Category:Games published by Tonka

Yes, Tonka did in fact publish games (and a console) at one point.

While the rest of the details are a bit fuzzy, the story goes that after having trouble lifting the weights, Sega gave Tonka the keys to the Master System in the US so that Sega could prioritize its business in Europe and Asia, as the latter thought that Tonka was up to the task. While the Master System was initially met with enthusiasm and commercials were made for it, Tonka quickly realized that it was a white elephant and didn't put much effort into marketing the Master System, not wanting to bring over much of the Japanese library and buckled under 1988's chip shortage.

While it's obvious in hindsight, this was because the Nintendo Entertainment System was considered the most popular console in the US and other companies were also struggling to make an impact. Nobody wanted to, or couldn't make games on consoles that weren't the NES. After feeding the goldfish for a good three years, Tonka let Sega buy back the US rights so that Sega could gently nudge the Master System into a period of moderate support (basically, it got a new budget model, a converter for the Genesis, a few games, and that's all she wrote).

The Master System was subsequently discontinued in 1992.