Commodore 64 Games System
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 This is why you don't get cheap in the console market.
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The Commodore 64 Games System (or C64GS for short) is the video game console version of the popular Commodore 64 home computer. It was released in 1990 exclusively in Europe and was a major commercial failure.
Why It’s No Longer Keeping Up With You Anymore
- It didn't have a keyboard, resulting to most of the games already released on the original C64 being borderline unplayable on the C64GS, missing an opportunity to increase the library of games for the system. As an example, the standard C64 version of Terminator 2: Judgment Day was designed for the console, but was included on a cartridge that required the user to press a key to access the game.
- It was completely useless as a video game console overall, since the original C64 could run more games than the ones the C64GS was compatible with. Worse yet, a standard C64 was only just £50 more expensive than the C64GS making it a worse deal overall. Also, most people considered the regular C64 a game console anyways.
- To rub salt on the wound, the standard Commodore 64 had the ability to play games on floppy disks and cassettes, which cost as low as £1.99, while the C64GS was stuck with cartridge versions of the same games which all cost £35, making the C64GS an immense rip-off. Also, cartridges were limited to 16 kilobytes of data without bank switching, whereas floppy disks and cassettes could hold, at minimum, 10 times as much data.
- False advertising: Commodore promised "up to 100 titles before December" (even though December was two months from the time of its writing), while in reality only 28 games were made for the system, most of them being compilations of older games.
- It arrived much too late. It was designed to compete with the 8-bit consoles (NES and Sega Master System), but the C64GS' European release was two months after that of the PAL Sega Mega Drive (Genesis), and one month after the Japanese release of the Super Famicom (SNES), and three years after Commodore's own 16-bit Amiga 500.
- TV hookups, joystick support and cartridge slots were already found on the C64 as well.
- Limited software support. Only a few companies developed games for the system, but probably only because the games were compatible with the original C64, providing the games with a commercial safety net in case the C64GS failed.
- It was outdated, as the moment that it came to market, the Sega Genesis came out at nearly the same time, and was a superior system in every way possible.
- The Atari XEGS, despite being a market failure itself, was a more competent attempt at a video game console/8-bit home computer hybrid system, since it had a detachable keyboard and was compatible with most, if not all, existing Atari 8-bit hardware and software. Also, the XEGS was released three years before the C64GS.
Reception
It is the worst selling console ever, with only 2,000 units sold. Commodore was left with 18,000 unsold units; however, the unsold units were simply converted into standard Commodore 64 computers.
Commodore apparently learned absolutely nothing and tried the exact same thing again a year later, only this time it was the turn of the Amiga 500 to get shoved in a box with no keyboard: the result was the CDTV, the fifth worst selling console ever. Then, two years later, they did it again by shoving an Amiga A1200 in a box and calling it the Amiga CD32. They went bankrupt after that system failed.
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