NEC Game Center
NEC Systems/Consoles
Starting out as Nippon Electric Limited Partnership in 1898, NEC has racked up an impressive array of accomplishments in many areas of technology. Initially making just telephones and switches, NEC also entered into radio communications, photo-telegraphic and carrier transmission equipment as well as microwave research. During the late 1970's, early 1980's NEC added consumer electronics to their resume.
In the early 1980's NEC took the "divide and conquer" approach expanding its operations into many markets through the creation of several similarly named legal entities. In 1983 Nippon Electric Limited Partnership was rebranded as NEC everywhere except Japan where it still goes by its original name.
Video games are just a tiny segment of NEC's century long history. In 1987 they licensed the technology from Hudson Soft to create their first video game console, the PC-Engine. It was launched as the TurboGrafx-16 in the U.S. the next year followed by a handheld system called the TurboExpress. The U.S. market proved to be more difficult to win over than the Japanese market.
Somewhere in the early 1990's NEC began to concentrate their video game operations only in Japan launching the PC-FX system as a Japan-only release in 1994. The PC-FX saw moderate success with games being produced for it up through 1998 when NEC stopped making its own video game consoles and instead moved into a behind-the-scenes roll supplying Sega with chipsets for the Dreamcast.
For all you collectors out there, it has been said that in terms of graphics and sound the TurboGrafx-16 ports of arcade shooters is closer to the original than ports made by the likes of Sega or Nintendo. Nowadays you can find several PC-Engine and TurboGrafx-16 games available for download on Nintendo's Virtual Console but if you want the real deal stick around here and check out the links to the individual systems above.
NEC Video
80's NEC Commercial (English)
80's NEC Commercial