ZX Spectrum

Launched in 1982 at £125 for the 16 KB model, half what the competition cost. The thrift shows everywhere: the keyboard was a rubber mat, the sound a single beeper, and the display divided the screen into 8×8 pixel cells that could each hold only two colours. The resulting attribute clash — colours bleeding between neighbouring cells — became an aesthetic signature rather than a defect.

Around five million were sold. Programs loaded from cassette tape over four minutes of screeching, and because the machine was cheap enough to buy for a child, the games were often written by teenagers in bedrooms. Out of that came the studios that later built Britain's games industry, among them the founders of Rare and Codemasters.