country of manufacture and a model number, which often reveal the original maker.
- Keep the box and leaflet where you can: they are often the only place the importer’s name and the original title both appear.
The Glow of the Game records the other names many of its games were sold under, along with the maker, importer and country, and the second volume ends with a glossary of every company named across both books. You can browse every game on The Games page.