History of video games/Platforms/Action Gamemaster

Development
The Action Gamemaster was a vaporware handheld system developed by Active Enterprises of Miami, Florida. The company was famous for developing the Cheetahman IP and the Action 52 game multipack.

The system was announced by January 5th, 1993.

The system was shown at the CES 1994 trade show.

Legacy
While contemporary sources seemed warm to the device, later sources are skeptical that the console as advertised was technically feasible. The mid to late 2000's would see handhelds capable of playing NES, SNES, and Genesis games via emulation or hardware clone chips, realizing the stated capabilities of the Gamemaster, though not its ambitious goals of playing current generation home console games on a portable device.

Compute
The console was simply said to be "16-bit". This provides little real technical information, though it does show the importance of the label during the "Bit wars" of the era. A more meaningful indication of the compute power of the system is found in the stated capabilities of the system, which would put it on par with, or superior to, common home consoles of the time. Portable consoles able to match the capabilities of the SNES or Genesis would not find widespread popularity till around the end of the 1990s or early 2000s.

Display
The LCD screen used by the console was 3.2 in. At the time this would have been a comparatively large display for a portable console.

Expandability
The device was said to have supported add ons such as an external CD-ROM drive, TV tuner, and car power adapter. While other contemporary portable systems could be found with support for car adapters or even TV tuners, the ability for a external CD-ROM drive to be used with a portable console was far more unusual and distinctive.

Games
The device was said to run its own games, as well as NES, SNES, and Genesis games via adaptors.