Dedicated console

All home video game consoles from the first generation of video game consoles are dedicated to one or a few games, they can usually be selected with a game switch on the console. Less common, the games can be selected with a cartridge. On these cartridges isn't a program; there are just a few wires that connect electrically a few parts of the intern console hardware that a game appears on the screen. Examples for this technique are the Magnavox Odyssey, the Coleco Telstar Arcade and the Philips Tele-Game ES 2201.

Developing from earlier non-video electronic game cabinets such as pinball machines, arcade-style video games (whether coin-operated or individually owned) are usually dedicated to a single game or a small selection of built-in games and do not allow for external input in the form of ROM cartridges. Although modern arcade games such as Dance Dance Revolution X and Half-Life 2: Survivor do allow external input in the form of memory cards or USB sticks, this functionality usually only allows for saving progress or for providing modified level-data, and does not allow the dedicated machine to access new games. The game or games in a dedicated arcade console are usually housed in a stand-up cabinet that holds a video screen, a control deck or attachments for more complex control devices, and a computer or console hidden within that runs the games.

First released in the mid-1970s by games such as Mattel Electronics' Mattel Auto Race and Mattel Electronic Football, dedicated handheld video games are considered the precursors of modern handheld game consoles.[1] Devoted to one game or a collection or built-in games, dedicated handhelds tend to employ simple VFD or LCD screens although older models often utilized even more primitive arrays of small light bulbs or LED lights to produce calculator-like alphanumerical screens. Dedicated handheld systems typically comprise a screen, a number of control buttons, and a compact body that houses the game engine. Nintendo's Game and Watch series increased the popularity of dedicated handheld games during 1980s.

Dedicated consoles have appeared for fishing games, where the unit's body itself becomes a specialized controller in the form of a rod and reel. Other dedicated consoles have been released with light guns, for hunting, shooting, and even archery games.

Rising to popularity in the early 1980s, game watches are electronic wristwatches that allow the wearer to access an included video game that uses the display in the watch's face as its screen. Game watch buttons which originally may have been used for setting hour and minute gain secondary functions in relation to the needs of the game.

A handheld TV game with power and TV leads attached.

A dedicated console differs from a handheld TV game (or a "plug and play game") in that the latter integrates the video game console with the game controller.

Most modern dedicated home game systems are popularly referred to as "plug and play," because they are based on modern technology which enables the hardware and software of the entire game to be within a single controller, with no separate console at all. Some of these are clones of old games, and are produced in China or Southeast Asia (i.e. Power Player Super Joy III), while others contain licensed games and are distributed in mainstream stores in the West. Of the latter, Jakks Pacific's line of TV Games is among the most famous, which includes re-releases of many vintage games, from arcade classics to Atari 2600 games, as well as games based on currently-popular characters, such as SpongeBob SquarePants. Konami has also released a line of their classic arcade games, including Frogger, on "plug and play" dedicated systems.

The Pelican VG Pocket was an attempt to make a TV game with a backlit color LCD. Dedicated consoles and handheld electronic games with LCD screens that only have one game are rather distinct devices, but the release of the Pelican VG Pocket has blurred the categorization between the two.