As one of the inventors of the compact-disc Philips wanted to show the world what more can be done with the compact-disc. For this reason they developed the CD-interactive (CDi). The CDi could, besides playing normal Audio-cd's, play a wide range of other formats which included: CD+G, CD Portfolio, CD Photo, CDi, CDVideo(VCD). The CDi was not released as a game-only-machine. In fact quiet a few bad games were released, but the cdi probably features the most educational releases ever seen on any other console. But nevertheless, the Philips CDi never became very succesfull. At this moment there isn't any alternative with similar functionality.