First off, you should know what the ROB was. It stands for Robotic Operating Buddy, and was packaged with the very first NES sets that were shipped. It was a robot that played games with you by communicating with the TV screen. That's a pretty bare-bones explanation, if I gave you the technical one you probably wouldn't understand it.

Only two games were ever released for the ROB—Gyromite and Stack Up. In Gyromite, the ROB controls pillars that open and close, allowing Professor Hector to defuse bombs hidden in his lab. In Stack Up, ROB moves blocks to match the pattern on the screen. It sounds pretty confusing, which is probably why not many sold. But ROB's purpose wasn't to be a good friend to play games with—he was meant to sell the NES. Back in 1985, the great video game crash was still in effect, yet Nintendo decided to market their NES anyway. The problem was, no retaliers wanted to buy NES's. Here's where the ROB comes in—it was like a trojan horse. The ROB was quickly developed in Japan, and when he was flashily displayed with NES sets, retailers drooled—surely this thing would sell! It was like nothing anyone had ever seen before! NES sets were bought like mad, everyone liked it, and the NES went on to be the best selling game system ever.

If you think about it, the NES may owe it's success to the ROB, which got it into the market. Sadly, Nintendo ditched the ROB after a year or two, much like the Greeks who poured out of the trojan horse after gaining entry to Troy. They never made any more games for it, but when you look at it that's no shame—it's not terribly interesting anyway. Gyromite is mildly entertaining when played with another human, however.


Because of it's limited production (and popularity), ROB is quite the rarity these days—especially complete with all of his working parts. If you ever find one, you might consider picking it up, it's a great collector's item. Even if you find one bare or not working, get it cheap—it might look good just sitting on your shelf. :D

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