Nintendo Automatic Ultra Scope / Ultra Cope (オートマチック ウルトラ スコープ / コープ, 1971)

The challenge for every toy maker is to repeatably come up with new appealing toys. The third of the Nintendo 'ultra' toys created by Gunpei Yokoi (after the Ultra Hand in 1966 and Ultra Machine in 1967) was another item surely coveted by children and (some of) their parents alike.

Nintendo Automatic Ultra Scope (1971)

It was called the Automatic Ultra Scope (オートマチック ウルトラ スコープ), or Ultra Scope for short.

The Ultra Scope is a well executed quality product. Most of the ones that have survived to this day still work like they came out of the factory yesterday.

Introduced in 1971, for a retail price of ¥2,980, the Ultra Scope did not repeat the phenomenal sales success of its two 'ultra' predecessors, but still sold decently.

Based on the periscopes used in warfare (in particular submarines), with two mirrors at a 45-degree angle, this toy allows viewing over high obstacles and around corners.

The top mirror is mounted on a four-piece retractable arm, which, when fully extended, stands a cool one meter high.

The manual includes some examples for it's use. But really, you have to be very unimaginative to not see its potential.

Look on a high shelf

Watch over a tall crowd

The Ultra Scope comes in a sturdy box, and two batteries are included (one unfortunately missing in picture below).

The bottom half of the box has a white dotted pattern. When you look closely you will notice that it actually consists of lots of little "NG" (Nintendo Game) logos. This print was used on many of the boxes for the Nintendo toys released in the early 70s.

The exterior of the box is decorated with lots of little "NG" logos

The Ultra Scope is very solidly built and weighs around 1.2 kilogram. It's heavy! A black plastic carry strap is mounted to the side, which is no luxury given the Ultra Scope's weight and the need to keep it steady when spying observing an object of interest.

The Ultra Scope before use

The Ultra Scope's arm, top mirror and visor all fold neatly together, making a nice compact package.

Manual front

A leaflet with instructions is included, to get you started with the Ultra Scope.

Manual back

The two included C-cell batteries (called type "UM-2" in Japan) power a motor that drives the movement of the arm with the top mirror. The inclusion of this motor is the reason the Ultra Scope is called 'Automatic'.

Batteries go in the back

On the front, two big square red buttons control the up and downward movement of the mirror arm. You can easily operate these with your thumbs when holding the Ultra Scope and looking through the visor.

The "Automatic Ultra Scope" name is embossed on the front of the body

The visor with the the bottom mirror needs to be flipped outward before use. The light gray button on the side of the visor allows the angle of the bottom mirror to be slightly adjusted, to ensure bottom and top mirror are perfectly aligned.

It is noting more than a coincidence, but Nintendo aficionados will recognize in the color scheme of the Ultra Scope (shades of gray mixed with black and red accents) the familiar colors of NES, which it predates by fifteen years.

The top mirror is safely stored inside the body of the Ultra Scope. Only when the arm is moved out, by pressing the 'UP' button, will the mirror automatically (through a spring) take the 45 degree angle position.

The upwards and downwards movement of the mirror arm causes a nice satisfying whirring sound. It is pretty loud though, so this somewhat limits the options for stealth espionage use.

Looking the opposite way from normal use:
from the top mirror down to the bottom mirror

The fact the arm is motorized gives the toy a sophisticated feel, but it is also functional - as it allows precise positioning of the height of the top mirror, while looking through the visor.

Looking through the visor, the two mirrors allow you
to view up to one meter above your normal eye level

To move the top mirror up, the motor unwinds a flexible metal strip which is stored wound-up on a axle inside the body of the Ultra Scope, and pushes this inside the re-tractable arm, pushing it up. The mirror is moved down by winding this strip back on an axle, pulling the arm down. The metal mechanism involved is part of the reason for the hefty weight of the Ultra Scope.

Up we go!

It takes around 20 seconds to fully extend the arm. When its done, you have one impressive looking toy. Be careful when operating it though, as you can easily take out someone's eye with the end of the arm.

How high can you get? Well, about one meter

The first batch of Ultra Scope toys was actually called Ultra Cope; the 'S' somehow becoming lost in translation. The Japanese katakana also reads 'urutora koopu' (ウルトラ コープ).

First version of the Ultra Scope was called Ultra Cope

Why Nintendo ever thought of naming it Ultra Cope remains a mystery. Could it really be just the result of a bad translation job?

This (erroneous?) name was applied consistently on this version, including the embossed name on the body of this Ultra Scope, err sorry, this Ultra Cope.

The box art of the two version is also slightly different. To insert the 'S' and (in case of the Japanese language name) the 'ス', the layout of the title had to be adjusted somewhat.

Nintendo Ultra Cope (left) and Ultra Scope (right)

One can only speculate what happened at the Nintendo headquarters between these two versions. How many Ultra Cope's were already produced and distributed before someone raised his/her finger and exclaimed "for forgot the 'S'"!

Ultra Cope (bottom) and Ultra Scope (top)

Besides the name change, the versions are functionally identical.

Ultra Cope (left) and Ultra Scope (right)

There is one other slight difference in the design of the two versions: a geometrical pattern is stamped in the metal strip on the side of the Ultra Cope, while this is not the case for the Ultra Scope, which has a smooth strip.

Spot the difference - Ultra Cope (left) and Ultra Scope (right)

Yet another version of the Ultra Scope is the international release. Nintendo's export activity was still small in the seventies, but through some deals with third parties abroad, limited numbers were distributed outside of Japan (similar to the Slugger Mate version of the Ultra Machine and the Australian Ultra Hand).

Nintendo Automatic Surveillance Scope (international release Ultra Cope)

It was actually the Ultra Cope version (sans 'S') that made it abroad. For the US market, it was renamed to Automatic Surveillance Scope, as the 'ultra' prefix did not have such international appeal.

We have seen better localization jobs

The localization was limited to plastering the English name on top of the Japanese box. The sides of the box remained in Japanese language. The fact that no real dedicated English box was produced clearly indicates that limited numbers were shipped outside of Japan, possibly even with limited involvement of Nintendo.

Importer information on the box of the US version

So, there you have it. The ins and outs of the Ultra Scope; the third and final of Gunpei Yokoi's 'ultra' toys. Like his other toys, another great marriage of engineering skill, imagination, execution excellence and resulting play fun. Traits of what is currently still recognized as the Nintendo way of designing.

Three versions: Ultra Cope, Ultra Scope, Surveillance Scope

I am sure that all of you who have made it this far into this post by now are bursting with excitement to see the Ultra Scope in action. Well, here goes.

Oh, wait. There is more: a special sweepstake version of the Ultra Cope.

[2024 update] As mentioned in the comments below, there is another box version. More about that here.

Nintendo Color TV Game Racing 112 (任天堂 カラー テレビゲーム レーシング 112, 1978)

In the early days of video arcade games, three genres stood out in terms of popularity. Number one has to be shooting games (with examples like Space Wars, Space Invaders and Nintendo's own Sheriff), followed by racing games and sport simulation games (including Pong!). All three genres have remained popular ever since.

Early arcade racing games include Taito's Speed Race (1974) and Atari's Night Driver (1976).

In 1978 Nintendo brought the video game racing experience to living rooms in Japan, with the introduction of Color TV Game Racing 112 (カラー テレビゲーム レーシング 112).

Nintendo Color TV Game Racing 112 (1978)

It is one of the first home video game with an actual steering wheel. The Coleco Telstar Arcade, which also featured a steering wheel (as well as a gun), was released one year earlier in the US.

Racing 112 is the third of the four games in the Nintendo Color TV Game series. It followed TV Game 6 and TV Game 15, both from 1977. Like all games in the Color TV Games series, it is a dedicated game machine with hardwired game play and a fixed number of game variants.

Color TV Game Racing 112 and Color TV Game Block Kuzushi

Racing 112 is a big game, with a big box (check out the size difference with Block Kuzushi in above picture).

What's in the box

The console features a steering wheel and gear shift for single-player game mode, and two paddle controllers for two-player mode.

The model number of Racing 112 is "CTG-CR112". The box exterior contains the Nintendo name in the copyright notice, as well as in large kanji ("任天堂").

A price drop to ¥12,500 required the existing stock to be sticker-ed over

The game price was originally set to ¥18,000, but quickly lowered to ¥12,500 to ensure competitiveness. The price would eventually be further reduced to ¥5,000.

Later versions of the box have the lower price printed on them

When opening the box, we see the console firmly packed between two polystyrene pieces.

The steering wheel is included loose, to reduce the dimensions of the game and prevent an even bigger box.

Color TV Game Racing 112 manual

The steering wheel can be mounted easily on the console, and taken off again after playing.

The manual includes assembly instructions

Like all other Color TV Games, the set includes an RF-switch. In the 70s, TV sets were still produced primarily for watching television broadcasts. They were not yet designed to take input signals from multiple devices, and only had a single input (intended to be connected the an antenna). A video game like Racing 112 could be connected directly to this input, but this would require the antenna cable to be removed and moved back again before and after playing the video game.

RF switch included with Color TV Game Racing 112

Enter the RF-switch. This device allowed both the video game and antenna to be connected to the TV at the same time. With the switch you would select which of the two input signals you wanted to pass on to the TV. Once installed you would have no more messing about with cables before and after play.

In 1978 a typical video game manual contained many pages with instructions on hooking up the console to your TV set. Today life has become somewhat simpler, thanks to TV sets with multiple AV inputs. And with the current widespread availability of cable TV, who remembers roof-top antennas?

The console measures an impressive 43 centimeters wide. The steering wheel is 18 centimeters in diameter. The casing has a nice off-white and brown color combination and feels very solid. The widened and raised body underneath the steering wheel gives a real dashboard-like feel to the controls left and right of it.

The "Racing 112" name is included on a bright metal faceplate on the front. Like the two earlier Color TV Games, the Nintendo name is still not displayed prominently; only on the box and on the bottom of the console.

The gear-shift and steering wheel on the front-side of the console are used to control one of the one-screen cars in single-player mode. The gear shift has two positions. First gear is up.

Second gear is down.

On the back-side we find two cups for storing the paddle controllers when they are not used, the output cable (to connect to the TV through the RF-switch) and a connector for the power adapter.

Racing 112 requires an external 9 volt power adapter, which had to be bought separately. It is the same adapter (model CTGA-901R) used by all games in the Color TV Game series.

A note on the inside of the box explains the compatibility of
the required power adapter with TV Game 6 and TV Game 15

When switched to two-player mode, the two paddle controllers are used to steer two on-screen cars. These controllers have a good length cable, which is fixed to the console.

The paddles are well-designed and the turning knob has a good size, allowing precise control of the cars.

The objective of the game is to pass as many cars on the track as possible with the player controlled car(s), without crashing into any of them. Every car passed scores a point.

Game variants are selected using the many switches on the control panel on the right.

The top left switch on the control panel is used to select the game mode (ゲームセレクト). The left and middle positions are single-player games, the right position is the two-player mode. The two versions of the single-player mode are "spacious course" (広いコース) and the more difficult "narrow course" (狭いコース).

The top middle switch sets the speed (スペード). From left to right: low (低), medium (中) and high (高) speed. In two-player mode this sets the fixed speed of the game. In single-player mode this defines the top speed of the player's car (reached when switching to second gear with the gear shift). The low speed is not available for single-player mode. The relation between the game mode options and the speed options is indicated by the green and yellow bars above and below these switches.

The red button on the top right is used to start the game (スタート).

The left-most switch in the bottom row is the power switch "電源" ( up is on, down is off).

The other four switches in the bottom row manage special game elements and allow the player to further refine the difficulty level to his or her own taste. From left to right: zigzagging of opponent cars "ジグザグ" (up is yes, down is no), touching the guard rail causes a crash "ガードレール接触" (up is yes, down is no), bad road "悪路" (up is yes, down is no) and number of cars "車の量" (up is many, down is few). The really tough players will set all these switches in the up position.

TV Game 6 had six game variants. TV Game 15 had fifteen. After looking at all these switches and related settings, one question remains: does Racing 112 really have one-hundred and twelve game variants, as the name suggests?

It turns out this is actually true, though many of the variants are simply permutations of the same game elements.

Let's do the math. There are seven game modes it total; four single-player modes (spacious or narrow course combined with medium or fast speed) plus three two-player modes (low, medium or fast speed). With the four difficulty switches it is possible to select sixteen different options (2x2x2x2).

So, seven game modes with sixteen difficulty options each brings the total to one-hundred and twelve game variants (16 x 7 = 112).

The manual includes an overview of the 112 game variants

Color TV Game Racing 112 is a fun and challenging racing game. As one of the earliest Nintendo home video games it was rightly honored with a mini game in Wario Ware Inc for Game Boy Advance.

Racing 112 mini game in Wario Ware 

Also check out this Racing 112 leaflet.