After playing my new AV Famicom and the 18 games that came with it for a few days, I have a few things to report. The first of which is that yes, I still love it. But if that were all I had to say, then this would be a boring article. Luckily, the other things are more interesting. For example, I am quickly falling for the Nintendo “dogbone” controller. It’s strange really; I’ve had one for years but never really gave it a good chance. I was biased immediately by the slanted A-B button arrangement, which I definitely do not like for playing Super Mario Bros. games (because I constantly hold down B with the tip of my thumb and use the ball of it to hit A and jump — the upward-slanted button line makes this play style awkward). But for every other game, it’s really comfortable. I now highly recommend getting one and giving it a chance if you haven’t already. My old US dogbone needs a good scrubbing and some new conductive rubber pads (I might have some left from an old controller repair kit somewhere) before it will be completely up to par. But once it is, I think it just might become my new favorite NES controller. I noticed something funny when comparing the Japanese dogbone and the US dogbone side to side. The Japanese dogbones have three foot controller cords, which is a pathetically short length by US standards. But it’s no big surprise; after all (or so I hear repeatedly) Japanese people all live in tiny apartments the size of my kitchen, so they’re never more than three feet away from their TV — even when taking a shower. Anything longer than three feet and the annual choking and tripping deaths in Japan would skyrocket. But hey, that’s Japan. In the US, we’re proud of tripping over our cords; it’s a matter of national pride. So how’s this for comparison: the cord on the US dogbone controller is eight feet long. No, not your standard six feet. Eight. Because of the three foot Japanese cord length, I think Nintendo of America decided to tack on another couple feet just out of spite. Either that, or Nintendo has a death wish for Americans.

So what else is new? A few things. First of all, you must drop everything and play Tetris 2 + Bombliss. This cart contains my new official favorite version of Tetris, and it comes with a bonus Tetris-like game called Bombliss. This particular version of Tetris was never released in the US, so not many American gamers probably know of it (and no, it’s not Tengen’s Tetris). And for some reason, despite the number “2” in the title, it seems to be the same ‘ole Tetris that we know and love. This version was developed by Bulletproof Software, has great graphics, smooth gameplay and controls, and relatively relaxing music (instead of relentless, frantic Russian marches that typically make me want to jump off a bridge when under level-11 duress). Bombliss, also included, is a game played with Tetris-like pieces, except that some of the pieces contain — surprise — bombs. Every time you complete a horizontal line, all the bombs in the line explode. Your goal is to blow up everything on the play field (normal blocks included) by tactical bomb placement. Bombliss also has a puzzle mode, which is really addicting and worth playing. The game even lets you put in your initials and saves all your high scores to SRAM. All in all, I think Tetris 2 + Bombliss is a must-have for your Famicom collection. How do you get it? Well either track down an original copy of the cart (worth having), or perhaps find it through other means.

The last thing I have to report is a follow up on the couple Deadly Towers articles we had on here. It turns out that one of the 18 used games that came with my AV Famicom was none other than the Japanese version of Deadly Towers, known as Mashou (“Evil Bells”) over there. The only thing I really have to say is that I played it for a while, and it appears to be exactly the same as the US version, which is to say that it sucks just as bad. I’m exaggerating a bit, because I really like the charm of it, but of course, it’s no Zelda. Overall, the coolest thing about owning Mashou in cartridge form is that the cart has a nifty red LED built into it that lights up when you turn the system on (see white cart in picture above). For that reason alone, you must own it now. Run, don’t walk, to your nearest…Japan. Try not to trip on the way.

The Tetris part of the sublime Tetris 2 + Bombliss.

The Bombliss part of Tetris 2 + Bombliss.

You may have noticed on other gaming blogs that yesterday (Feb 21st, 2006) was the 20th anniversary of the first release of The Legend of Zelda on the Famicom. I’ve been playing The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap this week by coincidence (an excellent game, by the way), and all this confluence of Zelda activity has gotten me thinking. Wouldn’t it be awesome to play a massively multi-player online role-playing game (MMORPG) set in the Zelda universe? Perhaps Nintendo could make a spiffy, slick 3D one with nice graphics for their upcoming Revolution console. If not, I’d be happy if some fans simply made a homebrew 2D, top-down MMORPG using A Link to the Past as a graphical framework. Either way, there would be some serious questions to address in such a game.

The most obvious question about a Zelda MMORPG is: who would you play as? Would the world have 1,000 Links running around? Or could you choose your race during character creation, kinda like World of Warcraft? You might choose to be Hylian, Kokiri, Goron, Zora, Deku, Rito, Minish, Fairy or even other races that have appeared in Zelda games. Each race would start out in their own zone with their own quests, etc., although they could obviously travel all over Hyrule. Another major question is: where would Link and Zelda be in all this? Would people just get frustrated (ala Star Wars Galaxies) if they couldn’t play as the main characters? Another issue is gameplay: I think since the Zelda games are action-adventure games, that the gameplay of a Zelda MMORPG should be action-role-playing. That is, you swing your sword and do actions in real time, but you could build up experience and raise your stats over time. Also you could learn new skills and techniques (unique to each race) that could let you access new areas, or just simply let you have new abilities. And like other MMORPGs, there would be an in-world economy (but based on rupees, of course). You’ll gain rupees based on killing monsters, and spend them by visiting shops and buying from other players. There are many possibilities in the universe of Zelda. I just wanted to write this article as a quick brainstorm to get started, but please feel free to continue and improve my train of thought on a new Zelda MMORPG. Good idea? Bad idea? Please discuss!

Just yesterday I had the opportunity to conduct an email interview DahrkDaiz, creator of the impressive hack Mario Adventure. Mario Adventure is a completely new Mario game made from modifications to the Super Mario Bros. 3 game engine for the NES. The game was the subject of a recent piece on VC&G and has proven to be quite popular now that it has been given wider attention on our site.

Vintage Computing and Gaming: Thank you for agreeing to this interview. First off, where are you from?
DahrkDaiz: Knoxville, Tennessee

VC&G: What do you do for a living?
DD: I’m currently a student at ITT-Tech and working full time at a fast food restaurant.

VC&G: Do you aspire to be a professional game designer?
DD: I hope so one day but in reality I know game design is a tough field to crack, so I’ll continue to pursue the dream in my spare time while focusing on a realistic programming career, working for businesses to make a living.

VC&G: What’s your favorite video game? Favorite Mario game?
DD: A tie between Sonic 3 & Knuckles and SMB3. [Favorite Mario Game:] SMB3, no surprise there.

VC&G: What inspired you to make Mario Adventure?
DD: The total lack of a proper Mario sequel. I was disappointed with the Mario Advance series and I saw other people’s attempt at creating a new SMB3 experience and decided to take the matter into my own hands.

VC&G: Mario Adventure has been very popular on VC&G. It been downloaded over 11,000 times from our site in the last few days. Is there anything you’d like the players of Mario Adventure to know or keep in mind while playing?
DD: This hack was made with the hardcore SMB3 player in mind. I could practically beat the original with my eyes closed and figured it was time to up the difficulty. However, I tried to include ways to pass hard obstacles easily. Use your power-ups to their fullest abilities and you should do fine getting through the game.

VC&G: What’s your favorite new feature of Mario Adventure? Also, what’s your favorite world in the game?
DD: Definitely the key collecting idea. I always liked having to back track through levels or world to get something out of the way to continue in a game. Point A to point B grows old quickly. [Favorite World:] Colossal Classics. The giant nostalgic look just has something about it that pleases me. Though I thought I could have a slightly better job with it.

VC&G: What development tools did you use to create Mario Adventure?
DD: FCEUd (emulator with an excellent debugger), YY-Chr (graphics editing), Mario 3 Improvement (archaic SMB3 level editor), Hex Workshop (hex editor).

VC&G: How long did it take you to complete Mario Adventuree?
DD: Approximately 16 months.

VC&G: Was reverse engineering the Super Mario Bros. 3 Game engine and implementing new rules, power-ups, etc. difficult? Tell us more about how you made changes to the Super Mario Bros. 3 game itself.
DD: At first it was very difficult. I slowly began to see a certain logic used behind the game. However, when reprogramming the code, I had to find unused space in the ROM, so that was pretty much hit and miss. Admittedly I did a poor job at coding it, hence all the bugs and glitches, but I did what I could with what knowledge I knew. A lot of time stepping through code and even writing code out on paper while at work during my break was required.

VC&G: Did you do all the level design in Mario Adventure yourself?
DD: Absolutely everything was done by me in this.

VC&G: Do you think Mario Adventure would work properly if somehow put on an actual hardware cartridge and played on a real NES/Famicom? Have you ever attempted this?
DD: Unfortunately, it will not. I reprogrammed the game to take advantage of a bug most emulators have, however, I did not realize at the time that it was a bug. The hack would work on a real NES, but not properly all time. The main bug being the status bar moving up over the screen at certain times.

VC&G: Have you ever heard from Nintendo about your Mario hacking exploits?
DD: Surprisingly, no.

VC&G: Have you done any previous game hacking projects? If so, tell us about them.
DD: Before Mario Adventure? No, but there were a few things I did while working on Mario Adventure and afterwards. Most of it is unknown unfinished test projects. I created a cool parallax (SNES style) background scroll in Mega Man 3 for Snake Man’s stage. I hacked Castlevania 3 to start and stay as Alucard. I completely hacked Ms. Pac-Man to have 32 unique levels, a mode to play levels at random and a pellet counter. This hack is known as Pac-Man 3 and will be available on my site once it relaunches.

VC&G: What can you tell us about your next hacking project? When will it be ready?
DD: I can tell you now the next big project is another SMB3 hack. Most people may sigh at this, but I took a different approach with this hack and differs from Mario Adventure. The scale is that, if not more than Mario Adventure. It makes Luigi and Mario be separate characters with each having special powers of their own for different gameplay, including Luigi’s floaty jump and slippery control and a new item box for Mario found in Mario Adventure. Each character has their own separate 8 worlds to play through, so this is literally two hacks in one. It’s like nothing you’ve ever seen.

VC&G: Is there anything else that you’d like our readers to know?
DD: Mario Adventure is a real gem, but I’ve listened to a lot of good and bad feedback on it and this new project I’m working on addresses those issues. But I like to thank everyone who’s played this hack and given so much praise for it. It’s really inspired me to take game development as a serious career.

In a way, I think we all thirst for a new 2D side scrolling Mario adventure. It’s some sort of basic human need, along with eating, sleeping and reproduction. Why, just last week I was about to keel over for want of Mario when, at the last minute, I found the greatest NES game hack of all time, Mario Adventure. But this isn’t your usual game hack, mind you. You’ll find no giant buttocks glued onto Mario’s forehead, no nude Mushroom Retainers, no Super Tokin’ Brothers with Luigi replaced by a white Rastafarian with a cannabis leaf for a hat. Nope, this is a real game — a new game, crafted with care and aplomb using the Super Mario Bros. 3 game engine. Who executed this masterful feat? Look no further than intrepid homebrew coder “DahrkDaiz,” who completed the game over the course of sixteen months, sometimes coding on paper during his breaks while working at a fast food restaurant (check out our interview with Mario Adventure’s creator here). Now that’s what I call dedication. This man deserves serious recognition for the creation of this masterpiece.

[ Continue reading Mario Adventure: The Best NES Game Hack of All Time » ]

A few weeks ago, while playing through my Atari 800 game collection, I discovered a rare gem that I’d never played before. It quickly made my way into a top ten list of most underrated games of all time (well, for the Atari 800 at least). It’s called Dandy Dungeon, a 1983 release through the Atari Program Exchange (APX) written by then-MIT-student John Palevich. At first glance, it appears to be a Gauntlet clone with primitive graphics (the Gauntlet of which I speak is the 1985 Atari Games arcade release), but it turns out that Gauntlet, not Dandy, is the clone (apparently, Mr. Palevich wasn’t too happy about Ed Logg stealing his design and sued Atari Games over it). I had played another game just like Dandy before for the Atari 7800 called Dark Chambers with exactly the same gameplay, but different graphics. Well, it turns out it’s no co-incidence — Dark Chambers was written by John Palevich as well, commissioned by Atari Corporation later on. As an interesting bit of trivia, Atari Corporation and Atari Games were two separate companies by the time of Gauntlet’s release in 1985.

So then, why is Dandy so cool? I’ll give you my first three reasons: it plays like a dream, it supports four simultaneous players, and it includes a built-in dungeon editor! The included dungeon designs aren’t very good, I’ll admit, but the ability to design your own dungeons overcomes this weakness (plus, I found six Atari 800 disk images with dungeons designed by different people — see below). Gameplay is smooth, robust, and the controls are great. Also, like in Gauntlet, slugging it out with three other friends is priceless. Finding good four-player games for the Atari 800 is tough, so I’m very happy about this feature.

What makes Dandy like Gauntlet and, yet…unlike Gauntlet? First of all, similarities include running around a dungeon shooting monsters with up to four friends, collecting food, using potions (bombs) to kill masses of monsters (who just so happen to come from generators at times). Also, you depart each dungeon level at an exit and descend to a lower dungeon level. The most obvious difference between the two, to me, is the fact that your health doesn’t tick down over time in Dandy like it does in Gauntlet (an ingenious feature to swallow up more of your quarters in the arcade — Mr. Logg knew what he was doing). Also, the monsters in Dandy Dungeon have a strange hierarchy that is slightly hard to explain. There are different “levels” of monsters. Each level, or strength, per se, looks different, but they all behave the same (they don’t shoot, just run at you). The higher the level of monster, the more shots it takes to kill it. But with each shot along the way, the graphic for the monster changes down to a lower level of monster, until it dies. For example, there is a “little man” monster who takes only one shot to kill. Then there is a “smiley face” monster that takes two shots. However, when you shoot the smiley face monster, it turns into the little man monster, who in turn only takes one shot to kill. It’s weird, I know…Dark Chambers is just like this too. Luckily, Ed Logg had the sense to change this confusing design feature when designing Gauntlet (which has discrete types of monsters that each have different characteristics). Also, in Dandy, you can save the food you collect for later use, which is nice — in Gauntlet, you eat it immediately, whether you need it or not.

If you’d like to play the game, get a good Atari 800 emulator (I recommend Atari800WinPLus) or an SIO2PC cable to play it on a real Atari, then download the disk image. If you want different dungeon map packs, here they are: Pack 1, Pack 2, Pack 3, Pack 4, Pack 5, Pack 6. Finally, here’s a note on gameplay that’s not immediately evident: to use collected food, press 1 through 4 on the keyboard, where the number you push is the number of the player who wants to use stored food. The same goes for bombs, although you hold down the SHIFT key while pressing the number. You can also shoot bombs, of course, for immediate effect.

Have fun! Please feel free to share your comments on the game below in the comments section.

[Update: 11/17/2014 — I changed the SIO2PC link from sunmark.com (now long since gone) to a link to AtariMax that works. ]

I received my Generation NEX two days ago via FedEx, part of the first shipment of a new NES clone console from Messiah Entertainment (the self-proclaimed saviors of “gaming”). My initial impressions were good, because the packaging is pretty nice. But once you open the clear plastic box and plug it in, things get a little ugly.

First off, the included tiny, corded controller is terrible. The buttons are laid out in a slanted pattern (which I hate.. more on that in another entry) and their feel is mushy. No, not “Excellent Official NES Controller Mushy,” but a very bad kind of mushy. And another note about the controller: look at the picture. See those two black buttons above the red ones on the right? Those are the Select and Start buttons. The two in the middle are “Slow” and “Turbo.” Also, the controller has two shoulder buttons like a SNES, except in this case they function like the regular “B” and “A” buttons. All in all, very awkward. Of course, you can plug in your original NES controller to the unit (a must), but I thought I’d mention the pack-in controller, since, after all, it is part of the package.

The sound on most of the games I’ve tried so far (SMB3, Pinball, River City Ransom, etc.) is off and not accurate (compared to being played on an original NES). The colors, too, on all games seem a little strange. Huge bummer. Also, certain games like the aforementioned River City Ransom do weird stuff when you play them, including messing up the menus, changing colors, and generally not working properly. Castlevania III doesn’t even work at all (just a blank green screen). And yes, I cleaned all my games thoroughly before trying them on the NEX. I need to test more games with this, but it feels like it would just be a waste of time. So what on earth could have led me to believe that my games would actually work on this console? Oh. Here’s an excerpt from their July 29th, 2005 Press Release:

8-bit Software Galore: Enjoy all your favorite NES and Japanese Famicom games using one console.

Also, there’s this from their Official NEX FAQ:

Q: Does it contain custom ICs, or is it based around the NOAC [NES-on-a-chip] that most “clone” consoles are based around?
A: Our IC is a custom designed IC that is built on the NES algorithm. Every attention to detail has been spent on compatibility.

Did they even test this thing? How hard could it be to make a 100% compatible NES clone in 2005? And how could they possibly say it’s truly compatible with any game? Sigh. Marketing “oversight,” I guess.

I recently have been alerted to the fact that Messiah has posted a game compatibility list on their site — conveniently long after I committed my money to the NEX (I pre-ordered in August). It makes me think Messiah themselves didn’t get their hands on the final NEX hardware until about a week before I did. If I had seen the list beforehand, I definitely wouldn’t have ordered one. Also note that a game like River City Ransom (the first game I tested with it, incidentally) shows up on their list as working (as of this writing.. they may change it once they see the criticism), but in fact if you play it, the first intro-stage has really weird colors, THEN it shows the title screen, and then you start playing. God knows how else it’s garbled up if you keep going. So I think we can tell that their game compatibility list isn’t accurate.

The compatibility problem brings me to another issue. I suspect that the Messiah guys didn’t do the hardware development on this machine. I think they probably repackaged the latest Asian gray-market Famicom clone, perhaps adding the built-in wireless controller functionality themselves in the process (supposedly its best selling point, although I have not tested it). If anyone can find some hardware design credits on their site (There are none in the system manual, only to the “President” and some marketing guys), let us all know. This whole thing stinks like fish. And speaking of the President, here’s an inspiring word from the man himself, direct from their May 23rd, 2005 press release:

Brad Strahle, Messiah’s President, considers the Generation NEX to be one of the most important retro products available. “With the release of Generation NEX, we want the core gamer to know that we have not forgotten our roots. Classic gaming is where it all began and with Generation NEX the classics will live on.” Strahle continued, “All gamers will love playing their favorite retro games on the Generation NEX and enjoy them with a new passion.”

Safely considering myself to fall under the banner of “all gamers,” as mentioned by Mr. Strahle in the release, I am sorry to say that I don’t love playing my favorite “retro” games on the Generation NEX. The only new passion it has inspired in me is a distrust and dislike of a company known as Messiah Entertainment. I highly recommend staying far away from this me-too capitalize-on-retro-craze rip-off. It has game compatibility akin to, or even worse than, a $10 Chinese Famicom clone. For $60 you could probably get an original NES with a new 72-pin connector in it, some real NES controllers, and ten or more decent games. Avoid the NEX and get the real thing (Ebay is calling). With all its problems, it would have more appropriately been named the Generation SUX. Yeah, I know; that’s hitting below the belt. But I never promised a civil review.

By the way, if anyone is lured by the pseudo-stereo capability of this thing, don’t be impressed. Just use an RCA 1 Male to Two Female Y-cable on a normal NES. It splits the mono signal into two channels so you can easily plug it into both your left and right audio input on your TV or receiver.

With this thing being such a bust, check out my article on replacing the 72-pin cartridge connector on your NES and eliminating the blinkies.

Review Update (11/10/2005): A few people have told me that I didn’t mention that the NEX plays original Famicom carts as well as regular NES games (through a slot on the top of the unit), and that this is a strong feature of the unit. My review was originally targeted at people who were already familiar with the system’s features, hence the oversight. But it is worth mentioning, and it does play them — I tried the only two Famicom games I have (Robocop 2 and Zippy Race) the first day I got it, and they worked, although Robocop 2‘s music seemed a little messed up. The Famicom cartridge slot is a nice extra, but I reviewed this system from the standpoint of a complete NES replacement system, as it is primarily marketed. Unfortunately, the NEX fails miserably at this task. I suspect that the attractiveness of the NEX for most people (the general gaming public) would be as a replacement for an old, unreliable front-loading NES, for which they might actually have games. It’s highly likely that only the most dedicated of NES fans have Famicom carts they want to play. But if Famicom compatibility is your thing, go for it. Nobody’s stopping you but your own wallet.

Second Update (11/14/2005): If anyone wants to know more about Famicom to NES converters inside copies of Gyromite, check out my new article on it here.

Third Update (12/21/2005): What’s up with IGN’s weird Generation NEX review? I don’t know. My comments about it are here.