The V.Flash Home Edutainment System, also known as V.Smile Pro in

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

, is a seventh-generation

educational Education is the transmission of knowledge and skills and the development of character traits. Formal education occurs within a structured institutional framework, such as public schools, following a curriculum. Non-formal education also fol ...

home video game console A home video game console is a video game console that is designed to be connected to a display device, such as a television, and an external power source as to play video games. While initial consoles were dedicated units with only a few game ...

and spinoff from the V.Smile series of

video game console A video game console is an electronic device that Input/output, outputs a video signal or image to display a video game that can typically be played with a game controller. These may be home video game console, home consoles, which are generally ...

s developed by VTech and Koto Laboratory. Unlike the V.Smile, this game console uses

3D graphics 3D computer graphics, sometimes called CGI, 3D-CGI or three-dimensional computer graphics, are graphics that use a three-dimensional representation of geometric data (often Cartesian) that is stored in the computer for the purposes of perfor ...

. This system is designed for kids aged 6 to 10. Although critics praised the V.Flash for improving on the V.Smile's base, the console's sales lagged behind the former. VTech discontinued the V.Flash shortly after and shifted focus back to the V.Smile.

History

It was revealed at the 2006 London Toy Fair, and released in September

2006 2006 was designated as the International Year of Deserts and Desertification. Events January * January 1– 4 – Russia temporarily cuts shipment of natural gas to Ukraine during a price dispute. * January 12 – A stampede during t ...

. The system retailed for $100.

Games

Since the console did not sell as well as the V.Smile, not many games were made for it. All games were released in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

, the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

and

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

, with the exceptions of Bratz Fashion Pixiez: The Secret Necklace, which was not released in the United Kingdom and Germany, Multisports, which was exclusive to Germany, and Scooby-Doo!: Ancient Adventure, which was not released in Germany. Additionally, Bratz Fashion Pixiez: The Secret Necklace, Cars: In the Fast Lane and Disney Princess: The Crystal Ball Adventure were released in

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

. There are 10 titles known to have been released.

The Princeton Review The Princeton Review is an education services company providing tutoring, test preparation and admission resources for students. It was founded in 1981, and since that time has worked with over 400 million students. Services are delivered by 4, ...

was involved in the development of educational content for some games.

CDs

Unlike most other

CD-ROM A CD-ROM (, compact disc read-only memory) is a type of read-only memory consisting of a pre-pressed optical compact disc that contains computer data storage, data computers can read, but not write or erase. Some CDs, called enhanced CDs, hold b ...

-based consoles, this system uses 12 cm CDs enclosed with plastic to protect damage from touching (although it could also protect from piracy), which is somewhat similar to 3.5"

floppy disks A floppy disk or floppy diskette (casually referred to as a floppy, a diskette, or a disk) is a type of disk storage composed of a thin and flexible disk of a magnetic storage medium in a square or nearly square plastic enclosure lined with a ...

or UMDs. The discs use the

ISO 9660 ISO 9660 (also known as ECMA-119) is a file system for optical disc media. The file system is an international standard available from the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). Since the specification is publicly available, im ...

file system, without any

copy protection Copy protection, also known as content protection, copy prevention and copy restriction, is any measure to enforce copyright by preventing the reproduction of software, films, music, and other media. Copy protection is most commonly found on vid ...

mechanism other than a simple sensor in the case jacket, making it possible to make a disc image out of the media. Because of this, the V.Flash can also play

audio CD Compact Disc Digital Audio (CDDA or CD-DA), also known as Digital Audio Compact Disc or simply as Audio CD, is the standard format for audio compact discs. The standard is defined in the '' Red Book'' technical specifications, which is why t ...

s and user-recorded

CD-R CD-R (Compact disc-recordable) is a digital media, digital optical disc data storage device, storage format. A CD-R disc is a compact disc that can only be Write once read many, written once and read arbitrarily many times. CD-R discs (CD-Rs) ...

s using the supplied disc adapter.

Other hardware

The processor is an

ARM9 ARM9 is a group of 32-bit RISC ARM processor cores licensed by ARM Holdings for microcontroller use. The ARM9 core family consists of ARM9TDMI, ARM940T, ARM9E-S, ARM966E-S, ARM920T, ARM922T, ARM946E-S, ARM9EJ-S, ARM926EJ-S, ARM968E-S, ARM99 ...

processor from

LSI Logic LSI Logic Corporation was an American company founded in Santa Clara, California, was a pioneer in the ASIC and EDA industries. It evolved over time to design and sell semiconductors and software that accelerated storage and networking in data ...

. Files are stored in 3 main formats: .mjp (Motion JPEG), .ptx (Pro Tools session file), and .snd. The latter have been determined to be

PCM Pulse-code modulation (PCM) is a method used to Digital signal (signal processing), digitally represent analog signals. It is the standard form of digital audio in computers, compact discs, digital telephony and other digital audio application ...

WAV files. Capable of rendering 1.5 million polygons per second and equipped with a 32 bit CPU, this system is directly comparable to the fifth generation game consoles, such as the

PlayStation is a video gaming brand owned and produced by Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE), a division of Japanese conglomerate Sony. Its flagship products consists of a series of home video game consoles produced under the brand; it also consists ...

. The system may use a memory card to save games.

Notes

References

External links

Official Site

* http://dso.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=177100739
V.Flash reverse engineering

VFlash technical details and reverse-engineering

archived in the Wayback Machine on December 27, 2013
20th Century Retro Games entry
(Gallery page for various VTech V.Smile models, including V.Flash) {{VTech products VTech Discontinued video game consoles Seventh-generation video game consoles ARM-based video game consoles CD-ROM-based consoles Educational video game consoles