Atari Lynx

Atari Corporation · 1989 – 1995

The Lynx was the first handheld with a colour backlit screen, designed by Epyx before being acquired and marketed by Atari. Superior hardware to the Game Boy — faster processor, more colours, hardware sprite scaling — couldn't overcome the Game Boy's battery life, software library, and price advantage.

The Lynx originated as the "Handy" at Epyx, a game publisher that had designed the hardware before running out of funding and selling the project to Atari. The hardware was genuinely impressive: a 16-bit 65C02 processor, a dedicated blitter chip with hardware sprite scaling and distortion, a backlit colour LCD displaying 4,096 colours, and a built-in ComLynx port for multiplayer linking up to eight units. Atari launched it at $179.95 in 1989, compared to the Game Boy's $89.95, and the price differential immediately limited its market penetration. The battery problem was severe: the colour backlit display consumed six AA batteries in approximately four hours, compared to the Game Boy's fifteen hours on four batteries. Despite a library of technically impressive games — California Games demonstrated hardware sprite scaling no other handheld could match — the Lynx sold approximately three million units against the Game Boy's eventual 118 million.