Ah, the good old TI-99 series. I had the TI-99/4A and compared to its rivals like the Commodore 64, it was junk. To do anything cool with it you had to buy the bulky, expensive Peripheral Expansion Box. The TI-99 did make history in two ways:
* giving us the term "sprite" in the computer graphics sense. Such things were called different things on different platforms: "player-missile graphics" on Atari, OBJs on Nintendo, MOBs on Commodore. The designers of the TMS9918/9918A chip which the TI-99s used, named movable graphics "sprites" after the way they floated above the textual-grid display; and TI Extended BASIC provided a CALL SPRITE command.
* providing the first ROM-cartridge lockout system in a dick move that would later be copied by Nintendo and every other console manufacturer. The 1983 "beige" rerelease of the 99/4A would not boot unlicensed cartridges (though cassette- or disk-based games would still run).
* giving us the term "sprite" in the computer graphics sense. Such things were called different things on different platforms: "player-missile graphics" on Atari, OBJs on Nintendo, MOBs on Commodore. The designers of the TMS9918/9918A chip which the TI-99s used, named movable graphics "sprites" after the way they floated above the textual-grid display; and TI Extended BASIC provided a CALL SPRITE command.
* providing the first ROM-cartridge lockout system in a dick move that would later be copied by Nintendo and every other console manufacturer. The 1983 "beige" rerelease of the 99/4A would not boot unlicensed cartridges (though cassette- or disk-based games would still run).