TLB2


 * "The TLB2, that little black box what does it all!"
 * -Marketing slogan

The TLB2 (short for "That Little Black Box") is a fanonical game console created by JustAlex93.

It is a console released in Late 1983/Early 1984 in the U.K. by Murphy Computing and was eventually discontinued in 1992.

A successor "Bird Box", a 16-bit system similar to Amiga and later models of PC-98, was released in 1991

Overview
The TLB2, developed by a team lead by Murphy Computing's CEO Barton Murphy, was touted to be a low-cost, full-colour system that could be used as either a games system or a home microcomputer. Instead of cartridges, the TLB2 uses a small-sized floppy disk format referred to as the "Floppy Card" for its software titles. Each Floppy Card comes included with a protective storage sleeve.

The system has a distinctive display mode where ASCII characters are used to create a pseudo-bitmapped screen. Text VDUs store a small grid of ASCII values used to look up appropriate entries in a character matrix table accessed by the display processor. By changing the character matrices, or essentially treating them all as user-definable graphics, a bitmap screen could be achieved using less memory.

The TLB2's main input device, the TLB2 Game Controller is a joypad with four rubber fire buttons, D-pad, and a start/pause button.

Murphy Computing had also developed the TLB2 Keyboard, a peripheral which, with the included TLBASIC OS Floppy Card, lets the user run the TLB2 as a computer. With the MGC-004 External Floppy Card Drive, the user can save data on rewritable Floppy Cards when the TLB2 is in computer mode.

With the TM-16/TM-32 Memory Expansion Pack (M.E.P.), the user can add an extra 16K/32K of memory to the TLB2's base memory, making it ideal especially for the system's computer mode.

MORE INFO TO BE ADDED

Product Listings
MORE TO BE ADDED
 * MCG-001 - TLB2
 * MCG-002 - TLB2 Game Controller
 * MCG-003 - TLB2 Keyboard
 * MCG-004 - External Floppy Card Drive
 * MCG-005 - TLB2 Trackball Controller
 * TM-16 - TLB2 Memory Expansion Pack (M.E.P.) 16K
 * TM-32 - TLB2 Memory Expansion Pack (M.E.P) 32K
 * FCD-C - Floppy Card Drive Cleaner
 * FC-RW1 - Rewritable Floppy Card

Legend

 * * - Supports two players
 * 16 - TM-16 M.E.P. Required
 * 32 - TM-32 M.E.P. Required

Video Games
MORE TO BE ADDED
 * Bladenite (1984, Action-Adventure)
 * Bladenite II: Dreadhunt (1987, Action-Adventure)16
 * Bladenite 3: Revenge (1991, Action-Adventure)32
 * Bladeflite (1989, Racing)16
 * Dead Dude: Undead Cool Guy (1985, Platformer)
 * Solar Nightmare (1985, Shoot-'em-up)
 * Guacamole Rush (1985, Racing)
 * Hayden's Adventure (1988, Platformer)*
 * Hayden's Adventure II (1989, Platformer)*
 * Hayden's New Adventure (1990, Platformer)*16
 * Rags to Riches (1989, Clicker)
 * Q.W.E.R.T.Y. (1984, Puzzle)
 * EVADE (1988, Maze)*
 * Grimbot: Robo-Reaper (198?, ????)
 * Titan Assault (198?, ????)16
 * Cloudmania (19??, ????)
 * Street Fighter (1988, Fighting, port of the arcade game by Capcom)*16
 * Doraemon: Daiboken (1985, Platformer, Japanese exclusive)

Computer
MORE TO BE ADDED
 * TLBASIC v1.0
 * TLBASIC v1.5

Trivia

 * The TLB2's display mode is inspired by that of the Sinclair LC3, an unreleased game console.