Bee Card (game cartridge)

128-kilobit BeeCard telephone card manufactured by Mitsubishi Plastics.

A BeeCard (ビーカード, Bī Kādo) is a ROM cartridge developed by Hudson Soft as a software distribution medium for MSX computers. BeeCards are approximately the size of a credit card, but thicker. Compared to most game cartridges, the BeeCard is small and compact. Because of the card's size, Atari Corporation also adopted it for the Atari Portfolio, a handheld PC released in 1989.

Only a small number of MSX software titles were published on BeeCard. In order to accept a BeeCard, the cartridge slot of the MSX had to be fitted with a removable adapter: the Hudson Soft BeePack. The first mass-produced BeeCards, however, were EEPROM telephone cards manufactured by Mitsubishi Plastics; these were first sold in Japan in 1985. The trade names BeeCard and BeePack derive from Hudson Soft's corporate logo, which features a cartoon bee.

MSX software published on BeeCard

Hudson Soft and other software publishers distributed at least nine MSX software titles on BeeCard:

Title	Catalog number	Publisher	Year
Baseball Craze	BC-M1	Hudson Soft	1985
Star Force	BC-M2	Tehkan	1985
Jet Set Willy	BC-M3	Hudson Soft	1985
T-Plan	BC-M4	?	?
Pooyan	BC-M5	Konami	1985
Bomberman	BC-M7	Hudson Soft / Japanese Softbank	1986
Star Soldier	BC-M8	Hudson Soft	1986
Champion Takahashi's Adventure Island	BC-M9	Hudson Soft	1986
E-Piano III	?	?	?

HuCard

Main article: HuCard

Hudson Soft later collaborated with NEC to develop a video game console called the PC Engine. The companies elected to use Hudson Soft's slim ROM cartridge technology to distribute PC Engine software. Hudson Soft adapted the design for their needs, and produced the HuCard. HuCards are slightly thicker than BeeCards; also, whereas a BeeCard has 32 pins, a HuCard has 38.