Many people think that Emerson Arcadia 2001 is just a system, like all other software systems. Arcadia 2001 is certainly the most well-known of these systems, explaining why it has resulted in console groups often referred to as "Emerson Arcadia 2001 clones".
Although it was the most popular system of this type of console. Philips/Signetics has developed a hardware platform to demonstrate the capabilities of the Signetics 2650 & 2636 chipset. In a way, this material has been licensed (by Philips) to many third-party companies around the world, so systems like Interton VC-4000, Voltmace DataBase, Acetronic MPU-1000, ITMC MPT-05 etc.
Later, the hardware was improved with the use of a Signetics 2637 instead of the 2636 (handling audio and video), which resulted in a new wave of licensed systems, all based on the same hardware and playing the same games. This console group includes: the Ormatu Spelcomputer 2001, the Advision Home-Arcade, the Prestige MPT-03, the Tele-Fever, etc. and the Arcadia 2001.
All systems (based on chipset 2650 & 2637) are compatible with each other. This means that everyone could play games with each other if the slots for "Cartridges" were identical (which is not the case, leading to subgroups).
The Arcadia 2001 sub-group includes: Advision Home Arcade (France), Bandai Arcadia (Japan), GiG Electronics Leonardo (Italy), Hanimex HMG-2650, Leisure-Dynamics Leisure-Vision, Intercord XL 2000 System, fever, etc… This means that all of these systems can use the same cards (Cartridges) directly.
The Software Library is not very impressive, but there are good reasons for that. First of all, some titles just direct the doors from the Interton VC-4000 & Compatible Systems team. Philips also had great plans for a new platform. He published the adaptations of the famous classic Arcade (Pac-Man, Berzerk, Phoenix, etc.), but Atari sued them. Philips was then forced to modify these games profoundly, resulting in poor adaptations at least for Arcadia 2001. Because outside the United States, other compatible systems sometimes had an unaltered version in their library (for example Robot Killer for MPT- 03).
The Arcadia is equipped with two detachable controls made with a joystick, a 12-button keyboard (flat screen buttons) and two fire buttons (actually have the same function). Small plastic underwear was delivered with some toys, having various "key" functions when placed on the controls (such as the Mattel Intellisivision).
The control panel consists of 4 buttons and the on/off activation button.
