Category Archives: Console Video Games

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Apple II, Commodore 64, Computers/Tech/Games, Console Video Games, Games and Technology, Main, Photo Gallery

Boatfest 2023 Recap

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Last weekend I attended the second annual Boatfest gathering, which again took place in Hurricane, West Virginia. Despite its name, the event has nothing to do with boats — it’s a gathering of retrocomputing and retrogaming enthusiasts named after the organizer, John “Boat of Car” Shawler.

Boatfest is difficult to summarize because it’s different things to different people. Some people go to Boatfest to show off their vintage computers and gaming systems, while others go just to see them. It’s an event where old friends reconnect, and new friendships are made. There are tournaments, there are presentations, there are people repairing things, and this year there was even an auction. And the fun didn’t stop at the show, as the party moved to local restaurants each evening. At its core, Boatfest was simply fifty people meeting in a single location to have fun.

This year’s Boatfest took place in the Copper Room, an event space located above a Connolly’s, an Irish Pub… that recently went out of business. Fortunately, Boat was able to work a deal and maintain use of the space. The room was twice as large as last year’s space, with a capacity of approximately 50 people. A series of round tables were available for attendees to set up their vintage equipment. In the front of the room, couches and chairs faced a makeshift presentation area complete with cameras, microphones, and a projector screen. More tables, filled with items for the auction and things for sale, lined one of the walls. There was also a large chest-style refrigerator full of drinks, a restroom, and a kitchen area. With the addition of a few extension cords and power strips, the room was ready for business.

Several people associated with show are involved in podcasts, many of whom performed live shows in front of the attendees. Boat, the event’s organizer, is one of the hosts of the Amigos Podcast, a show about Amiga computers. Boat’s podcasting partner, Amigo Aaron, does another show with his brother, The Brent, called ARG Presents. Both of those shows did live performances, and I did one as well for Sprite Castle, covering the 1986 game Friday the 13th. There were also a couple of Jeopardy-style trivia challenges, but in between those events it was all about the gaming and checking out each other’s tables. My time was spent pretty evenly between demonstrating the things I brought, and checking out everyone else’s goods.

For my part, I brought two computers. First was an Apple IIe with a CFFA-3000 card installed that allows users to load games and programs via a USB stick. I also brought my old Commodore SX-64, which was a portable version of the Commodore 64 (complete with a 5″ color screen). Boatfest is a place where terms like “rare” are relative. Approximately 9,000 SX-64s were originally sold back in the mid 1980s. Of those, of course, many have since died. It’s a nearly 40-year-old computer that cost $1,000 in 1984 and was relatively obscure even when it was new… and there were four of them in the room.

There were so many neat systems on display that it would be impossible for me to list them all. One of my favorite displays was a working Video Toaster running on an Amiga 2000. The Video Toaster was a video editing suite that could be used for video production. It’s a legendary piece of equipment which I have heard about for decades but never actually saw in person. At Boatfest I was able to sit down in front of one, play with it for nearly an hour, and walk away with a DVD-R copy of the experience. All over the room people were having similar experiences, whether they had stumbled across some holy grail from their past or discovered something new for the first time.

Building off of last year’s swap table event, in 2023 Boatfest held an actual auction. Attendees were encouraged to bring items from home, set a reserve, and let ‘er rip. The Brent did a fine job of running the auction, and I had about a dozen entries for sale. I tried to keep things interesting by putting both some low and high dollar items up for sale. For example, I brought five 10-packs of NES cartridges that I listed for $1/game. On the other end of the spectrum, I decided to sell my NTSC Amiga CD32. It is a rare variant of a rare console that ended up selling for $475. The buyer was happy with the price and I was happy to pass it along to someone else to enjoy. I have such a hard time parting with things, and knowing they’re going to someone who will appreciate them as much as I did makes it a little easier. Some of the items in the auction sold much higher than I was expecting, while others went surprisingly low. I didn’t talk to every buyer and seller so I can only speak for myself when I say I thought everything with amazingly smooth and I was more than pleased with what my items sold for.

There was always something happening at Boatfest. In the front corner of the room, Frank and Jason from Retro Rewind were busy soldering on people’s broken machines, doing their part to keep these old computers operational. In the rear of the room, PacBilly and his brother had organized an Astro Duel Deluxe tournament, which had four people at a time shooting each other’s spaceships. There were two separate Jeopardy-style trivia contests that took place. I competed in the first and took second place with -100 points. On the second game, I knew like seven answers in a row — sometimes it’s the luck of the draw! But in addition to all these activities, conversations were happening non-stop, and everyone was always approachable. There were many times I found myself walking up to a conversation in progress and joining in — and, just as often, there were times I was talking to someone and suddenly three or four people had gathered around. There wasn’t a single person at the show who was stand-offish or negative.

At Boatfest 2022 attendees were on their own for meal arrangements, and even though it was never really a problem, each time I skipped out to grab sometime to eat I felt like I was missing part of the show. In 2023, this was rectified by shutting down the show each evening for 90 minutes and inviting everyone in attendance to a local restaurant. This worked out great for multiple reasons. Not only were attendees able to sit down and eat without worrying about missing any part of the show, but it was nice to get away from the noise for a bit and reset. Each night I ended up sitting by different people and had some great conversations. Plus, Hurricane, West Virginia has a surprisingly number of great restaurants!

Traditionally the Sunday after the show is spent visiting local locations and winding down. Unfortunately for my buddy Jeff and I, the beds in our rental RV weren’t as comfortable as we had hoped and so we made a command decision to hit the road back home Sunday morning. We took turns driving and made a few stops to stretch, but ended up driving all 990 miles back home on Sunday. It was a long day on the road, but sleeping in my own bed was 100% worth it.

Both Jeff and I had a blast at the show, and I haven’t heard that anyone didn’t have a great time. If there’s a Boatfest 2024, I’ll definitely be there… although probably not in an RV next year. ;)

My Boatfest 2023 Photo Gallery: LINK

Computers/Tech/Games, Console Video Games, Main

The Art of Selling Nintendo Games

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It’s a little difficult to explain how I ended up with more than 200 Nintendo cartridges — a system I never cared that much for in the first place. For those who know me, it may be even more difficult to believe that I’ve decided to part with them.

The Nintendo Entertainment System, or NES, was released in North America the fall of 1985 just in time for Christmas. Several of my friends ended up owning a Nintendo, and while I enjoyed playing their games when I visited, I never wanted a Nintendo of my own. By the time the Nintendo was released I already had a Commodore 64 computer in my bedroom. While Nintendo owners had to buy (or rent) games to play, I was downloading new games every night for free using my computer’s modem.

I didn’t get a Nintendo until the summer of 1991, right around the time Nintendo released their follow-up system, the Super Nintendo. A fast food coworker of mine sold me his NES including 30 games for $100, in part to help pay for a Super Nintendo. I hooked the Nintendo up in my bedroom and played games on it while my computer was downloading other games. When I got my first apartment I hooked the Nintendo up in the living room, where Jeff, Andy and I occasionally played Super Mario Bros. 3 or Tetris. By the winter of 1993 I had assembled my first PC, and both the Nintendo and my Commodore 64 went into storage.

I didn’t think about the Nintendo again until I joined Digital Press, an online haven for video game collectors. Being (virtually) surrounded by like-minded gamers gave me the collecting bug, and I began buying video game cartridges at garage sales and thrift stores — not just Nintendo, but Atari 2600 and Sega Genesis games as well. From the late 90s though much of the 00s, old game cartridges could be picked up for pennies on the dollar. At one garage sale I bought an Atari 2600 console with joysticks, paddles, and 40 games for $20. Every garage sale you went to had Nintendo games for a buck.

The thing I discovered about myself is that I loved the hunt for games infinitely more than I loved playing the games. I loved the excitement that came from walking up to a garage sale in hopes of finding a title I didn’t already own. I created a spreadsheet of all the games I owned and copied it to my Palm Pilot (remember those?) so when I was out shopping I could easily check whether or not I already owned a specific title.

Sometime in the early 00s, Blockbuster launched GameRush, an offshoot designed to compete with GameStop. Some GameRush locations were stand-alone stores while others were nestled inside Blockbusters. A few years later — I want to say this was 2007 or 2008 — Blockbuster announced that all GameRush locations were closing and that all their inventory would be liquidated. Armed with my electronic spreadsheet, a friend of mine and I spent an entire weekend driving to every local GameRush location, about a dozen, buying every NES game I didn’t already own. Not only had GameRush dropped the price of used NES games to 99 cents, but they were also offering a buy two/get one free sale. The funniest thing about this sale was that GameRush put all their NES games in clunky, oversized antitheft boxes that definitely cost more than the old games they were protecting. The plastic containers were difficult to open, and by the end of that weekend every GameRush cashier in Oklahoma City had cursed my name after I had approached them with towering stacks of cartridges that they had to open one at a time using a janky plastic key device.

By the end of that weekend, my collection of NES games had soared to approximate 250… and still, I didn’t play them. Sure, I sorted them, arranged and rearranged them, cleaned them, and made lists of them, but I never played them. I bought a set of shelves to display them, and when they outgrew that, I built some custom shelves to house them.

In 2011 we moved from that house to the big house. When we moved, I put all those NES cartridges in a big plastic tub where they slept for several years. On a whim one day I pulled those games out of the tub and put them on a shelf in my closet; when I needed the shelf space for my DVD collection, I put the games back in the tub. I’m positive I never played any of those games during the seven years we lived in that house.

The next time I touched that tub was to move it from that house to this house in 2018. The tub has been sitting in the back of my closet, unopened, for almost three years.

Two weeks ago I was looking for something in my closet and ran across that tub of games, which I had essentially forgotten about. I already mentioned that I don’t play a lot of NES games, but if I wanted to, I have three ways to do it within 2′ of the chair I am currently sitting in. Directly in front of me, I have a Nintendo emulator installed on my PC. To my immediate left I have two devices, a MiSTer FPGA computer and a Raspberry Pi, both of which also play NES games. All three of these solutions allow me to play every single NES game ever released with minimal effort. If for whatever reason I want to go back and revisit some of these old games, I have plenty of ways to do it. Pulling physical cartridges out of storage and playing them on vintage hardware is the least convenient way, and the method I’m least likely to do.

I feel a lot of anxiety when it comes to parting with certain things, old video games being one of them, but when I realized the games inside that tub hadn’t been played in over a decade, something inside my kooky brain finally clicked. Like I said before, I never liked playing those games as much as I liked hunting for them in the wild and displaying them. With the proliferation of eBay and Craigslist, I very rarely see vintage games at thrift stores or garage sales anymore. There was a time I got enjoyment from putting all those games out on display, but today it feels like a burden to keep lugging around all that old plastic.

Last weekend, Operation Nintendo went into effect. I spent about $20 at Dollar General on isopropyl alcohol, Goo Gone, Fantastik spray cleaner, a pack of Q-tips, a roll of paper towels, and a four pack of Magic Erasers. I’ve been cleaning and testing my way through the pile of games, one at a time. Some of them have previous rental stickers that need removed. (Curiously, some of the games that came from Blockbuster have stickers on the back reminding customers to “rewind the tape.” Somebody at Blockbuster had a sense of humor.) Lots of the games needed cleaning before they would even work. Sometimes early in the morning and sometimes late at night I’ll grab a stack of games and scrub their little contacts as the sun is either coming up or going down.

My office is filled with multiple piles of NES games. There’s a pile of games that haven’t been cleaned, and a pile of games that have. After the games are cleaned I plug them into a Nintendo clone I have (the RetroN 1) and test them out. If the game fires up, I take a picture of it working along with shots of the front and back of the cartridge and it goes into the “ready to list” pile. Games that don’t work go into the “try again” pile. When the “ready to list” pile gets so tall I’m afraid it will topple over it gets moved over near the computer (the “list it on eBay” pile). As time permits I list them on eBay and the games are moved to a “they’ve been listed on eBay” pile until they sell.

Over the past week I’ve listed 78 NES games on eBay; 15 have sold. The vast majority of my games are listed at $9.99, which includes free shipping. Shipping a padded envelope with a game inside costs $3.50, and eBay now takes 12.55% plus $0.30 off of the total price. For a $9.99 sale, that means eBay keeps $1.55; add in $3.50 for shipping and I’m making just under $5 on a $10 sale. eBay is a good way to part with old video games, but not a good way to get rich doing it.

There have been exceptions. My copy of Tecmo Super Bowl sold for $30, and a game I don’t even remember buying (Bible Buffet) sold almost immediately for $70. But again, these are the exceptions to the rule. Most of the games I’ve listed haven’t sold, and most of the ones that have sold went for $9.99.

To be honest, selling these games has been the most fun I’ve had with them in years. It’s been fun to go through and touch them all, to find random people’s names written on the back of them in Sharpie, and to look at the label artwork. It’s pretty satisfying to pull a game from the non-working pile and clean it until it fires up. Frankly, I get more enjoyment from that than playing them.

For anyone worried (or excited) that I’m “selling it all,” I wouldn’t go that far. The hundreds and hundreds of games I’ve been cleaning and listing on eBay have come from a single tub. There are more tubs in the closet. There are dozens of tubs in the garage. I have miles to go before I sleep.

I haven’t decided what else, if anything, I plan to get rid of. For now, I’ll focus on these NES games. They’re small, easy to ship, and I won’t miss them too terribly much. Except for ExciteBike — I’ll miss that one. That was such a great game and I might hang on to it. Oh, and Dr. Mario, which was fun, and Tetris, which Susan likes. And Super Mario Bros. 3, because it was such a classic. But other than that, I’m selling them all. Wait, is that Gauntlet? Maybe just one more…

Console Video Games, Main

Here We Go Again: The All New Atari VCS

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What’s old is new again. This time it’s the Atari VCS, a new game console aimed directly at the nostalgic hearts of those of us who grew up in the late 70s and early 80s playing the Atari 2600. If you’re wondering what the Atari VCS is, what it does, how it compares to the Atari Flashback, and whether or not it’s worth buying, read on.

Those who were there (and any retrogamer worth their weight in buried E.T. cartridges) knows that Atari’s original console released back in 1977 was also known as the Atari VCS. It wasn’t until the release of the Atari 5200 that the original system was renamed the Atari 2600. For the remainder of this post, I’ll refer to the original console as the Atari 2600, and the modern revisioning as the Atari VCS.

Also, I should get this out of the way — Atari, the company, isn’t really “Atari”, the company. The original Atari, the one founded by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney in the 1970s, hasn’t existed for a long, long time. In the early 80s, Atari split into two companies: one for software and game development (Atari Games Inc.), and one for hardware (Atari Corporation), which was sold to Jack Tramiel. Since then, Atari was purchased by JT Storage, JT Storage was purchased by Hasbro, and Hasbro was purchased by the French company Infogrames Entertainment. The only difference between the modern company calling itself Atari and any other hardware or software developer is that Atari purchased the rights to use the company’s logo.

In the summer of 2017, rumors of a new “Atari” (I’ll drop the snarky quotation marks hereon out) console began to hit the internet. After more than a year of rumors and computer renderings, Atari has finally released the specs of their new console, the (new) Atari VCS.

According to the Indiegogo launch page, the Atari VCS is a Linux computer (running Ubuntu) with 4GB of RAM and 32GB of storage. It supports Bluetooth and USB controllers, HDMI video, and comes with Atari Vault pre-installed. The pre-sale collector’s edition comes with two controllers and a system for $299.

There’s a lot to unpack in that paragraph.

The Indiegogo video shows the Atari VCS playing vintage Atari 2600 games, and with hardware specs like that, it should be able to with no problems. The Indiegogo page specifically mentions that the console ships with Atari Vault. Atari Vault is a collection of Atari games (mostly 2600 games, with a few arcade ports thrown in) that has been on sale for a few years. Atari Vault was released for Microsoft Windows, Linux, and macOS in 2016, and is available on Steam for $9.99. If you are planning to purchase the Atari VCS solely for the purpose of playing vintage Atari 2600 games, know that you can do that right now on your computer for a ten-spot.

(Atari emulation is nothing new. I have Atari emulators on all my computers, modded game console, and even my iPad.)

If the “living room experience” is important to you, don’t forget about the Atari Flashback system. The Atari Flashback 8 Gold (~$60 on eBay) contains 100+ Atari games, two joysticks, and HDMI out. It won’t offer some of the advanced features the Atari VCS is touting, but if all you want to do is play Atari 2600 games, this is a much more inexpensive plug-and-play option.

That’s not all the Atari VCS claims to be able to do, of course. The project’s launch page also mentions features like web browsing and video streaming, which, if it’s running Ubuntu Linux, make sense. Other than access to Atari’s new proprietary game library/store, everything that’s being advertised can be performed by a $35 Raspberry Pi computer, which also runs Linux. I have written several posts about the Raspberry Pi, and one specifically discussing RetroPie. Setting up a Raspberry Pi to play RetroPie is not as effortless as hooking up an Atari Flashback or (I’m assuming) a new Atari VCS. Setting up a Raspberry Pi takes some Linux knowledge and a bit of tinkering to get up and running. It’s not an out-of-the-box solution by any means. That being said, if you’re like me and have set up a $35 machine that can play essentially every Atari, Nintendo, Super Nintendo, and Sega Genesis game (along with hundreds of thousands of titles on other console and computer platforms), the idea of paying $299 for a console that does the same (or less) doesn’t excite me.

The Atari VCS Indiegogo page mentions their partners and online store without divulging many details. Roughly two-dozen confirmed partners are listed on the page. There are a lot of references like “we hope the new Atari VCS will inspire even more creativity!” along with lots of “we plan to” and “we intend to” that make me nervous. What makes me most nervous is that the plan sounds just like Ouya’s business model. The Ouya was a similar Android-based console released a couple of years ago. It too ran emulators and offered an online store, but failed when neither the chicken nor the egg materialized. Developers stopped making games for the system when people stopped buying games for the system because nobody was developing new games. The Puya launched in 2013 and was dead by 2015.

Here is my current biggest problem with the Atari VCS.

Payments made to Indiegogo are not guaranteed presales. The company says so, underlined and in bold on their own site that “Indiegogo is unable to guarantee that projects will succeed or that perks will be delivered or deemed satisfactory.” Even if Atari has the best of intentions and fully plans to deliver the new Atari VCS a year from now in the spring/summer of 2019, there is no guarantee when or if you will receive one. Payments on Indiegogo are early investments in a product or a dream. Even if I were inclined to spend $300 on an (in my opinion) overpriced Linux machine, I certainly wouldn’t do it through Indiegogo, and I most certainly wouldn’t do it a year prior to launch.

When Nintendo announced their NES Classic Edition, I predicted that there would be no market for the limited console and that it would be a big flop. I was wrong. The console sold out almost immediately and has been in high demand ever since, despite a long list of cheaper and better alternatives. I’d like to say the same for the Atari VCS, an expensive Linux machine, but through Indiegogo people have already invested $2.5 million in the past week. For their sake, I hope Atari comes through and delivers a gaming experience worthy of the price tag. For that matter, I hope Atari delivers anything at all.

Console Video Games

Free NES/SNES Controllers (Review)

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In early June I ran across an ad on Facebook for free USB NES controllers. The offer was posted by Epictronics, who said all one had to do to qualify for the offer was “Like” their company on either Facebook or Instagram and cover shipping costs. Not a bad advertising gimmick in my book.

I don’t need another USB game pad, but they’re handy to have around, especially when setting up and playing with Raspberry Pis. Besides, Epictronics had me at “free.” Two minutes after seeing the ad I had already Liked their Facebook page and was busy filling out my order. Along with an NES game pad, I noticed the company also offers a free SNES game pad! Cover the additional shipping and you can add that to your cart, too!

(Note that the URL works whether or not you have liked Epictronics on Facebook or Instagram. Your morals are your own.)

It didn’t take me long to figure out how Epictronics can afford to offer “free” (there’s those quotes again…) game pads in exchange for Facebook and Instagram likes. Shipping for one free controller is $10; for two, it’s $16. Conveniently, Epictronics accepts PayPal for their free game pads. The website was optimistic in predicting the controllers will take 2-3 weeks to arrive to the US. My package from Wang Shang took 5 weeks.

The controllers arrived inside an unpadded plastic bag, wrapped in a thin sheet of foam. Each controller came in its own baggie. The USB cord attached to the SNES pad was neatly coiled and tied with a bread tie, while the NES controller had no tie and the cord was just coiled up inside its bag.

When placed next to authentic NES controllers, you can see that the mold for the new controller is essentially identical. The color is a lighter shade of gray and the word “Nintendo” is missing from the label, but from five-feet away it would fool anyone who hasn’t seen on since the console’s original heyday.

Once you actually pick up the controller, all bets are off. The first thing you’ll notice is that the controllers are so light that you would swear they’re empty inside. The NES controller in particular feels about half as heavy as an originally controller. My thumbs instantly noticed that the A and B buttons were convex instead of concave, which doesn’t feel right. None of the buttons, including the d-pad, feel like the original. On the USB controller, all of the buttons have a poppy feel to them, where the originals felt more mushy. I do have to say the almost 5′ long cord was nice.

Installation could not have been simpler. Windows 10 recognized the controller as a “usb gamepad” almost immediately, and that was that. Ten seconds later, I fired up MAME and played a quick round of Donkey Kong using the NES pad. The buttons felt a little “punchy,” and I suspect they might require breaking in.

Bottom line? You get what you pay for. There are much better USB game pads on the market for just a few dollars more, and if you’re a stickler for authenticity, companies like RetroUSB sell USB adapters for most vintage controllers.

I can only recommend these “free” controllers if, like me, you have half a dozen Raspberry Pi systems that you’re constantly reloading and testing. They’re okay for testing purposes or for letting the kids play with, but real gamers will want a real game pad pretty quickly after using one of these.

Console Video Games, Raspberry Pi

Old Skool NES Raspberry Pi Case

Last year, Nintendo released the NES Classic Edition. It was a game console that looked like a tiny version of the original Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) from the 80s. It had 30 built-in games and cost $59.95. Nintendo woefully underestimated demand for the console. Stores couldn’t keep them in stock, and when they did hit shelves, scalpers scooped them up and resold them online for huge profits. And then, with thousands of potential customers begging Nintendo to ramp up production, the company confusingly cancelled the product instead.

This led lots of techie people to roll their own solutions, the most common of which was to install emulators on a Raspberry Pi (which made my list of NES Classic alternatives and which I wrote installation instructions for). It’s a nifty and inexpensive solution, but physically it’s missing the nostalgia form factor.

Enter the “NES inspired” Raspberry Pi case by Old Skool Entertainment System.

Not shaped exactly like an original NES, the Old Skool Entertainment System is the perfect shape for a Raspberry Pi. The case, which was designed to hold a Pi 3, 2 and B+, splits apart at the middle and includes four screws that goes up from the bottom into the top while holding the Pi in place.

Like any good case, there are openings that line up with all the Pi’s ports, so you won’t need to remove the case to access anything on the Pi. The front flips open to provide access to the Pi’s USB ports. While I appreciate the throwback to the original NES design, this does mean that all your USB cables will be routed out the front of the case. If you have an Ethernet cable running to your Pi, the lid will always be in the up position.

The case currently sells for $20 on Amazon and is available for Prime shipping, but there’s one thing on the packaging that worries me:

The absolute worst thing you can do when making a third-party product is mention Nintendo licenses by name. Claiming that your case was merely inspired by the original NES might be enough to skate past Nintendo’s lawyers, but mentioning characters by name and including instructions on how to download emulators and install ROMs is usually enough to draw the ire of suits. Hopefully when (not if) Nintendo’s lawyers come calling, all Old Skool will have to do is change their packaging, and not pull their case completely off the market.

So yeah, I like it. It’s no custom Commodore 1541 Raspberry Pi case, but it’s close.

Articles, Console Video Games, Raspberry Pi

A Guide to (Many) NES Alternatives

Big Lots is already consolidating their Halloween shelves to make room for incoming Christmas-themed items. (Yes, in September.) One hot item for retrogamers this holiday season will be Nintendo’s official NES Classic Edition, a miniature version of the classic Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) that comes with 30 games built-in and goes on sale on November 11, 2016.. If the last video game system you owned was an original NES, you may not be familiar with all the ways you can play those old NES games, which vary greatly in both quality and price.

In this post I’ll be discussing all of the methods I’m familiar with when it comes to playing old NES games: original hardware, emulation, Famiclones, FPGAs, plus a couple of systems that don’t fall into any of those categories. For many of you, you are excused — come back tomorrow!

ORIGINAL HARDWARE

Nintendo originally introduced the NES to North Americans in October of 1985. It was the holiday hit of the season, and if you are still reading, it’s possible you spent the following year (along with millions of other people) playing Super Mario Bros., Duck Hunt, and other classic early Nintendo titles.

Millions of NES units have survived the test of time, and it is still possible to pick them up today in video game stores and on Craigslist. The one part most prone to fail are the internal pins where cartridges connect. If the cartridge doesn’t make a good connection, the screen will simply flash when the system is powered on. Replacement pins are available and sometimes they can be bent back into place, but just know if you are seeing these symptoms, the NES most likely needs some minor repair.

Additionally, the NES uses old school A/V (composite) video cables and only provides mono sound. The video signal looks great on old CRT (tube) televisions, but not so much on modern flat screen HDTVs. A later hardware revision solves the cartridge loading problem by moving the slot to the top, but only provides coax (cable) video output. Unfortunately, these “top loaders” are even more coveted by collectors, and the price reflects it.

Summary: While the original hardware provides a 100% accurate experience, expect to buy a few adapters to get this old system to connect to your modern television.

EMULATION

Emulators are programs that run on a computer (or tablet, or phone) that emulate the experience of playing old games. The key is “emulate” and not “simulate” — emulators are often very good if not great at emulating old games, however those looking for a pixel-perfect experience may find minor imperfections to squabble about.

The best thing about emulation is that it’s free. Emulators like FCEUX and NEStopia are free to download. Obtaining ROMs (software dumps of the original games) to play on the emulators is a gray area at best, although archives containing every known NES ROM are not difficult to find.

If emulation is free, why isn’t it the only (or preferred) solution? For starters, setting up most emulators takes more technical know-how than connecting a gaming system to a television. Some people prefer what I call the “living room experience” of inserting physical cartridges into a console and playing the games from their couch. You can simulate this experience by connecting a computer to your living room television. They even sell USB adapters that allow you to connect vintage NES controllers to your computer! These are obviously the exception to the norm. Most people play emulated NES games while sitting in from of their computer.

I would be remiss if I didn’t at least mention the Raspberry Pi, a $35 mini-computer that does a tremendous job of playing NES games through emulation. With HDMI output adding a USB joystick, you can be up and running in no time by following any of the easy-to-follow installation guides available through Google.

Summary: Not the most authentic NES experience, but definitely the free’est.

FAMICLONES

In Japan, the NES was known as the Famicom (short for “family computer”). Any unofficial system that plays NES games is called a Famiclone. There are three major categories of Famiclones and literally hundreds of different clones on the market, all of which have different games, features, and quality. The three major categories of Famiclones include the “All-in-One,” the cartridge-based Famiclone, and the Multi-system Famiclone.

The “All-in-One” Famiclones do not include a cartridge slot. These were really popular in flea markets about five years ago, advertising “10,000 games in 1” (and sometimes more). According to Wikipedia there were a total of 713 licensed NES games (826 if you include unlicensed games), To get 10,000 games, these developers cheat in many ways; some of the “games” are simply levels from other games, some of them are games with the graphics modified, and in the cheapest of these units, the menu simply repeats after 100 or so games. The build quality on these all-in-one systems are often shoddy (at best) and the emulation quality isn’t much better. Kids who have never seen an original NES game in their life may still complain about the quality.

Summary: Toys for kids. Fun until they break, which will be soon.

Cartridge-based Famiclone systems allow gamers to use original NES cartridges, but run their emulation from what has been dubbed a “Nintendo on a Chip” (NOAC). The problem with these systems is that they are a dime a dozen, and quality (both build and emulation) varies greatly. The NEX (released in 2005 by Messiah) drew great ire from classic gamers when they learned it played most games pretty well and a few poorly or not at all. Famiclones have mostly been replaced by multi game system Famiclones.

Summary: Tough to know what you’re getting until you get it.

Multi-systems, like the RetroN 5, have largely replaced the original Famiclones. The RetroN 5 has 5 cartridge slots that allow it to accept not only NES but Super Nintendo (SNES), Sega Genesis, and all the Gameboy (original, Color, and Advance) cartridges. The RetroN 5 includes HDMI video, supports cheat codes, and allows vintage controllers to be used. All of these features don’t come cheap, as the RetroN 5 currently sells for $180 on Amazon. It’s a little tough to categorize the RetroN 5 as technically under the hood it’s running an Android emulator, but without removing the case, it’s hard to tell. The older model (RetroN 3) along with other competitors like the Super Retro Trio and FC3 are also still available and cost much less. These systems are all better than generic Famiclones (and leaps and bounds beyond those cheap All-in-One alternatives), but they’re definitely not perfect.

Summary: The best of the Famiclones. It’s still emulation, but it’s better than older models.

FPGA

FPGA stands for Field Programmable Gate Array, and explaining how it’s different from emulation (and why that’s important) can be difficult. Here’s how someone explained it to me, and while it’s not 100% technically accurate, it helps clarify the difference.

Pretend the original NES was an abacus — one of those ancient devices that allowed you to perform math by sliding beads back and forth on a series of rails. An emulator would be like a series of memorized math facts — let’s say the single-digital multiplication table. We know 3×4 is 12 and 6×9 is 54 because we memorized those answers. Note that we don’t need any understanding of multiplication properties to provide these answers; we simply memorized them. If someone asks us what 12×13 is, we don’t know, because that wasn’t on our memorized chart. An FPGA is a chip that has been reprogrammed to perform like an abacus. It doesn’t just provide math facts it has memorized. Because it is acting as an abacus, it acts exactly how an abacus does.

If this doesn’t sound cheap, you’re right. My MiST FPGA computer cost roughly $250 (US). The cool thing about it is it can be programmed with cores to simulate lots of different 8-bit and 16-bit systems. It is also very accurate in the way it does this. The bad thing is, emulators are also pretty good at doing the same thing, and they are free. Lengthy, vitriolic arguments have taken place over which solution is better, and why.

For $250 you can do what I did; purchase a MiST FPGA and play all those old NES games in pure VGA glory. But wait; there’s more.

Last week, RetroUSB announced their all new AVS, an FPGA-based NES console. With FPGA guts, the company is promising 100% compatibility and accuracy. The HDMI connector outputs 720p video (perfect for modern televisions) and it uses the original NES controllers. It uses vintage NES cartridges, supports Game Genie and Pro Action Replay cheat codes, can simulate scan lines, and even connects to some sort of proprietary online scoreboard for tracking high scores. MSRP is $185, cheaper than a MiST and, is probably the best modern hardware implementation of an NES we’re likely to see (at least this week).

Summary: That person in your life who has a hundred NES cartridges and balks at watching movies on a non-HD television will own one of these.

MISCELLANEOUS

For completion’s sake I’ll mention the Analogue NT, a yet-to-be released NES console that combines original vintage NES chips with a new case, multiple video outputs, and some options for configuring and tweaking games. I won’t go into details because, with HDMI output, this unit will cost more than $600 including shipping.

Summary: A unique and expensive solution to playing NES games that nobody you know will ever own.

Finally, to bring things around full circle, there’s Nintendo’s own addition to this already huge market: the NES Classic Edition. Unlike most of the consoles mentioned above, the NES Classic Edition does not use cartridges, nor can it be expanded. It comes with 30 built-in games. The final list of games to be included is:

Balloon Fight, Bubble Bobble, Castlevania 1 and 2, Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr., Double Dragon II: The Revenge, Dr. Mario, Excitebike, Final Fantasy, Galaga, Ghosts’N Goblins, Gradius, Ice Climber, Kid Icarus, Kirby’s Adventure, Mario Bros., Mega Man 2, Metroid, Ninja Gaiden, Pac-Man, Punch-Out!!, StarTropics, Super C, Super Mario Bros. 1-3, Tecmo Bowl, The Legend of Zelda, and Zelda II: The Adventure of Link.

Many of these games are classics. If these are the only 30 games you want to play, you’re in luck! If there’s one NES game you want to play that’s not on this list, you’re out of luck.

Summary: Great solution for casual NES fans who want a taste of nostalgia.

SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS

I’ve presented a ton of options, solutions and choices in this article for playing NES games. Which one is right for you?

– Emulation ($0): If you’re technically minded and haven’t done so already, give emulation a chance. Along with the NES, almost every 32-bit and earlier video game console (and computer) has been emulated. A $35 Raspberry Pi combined with a USB joystick and an afternoon’s worth of configuration is worth the investment!

– NES Classic Edition ($59.95): If you’re looking for a living room solution that plays some common NES games and you don’t own any NES cartridges (nor do you plan on buying any), the NES Classic Edition would be a nice solution, especially for those with little kids.

– RetroUSB AVS ($185): If you’re looking for a modern replacement for the original NES, based on what I have read, I believe this is the best solution. Keep in mind that $185 doesn’t include any game cartridges, but if you’re willing to drop almost $200 on one of these, I suspect you may already own some.

– RetroN 5 ($180): Inside this is running an Android emulator, so as far as quality goes you would get the same from a $35 Raspberry Pi. What you do get is the ability to use vintage joysticks and vintage cartridges. If I were only interested in playing NES games I would go with the RetroUSB AVS listed above; if I also wanted to play Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis, and Gameboy games and had limited space to dedicated to consoles in my game room, I’d consider the RetroN 5.

– Original NES ($100+): Prices go up around the holidays, and based on what I’ve seen on my local Craigslist, are already beginning to do so. An original NES won’t look great on a modern flatscreen television, and may require some minor repairs if someone hasn’t already refurbished it. If you’re not dying to own an original piece of history, there are better options.

– Cheap Famiclones ($20-?): You get what you pay for.
– Analogue NT ($500-$600): I like the $400-cheaper Retro AVS better.

Whatever solution you pick, I hope your children (or you) look like this.

Console Video Games

Wii-P-R

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Over the holiday weekend Susan and I stopped by a thrift store, where I ran across this disgustingly dirty Nintendo Wii for $20. Usually when I find a cheap Wii for sale it means the optical (DVD) drive has died, but I had other plans for one so I decided to take a gamble. The bundle had a power supply, Wiibar, and video cable, but no Wiimotes.

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Ten minutes later after a quick coating of Fantastik, we were in business.

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With everything connected (and a borrowed Wiimote from the other Wii) I fired it up with my fingers crossed.

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So, it booted right up. You can see the previous owner had Netflix installed and a few other apps. The next test was to insert a game and see if the internal optical drive was any good or not.

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No dice. The error reads, “An error has occurred. Press the Eject Button and remove the disc, then turn the Wii console off and refer to the Wii Operations Manual for help troubleshooting.”

This is unfortunately a common fate for Nintendo Wii consoles. The internal optical drive dies, and when it does, most people toss them into the trash. Nintendo will (or at least would) replace the internal drive for $90, but you can buy refurbished consoles at GameStop for $60, so replacing the drive doesn’t make much sense. In some cases it is possible to replace only the drive’s lens, but… good luck with that operation.

There is an alternative, however — the soft mod. This only works on the original-style Wii (not the newer “Wii-Mini”). I modded my first Wii in 2010 and things have only got easier since then. Once the machine is soft modded, you’ll be able to do all sorts of cool things — including loading game ISOs from a connected USB hard drive.

But first, a hurdle. The original owner had set a security PIN code, which prevented me from formatting the Wii and/or modifying it. I tried “1111” and “1234” with no luck before resorting to Google. The first website I found, Nintendo’s, said they could reset it for 50 cents. Seriously. Nintendo wants 50 cents for the reset code! Fortunately, the second link Google returned was to this page, which will generate a parental control password reset code for you (for free). With the console unlocked, I was able to format the machine and move forward.

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With the machine formatted, I grabbed an SD card and followed the instructions on this page. Unlocking the Wii took about 5-10 minutes, once I had everything downloaded. Note that for the original style Wii, as long as the firmware isn’t too new, you don’t need to open the unit to mod it. It’s all done through a package which installs from the SD card slot. Clever!

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And that’s really all there is to it. I went into more detail in this post from 2010, but now that the Wii has been modded it can read games directly from an external USB hard drive. I used Wii Backup Manager to backup my original Wii games. What you will do is connect an external USB hard drive to your PC, insert a Wii disc into your PC’s DVD drive, and use Wii Backup Manager to copy your games (one at a time) over to the external hard drive. Once you have finished, you connect the USB drive to the Wii’s USB port and with help from another program (I use USBLoaderGX), you can play your Wii games right off the external hard drive. No optical drive or discs required!

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I know that this workaround is used more for piracy than anything else, but as I mentioned on that previous entry I wrote, this was a great way for me to let my kids play the Wii without having to worry about them scratching up my original games. Now, six years later, I’ve found another use for it — an inexpensive way to breath life back into a Nintendo Wii someone else had tossed away.

Arcades/Arcade Games, Console Video Games

2015 Track and Field Arcade Championships

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I like being involved in weird and unusual things. Sometimes I get involved in weird and unusual things by saying “sure” when I get invited to such things. Last week my friend Dean invited me to attend the inaugural Track and Field World Championships at a local private arcade. Dean told me a few well known competitors would be flying in from California for the event. He also told me that local video wizard Drew Stone would be documenting the tournament, and wanted to know if I would provide audio commentary for the proceedings and interview the competitors.

I said “sure,” which is how I ended up attending the 2084 Arcade in Beggs, Oklahoma with a wireless microphone system threaded through my shirt while watching some of the best Track and Field competitors in the world battle it out on the vintage game.

Track and Field is a classic arcade game, released by Konami in 1983. The game’s unique controls and social competition aspect (allowing up to four players to compete against one another) were enough to make it a good game, but the hype surrounding the 1984 Olympics (which took place in Los Angeles, California) certainly didn’t hurt the game’s popularity.

Each competitor in Track and Field must use three buttons to play the game. There are two RUN buttons that must be hit repetitively to propel your feet in the running events, and a third JUMP/THROW button that does just that. Not only does the game require quick reflexes and pixel-point accuracy, but also maniacally fast fingers (with tough forearms to match). While many classic arcade games only require good hand/eye coordination, Track and Field adds those RUN buttons to the mix. Literally, the faster you can mash those buttons, the faster your little man goes.

And Hector “FLY” Rodriguez is the fastest of the fast, although technically speaking he “flicks” the buttons instead of mashing them, as do most of the world’s top players. In 2008 Hector scored 95,350 on the game, breaking the former world record of 95,040 which was held by Kelly Kobashigawa for 23 years.

But Hector was not the only competitor in town. Jack Gale, also from California, arrived with his eye on the trophy. Gale is no stranger to winning — he is currently first in the world in games like Enduro Racer, Mad Crasher, and Vs. Hogan’s Alley, and holds (and has previously held) many others. Gale’s world record on Zoo Keeper stood for nearly twenty years.


Jack Gale and Hector Rodriguez discuss strategy outside the arcade as Mason looks on.

King of Kong did a disservice to the arcade community by prominently displaying the negative side of rivalry instead of the friendly competitive spirit I’ve witnessed at every single arcade competition I’ve attended. I’ve met several of the people featured in King of Kong (including Billy Mitchell) who have been nothing but polite and genuinely kind, not only to me but their other competitors. Anyone expecting anything less from a gaming competition (hosted in Oklahoma, no less) should be surprised. Rob Walker, one of the contestants and the owner of the 2084 arcade, cooked enough burgers and dogs to feed an army. My only complaint of the day was that so many people brought so many pops and drinks to share that there was no room in the ice chests for us to add our twelve pack. The vast majority of people I’ve met in this circle are generous and kind; in Oklahoma, doubly so.

(When some of the competitors noticed Mason taking an interest in the game, they began giving him tips and encouraging him to enter. While we all knew Mason’s chances of winning a tournament that included the world record holder were extremely slim, it was very nice for them to include him, a gesture that truly shows the real generosity and kindness of most arcade enthusiasts.)

With our bellies full of burgers and hot dogs, it was time for practice to begin. On any other day, everyone’s focus would have been on Walker’s immaculate collection of games… but not on this Saturday. On this Saturday, machines like Journey, Robotron, Joust, and Bubbles sat untouched as the contestants warmed up their chops on the three practice machines that had been moved into the center of the arcade.

As the sun went down, the competition lit up as nine hopeful competitors entered the qualifying round. Each qualifying round was played on the same machine. The machine had two cameras mounted on it, one rebroadcasting the screen to a large flat screen television mounted behind the player and another one recording each player’s face. Additional action was recorded by two or three additional cameras. All of this wizardry was concocted and coordinated by local television media Drew Stone.

After the prelims, the field was narrowed to five finalists: world record holder Hector Rodriguez, Jack Gale, event co-organizors Dean (owner of Arcade Sales and Rentals) and Rob, and Rob’s son Brad. Less than 10,000 points separated the top five scores.

Although Mason did not advance to the finals, he had another job to perform. Mason randomly picked each finalist’s name from a plate to determine the final order.

Although the competition was always friendly, it was also intense as each player flicked, tapped, and occasionally bashed the buttons as furiously as possible in order to propel their runners toward the finish line. Each competitor pulled out every trick they knew in order to obtain as many bonuses as possible. With gamers this evenly matched, a winning score could come down to earning a single 1,000 point bonus.

By the end of the night we were all hot, sweaty, tired, and having a blast. Dean and I, with our wireless microphones attached to our lapels, gave commentary on each player’s performance as they pushed their scores higher and higher. And while every competitor did awesome, at the end only one person could be the ultimate winner.

At the end of the night, pictures of the competitors were taken surrounding the Track and Field machines. The machine used in the competition along with a few additional Track and Field marquees were autographed. Trophies, leftover from the original Classic Video Game Tournaments in the 1980s, were obtained and distributed to the winners.

Oh, and speaking of winners, at the end of the night the points were tallied and the winner…

…will be revealed when the video is released. Sorry, I’ve been sworn to secrecy!

Thanks to all the competitors and spectators who attended the event, and special thanks to Dean and Rob for organizing the event in Rob’s wonderful private arcade, and Hector and Jack for coming all the way from California to attend the event. Talks are already underway in regards to a bigger event next year. Mason is hoping they do; he spent the morning practicing…

PS: If you want to hear me talk about the Commodore 64 version of Track and Field, I covered it a few months ago on my C64 game podcast, Sprite Castle.

Console Video Games, Main

Happy 30th Birthday, Super Mario Bros!

I can tell you everybody I knew who had a Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in 1985: my neighbor Doug, my buddy Jason’s little brother Adam, my buddy Jeff’s aunt and uncle, and not long after that, Jeff’s family. At each one of those houses I remember playing Super Mario Bros.

I got my Commodore 64 in 1985, the best game playing home computer at the time. The Commodore 64 had great sound, great graphics, and many, many great games… but it didn’t have Super Mario Bros., something some of my Nintendo-owning friends reminded me of on more than one occasion.

Like all platform games, the goal of Super Mario Bros. is to move the player’s character — in this game, Mario or his brother Luigi — from the beginning of the level to the end of the level without getting him killed. There are a few ways to get killed: you can run into an enemy, fall through a pit, or get shot. Beating the first level isn’t that difficult and most people were able to master it pretty quickly.

Then you started finding the secrets.

While most of the pipes were simply part of the level’s structure, there were a few you could enter that led to secret rooms filled with coins! The mushrooms made you big! The flowers gave you the ability to shoot fireballs! 100 coins gave you an extra life!

Those weren’t even the good secrets. On the game’s second level, my neighbor showed me how you could trap a turtle and jump on him indefinitely, giving you hundreds of extra lives. There were hidden bricks; secrets, hidden within the levels that did magical things. Before long the game wasn’t about getting from the beginning of the level to the end at all — it was about finding all the little secrets hidden within. This was long before secrets spread at the speed of light across the internet — you either read them in a book or a magazine, learned them from a friend, or discovered them on your own.

Eventually, we Commodore owners did get our own Super Mario Bros. — kind of. In 1987 Rainbow Arts released The Great Giana Sisters (itself a close copy of Super Mario Bros.), which was soon modified to look like Super Mario Bros. As far as games go it was pretty good, but it wasn’t the Nintendo version.

There aren’t a lot of pack-in games that people have such fond memories of. Few people point to Combat or Pole Position II as their favorite games for the Atari 2600 or 7800 (respectively), but Super Mario Bros. was an instant classic — so much so that, 30 years later, here I am still writing about it. (Find someone who wrote 500 words about Pole Position II on its 30th anniversary, I dare ya.) Not only did it launch Nintendo into the stratosphere, but it created a long running series of games that continues today and turned Mario into one of the most iconic video game characters of all time. Nobody you know dressed up as Pole Position II for Halloween last year.

Not only did Super Mario Bros. add the words Goomba, Koopa Troopa, Piranha Plant and Hammer Brother to the vocabulary of children everywhere, but it permanently raised the bar of video games. No longer were we content with safely guiding characters from Point A to Point B. Not only did we want more out of our games; suddenly, we expected it.

Happy 30th birthday, Super Mario Bros. May you eat a thousand magic mushrooms and still be able to fit into your overalls.

Commodore 64, Console Video Games

Ten Games You Should Try To Beat

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A friend of mine recently asked me to name five games I would recommend playing all the way through from beginning to end. There are tons of modern games (The Last of Us, Halo, Portal) that have great story lines, but I wanted to go somewhat old school with my list. I also couldn’t possibly limit myself to just five, so instead here are ten games I recommend modern gamers go back and play through from beginning to end. Note that this is different than my list of games that will always stick with me; the games on this post were picked for their memorable story lines and the rewards that come with completing them.

Presented roughly chronological, let’s start at the beginning.

01. Adventureland (Scott Adams, 1978)

It all begins with Adventureland. From Wikipedia:

“Adventureland is an early, formative work of interactive fiction. It was written by Scott Adams, and was not only the first text adventure game to be commercially published and sold for the then-new home computers, but was the first commercially available adventure game of any kind for use on the systems.”

Why you should beat it: Quite simply, because this is where it all began. All roads to computer gaming eventually lead back to these original text adventures. There are many, many text adventures to choose from, including all the great ones released by Infocom, but to really understand where it all began, you should play Adventureland.

When you’re done reading the list, you can play Adventureland online right here.

Although the original was text only, later releases added static pictures for players to look at.

02. Adventure (Atari 2600, 1980)

The Atari 2600’s hardware was somewhat designed with Pong in mind. Pong contains two players (“paddles”), a ball, and a background (in Pong’s case, a simple vertical line dividing the screen). Most of the system’s early games like Combat and Outlaw were technical riffs on this design. Programmers weren’t trying to figure out how to create an adventure game for the Atari 2600 back then — they were all trying to figure out how to make working games using the console’s limited resources. Most of the system’s early games (including the ones I just mentioned) took up 2k of ROM each. That’s way less information than the words in this article.

Inspired by Colossal Cave (the original text adventure), Warren Robinett decided to create an an adventure — unoriginally titled Adventure — for the Atari 2600. He used the Atari’s backgrounds for the mazes, the two “player” sprites for monsters, the “ball” as the player’s avatar, and the “bullets” for additional maze features. He crammed all of this into 4k.

In retrospect Adventure looks incredibly simple and archaic; at the time of its release, it was heralded as imaginative and groundbreaking. According to Wikipedia:

Atari’s Adventure sold one million copies, making it the seventh best selling Atari 2600 game in history. As the first action-adventure video game and first console fantasy game, Adventure established its namesake genres on video game consoles. In addition to being the first graphical adventure game on the Atari 2600 console, it was the first video game to contain a widely known Easter egg, and the first to allow a player to use multiple, portable, on-screen items. The game was also the first to use a fog of war effect in its catacombs, which obscures most of the playing area except for the player’s immediate surroundings. The game has been voted the best Atari 2600 cartridge in numerous polls, and has been noted as a significant step in the advancement of home video games. GamePro ranked it as the 28th most important video game of all time in 2007. In 2010, 1up.com listed it as one of the most important games ever made in its “The Essential 50″ feature.” (Link)

Why you should beat it: Because Adventure was first, and for so, so many game developers, this was the first adventure game they ever played. With 4,096 bytes of code, a few blocky blocks and a dragon that looked like a duck, Adventure showed gamers what video games could be — an adventure.

03. Karateka (Apple II, 1984)

Originally released for the Apple II but quickly ported to other home computer systems, in Karateka players must punch and kick their way through a long line of opponents in order to rescue Princess Mariko, who is being held prisoner by Akuma in his castle. At the time of its release, Karateka was championed for its fluid animation and cinematic experience.

Few martial arts games of the 1980s had plots. The plot of Karate Champ is “keep winning tournaments,” while the plot of Kung Fu Master is “keep punching people until you save Sylvia.” Karateka was different though, and was presented like a mini movie complete with cut scenes and jumps in location as parts of the plot were revealed. When I saw Princess Mariko slump down in her cell for the first time, man, I knew I had to save her.

Karateka also features multiple enemies that can kill you with a single blow, including deadly portcullis and, ultimately, Princess Mariko. There is no saving your game, no bonus lives, and no continuing. In Karateka dead means dead — no happy ending for you.

Why you should beat it: Because both in life and in Karateka, you only get one chance. This game taught me that video games could be tough, fair, and rewarding all at the same time. From finishing off a tough enemy with a triple kick-kick-kick combo to punching Akuma’s bird out of the air in mid-flight, the whole game just seems fun. And for most first time players, the game ends with you being insta-killed, causing them to slap their foreheads and play through the entire game again to rescue the princess. Just like real life, sometimes 99% isn’t enough for a woman.

04. Bard’s Tale III (Interplay/Electronic Arts, 1988)

Wizardry (released by Sir-Tech in 1981) is cited as one of the first D&D-style games to be released for home computers. According to Wikipedia it was the first true party-based role-playing video game, the first dungeon crawl, and the first to feature color graphics. I loved Wizardry, but it wasn’t perfect. Soon, other games inspired by Wizardry came along, improving some of the original’s shortcomings. One of those was Bard’s Tale, released by Interplay and Electronic Arts in 1985. This was followed by Bard’s Tale II in 1986 and what I consider to be the best game in the series, Bard’s Tale III in 1988.

While Wizardry mostly limited players to multiple levels of the same dungeon and Bard’s Tale introduced us to multiple dungeons in the land of Skara Brae, Bard’s Tale III had players travelling to multiple worlds, parallel dimensions, and ultimately through time. It combined the dungeon-crawl layout of the previous games with the ability to enter short parser-based commands in order to handle certain objects.

Why you should beat it: Not only does Bard’s Tale III have a great story that takes place in great locations, but to me it’s the epitome of first-person old-school dungeon crawlers (Ultima be damned). I love this game and has dreamed about wandering around Skara Brae at night, dealing with wandering Wights and Ice Giants. The pixel-drawn animations are charming, the music is creative, and the whole game is enormously rewarding. None of that stupid grinding levels for the sake of grinding levels here (unless you’re starting with a fresh party). Instead it’s all about quest after quest after quest.

05. King’s Quest (Sierra Online, 1984)

King’s Quest holds the title of “first 3D graphical adventure game,” although the definition of 3D as it applies to video games has changed throughout the years. King’s Quest was called 3D because Sir Graham, the protagonist, could move both up and down as well as left and right and could walk behind objects as well as in front of them. It’s a far cry from Oculus Rift, I’ll give you that, but at the time it was still pretty amazing.

King’s Quest was designed to show of the graphic and sound capabilities of IBM’s first foray into home computing, the PCjr. The PCjr launched for $1,269 ($3,000, adjusted for inflation); for that you got 128KB of RAM, a horrible chiclet keyboard, no mouse, and no monitor. (A complete system with a few sensible upgrades brought the price closer to $1,500.) Prior to its release it was predicted that the PCjr would put all other home computing companies out of business, but that didn’t happen. Instead the PCjr was discontinued after three years, after having sold only 500,000 units.

Despite the PCjr itself which is viewed as a flop, the greatest thing to come out of its release was a new line of games made specifically for it. Sierra On-Line was paid in advance to develop a launch title that would show off the PCjr’s capabilities (including its 16 color mode and three voice sound chip, provided by Texas Instruments). That game ended up being King’s Quest.

King’s Quest was the first point-and-click game, a genre that became very popular in the 80s and 90s and died off as other interfaces took favor. In these games you use your computer’s mouse to click on the screen, causing your character to walk to that spot. (Again, I realize that’s not particularly groundbreaking today.) For computer owners without a mouse, you could still control the game using the keyboard’s directional arrow keys. This control scheme was combined with a simple parser that allowed players to interact with this new graphical environment. To pick up a rock you can’t just type “GET ROCK” as you’ll be greeted with “You’re not standing close enough to the rock.” You have to actually stand near things to interact with them.

The plot of King’s Quest is simple and involves gathering three treasures hidden throughout the land. You’ll have to solve small puzzles to retrieve them. As a kid, I struggled with some of the puzzles; as an adult, you’ll struggle with the interface as you’ll constantly be trying to figure out what you can do and what you can’t do.

Why you should beat it: King’s Quest isn’t the best point-and-click adventure of all time, and if you like this style of game there are many better ones you should try including Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, Sam and Max hit the Road, Full Cycle and The Dig. Sierra also released several other series of Quest games including Space Quest, Police Quest, and Hero’s Quest. That being said, it’s always fun to explore the roots of gaming. Better games came from companies like Sierra On-Line’s radical thinking and willingness to throw things to the proverbial castle wall to see what would stick. I found defeating King’s Quest a rewarding experience — and if you do too you’ll be excited to know that not only was the game later remade with better graphics, but there are also seven official sequels which will keep you busy for a long time to come.

06. Another World (Delphine Software, 1991)

In half an hour, Another World manages to tell a complete story. It does this without any spoken or written dialog and with no additional information other than the game presented on the screen. Of course it doesn’t need to show your health information because if anything touches you in this game, you instantly die.

Another World begins with a video showing Lester Knight Chaykin’s particle accelerator being struck by lightning. Even though as we watch the action unfold we know what’s about to happen before Lester does, the moment he is zapped away into the alternate universe the game takes place in is still jarring. The transition from introduction to gameplay is seamless; you will find yourself suddenly controlling the action you were just previously watching. (If you don’t, you will soon find Lester drowning…)

Why you should beat it: The polygon style of graphics used in Another World were very unique at the time, although I suspect many of the techniques invented for this game live on in modern gaming. Even if it didn’t have a groundbreaking art and storytelling style — which it does — it would still be a great game.

I’ll be honest with you: this game gets super hard toward the end and the odds of you beating it are pretty low. If you aren’t compelled to play this game, or don’t get very far after trying, you should at least watch the entire playthrough below on YouTube. It’s 23 minutes long and will spoil the ending for you, but it’s almost as enjoyable to watch as it is to play.

07. Maniac Mansion (Lucasfilm Games, 1987)

By the time Lucasfilm Games had entered the ring, point-and-click adventures had dropped manual parsers and were completely point-and-click games. While some gamers didn’t like losing the control the parser provided, being able to select verbs from a menu and objects from the screen took some of the guesswork out of “what am I supposed to do here” problems gamers previously experienced with these games.

Maniac Mansion introduced a few new ideas to the genre, including the ability to switch between multiple characters in multiple locations in order to solve puzzles, but more than that, it was funny. Really, really funny. I grew up with the Commodore 64 version, although the DOS version is also very good and playable. Some of the 16-bit version like the Amiga don’t look “right” to me. I suppose it comes down to what you’re used to.

Why you should beat it: Because you kind of need to play this one before playing the equally funny Day of the Tentacle. And because no other game on this list allows you to put a hamster in a microwave.

08. The Incredible Machine (Sierra On-Line, 1992)

While many games are about action and strategy, The Incredible Machine is all about puzzle-solving. On each of the game’s 84 levels, you’ll be presented with a puzzle and some tools, and it’s up to you to come up with some sort of Rube Goldberg device in order to complete the level’s goal. Some of the goals are simple (“Pop the balloons”) while others are more complex. On each level you’ll be given some combination of tools to deal with: pulleys, ropes, belts, gears, ramps, scissors, and so on. Many of these tools can be combined to make more complex machines. Guns can be made to fire by connecting their triggers to objects using ropes, for example. Little “motors” (hamster on treadmills) can be started by hitting their cage. All of the tools can be “flipped” left-to-right to modify their actions. For many levels there are often obvious and intended solutions, but you don’t have to solve them that way.

The first 20 levels are “tutorial levels” that pretty much tell you how to solve them. After that, the difficulty ramps up and you are on your own. You’ll spend half your time trying to come up with workable solutions using the few tools you’re given for each level, and the other half trying to make those things work. It’s a fun kind of problem-solving.

The game also comes with a free-form editor mode that allows you to create wacky machines with no restrictions. The Incredible Machine has two direct sequels as well as another similar line of games (The Incredible Toon Machine). Another line of Incredible Machine games (“Contraptions”) were released in the early 00s, and in 2011 the game was added to Apple’s App Store although it has since been retired.

Why you should beat it: Because it’s a game that can be both frustrating and fun at the same time, something that many modern games forget is possible. If you enjoy physics-style games like Crayon Physics, you should check this out. I don’t have to ask you to beat this one; once you get started, you’ll just want to.

09. Fallout (Interplay, 1997)

There were a lot of 8-bit games that tried to recreate post-apocalyptic worlds, but few did it better than Wasteland. Another Interplay/Electronic Arts teaming, Wasteland takes place generations after a nuclear holocaust. While the game is highly revered among classic gamers, for whatever reason the relationship between Interplay and Electronic Arts soured; the Wasteland connection was removed from EA’s planned sequel (Fountain of Dreams), and Interplay’s sequel (Meantime) was cancelled. Even through Interplay no longer retained the rights to Wasteland, ten years later in 1997 they released their own “spiritual” sequel: Fallout.

Although the setting is the same between the two games, Fallout is presented with a more modern interface. Although most of the game’s events play out in real time, combat remains turn based. The main plot of Fallout revolves around the search for water, although players will experience many side plots and tasks along the way. Despite the game’s gritty and bleak setting, Interplay injected the story with tons of humor.

Why you should beat it: Fallout was named “RPG of the Year” by GameSpot in 1997 and in 1988 by Computer Gaming World. PC Gamer once named it the fourth best PC game of all time. Artwork from the game is on display as part of the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s “The Art of Video Games” exhibition.

Fallout is one of the best computer role playing games ever released, period. In 2014 a fan-made sequel to Wasteland was finally released. It’s really good, and in fact the games interface is better than Fallout’s, but Fallout is such a great game that I stuck with it. But if you like it then yeah, definitely check out Wasteland 2 too.

10. Hotline Miami (Dennaton Games, 2012)

Hotline Miami (the newest game on my list by 15 years) takes place in 1989 and is presented in a top-down retro style. After receiving a somewhat cryptic message on your answering machine, as the first chapter begins you will decide what kind of mask to don (rooster, owl, tiger, pig, or horse, each with its own advantages) before walking into an enemy’s building and single-handedly massacring dozens of enemies. Some of them you will knock to the ground and bash their brains in mercilessly with a crowbar or a baseball bat before obtaining an Uzi or a shotgun and really getting the party started.

Throughout the game you’ll discover things are not all as they seem. Your senses will be thrown off by minor changes in levels and items coming and going. You’ll also get killed. A lot. A lot lot lot. Fortunately each level restarts immediately after your demise. Going in with guns blazing didn’t work? Try hiding around a corner with a bat and see if that doesn’t do the trick. Line of sight is important in this game.

The story itself is unsettling. Just when things don’t make sense, they’ll begin to, only to get more confusing again. There’s no point in trying to explain Hotline Miami. I played this game for hours a night every night for a week or two before beating it. It wasn’t until the very end that I understood the entire plot. At least I think I did.

Why you should beat it: Hotline Miami moves fast, plays fast, and gets weird fast. Figuring out how to beat each level is so much fun that you’ll quickly lose track of how many hundreds of lives you’ve violently taken. Which is okay when you’re the good guy, right? At least I think you’re the good guy. The game’s story is good, but more than that it goes to show how effective old school graphics and gameplay can be when done right. Also, Hotline Miami 2 was released last month.

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The following games came up while I was brainstorming but eventually fell off the list. They’re all great games and rewarding to play through in their own right: Prince of Persia, Oregon Trail, Ikaruga, Double Dragon, and countless others.

Now it’s your turn. What games do YOU think people need to play through? New or old, doesn’t matter — let’s hear your additions to the list!