8-Bit Christmas goofs

The timestamp on the camcorder shows 25/12/1988, a full year before the Power Glove went on sale.

Although Cabbage Patch Kids were highly sought-after in the early 1980s, by 1988 the company had filed for bankruptcy and licensed the dolls to several distributors, making them easier to find. It is highly unlikely they would have 'sold out in 20 minutes' in a Chicago toy shop in the late 1980s.

The Billy Ripken profanity card originates from Fleer's 1989 set, whereas the film is set in December 1988. Even if the cards had been issued ahead of schedule, a note labelling it an "error card" and stating a value of $95.00 would not have been published in collectors' magazines so soon.

A student is shown wearing a Pantera Projects "In the Jungle" T-shirt. Pantera didn't achieve nationwide recognition until 1990 with the release of the album Cowboys From Hell, and by then they were using a logo different from the one shown on the shirt.

The film is set in 1988. The orange-coloured NES Zapper wasn't released until 1989.

When young Jake first visits the shopping centre with his family, at the 48:22 mark he passes a woman in a red coat, a white blouse and a black skirt. Later in the film, on a different day during a second trip to the shopping centre at 1:13:21, the same woman is seen again in the identical outfit as she walks past the mums holding placards. This suggests both scenes were filmed at the same time.

At the parents' meeting about banning video games, a police officer is seen wearing a coat bearing the flag of Chicago on the sleeve. Batavia, Illinois, is not part of Chicago; the two are not even in the same county.

When Jake's family visit the shopping centre, they come across two lifelike animatronic dinosaurs, one of which is moving. Because the film is set in the late 1980s, that level of animatronic technology was not commonplace until Stan Winston's team developed it for the 1993 film Jurassic Park. A lifelike, Jurassic Park-style animatronic dinosaur was later constructed in the 2000s for the Toys R Us in Times Square, New York.

The NES Power Glove required three ultrasonic receivers set up around the television, and they are conspicuously absent when the glove is shown in use.

While Jake is playing the Nintendo in the shopping centre, the red power light is illuminated even though the power button is not pressed, which means the console should be switched off.

Jake visits the shopping centre on two separate days, and several of the same shoppers are seen wearing identical outfits on both visits.

When Jeff produces the green slip showing he'd won a Nintendo competition, Josh snatches it from him; it's very creased, but when Jeff takes it back it is smooth again.