1997 · Tiger · Hong Kong · handheld
Tiger Game.com
A touchscreen handheld years before the DS, with hardware that could not keep up.
A curiosity Easy to run ▶ Watch on YouTube ↗
Tiger Electronics' 1997 handheld, which put a touchscreen and a stylus in players' hands years before the Nintendo DS — and paired them with hardware far too weak to run the ambitious console ports it advertised on the box.
Its version of Resident Evil 2 was so reduced it became a punchline for the whole idea.
What it cost
a rounding error against a month’s pay in 1997 · about $137 today
| US launch list price ($69.95 with Lights Out & Solitaire) |
$69.95 (1997)
First handheld gaming device with a built-in touchscreen, stylus, and dial-up Internet modem. |
|---|---|
| Typical street price | — No verified mass-market street price recorded yet. |
| Units sold | ≈300,000 estimate Approximately 300,000 units sold. |
Why it mattered
The Game.com put a touchscreen in players' hands before Nintendo did, and its failure — hardware too weak for its ambitions — is a lesson in promising more than the silicon can deliver.
Emulating it today
| Emulators | MAME (gamecom driver) |
|---|---|
| Setup effort | Easy to run (2.5 on this site's scale) |
| Controls | A standard modern controller covers the ordinary controls, though unusual accessories may need custom mapping. |
| Runs on a handheld | Yes |
The emulator names above are starting points, not a promise that every title or accessory behaves identically. Computer platforms usually add model selection, disk handling and keyboard setup even when CPU emulation itself is mature.
Game.com Internal MCU ROM (gamecom.zip)
The Tiger Game.com requires an internal CPU microcode ROM dump (gamecom.zip in MAME) containing the touchscreen drivers, calendar, calculator, and system menu.
How many files you need: 1. One archive: gamecom.zip in the BIOS or ROMs directory.
Where it stands legally: Copyrighted by Tiger Electronics / Hasbro.
Firmware details checked 2026-08. Emulator requirements change — see MAME Game.com Driver Documentation for the current list.
Where the software is
Preservation catalogues describe verified dumps; they do not grant permission to download commercial software. A curated, correctly matched set is easier to use than an undifferentiated archive.
Copyright: Commercial software remains copyrighted unless its owner explicitly released or relicensed it. Homebrew, public-domain programs and current reissues should be treated separately from abandoned commercial titles.
This site names preservation projects and explains what they are. It does not link to ROM downloads.
Where to start
- Lights Out 1997 puzzle
Genuinely good, and about the only game that suited the machine.
- Resident Evil 2 1998 survival horror
A port so reduced it became a punchline for the format's ambitions.
- Fighters Megamix 1998 fighting
- Duke Nukem 3D 1998 first-person shooter
The verdict
A curiosity for its touchscreen and its infamously bad ports.
Almost nothing on it plays well — a machine to marvel at, not to enjoy.
- Worth it if
- Players curious about obscure handhelds and willing to learn how the original machine worked.
- Not for
- Anyone who wants a large, instantly accessible library and no model, firmware or control decisions.
Scored 2/5 for fun today and 3/5 for historical importance. Those two scores decide the label at the top — a machine can matter enormously and still be no fun.
Read more & watch
This page is 50% complete against the facts we try to record for every system. Gaps are shown as gaps.