In 1989, ten years after the release of the ill-fated Microvision console, Nintendo released the Game Boy, a handheld console designed by the team that had been responsible for the Game & Watch systems. The system included interchangeable cartridges with hundreds of different titles, such as Pokemon, The Legend of Zelda, Mario Golf, Street Fighter II and Bomberman. However, the top selling game was Tetris, a highly addictive falling-block puzzle game, which sold millions of copies. It was so popular that many consumers bought the Game Boy simply to play Tetris. The original Game Boy (along with the successor the Game Boy Pocket, Game Boy Color, and Game Boy Advance) is the best selling game console ever, having sold more than 195 million units.

Several rival handhelds also made their debut over the next two years, including the Atari Lynx, TurboExpress and Sega Game Gear. The Atari Lynx (1989) was the first colour portable ever made and the first that featured a backlit screen. It also supported networking support with up to 7 other players, and could be turned upside down to accommodate left-handed players. Unfortunately, the unit's high price, unwieldy size and lack of compelling games meant that the Lynx became a commercial failure, despite a redesign in 1991.

The TurboExpress was released in 1990 as a portable version of the TurboGrafx home video game console. It was the most advanced handheld of its time and was able to play all the TurboGrafx-16's games, and could also be connected to a television using the RCA audio/video input. The 'TurboLink' feature allowed two-player play in games such as Falcon, a flight simulator, in which two players could access a head-to-head dogfight mode.

The colour screen Sega Game Gear was based on the Sega Master System and was released in Japan in 1990 and in Europe and North America in 1991. Although the system failed to make a significant impact on the Game Boy's lead in the handheld market, its large library of games meant that it achieved higher sales than the Lynx and the TurboExpress. It remains the longest running handheld system not made by Nintendo.

In 1998, the Game Boy received its first major makeover, featuring a colour screen along with twice as much memory and processing speed. The new Game Boy Colour system was backward compatible with the original Game Boy, instantly giving it a huge library of titles.

Other handheld consoles released during the 1990s included the Neo Geo Pocket Color (NGPC) designed by SNK, the makers of the Neo Geo home console and arcade machine and WonderSwan Colour - both of which were for the Japanese market.

You can find out more about the fourth and fifth generation of handheld consoles released during this period by selecting an item from the list below.