It's time to take a look back at the on of the greatest gaming consoles that ever lived the Nintendo Entertainment System.
Twenty years ago today, on Thursday October 10,1985 after five months of testing the waters in N.Y.C., Seattle and Los Angeles the NES was offically released into U.S. retailers nationwide, it costed about $199 and was known as the action set, and included SMB,two controllers and a light gun, this set replaced the older entertainment set that included R.O.B., two controllers, a light gun, and four games, two shoot up and two stack ups, Wild Gunman,Hogan's Alley,Gyromite and the usless "Stack Up".
Yeah, Yeah we all know about the NES's history, how in Early 1985 Nintendo had to get a skeptical U.S. crowd invested in an NES, and how in '84 Atari and Jack "Satan" Tremiel scoffed at Nintendo's Famicom machine, but there are many myths and facts about the NES and i'll disclose them all.
Fact #1: SEGA had orignally planned to launch the Mark III in the U.S., but they were afraid it would fail since many Americans hated games, but SEGA decided to take hold of Atari's Arcade Division which had be purchased by Williams, on May 2,1985 they outbid Williams by the tune of $170 million who had paid $75 million to obtain Atari's Arcade divison from Warner Comuncations.
Fact #2 the NES was originally unveiled at the CES show in May of 1985, R.O.B.(Robot Operating Buddy) was first unveiled at the 1985 Toy Fair in Febraury at the World Trade Center. The only retailer that carried NES units in the summer of '85 was Kaybee toys.
Fact #3 Nintendo took a very serious look at all the mistakes that Atari and many others had made during 1982 and 1983 that led to the 1984 crash, the decided that not only would the NAVS(Nintendo Advanced Video System) be renamed and redisigned, but that they would call NES titles gamepaks instead of cartridges to avoid turning away people. They also inacted piracy restrictions and built and very tough lockout code for NES titles to prevented them from being copied. They even inacted a strict 3rd party policy that forced 3rd party developer to license thier titles and not make any games for other console(why the SEGA Master System never gained the following it got in the U.K.)the policy also forced 3rd party devlopers to release on 4 titles a year while Nintendo would release most of the them. The policy ran from February 1986 to December 31,1988.
Fact #4 The Minus World in Super Mario Bros. was a homage to a saturday morining cartoon called the "SNORKS", which was like a spinoff of the Smurfs, Miyamoto was a fan of the cartoon which at the time was pretty popluar and the NES itself got it's promotion from Saturday morning T.V., Hudson Soft actually released a O-bert like game starring the "Snorks" which only a few thousand copies were made, and the game itself is nearly impossible to find.
Fact #5 the NES outsold it's competitors during 1986-1991 this was because Nintendo was able to convince parents to buy an NES because it was family friendly console, During the Holiday season of '85 the NES was the biggest selling electronic of the season, outselling even CD players and 4 headed VCRS! By Early 1986 Nintendo's pretax profits were $300 million and had sold a total of 1.1 million NES units the U.S. In the U.K. the console arrives late and the demand for the NES is strong, but in Japan Nintendo can't crush it competitor SEGA, both the Famicom and Mark III continue to battle it out in a two horse race in sales.
Atari oh.. Ignorant Atari and thier arsehole of a boss Jack Tremiel hated Nintendo, hated Japanese, and felt that Atari's dying 8-bit computer line was marketable, after churning out cheap ass Atari 800, LX, 800X, 150 computer lines. In July '86 after two years of making an idiot of himself he finally releases the Atari 7800 machine, that let gamers play all of the 2600 favorites, but the console itself was too little too late and probably would have gotten some attention had it be released 2 years earlier and Atari's rep was now shot and the 2600 died because many of the games on were poorly designed and unplayable and continued to be, so the 7800 imploded badly.
Meanwhile SEGA finally got the Mark III released in the states under the name "SEGA Master System" in September 1986 for $299, SEGA knew and understood Nintendo's tough 3rd party policy, So they decided to market the system as a home arcade machine, due to the low demand itself, SEGA produced only a minmal amount of hardware, and focused on it's strong 1st party lineup the SMS sold well but couldn't come close to the NES's sales, in the U.K. the SMS had strong 3rd party support from the British and it outsold the NES there.
Fact #6 When the 3rd party policy came to an end in 1989, SEGA prepared to the launch the Mega Drive under the name "Genesis" in the U.S. NEC a electronic company released the false 16-bit "PC Engine", Fearnig that the 16-bit machines would cause people to lose interest in the NES despite Tetris, Zelda, and SMB2(which was met with alot of negetive reaction)Nintendo unleased Super Mario Bros. 3 in time for the Summer of 1989 and sold over 7 million copies of the game that year and caused people to stick with the NES for 2 more years, by 1990 Nintendo pretax profits reached $8 Billion!!!!! The system's decline came in 1991 when Codemasters got premission from a judge in a lawsuit Nintendo filed to release "Game Genie" which allowed users to pass though the NES lockout code and cheat on games, this ruined the lastablity in NES games. With the unveiling of "Sonic The Hedgehog" and with NES sales falling behind the Genesis, Nintendo was forced to launch the Super NES in August 1991 they had actually considered making NES owners wait until 1992.
I'm not spamming ,I just would like for anyone to share found memories of playing the NES, like I do of playing SMB3.
yeaaaaa don't double post plz kthx
Kicking Shredders metal butt on Turtles. Oh, and clearing SMB in 7 mins!
I wanted Double Dragon for ages as well. Got it eventually and I never get bored of sending that huge dumbass Bobo over the edge thanks to that rather nifty conveyer belt! ![:]](https://www.lighthead.net/misc/mofo/smilies/biggrinshaded.gif)
Concerning your anti-Nintendo posts, this seems awfully out of place. o.o
Ah well. Happy B-day. (remembers being teenagers at Super Mario Bros. as a two-year-old) ^^;
Oh My God, Pat L said something nice about Nintendo.
PARADOX!!! *Throws Craig out a window*
Easy. Pat has made it quite clear he only dislikes the CURRENT Nintendo regime.
Anyway:
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Fact #3 *snip* ...the policy also forced 3rd party devlopers to release on 4 titles a year while Nintendo would release most of the them. The policy ran from February 1986 to December 31,1988.
I remember this. Konami had to create a subsidiary company called ULTRA Games back in the day to get around that crazy restriction.
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Fact #4 The Minus World in Super Mario Bros. was a homage to a saturday morining cartoon called the "SNORKS", which was like a spinoff of the Smurfs, Miyamoto was a fan of the cartoon which at the time was pretty popluar and the NES itself got it's promotion from Saturday morning T.V., Hudson Soft actually released a O-bert like game starring the "Snorks" which only a few thousand copies were made, and the game itself is nearly impossible to find.
What? That seems a little far-fetched to be true. SNORKS? Ugh. The "Minus World" wasn't put in intentionally, it was a glitch in the program.
Um, right? Right?
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Concerning your anti-Nintendo posts, this seems awfully out of place. o.o
That's the exact same thing I was thinking when I saw the title and then the author, I thought I had skipped lines by accident. Just kidding Pat. 
Happy B-day NES.
Game Genie, the original cheat machine. Had one of those for NES, SNES and Game Boy, and it certainly made some games a lot more manageable. That makes sense why it would have caused trouble, but I never realized there was actually a controversy.
It also allowed me to cheat like a dog (though why a dog would cheat, I don't know). I'm glad that I've been too cheap to get the latest cheat things, though, it's much less temptation when you don't have the darn things. And honestly, NES level games tended to require more effort than games nowadays, speaking generally and not specifically, since there are super-hard games even now. But, it seems easier to slide through more recent games than older machines.
But anyhow, neat little historical bit. This was the daddy of the SNES, which was where Mega Man got his start (and went through six Classic games!), as well as several other famous games, like Final Fantasy.
Mario 3 was the best game ever at the time. Too sweet, period! I've played many NES games. I beat Ninja Gaiden 2 yesterday[got it "accidentally" on Saturday along with Mario RPG and(finally!) MegaMan X]. The only game I haven't beaten is Ninja Turtles. It's easy to see why. TMNT 2, RBI Baseball, and Wizards and Warriors are other highlights. W&W was tied with Mario 3 as the best. You've gotta play these!
I remember Ultra Games, they released a dozen NES cartridges under that name, including: Blades Of Steel, TMNT,Metal Gear, Snake's Revenge, and TMNT II: The Arcade game which was the last Konami title released under that name.
Though it may seem farfecthed, the minus world was a homage to the Snorks, because the hidden stage can only be found in the U.S. version of SMB, it's not in the Japanese Famicom noir is it in Super Mario all-Stars and the 1999 GBC port SMB DX.
There were 15 cartridges that launched with the NES, they were:
15. 10 Yard Fight.
14. Mach Rider.
13. Exitebike.
12. Hogan's alley.( One of the first titles that was released during it's test marketing)
11. Gyromite.( the only game that worked pefrectly with R.O.B.)
10. Mighty Bomb Jack(made by Williams just before SEGA overbid the arcade division.)
9. NES football.
8. Punch out.( Later remade as Mike Tyson's Punch out 2 years later.)
7. SNORKS.( Made by Hudson soft a 1st party developer for Nintendo only a few thousand copies were made.)
6. NES baseball.
5. Dunk Hunt(sold seperately until 1986.)
4. Wild Gunman.
3. Kung Fu.
2. Defender II(Replaced "Stack Up", released by Sammy, published by Nintendo.)
1. Supeer Mario Bros.
It's called a glitch. Glitches are not references to things. Glitches are glitches.
This is like saying falling through walls in Sonic Adventure is a reference to X-Men's ShadowKat, disregarding the fact that it was never intended.
Here is my pick for the top 10 greatest NES titles ever.
10. Blades Of Steel. Publisher: Ultra Games/Konami Released: February 14,1989. BOS is real hockey, a title that says it all, this game made hockey very fun and less repetitive, I can still remember getting into the the fist fight mini games.
9. Super Mario Bros. Publisher: Nintendo. Released: October 10,1985.
You've played, I've played, your mother's played and just about everybody,played this game, I remember the fire flowers, and the underwater stages I also remeber how everytime you defeated Bowser with a fireball he changed into an emeny.
8. Double Dragon. Publisher: Tradewest. Released: October 27,1987.
Nobody can forget the music or the metal chains,brass knuckles, and baseball bats. It;s too bad that Tradewest doesn't exist anymore though.
7. Metal Mech. Publisher: Jeleco. Released: September 1990.
It was short but fun, MM was like playing as Tails in SA2 which a mech that walked around shooting and killing aliens, you could also leave your mech and go anywhere you wanted.
6. Contra. Publisher: Konami. Released: June 10,1988.
up,Up,Down,Down,Left,Right,Left,Right, B,A,B,A,Select,Start.
Everybody remebers the 30 lives code right, it was the only way you could be the game.
5. Metal Gear. Publisher: Ultra Games/Konami Release" April 25,1989.
Ahh....found memories or playing Metal Gear, and looking for items, likes Gas masks and silincers. I spent hours on this game.
4. The Legend Of Zelda. Publisher: Nintendo. Released: March 17,1987.
"Zelda,Zelda! I used to love the ad that came on T.V.
3. TMNT III. Loved kicking butt on foot soldiers.
2. Chip N' Dale's Rescue Rangers Released: April 25,1989. This game was fun as hell, you could pick up, apples and stuff to throw at enemies.
1. Super Mario Bros. 3. Publisher:Nintendo. Released: May 18,1989.
This is the #1 NES game,the #1 selling game too, I still play this baby and beat over and over again, I love the frog suit, tanooki suit and Hammer suit. This game is a joy that I will be looking forward to downloading on Gametap next year.
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5. Dunk Hunt(sold seperately until 1986.)
What is this "Dunk Hunt"?
Is that the game Shaquille O'Neal made with the Zapper?
I had heard of it, but doubted its existence as one doubts the existance of an extinct fish or a leprechaun's pot of gold.
But today... Today I see the truth. The glorious, shining truth.
Have you been taking writing lessons from Tycho?
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Though it may seem farfecthed, the minus world was a homage to the Snorks, because the hidden stage can only be found in the U.S. version of SMB, it's not in the Japanese Famicom noir is it in Super Mario all-Stars and the 1999 GBC port SMB DX.
Being that the Minus world is and always has been, you know, a BUG... you wouldn't expect to see it in later ports and remakes. I don't care how popular it is, programmers tend to view such aberrations as disgraceful (or at least I would imagine). Even the mini-Fire Mario exploit was removed.
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7. SNORKS.( Made by Hudson soft a 1st party developer for Nintendo only a few thousand copies were made.)
Where the hell did this come from? One Google search later, and I see nothing that supports the notion that such a game ever existed. It's not at GameFAQs and its not at the Video Game Museum.
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10. Mighty Bomb Jack(made by Williams just before SEGA overbid the arcade division.)
Um, what? MBJ was made and published by Tecmo. Where the hell do you get this crap?
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8. Punch out.( Later remade as Mike Tyson's Punch out 2 years later.)
You've got it backwards. Mike was removed from later versions because Nintendo's license expired.
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2. Defender II(Replaced "Stack Up", released by Sammy, published by Nintendo.)
There's no replacing. Stack Up came first.
