Nintendo TL-28 Electronic Game, Turtle Bridge Game & Watch

This handheld electronic game is part of Nintendo’s Game & Watch series. It has a rectangular plastic case and five plastic keys with a screen at the center that is 2” wide and 1 ¼” high. The screen shows water with cliffs on each side and sand underneath. Text left of the screen reads: GAME (/) & (/) WATCH (/) Nintendo. Text above the screen reads: TURTLE BRIDGE. A mark below it reads: WIDE SCREEN.

The plastic back of the screen has a compartment for two small batteries and a small metal kickstand. A mark molded into the plastic reads: MODEL NO.: TL-8 (/) RATING: DC3V- 0.0002W (/) BATTERY: LR43(orSR43)x2 (/) Nintendo Co, Ltd. 1982 (/) PAT. PEND. MADE IN JAPAN. A sticker on the back reads: 12293654.

According to an article in Wikipedia, this “is a widescreen version Game & Watch that was released on February 1, 1982, with product number TL-28. The player uses a line of five turtles as stepping stones to transfer baggage from one side of a river to the other. Once a package is tossed to a colleague on the other side, the player can return to the home bank to fetch the next package. The turtles are not motionless but will dive to feed on any fish within reach, and they dive more frequently as the game progresses. The player may need to wait for the colleague on the far bank and cannot return to the home bank while carrying a package.” The same source says that over 1,000,000 copies of the game sold.

A March, 1982, advertisement lists the game as on selling for $34.95. It indicates that the game sells for as much as $55.00.

References:

“List of Game & Watch Games,” Wikipedia, accessed September 12, 2014.

[Advertisement], Los Angeles Times, March 14, 1982, p. 4.

Florent Gorges in collaboration with Isao Yamazaki, The History of Nintendo 1980-1991 The Game & Watch Games, an Amazing Invention,pix'n love publishing, < vol. 2, esp. p. 77.

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