25 Awesome Facts About The Super Nintendo Only True Fans Know
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Every so often, something comes along that helps redefine entertainment. These 25 awesome facts prove how amazing the SNES really was.
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When Nintendo introduced the world to the NES, many within the industry thought that it was going to be an immediate failure. After all, the company had only scratched the surface of gaming technology with the Game & Watch and that sort of thing paled in comparison to an actual full fledged console. Even after the success of their iconic little handheld, many felt that they just didn’t have what it took to captivate a large audience. Thankfully for everyone in the industry, the predictions were way off the mark and the NES became one of the greatest selling consoles of all time. It not only put the company on the map, but it pressured the gaming industry as a whole to continue to create innovative features within their consoles.
Given its large amount of success, it was a bit perplexing that the company was waiting so long to release their next installment. As it turns out, they felt that it was unfair to gamers that they would constantly have to pay for a new console and Nintendo felt that they had to do something to allow gamers to continue to play games on the same system for a longer period of time. Game developers helped them accomplish this through add-on chip technology in the cartridges and at first, they had no intentions of making the Super NES. After a while, the NES add-ons weren’t cutting it and they decided to begin development of the Super NES, a console that would span just over thirteen years and outsell every other console within its era. It would put gamers first and prove the company’s motto that gameplay, and not graphics, was king.
25 The Top Of Its Class
When it comes to the history of video games, it’s fair to say that the 90s were the start of something special when it came to video game consoles. Even before the 90s, we had all sorts of great systems to choose from, and given that these same consoles saw support for many years after their release, it’s no wonder why so many of us that were born during their introduction got to enjoy them much later in life. The fact that many of these consoles still work just as they were intended to all those years ago speaks volumes about the engineering and design work that went into them.
The amount of damage that the consoles can take while maintaining functionality has been well documented.
While many of Nintendo’s competitors tried to downplay the system, consumers didn’t buy it. They had seen what the NES could do and they were ready to see what years of development by the company would give them next. Despite trying to derail the console’s success, the company’s competitors could do nothing to stop the iconic machine from reaching the top, selling just around fifty-one million systems in total when it was all said and done. It would become the best selling console of the era and continue to live on much longer then even Nintendo thought possible thanks to dedicated fans.
24 Weekly Restrictions
If you haven’t had the chance yet, I highly suggest you bring out your old SNES and play a few games. I’m almost confident that you will quickly realize just how much fun it is to play in comparison to the consoles of today. Don’t get me wrong, there are a lot of things to like about today’s consoles, but there is just something that you feel when playing an old system like that which you can’t find with today’s gaming consoles. The best part about the whole experience is that you begin to understand the game mechanics a lot better than when you were a kid playing the games for the first time.
Though I wasn’t around for the original induction of the console, having played it later on in life and again when I was much older, I can easily see why Japan had such a problem with its release. Given the success of the NES, it’s no wonder that so many Japanese fans wanted to get their hands on the next console from the sleeping giant. Within the first few days of the release of the system, street congestion got so bad that the Japanese government had to halt the systems sales during the week. During the first couple months from that point on, stores in Japan were only allowed to sell the console on the weekends.
23 In It For The Long Haul
It’s rather strange that I have all these memories of playing the NES as a kid, but that it wouldn’t be until a bit of time later that I remembered playing the SNES with my older brother. It would be easy to say that perhaps I didn’t enjoy the system as much as I did its predecessors, but once the nostalgia began to kick in I quickly realized that it was anything but the case. Granted, there is something about the NES that not even the SNES can match, but to say that the SNES was far off would be a bit unfair. After all, some of my all-time favorite games are from the same system.
Now that I have begun to collect games for both systems again, I think back to all those times when game stores were getting rid of their inventory for old systems and selling it off at extremely cheap prices. It amazes me now what I could have got some of those iconic games for, but at the time I wasn’t thinking about the rarity of them. Though the United States sold off their inventory in the early 2000s for the system, it turns out that it would continue to be sold in Japan all the way up until 2003.
22 Iconic Mechanism Was All For Show
One of the things that always intrigued me about the NES was the leveler for the cartridge. It made sense that you would want to push the cartridge down, but upon playing it without doing so I began to wonder if it was needed at all. As it turns out, you didn’t need the mechanism in the system at all and it was all for show. With that being said, it didn’t seem to be the case with the SNES because the cartridge actually fit snug down in the system and it appeared as if pressing the ejector would release the mechanism holding the cartridge in place.
Often times, this is one part of a used system that will be broken.
After all, I was always told to use the ejector and that pulling the cartridge out without doing so would damage it. As tight as it felt in the system this made perfect sense to me at the time as a kid. I quickly found out later on though that, just like the NES, the eject button was all for show. It turns out that Nintendo placed one into the system because they felt that kids would enjoy ejecting the cart from the system and that it would allow them to have more interaction with it. Even so, you won’t see me yanking carts out of it without pressing that eject button anytime soon.
21 Preventing Some Serious Mistakes
There’s a lot of time and effort that comes to play when you are talking about game console design. You might have the greatest video game console on the market, but without the proper looks, consumers may pass you over for a competitor in no time flat. You don’t have to look far for examples as both the Xbox and the Dreamcast suffered the aforementioned fate despite being more powerful and innovative than the PlayStation 2 that they were up against. This same issues would crop up again many years later with the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, despite the fact that both consoles looked more alike than ever before.
As we’ve come to find out though, Nintendo isn’t exactly in the business of appeasing customers based on looks. After all, I think Bill Gates put it best when he said that both Microsoft and Sony were so busy competing with each other that they weren’t prepared to be blindsided by the Nintendo Wii that would eventually outsell them both. That isn’t to say that the SNES wasn’t built to attract consumers, but the actual design and shape was inspired for a whole other reason altogether. Due to the flat design of the NES, consumers tended to use it as a table, sitting their drinks on top of it. This caused the inevitable spill of said drinks and a flood of console repairs related to damage caused by such a practice. To discourage this practice, the company designed a slatted console that drinks could not sit on easily.
20 A Last Hurrah
When there is a discussion about such a company, many people will point to their graphics compared to other systems. It’s a fair argument as even when the SNES was released it wasn’t exactly leagues ahead of the competition by any means. In thinking about it though, we are lucky to have a company like Nintendo who has always put gamers first and focused more on gameplay and story rather than graphics. It’s hard to argue against a model that has allowed them to outsell their competitors more often than not, but it is my hope that they will eventually be able to bring world-class graphic quality to a system along with their gaming know-how.
Later on in the system’s life, Nintendo was attempting to gravitate away from cartoon-like graphics.
After all, you will be hard-pressed to find anyone who supports Xbox or PlayStation who doesn’t also have a soft spot for the gaming giant. They helped to make the industry what it is today and they continue to innovate and push both game and console designers to do better and that is a truly wonderful thing. You don’t have to dig too deep to find out just how beloved a console the SNES was though considering the fact that nearly seven years after its initial release Kirby’s Dream Land 3 became the final game on the console.
19 A Lasting Impression
One thing we hear from companies all the time is their commitment to customer service. There are many great companies out there that do an awful lot for their customers, but it would be hard to find anyone that does more than Nintendo. Sure, they have had their ups and downs in that area, but from the start, the company was committed to putting gamers first and making sure they felt like the company cared less about profits and more about creating great games for people of all ages to enjoy. They’ve always been known for providing world-class support and it’s hard to argue against the amount of care they put into making their systems when it’s almost a guarantee that if it’s a Nintendo system it will work.
I can’t tell you how many Game Boys I have seen with exploded batteries in them that only after a few minutes of cleaning them they fire up like nothing ever happened. Seeing the amount of support they enjoyed during the era of the Super Nintendo no doubt inspired them to continue to repair the systems for consumers all the way up until the year 2007. That’s pretty amazing considering it was a full four years after the console itself was discontinued inside of Japan and elsewhere.
18 Way Before Its Time
Though the internet was first conceived in 1983, it didn’t remotely resemble what we see today until 1990. At that time, there were still a lot of things that needed to be worked out, and as a result, it wasn’t exactly something that many game system engineers were thinking of implementing. It was too impractical and they weren’t really sure that gamers would even take hold of its implementation at all at this point. Despite all of the hurdles that were in place at the time, Nintendo continued to discuss the possibility of creating an add-on for the system that would allow users to download content and perhaps even play online.
It wasn’t an easy task to be sure and the company had to come up with a way to make it work flawlessly with the system. After countless years of research and development, they released the Satellaview for the fourth generation of the Super Famicom. Through this system, users could read online gaming magazines as well as play games that would be broadcast from a satellite modem to them through WOWOW satellite radio. These particular games were broadcast during a particular slotted hour in Japan from 1995 to early 2000. Additionally, users could download games as well as additional game content using special cartridges affixed with flash memory for storage. Furthermore, there were gaming competitions held that would award prizes to consumers on a weekly or monthly basis.
17 Leaping Into The Future
One thing that has always perplexed me about gaming consoles today is the inability of the end user to purchase their own upgrades for the system. It’s understandable to a point given the design and budget limitations that companies have when creating such consoles, but in today’s day and age, there is no reason in the world that they can’t figure out a way to allow users to add more life into their machines. It seems like a good business model and it is part of what has kept PC gaming at the forefront for so many years. Given that many of today’s next-generation consoles are basically miniature computers themselves, I think it is only a matter of time before end user upgrades become something that is commonplace.
Consoles upgrades have been discussed at the company since the beginning.
Though we might not think so today, Nintendo didn’t have a whole lot of money after creating the SNES, at least not in comparison to the amount of money they make today. It was for this reason that they needed to figure out ways that they could extend the life of the SNES without having to create a whole new system. Similarly to the NES, the cartridge-based architecture provided them with the solution. It was through this form factor that game designers were able to add upgrades such as memory and processors as well as Nintendo’s Super FX chip. The FX chip allowed game designers to enhance the graphics of the system as well as add 3D elements to their games for the first time.
16 An Iconic Title That Almost Wasn’t
Something that has hindered the gaming industry as of late is the inability to take chances on titles that would otherwise have a good chance at succeeding. Believe it or not, game titles today take a lot more time and money to create and as such, game publishers can’t give the green light to titles as easily as they could nearly thirty years ago. That isn’t to say that game development wasn’t expensive during the SNES’s time, in a sense, but the cost per game didn’t even hold a candle to the average production cost of modern games. This isn’t really all that surprising though when you consider that a modern pixel graphic in a game takes as much space and memory as some of the games on the SNES took in their entirety.
With all that being said, Nintendo had to still be selective in the games that they allowed onto the system. It wasn’t just cost that they were concerned with, but their brand as well. Even so, it is a bit strange that a title like Yoshi’s Island almost got rejected considering that company and game designing icon Shigeru Miyamoto was behind its development. The reason for the initial rejection wasn’t because of its gameplay, however, but because it didn’t match the more modern graphical quality of the time which could be found in the Donkey Kong line of games developed by Rare. Miyamoto had the last laugh though as the game became an instant hit among critics and fans alike, proving that gameplay and not graphics was king.
15 The Merger Of Two Giants
Anytime you look back through gaming history you are taken aback a bit by all the great innovations that never were, the mergers that never happened, and the consoles that never saw the light of day. It wasn’t easy gaining respect after the video game crash and many start-up companies had to go to those with instant success for help. Seeing as how Nintendo had just had a worldwide success with the NES console, it made sense that Sony would approach them with ideas about developing a console. Believe it or not, the company was always looking toward the future and though they wanted to continue using cartridges, they saw the benefit of a CD-based system.
Though they were willing to implement CDs into the system, it would take a company with some experience in that area to make it happen. As a result, the company approached Sony with the idea of creating a cartridge and CD hybrid-system known as Super NES CD-ROM. This particular deal fell through in a relatively short period of time though, due to the fact that Sony wanted to retain all licensing rights for the CD add-on, prompting the company to secure a contract with Philips instead. It makes you wonder what innovation the gaming industry would have seen had these two companies decided to merge as planned.
14 An All-In-One Console
Something that I hear about a lot is about the backward compatibility of consoles. It is something that the PC has been doing for years and it again raises the question as to why it was even an issue with gaming consoles, to begin with. After all, having such compatibility helps to extend the life of older consoles and ensures that the games for the older systems are still bought even after the newer system comes onto the market. Though companies have started to do this more and more as we saw with the Nintendo Wii, Xbox 360, and certain models of the PS 3, it isn’t anything new in the gaming world.
Company executives believed backward compatibility was the future.
Buying a new console wasn’t an easy choice for any family and the company knew that they had to come up with a way to entice the buyers of the NES to purchase the SNES. They understood that many parents wouldn’t see a reason to purchase the console until it had gone down in price and they knew that they had to come up with a solution. Initially, they had the idea of making the SNES backward compatible with the NES, but design limitations, as well as overall cost, prevented them from doing so. After not being able to make it backward compatible, the company worked hard to get the price per console down as much as possible. Despite being double the price of the NES, the SNES became the best selling console of the era despite the company’s fears.
13 Congressional Hearing Over An Add-on
One thing that you can be sure of when it comes to video games is that people will talk about the presence of violence in video games until the end of time. You can never appease everyone and there will always be detractors no matter how much game developers do to make things right. Despite countless studies showing that there is no correlation between violence in video games and violence in real life, we still see congressional hearings on the issue. In truth, what studies by MIT and Rochester University (to name a few) show is that video games overall have a very positive impact on brain function and that, in fact, violent video games help us to relieve stress and anger.
Furthermore, these same studies show that those who play video games have increased memory function as they age as well as better reaction time and reasoning abilities. Video games keep our brains active and inspire us to continue to learn and adapt to new situations as we age. Though some of this was presented before the introduction of the SNES, the addition of the Super Scope add-on prompted a full-on investigation into violence in video games by the United States Congress. Not surprisingly, as has been the case time and again, researchers found no links to violence in video games and violence in the real world and the congressional hearing was ended.
12 N64 Playing Ground
There are advantages and disadvantages to every piece of technology and when you compare a cartridge based system to a disc-based system, it becomes obvious, at least for a while, that space was the big divider. You just couldn’t get the amount of content onto a cartridge that you could with a single disc, but it didn’t stop the company from continuing along that same road. While our disc-based games may scratch and skip with time, it seems that those same cartridges continue on throughout the years with little to no problems at all. With the presence of disc rot and the introduction of seemingly endless flash memory, it seems as if cartridge based system may soon make a comeback.
The Switch showed what the future of video gaming may look like.
While the SNES still had a large legion of fans behind it, the company knew that it was drawing close to the twilight of its existence. Though they were right, it didn’t stop them from attempting to extend its life through creating titles that would later be introduced to us on the Nintendo 64. Originally, Mario 64, as well as Star Fox 64, were in development for the SNES and the company had plans to release them for the platform before the introduction of the N64. Who knows what these titles might have looked like, but I bet the company was glad that they waited to release them for the later system.
11 The Source Of That Yellow Tint
You might think that the stories of finding an old working NES or SNES in a barn someplace out in the middle of nowhere might seem far-fetched, but once you start running into those same systems many years later you begin to realize that it isn’t that unbelievable at all. I’ve seen some of the worst looking systems imaginable and yet they fire up just like they did all those years ago when they were first created. That isn’t to say that you never have to do repairs on them, but the likelihood of having to repair one is rarer than you think.
If you still have an old system or have gone hunting for one on eBay, you might be wondering why it is that so many have a strange yellow tinge to them that isn’t present on some of the later models. As it turns out, this isn’t indicative of any degrading taking place to the system itself, but rather the presence of a certain type of ABS plastic. This particular plastic was used in many consoles all the way up until the early 2000s and though it was easy to work with, it had a strange reaction to UV light. If any console with this ABS plastic was left near sunlight for too long it would have a chemical reaction which would cause its grey or white coloring to turn yellow. It’s the same process that causes some modern plastics to become brittle if left out in the elements too long.
10 Removing Enhanced Graphics
One of the drawbacks to older systems is that modern TVs and monitors struggle to maintain their intended aspect ratios. Today you can buy all sorts of convertors that do a decent job of porting things over, but if you want one that does a good job you are going to have to pay a pretty penny. Having used some of these mid range convertors I can tell you that they are worth it, but you might be surprised at the picture quality you get on an old tube TV with more modern AV cables. If you want an SNES or NES that does the same thing you will be paying a lot more and unless you really need to have one you are better off buying a convertor.
As frustrating as this can be at times, it turns out that the company was looking toward the future once again in their initial design for the SNES. Engineers had drawn up designs that would implement an S-Video output as well as an RGB port into the system for more modern televisions. As is the case with most things though, it became to expensive to mass produce and the company removed the component from the system.
9 An Unlikely Mascot
I often wonder just how much a mascot has played a part in the selling of a particular gaming system. Not every system has had one after all and more often then not it ends up being an iconic game character that causes consumers to purchase the system. True enough; mascots do help to sell certain products to customers, but when it comes to gaming consoles it is the games and the hardware that seem to attract users to a certain brand. While this is most certainly the case, it didn’t stop the company from entertaining the idea of placing Captain Falcon into that role.
Yes, you heard that one right, the iconic character that would become the face of the F-Zero game franchises wasn’t actually supposed to be a game character at all. Initially, Captain Falcon was a piece of concept art presented at a meeting discussing the creation of a mascot for the system. In fact, F-Zero was nearly completed before game creator Takaya Imamura was approached by the company and asked to create a character that would act as a mascot for the system. After designing the character the company decided against using a mascot and it was then used as part of the cover art for F-Zero. Additionally, the color scheme for the character is inspired by the red and yellow color of the Super Famicom.
8 Banking From Home
While it’s certainly true that video games have come a long way, many companies were interested in creating an all-in-one console from the very start. Initially, the company wanted to create a family computer that would double as an entertainment system so as to attract buyers with the concept that it would be for both parents as well as their children. It was an effort by the company to convince those same parents that it would be an all-around good investment. Though the idea and concept were there, technologically limitations, as well as expense, prevented the company from fully realizing their dream for the SNES.
Nintendo tried to create an all-in-one system with the NES as well.
They quickly realized that they couldn’t offer these particular elements in a gaming console without incurring a greater cost to the consumer and so they decided against doing so with the SNES. Though it might have stopped the company from turning the SNES into an all-in-one system, it didn’t stop companies like TranDirect from giving it a chance. Despite the system’s limitations, TranDirect had created a proprietary design that had the potential to allow users to connect to their bank through online using the system. While complications prevented its implementation, it showed the future of gaming consoles and their potential.
7 Not The Same Restrictions
As it becomes easier to translate games, we are likely to see this particular event occur less overtime, but it is still frustrating when you consider the number of games that have been released up until now that can only be played in their respective regions. Even if you manage to get your hands on a console that plays the specific game you are interested in, you are still left with the arduous task of translating the text within said game for your enjoyment. Some emulators have allowed users to enjoy these same games in a fully translated format, but it doesn’t allow them to enjoy it on their respective console.
While this particular issue is slowly becoming something of the past, you might be surprised to learn that you can play any game on your SNES no matter what region it is from. This is because, unlike the NES that came before it, there is no region lockout chip installed into the SNES. All that is required to play Super Famicom carts on your SNES is the removal of two plastic pins that are found on either side of the cartridge slot. Though you can’t translate the games, there are many that don’t need you to translate them in order to play them effectively.
6 Worries About The Criminal Underworld
When consoles are in short supply today it is more so the result of the manufacturer purposely limiting store supply so that it generates a greater demand and interest for the system. That isn’t to say that they haven’t run into production problems before, but more often then not you will see a large amount of console moved into stores a few weeks after the first weeks’ release of a system. While this certainly happened at times in the 90s and before, shortages were usually caused by companies not having the supplies to be able to produce the number of consoles that consumers wanted.
As you can imagine, in the early stages of a launch this caused people to pay a premium to those who had happened to get their hands on that particular consoles. The launch of the SNES was no exception and due to the extremely high demand for the system the company was increasingly concerned with potential raids of businesses by the Yakuza looking for some fast money. In an effort to prevent seizure of consoles shipments, the company decided to only ship the system to stores during the evening hours. This plan must have worked as the company never saw a major theft take place.
Link Source : https://www.thegamer.com/super-nintendo-facts-trivia-awesome-fans/