is that the "chattering parodius" version with the extra chip in it for all of the voice-over stuff? somehow, I think I missed that one when I used to purchase super famicom titles at launch

dragon ball z: hyper dimension is another cart that fetches a good amount of money and doesn't work on the SD2SNES cart

I received the famicom mini that I ordered from a japanese ebay seller and overall I'm impressed with the build quality of the system

the famicom mini has 8 games which are unique to it vs. the nes classic
the 8 titles found on the famicom mini:
atlantis no nazo, downtown street challenge, final fantasy III, mario club golf, river city ransom, solomon’s key, tsuppari sumo, and yie ar kung-fu

replace these 8 on the nes classic:
bubble bobble, castlevania II: simon’s quest, donkey kong jr., final fantasy, kid icarus, punch-out, startropics, and tecmo bowl

additionally, the famicom mini comes with 2 [hardwired] controllers which [are 40% smaller than the original famicom controllers and] fit into the sides of the system, just like the original. however, the microphone and volume adjustment slider on controller two are just a sticker and part of the molded plastic (instead of being an actual functional feature (the japanese version of zelda took advantage of the microphone and player's could defeat the pols voice (the large eared mouse looking enemies) by shouting into the microphone

finally, unlike the us nes classic, the famicom mini does not come with the usb to ac convertor. that is sold separately

lol. had to rip apart a system just last night and clean up all of the cartridge connectors to rid myself of that

not classic, but the rumor mill has it that pre-orders for the nintendo switch start this friday. limit one system per household @ gamestop and most stores are only expected to receive 20 systems at launch

I find it rather humorous that while sony pioneered the blu-ray format with philips, their new system (the ps4 pro) does not have the ability to play the 4K blu-rays

I'm not sure if microsoft will ever get over the stigmatism associated with being a u.s. company and gain a decent market share in japan but it will be interesting to see exactly how much power their scorpio system actually has

to me, all three players sort of missed the mark because the technology leap wasn't nearly what it was between the last generation and the one before it

or even 720p

I remember seeing that many ps3 titles weren't even native 720p, but upscaled so that the framerate didn't suffer

the ps4 pro is a strange move on sony's part. by introducing a splintered platform, developers now have to code and accommodate for 2 sets of hardware and try to make the games look good on both

the presentation was about what I expected it to be, but it was quite obvious that many of the developers haven't had enough time to work with the dev kits seeing as some of the "guest speakers" did not have anything to show (let alone specific title names for games in development

zelda looks great and so do some of the throw-back titles (bomberman r and street fighter). kind of disappointed that mario odyssey isn't a launch time (does this mark the 1st or 2nd time that nintendo didn't have a mario title at launch?) but it did look great

the enhanced rumble features look like they could really open up some very cool immersive elements in games (and work very well in conjunction with some time of AR/VR environment in the near future

I wonder if nintendo is planning on selling the neon colored (or other colored) joy-cons separately?

ps
apparently, amazon.com had systems available approx. 3:30am EST (according to an email that I received), but were gone when I woke up at 5:30am for work

pps
bestbuy.com still had systems available to ship (at 6:00am EST), but no stores (within 250 miles) for in-store pick-up were left

ppps
meijer.com (a chain like fred meyer) and toysrus.com still have do not have any information available on line

target.com still appears to have both systems (ones with the gray joy-cons, ones with the neon red/blue joy-cons) available

according to one of the gamestop managers that I know, the master editions haven't been put into their system yet. it will retail for 129.99usd and the only thing that it includes that the special edition does not is the master sword statue

was anyone quick/lucky enough to pre-order a zelda: breath of the wild master collection?

I loved zelda 2: link's adventure

I remember driving to canada to grab it 1 or 2 weeks earlier than the stateside release back in the day

zelda 2 (nes) is the adventure of link
Zelda_II_The_Adventure_of_Link_(NA) (resized).jpg

the legend of zelda: a link to the past, was on the snes/sfc and the only title not playable on the gamecube (up to that point)

gamecube and gb player
if you purchase one, just make sure that it has the software disc. without it, you're SOL

it's a pretty faithful re-creation, but given that the resolution of the GBA is slightly different than the SNES/SFC, the game's interface was re-worked to display better with the GBA's wide-screen format

for me, ALttP and LA DX were definitely the highlights of the series so far with OoT and MM coming in a close 2nd

I'm probably biased though, having written official guides for all of the above but ALTTP
having been responsible for huge pull-out poster for LA DX, I really love the care and thought that NCL did in the tiling of each of the screens and making the world fit together.

I really wanted to like the oracle series, but I think that they felt like "me too" games after link's awakening (and not as cohesive as they could have been. that's possibly due to the fact that it was supposed to be 3 titles linked together instead of just oracle and seasons

phantom hourglass really knocked it out of the park too with the ability to pack a huge world into the tiny handheld as well as taking advantage of all that the DS had to offer without those features feeling "bolted on"

the microphone idea was actually a carry over from the original famicom days (the 2nd controller on the famicom had a built-in microphone)

it's funny that an idea that was used in the early 1980s wasn't resurrected (and made globally) until almost 20 years later

really? paying $XXX for a commercial for a product that is already pre-sold out everywhere? yes, it creates awareness for those not in the know, but honestly the kids of those parents are well aware of what is coming out via social media and other outlets already

heck, the master collection of the new switch zelda title was sold out at 5:00am EST after going on sale just hours after their global video stream press event back on january 21st (with the other special edition selling out before noon the very same day

nintendo may have made some errors in their naming and marketing, but they've not had any problems whatsoever in generating buzz when it comes to launching new hardware

agreed. now, give me my multiplayer metroid prime pinball on the switch!!

street break!

I'm still bummed that I wasn't able to get a master edition of zelda. I can't believe that they went as fast as they did

and that's why I'm hoping to nab a sealed "brick" of wii u loz:botw's tomorrow as well

I sold a sealed case of wii TP CE's for $2800 a year ago and still have about 80 nintendo "bricks" which will be sold soon (and probably pay for a good portion of my next house

the guy from the first video seems to be very knowledgeable about [most] of the components used. great video

wait, what?!? so, according to this "so called" employee, nintendo is going to eliminate a game system that they can't keep on the store shelves and instead go back to manufacturing a system that is over 30 years old that uses cartridges that are no longer produced by companies that no longer exist? hmm... I don't think so

retrousb also manufactures a device that allows you to copy rom images onto a compact flash card and play them so their 2 products go hand in hand. do you see nintendo doing the same thing?

that's a good question. the biggest problem with the internet is that things tend to get blown out of proportion quickly due to the speed that we have access to the information. from what I've seen and read, this warping has affected less than 10 people that have post different, unique photos. not to say that there isn't an issue, but given the tear-down images from i-fixit, it seems rather unlikely that all of these [solid] components contained inside of the unit would be susceptible to warping or bending

the display almost extends the entire length of the main portion of the system (minus the joy-cons), so it seems very odd that it would be able to flex or bend.

the strangest news regarding this is that one person acknowledged this same issue and he had never docked his system. it makes you wonder if it may be an issue with the frame surrounding the display itself on a select few number of systems and that they were warped from the start

sony was notorious for forcing you to perform a firmware update in order to play games (not sure if they still are as I sold my ps4). at least from what I've see with the switch so far is that it informs you that an update is available but doesn't stop you to playing you current game library

I don't see the wireless controller option happening. nintendo never released wireless controllers for the super famicom/super nintendo systems and the whole point of this was to offer something reasonable cheap.

the lack of a cartridge port may also have something to do with the fact that it would cannibalize digital sales from their eshop for the switch (which should have past generation titles available by the time the snes classic is announced/released

winter gold is the best donor cart that there can be. it has the FX2 chip, the faster crystal and I believe 2x the ram that yoshi's island or stunt race FX had. you just have to change out the CIC chip as well

I think you mean composite (not component

however, speaking of component mods, the cables that HD retrovision is currently selling for the snes/super famicom, genesis/mega drive and saturn are pretty darn nice

if your tv supports 240p, these are definitely worth the cost as they eliminate all of that shimmering and blurriness

https://shop.hdretrovision.com/collections/component-cables

I missed out. went to bed right before they went on sale. I hope your friend does get his. rumors of orders for multiple consoles being cancelled are already circulating

from what I'm hearing, stores should have at least as many snes classic systems for walk-in customers as what they offered for pre-orders

I've also heard that many of the big box stores (best buy, target, walmart) could have as many as 60-100 systems available for walk-in customers on friday

4 more days!!

you will need a tri-wing screwdriver for the wii u game pad. there are plenty of them available on amazon, but make sure you get one that has a decent sized handle. those tiny ones are garbage

the bic pen trick works well for the two (3.8mm and 4.5mm) flower shaped or "game bit" screws, but not for the tri-wing screws

here are links for the "better" game bit and tri-wing screw drivers:
https://www.amazon.com/Silverhill-Tools-ATKNND-Nintendo-Screwdriver/dp/B00BEZY2I6/ref=sr_1_11

https://www.amazon.com/Leegoal-Tri-wing-Screwdriver-Nintendo-Gamecube/dp/B000S6AG9G/ref=sr_1_4

I don't get it. dirty bird wet mossy rocks?

yeah, I think that the original powerstone never left the case and was alway either in my dreamcast or sitting aside it when we were playing house of the dead, rival schools: project justice or sega bass fishing

you should be quite happy with that title. I have very fond memories of playing the multiplayer portion of the game against friends on both the london underground and trains during a few trips to england with a mate that put myself and another buddy of ours from scotland up for a week a few years in a row

I would love to do the portland show one year. rumour has it that's the place that I should be to try and unload my collection of nearly 3,000 still brand new, sealed games
(especially the japanese ps1, ps2 and dreamcast stuff)

MGC was ok 3 years ago, but the patrons there are just looking for cheap deals on used stuff

thanks for the head's up. glad I didn't plan a trip, haul a bunch of stuff and then become utterly disappointed

yeah, it's an interesting piece of hardware, but you are correct. the dual shock controllers are what truly separated the [launch] playstation into what it became

some of the games still stand up well (the original crash and spyro for example), while others show their age quite obviously (toshinden, tekken 3 come to mind) due to the low frame rate and polygon counts. technological feats in their time? yes, but not compared to today's games

and while I think that many people have fond memories of the saturn, n64 and playstation, it wasn't necessarily the early titles that they remember as the [great] titles

I still have an early beta copy of spyro (I authored the official strategy guide) that didn't support the analog sticks and god, what a pain in the ass it was to control that little dragon

no sewer shark or night trap?

I didn't realize that the new ones were out yet. where are you seeing these at?

thanks. no bj's here in michigan
btw, I've heard that each series actually has all of the games on every machine. each board is hardwire jumpered as to which game is booted up to. so, if you were to take it appear and put in a little [x] way toggle switch, you could play all of the games on one machine

I hoping that:
- the japanese version has all 60hz incarnations of the titles present and more importantly it gets hacked so that I can add the games that I really want to play on it (like the final fantasy tactics beta with the 2-player option

but isn't everything in that trailer just pre-rendered video? yeah, it looks great but I would like to see some actual gameplay video before passing judgement

I'm seeing that the ps classic is a "see price in cart", which shows you 74.99, but I can't seem be able to add the cartwheel discount to the online discounted price in the app. are you saying that you would need to go to a physical store and then get them to match the discounted on-line price and then show the cartwheel discount of 25% off and see if they'd stack that?

correct, unless your gamecube is japanese or modded, you will need the us game boy player boot disc to use it. regardless, you need some form of the game boy player boot disc to run it, otherwise its just a nice color-matched riser for your game cube system

I still have all of the files [somewhere] from when I developed a solder-free (eg. completely reversible) version, let me know if you want them

it works with both the us and jp versions of the game cube. you can additionally change out the power LED to display which mode you're in

I'm not surprised that it dropped, just by how much how quickly

it's obvious that bestbuy had stacks (and stacks) of the things and that they just weren't moving at all as xmas approached. I'll probably take my receipt back to gamestop and have them price match. maybe the hacking will get to the point where you can actually replace or add games to the on-board memory instead of having to load stuff from a usb stick and use a hub for the P2 controller

I agree but I also understand why no dual shock controller were included. sony was attempting to re-capture the original launch system experience. the problem being that the changes made to sony's controller helped make it what it is today with the ps4. while it might have seemed like a great idea (on paper), in hindsight it really killed them with the games that they could pick and package in the system
I believe that the playstation is the only console that I can think of where the company that produced the system, changed the pack-in controller, not once but twice during it's life cycle
original controller -> dual analog controller (no vibration - jp only) -> dualshock controller

yes, both the NES and original xbox had changes made to their controllers (the NES got the dogbone shaped controllers with the top loading system and microsoft shrunk down the "duke nukem" sized controller), but neither had any functionality changes
additionally, the 3D max and advantage controllers were both something that nintendo sold separately, but never as a default pack-in controller

let's amend this and provide the correct information so that everyone doesn't freak out. so, your sentence *should* read:
Do not use a NTSC SNES/N64/GC cable on a PAL Gamecube. The pinout for pin 3 is different and you will send 12V down the sync line and fry your PVM or whatever other components may be in the line to it.

*CSYNC/Composite Sync is replaced by +12V on PAL SNES and PAL Gamecube consoles (But not the PAL N64)
from: https://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=av:nintendomultiav

that looks great. I'll be following your progress

agreed, although it was cool to see a few of the guides that I authored back in the day on his shelves

I missed it and can't believe that it's not scheduled to be broadcast again (at least through july 1st). instead, the history channel would rather show the same garbage over and over (pickers, pawn stars, alien autopsy, etc...)

I received my genesis mini yesterday as well, but haven't had the chance to open it yet. I have one of the (hopefully) limited edition versions coming from japan (w/ two 6-button controllers and the mock cartridge that fits in the top of the system)

initially, those stacks were going for $80-100 but have settled down to about $60-65. they must have made a lot of them because I thought that they were going to be exclusively a famitsu special edition

I received both my Japanese mini and us mini last week. waiting for the 2 stacks to arrive now

what do you want for the command & conquer the first decade game? that would be fun to revisit after all these years

many of the consoles could have been much better had the controllers been a bit more comfortable and ergonomic. colecovision, intellivision and 5200 are few of those that come to mind

I thought that the original analogue systems contained circuitry that was harvested from original famicom disc drives for the additional sound channels. was I incorrect about this?

I do not believe that the analogue mini's contained the same additional circuitry

additionally, the initial run of the analogue systems was crafted from a solid aluminum billet that was cnc'ed. that definitely increased the initial selling price

do they really appreciate that much in value?

$300-400? more likely closer to $1000-1500

I a have NIB japanese ROB as well as copies of stack-up and gyromite. I'll post them tonight. I prefer the color scheme that ROB received in japan over what we received here in the states

I hear that amazon.co.uk pre-orders for the game & watch: super mario bros. went up and were sold out in 20 minutes. nothing yet for us here in the states yet.

they're also up on amazon.co.jp, but no shipping options to the u.s.
https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B08HJ9T6GY/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=game+watch+mario&qid=1599569026&sr=8-2

both can still be had through various channels but to be honest, the tempest wasn't all that great (the spinner does not spin freely like the original arcade title so the game doesn't play as well as it should. additionally, it's a raster LCD instead of vector display so on the smaller display it doesn't look as crisp as it would on vector monitor).

it looks like they've finally hit their stride with the controls being the proper proportioned size with dragon's lair. I may have to grab one of those.

after ordering the gcloader, you need this as well
https://laserbear.net/shop/ols/products/gcloader-sd-mount

it has a built-in SD card extender to bring the slot up to a usable access point and finishes off the gaping hole where the optical drive used to be

I modded mine and wrapped up the original optical drive and stored it away. the nicest part of these mods are that they are completely reversible like you never did them (sort of like my original region switch that I did back in 2001. no soldering)

I picked up these 256GB micro SDs for the systems that I've done for myself and others basically giving you enough space to put anything and everything that you'd want to play and still have a bit of space left over (just in case)
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0887P21Z2/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o06_s00

the price is right now too ($5 cheaper than when I purchased the last batch, and cheaper than purchasing two 128GB micro SD cards

load times do not seem to be an issue (regardless of the micro SD card size). I believe that the opening animation only gets to the 3rd [roll] of the cube before swiss is loaded and displayed.

that should work. I ordered a sd2sp2 about a week ago but am still waiting delivery of it. I recently picked up some sony pvm monitors and have one connected to the gamecube using bnc adapters to the component cables. unfortunately, swiss auto boots into 480p mode when the component cables are connected (regardless of whether or not the display can handle it), so the result is a half horizontally shifted screen. I need the sd2sp2 in order to change and save the configuration file for swiss (apparently, you can't even manually add a config file on the gc-loader sd card).

lol. I believe that I've got a sealed box of these and some other nintendo promo materials from back in the day, along with a handful of the gamecube demo dvd's

I'll give you $6 for it. you can double your money without even thinking.
truth be told. great score. congrats!

wii compatible for those systems with the ngc backward compatibility (all the wii systems having the gamecube controller ports under the door)

I sold 2 sealed pokemon boxes last year and got about a grand a piece for them. I think I still have 1 or 2 japanese versions lying about

just a head's up (and a small plug), for those in and around the metro detroit area, the 1st detroit retro videogame show will be taking place on saturday, november 6th from 9am-5pm at the knights of columbus monaghan banquet center, located at 19801 farmington rd in livonia, mi

we've got about 25 vendors spread over 5,500 sq ft selling home console (retro to present), arcade and even some pinball (and related) items.

more info can be found here:
https://www.facebook.com/detroitrgs

that the price increase also includes a nicer case and 8x the memory (as well as it being high-speed NVMe vs. 64 GB eMMC memory) but I get that it is a significant increase in price for those options

those sony wega's have beautiful pictures but are a pain in the @ss to move (that egg crate bottom really loves to cut into your hands).

in other news, if anyone here is still searching for a collector's edition of zelda: tears of the kingdom, I ended up with 2 extra australian copies (region-free) that I would be willing to part with for retail ($129.99) plus shipping. pm me for photos, details, and shipping.

just a head's up for anyone in the midwest (specifically around the metro detroit area in michigan), we will be hosting our 3rd annual retro videogame show on saturday, nov 4th from 10am-4pm in livonia at the elks club

drvgs (resized).png