Tiny Diggers – An iPad Construction Truck Game for Kids Age 2-5

You’re probably aware that Nintendo is a century-old company, established in 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi to print playing cards. And it doddled along until Fusajiro’s great-grandson Hiroshi Yamauchi took over and expanded the company into oddball kids toys in the 60′s and 70′s. Shortly thereafter, Donkey Kong changed the family fortunes forever.

Platypus Comix.net has a great gallery of bizarre pre-Mario toys, ranging from the extend-o-hand grabber to nostalgically kitschy board games. Nintendo referenced some of these at various times in the WarioWare series, so if you think you’ve seen these toys before, you’re probably not crazy. Watch for a pre-NES version of the Nintendo logo (same font!) as well as some hilariously bankrupt “NG” logos, meant to homage the “MB” of toyco legend Milton Bradley.

Riding high in the gallery is an increasingly realistic selection of toy guns. Once upon a time, Nintendo operated game centers with light gun shooting galleries. To bring the magic home, Nintendo manufactured plastic versions… either with toy lion / cowboy victims or without.

Talk about hardcore! The next time Dude Huge shows up with one of his Gears of War replica weapons, you can snort and say Nintendo did that back when he was just Dude Zygote.

Source: Platypus Comix.net