20 Awesome Things You Had NO IDEA The NES Could Do
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The original Nintendo can do way more than most gamers know. Check out these insane hidden tricks from the classic video game console.
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In 1983, Nintendo forever changed the landscape of the gaming industry with the production and release of their Family Computer, otherwise known as the FamiCom. This console would debut in Japan as an astounding success and would eventually be ported into what is known today as one of the most prolific and impactful gaming systems of all time: the Nintendo Entertainment System, which is more commonly known as the NES. When the NES was released in North America in 1985, it was right at the peak of the Video Game Crash of 1983. This event was a wide-spanning mass series of bankruptcies that nearly ended the video game industry as we know it. However, the widespread popularity and commercial success of the Nintendo Entertainment System is widely credited with pulling the gaming industry back from the brink of destruction.
We all know the cultural and historic value of the NES from it’s monumental impact on our pop culture and on gaming as an industry. It’s true that Nintendo’s success has been largely attributed to their solid business and marketing practices, but the company has had more slips and accidents in their products than you might think. Underneath the winning shield of franchises like the Mario series, there are a wide range of weird, wild, and wonderful peripherals and experiments made by Nintendo that have been essentially swept under the rug or forgotten by time.
Here are 20 top secrets and interesting facts about the Nintendo Entertainment System.
20 The Light Gun’s Design Was Different In Japan
Everyone who grew up with an NES in their house most likely has fond memories of the bright orange and gray Light Gun that was used for Duck Hunt. However, in Japan, the NES Zapper had a completely different design. When the Zapper was debuted on the Famicom, the gun that was released resembled a six-chamber revolver pistol. The Japanese Light Gun was originally developed to accompany a title called Wild Gunman, which was a Wild West cowboy shoot-em-out type game. At the time of the North American release of the NES, science-fiction inspired media like Star Wars was at the height of it’s popularity, so the decision was made to make the NES Zapper resemble that of a space gun instead of a revolver.
19 The Famicom Had A Completely Different Look
Before the North American debut of the NES was the Famicom, a portmanteau of the words “family” and “computer.” While the Famicom technically is the exact same as the NES in its hardware and capabilities, the marketing for these two consoles couldn’t have been more different. The Famicom was portrayed as more of a home computer that could be used by any member of the family, which is why it’s color palate featured a cheerful red and white design. However, the Nintendo Entertainment System was rebranded to blend in more with home entertainment systems, and was therefore redesigned in shades of black and gray to look more like a VHS player. This decision proved to be very successful, and the NES became a must-have item in the United States.
18 Nintendo Had A Hotline For Tips
In contemporary times, if you get stuck on a particularly difficult part of a video game, you can Google a solution within seconds to help you move on your way. However, before the widespread popularity of the Internet, this was close to impossible to achieve. Players either had to use word-of-mouth solutions or strategy guides. In the case of Nintendo, players had the ability to call into the Power Line. This was a hotline that was operated by the magazine Nintendo Power where players could call in to get tips and advice for getting past tricky parts of video games. Surprisingly, the Nintendo Power Line was up and operational as recently as 2010, when it was disbanded in favor of the popularity of Internet strategy guides.
17 You Can Learn To Play Piano
In the past and in recent years, there has been much effort to gameify some of the more unpleasant aspects of life, especially when it comes to something as tedious and repetitive as learning how to play an instrument. Fortunately for all of the would-be Mozarts out there, the Nintendo Entertainment System had a solution. In 1990, Nintendo released the Miracle Piano Teaching System, a game that used a small keyboard and foot petals to teach people how to play the piano while they played video games. An AI system would initially assess a player’s skill level and design and adjust in-game difficulty levels based on their prowess and ability. Despite Miracle Piano’s overwhelmingly positive reception, it’s high price tag prevented it from becoming a worldwide success.
16 You Could Play Games Online
While nearly all contemporary consoles from the past ten years have some capacity for online gaming. However, for many early gamers, the notion of playing multiplayer games with strangers from around the world used to only seem like a pipe dream. Nintendo has always been a company that dreamed big, and so there were originally plans for something called the Teleplay Modem. This modem could only reach up to 300 bit/s when it was debuted in a tech show in Las Vegas in 1992, but there were plans to improve the technology to the point where online gaming was possible. The Teleplay Modem was backed by Nolan Bushnell, a tech engineer who was responsible for the development and success of both Chuck E. Cheese and the Atari.
15 You Can Get A Workout
Long before the release of the Wii Fit, the Nintendo Entertainment System had it’s own health and exercise program with a unique and unusual controller mechanism. In 1986, the development company Human Entertainment released the title Stadium Events, a sports fitness game where players have to participate in a simulated track meet. The most unique thing about this game was that it featured the use of a floor pad controller. This was known as the Power Pad in the United States, and as the Family Trainer in Japan. The Power Pad didn’t have any uses besides it’s appearance in Stadium Events, but it would go on to serve as a basis and prototype for the home Dance Pads that are used in the game Dance Dance Revolution.
14 There Was A Secret, Unreleased Star Wars Game
Considering that it’s one of the largest and most popular entertainment franchises of all time, it’s no surprise that there have been literally hundreds of releases of Star Wars games that have been released across the decades. As fans of the series know, these games have varied wildly in their content, quality, and accuracy to the series. One particular Star Wars title is somewhat notorious for several reasons. 1987’s Star Wars was originally a Japan-only release. The game is your typical side-scrolling adventure where you, as a black-haired Luke Skywalker, have to fight off enemies with your light saber. The game partially uses scenarios and settings from the original movies, but the ending veers pretty dramatically off track. In the final boss battle, Darth Vader reveals that he is a shape-shifter and turns into a scorpion.
13 The NES Had A Robot Controller
One of the more well-known bizarre peripherals that was released alongside the Nintendo Entertainment System was R.O.B., also known as the Robotic Operating Buddy. R.O.B. was a close to ten inch tall plastic robot that functioned similarly to the NES Zapper when paired with a CRT television. Players were able to use R.O.B. as a part-toy and part-controller for two different titles on the NES. One of these titles was called Gyromite, a sort of fidget spinner predecessor where players use R.O.B. to spin tops according to colors that appear on your television while your robot buddy holds them in place. The other title was Stack-Up, a modified blend of Bingo and Tetris where R.O.B. helped you to balance and sort colored blocks.
12 The NES Can Save Data And Program In BASIC
One of the lesser-known facts about the Nintendo Entertainment System was that it had the capacity to be able to write and program simple games and data. This was possible through the use of the Famicom’s Family BASIC package and the Famicom Data Recorder. With the Family Basic package, users were given a keyboard and game cartridge that allowed people to write simple codes in BASIC, which stands for Beginner’s All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code. This was a programming language that was designed to be easy to use, straightforward and multi-purpose. When pairing the BASIC package with the Data Recorder, users could keep their codes and custom creations safe by saving them onto cassette tapes, which were a cheaper alternative to battery-powered solid-state saving mechanisms that were being used in home computers at the time.
11 A NASCAR-Endorsed Controller Holder
Celebrity endorsement is one of those things that has historically not gone over well in the development of video games. From Shaquille O’Neal’s doomed Sega Genesis title Shaq-Fu to Michael Jackson’s dancing persona in Moonwalker, something just doesn’t click when it comes to celebrities and video games. This was evident in the promotion of Nintendo’s Speedboard peripheral. The Speedboard was a type of controller-holder peripheral that set itself out to be a device that would make you a faster player. It’s literally just a piece of gray plastic that you can slide a controller into so you can set it on a table. The device was endorsed by NASCAR driver Kyle Petty, and is widely regarded to be one of the absolute worst console peripherals of all time due to it’s complete uselessness.
10 3D Gameplay Was Possible
While the true success of VR gaming is only just now becoming a reality, video game developers have been playing with the idea of a Virtual Reality headset for over three decades now. One of the earliest attempts at creating one of these devices was the debut of the Famicom 3D System. Much like the Oculus Rift or the PlayStation VR headset, the Famicom 3D was a device that was meant to be worn on the head for the purpose of immersive 3D gaming. However, there were serious problems with the headset. On top of the Famicom 3D fitting uncomfortably, it was known for giving gamers head-splitting migraines after a certain period of use. Eight years later, Nintendo would face another VR defeat with the failure of the Virtual Boy.
9 Household Objects Can Fight For You (With Their Barcodes)
One of the weirder peripherals that was developed for the Nintendo Entertainment System was the Barcode Battler. This was originally released as a handheld device that could eventually sync up with the Famicom and NES in a way that is similar to how the Nintendo DS handheld system can work with certain titles on the Nintendo Gamecube. Barcode Battler is exactly what it sounds like: players scan various barcodes from products in their homes, or in stores, and a randomly generated value is given to the player’s character so that it can battle with monsters or other enemies. The Barcode Battler system wasn’t popular at all in the United States, but it saw a lot of interest in the United Kingdom and in Japan.
8 You Can Create Works Of Art
Anyone who grew up in the 80s or 90s will remember wasting countless hours drawing pictures in Microsoft Paint. While a bare-bones art application might seem like it lacks appeal, there’s a certain charm to creating chunky digital drawings. With the 1991 Nintendo Entertainment System release, Videomation, players had the ability to essentially do everything they could do in MS Paint on their NES. In an unusual twist, this game was a North-American exclusive title and didn’t have any kind of Japanese release. Videomation allowed players to draw objects with a pen tool, place and select colorful stamps, and create art using a selection of predesigned palates and templates. The game was panned for lacking long-term playability, but it was one of the earliest art design applications on the market.
7 You Can Keep Your NES Under Lock And Key
Much to the bane of children everywhere, for every new console release, there is some new form of parental control. When it came to the Nintendo Entertainment System, most of the time, parents opted for the straightforward solution of confiscating the entire system and popping into a bedroom closet, far away from the reaches of small children. However, what was a parent supposed to do if they lacked storage space? That’s where the NES Lockout comes into play. This was a device that had a combination lock that literally fit over the entire console to make gameplay impossible. There would later be an upgrade to this system in the form of an actual chip you can implant into the NES, but it arrived well after the peak of the console’s success.
6 You Can Play Games With Up To Four Players
The Nintendo Entertainment System is known for being one of the earliest mainstream consoles, but it’s also a system that was much more limited in how many people could play games at once. For a long time, gameplay was limited by the two console ports that were available on the system. However, in 1990, Nintendo provided a solution with the NES Four Score. This was an adapter that allowed for up to four players to play games at once. This device quickly became the peacemaker between younger siblings and neighborhood kids everywhere as it instantly doubled the amount of players that could participate in a game. The only downside was that only a handful of games were compatible with this device, and that the range of four-player games was mostly limited to those in the sports genre.
5 You Can Knit A Sweater
As mentioned previously, Nintendo originally saw the Famicom as more of a family-oriented home entertainment device. Before video game consoles were relegated solely to the realm of gaming and online interactions, there was a wide range of experimentation that went on. One of these unsuccessful experiments was the Nintendo Knitting Machine. This was a peripheral device that would have given players the capability to design sweaters on their NES consoles and to use an automatic machine to knit the designs. The Nintendo Knitting Machine was designed to be able to create socks, sweaters, and more. The Knitting Machine was never actually brought to commercial release, but there are still promotional images and prototypes available that you can track down without too much of a fuss.
4 A Headset Worse Than The Famicom 3D
It might surprise you to learn that the Famicom 3D wasn’t the most ludicrous headset that was available for the Nintendo Entertainment System. That honor actually goes to the profoundly confusing Konami LaserScope. This device was a wearable headset that functioned as a head-mounted light gun. Its main appeal was that it was meant to be Nintendo’s first voice-activated headset. According to developers, the gun would only fire when players shouted at it. Obviously, you can see why there were problems with this design. The LaserScope was notoriously unreliable in its controls and firing mechanism, and its audio-based controls were flawed to the point where the headset was virtually unusable. To this day, no games have been released with successful audio-based controls that work reliably.
3 You Can Play The Lottery
Nintendo has made vast strides to distance itself from its pre-Mario past, including sweeping some of their less family-friendly exploits under the rug in order to maintain their squeaky-clean image. One of these situations that Nintendo hopes you don’t remember is a little experiment they did in Minneapolis of all places. In 1991, Nintendo partnered with a corporation called Control Data Corporation to try and bring an online version of the Minnesota state lottery to test whether or not home-based gambling would be a good avenue for the company to pursue. After issues were raised where it was believed that children could be either exposed to gambling or encouraged to gamble, the program was scrapped and forgotten about (until now, that is.) Nintendo doesn’t have any plans to reinstate gambling on their consoles, but who knows what the future holds?
2 There Was A Glove With No Love
This item is known easily as the most famous and notorious NES peripheral of all time. The Nintendo Power Glove was released in 1989 and was only available for sale for a period of one year. It was a wearable controller glove that looked a lot better than it functioned. Players were supposed to move their hands to control the characters in their NES games, but the problem was that the Power Glove rarely ever worked. Despite being a total commercial failure, the Power Glove was predominantly used as a promotional device for the Nintendo-backed feature film The Wizard, a movie about teen gamers in the 1980s. The controversy surrounding the Power Glove’s rise and fall is so ubiquitous that there is currently a documentary being produced about it.
1 Custom Modifications Mean The Sky Is The Limit
While the era of the NES is pretty much dead and gone at this point in time, it’s not true that this legendary console has reached its final resting place. Lots of dedicated Nintendo fans are still working to develop new technologies, uses, and innovations for this console. There are actually still games being produced by Homebrew developers for the console. Other dedicated supporters of the Nintendo Entertainment System have been focusing on creating new and exciting cases for their old consoles. There have even been tech upgrades made, such as the addition of DVD drives and fusions with other consoles. You can even produce an NES that makes toast while you play games, or one that functions as an electric guitar. Dream big!
Link Source : https://www.thegamer.com/awesome-things-you-had-no-idea-your-old-nes-could-do/