Toymaker Jakks Pacific has signed a licensing deal with comic book publisher Marvel Enterprises to make a video game device based on Spider-Man.

It will develop a version of its TV Games device featuring five Spider-Man games, for release in the fourth quarter of this year.

The TV Games unit is an all-in-one game console, incorporating the games, the controller and the processing functions into one box. That handheld device then hooks directly into a TV’s audio and video inputs.

The company already sells TV Games devices featuring classic games from the original Atari system and others. Jakks said the Spider-Man unit would retail for $20.

Video game publisher Activision holds the rights to make Spider-Man games for game consoles, and a Jakks executive said the company’s games would be much different, being original titles with an ?old school arcade feel?.

Marvel signed a deal with top game publisher Electronic Arts last week to license a number of characters, including Spider-Man, for a fighting game pitting Marvel’s superheroes against new heroes being developed by EA. That game is not expected until late 2005.

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