Toymaker Bandai Co Ltd of Tokyo has put its Bandai Digital Entertainment Inc subsidiary in La Mirada, California in full charge of the Pippin cut-down Macintosh games machine. Bandai president, Makoto Yamashina says the US company will start marketing the Pippin Atmark multimedia terminal in Japan on March 22. The machine will be sold in Japan for the equivalent of a pricey $600 compared to Sony Corp’s PlayStation which was launched in Japan at the equivalent of $400 and Sega Enterprises Ltd’s $450 Saturn. Bandai hopes to sell 200,000 Pippins in Japan in the first year of sales. US marketing will start in May.
