And here at the List we all wish our beloved creator of Mario, Link, Pikmin and of course, Wii Music Shigeru Miyamoto a truly wonderful birthday. Just think: By the time the next presidential election rolls around the guy will actually turn 64!
Why thank you so much Nintendo for giving gamers two Halloween worthy downloads to choose from today! Unfortunately neither of them are very good but hey…we sure appreciate the gesture. First up is Castlevania: The Adventure which was originally released for the Game Boy way back in 1989. Simon Belmont’s Grandaddy Christopher leads the charge in this installment as the series takes its first (of many) dips into portable water. Too bad this one whiffs it pretty hard as the end result is horrifying for all the wrong reasons. Aside from an excellent soundtrack, Adventure doesn’t come close to matching the visual or control standards set by its home console cousins. As a curiosity, I’d say this game is worth tossing a couple of bucks at but really what you should be doing is downloading the Rebirth WiiWare remake from a couple of years back. Now THAT is some damn fine Castlevania gaming right there, buddy.
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Featuring an uncomfortable amount of K’s, King Koopa’s Kool Kartoons was a real thing that happened briefly in the early 90’s on local channels across Southern California. In it, some smelly old alcoholic dressed in a Bowser costume would violate his parole by hanging out with a bunch of kids, showing the little tikes cartoons and handing out Nintendo presents before taking them to his “warp zone”.
Hit the jump to check out the intro.
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Well that isn’t a very nice attitude to have now is it 8-Bit Vader? The truth is that me and my pals here at the List have been invited to help put the final nail in the coffin provide our old friends over at Nintendorks.net with our invaluable insight and expertise on all things Nintendo (and maybe even some other stuff) from now on. Now what does this mean for you my dear, faithful reader? Well…nothing really. We aren’t going anywhere and I’ll continue to update regularly until the police find my lifeless, nude corpse at my computer desk surrounded by empty bottles of discount I.P.A. You can look forward to the same high quality self indulgence that we’ve blessed the internet with these past few years only now under both the Shigeru’s List url and the legendary banner of Nintendorks. In fact, I’ll probably be cross posting all of the larger pieces such as news and reviews on both sites but keep the random little mini updates exclusive to my little baby here.
I know, I know. It all sounds too good to be true but please, try and contain yourself. You’re embarrassing us.
“Holy, Shi-moly, how can I get in on this sweet deal!?” I hear you scream at your computer monitor. Well, it’s fairly easy: If you’re a Club Nintendo member, simply pony up the first born male in your bloodline as a ritualistic sacrifice to Beelzebub any time before January 6th and wait, WHOA. Yeah I read that press release all wrong, my mistake. Actually what you have to do is buy one of these first party games: Paper Mario: Sticker Star, Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask, Art Academy: Lessons For Everyone!, Crosswords Plus or Style Savvy: Trendsetters, which are all available either now or very soon. As a result of your monetary donation, Nintendo will provide you with a code that allows you to download a modified NES rom of the original Donkey Kong (which includes the aforementioned “banned on Earth” pie-making level)! Now keep in mind the only way you’ll receive this password is by downloading one of these titles from the eShop rather than picking up a retail copy. Factor in the new SD card that you’ll most likely need as a result of the massive amount of memory these “full retail” games soak up and you’re looking at somewhere between $40 and $50 bucks to afford yourself the glory of playing this game for five minutes before shutting it off out of boredom. Of course if that sounds a bit steep, you could always go and grab your N64 out of the garage and throw in Donkey Kong 64. As traumatic of an experience as that game was, keep in mind that it still featured a perfect emulation of the actual arcade original Donkey Kong, pie factory included. What? You don’t want to talk about Donkey Kong 64? No, no, I understand, how thoughtless. Please forgive me.
Holy shit, is that Rogue from the X-Mans cartoon!? Yep. Wow, that’s pretty cool. In any case, I’d never heard the term “Nintenpendent” before I watched the special report above, but whatever that might entail certainly has me concerned.
Pretty much every review you’re going to read about Kirby’s 20th birthday compilation will begin with a direct comparison to Nintendo’s own anniversary treatment for their mustached mascot a couple of years ago. And for good reason: When the announcement was made that a special commemorative box would be released to coincide with the 25th birthday of the original Super Mario Bros., a lot of longtime fans (yours truly included) were understandably excited. But as the end result wound up being essentially an unchanged 20 year old rom (Super Mario All Stars from the SNES to be exact) slapped onto a disc and packed in with a flimsy at best scrapbook along with an anemic 13 track CD…well, pissed isn’t exactly the right word but you get the idea. Now with HAL laboratory celebrating the second decade mark for their little friend Kirby with such style, what once simply felt like a missed opportunity for Mario at this point feels like a legitimate insult.
HAL really did this thing right.
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When Howard Phillips left Nintendo in 1991, ten years after joining the company and becoming part of the team that steered it through the arcade crash and the ensuing launch and wild success of the NES, one of the things that went with him was Howard and Nester. The comic ran from the first issue of Nintendo Power through volume 25, skipping a couple along the way, and featured a cartoon version of Howard cleverly dispensing tips for popular games to readers in the form of humorous dialogue with the rambunctious and clueless Nester as they traipsed through various game worlds in the style of Captain N. Nester continued his adventures for a while alone after Howard literally rode off into the sunset in volume 25, as depicted above.
As it turns out, though, that wasn’t the REAL end of the story… READ MORE
R.I.P.
*Cough*
“Thank you all. Please be seated. *Ahem*. Ladies and gentlemen, like many of you here today I came across Nintendo Power at a very young age. For me personally, it was the third grade and I was eight years old when I first heard whispers of a magazine that was all about Nintendo and filled with maps, special codes and strategies. These rumors spread like wild fire across the black top during recess but that’s all they amounted to at first: Rumors. Some kid knew a guy from another school who’s brother supposedly had described some book he’d seen as having the small clay Mario you see beside me plastered across the cover. More words were spoken of free pull-out posters and comic strips as well as contests that gave away prizes like t-shirts, toys and most importantly: Nintendo Games. It all sounded too good to be true of course and these second hand (third and fourth even) stories were all I had to tide me over before the truth of the matter would finally be revealed to me. It was a cold, overcast October afternoon when this kid I knew opened his backpack to reveal the beautiful image of a grown man in full body armor holding the decapitated head of Dracula by his hair.
I was hooked.
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Artwork courtsey of some dude from the internet.
Because honestly, how many different ways to play the original Super Mario Bros. exist at this point? I guess more like how many times will I keep buying the same game over and over again. Let’s see, there’s the original NES cart, a graphically souped up version in All Stars for the SNES, the Wii’s Virtual Console, Super Mario Bros. DX for the GBC, the retro cart for the GBA and now a new home in the eShop for the 3DS. Actually SMB has been available for a little while now but this weekend Nintendo will be dropping the price and selling it at a loss for 3.99 (roughly 3.99 more than what ambassadors had to cough up). I’m not in any way trying to discourage you from downloading it of course. It’s just that if you aren’t already up to your short and curly’s in various copies of this game then sit back and let me tell you about a little company that I really like called Nin-ten-do.
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Survival horror.
Well, allergies have begun to kick my face’s ass fairly regularly these past few weeks which can mean only one thing: invasion Summer time is here. And as much as I love to make seasonal playlists that usually consist of soft, sweet sounds from the 70’s, I also like to revisit certain video games that lend themselves perfectly to lazy afternoons spent drooling in front of the air conditioner. On this top 5 list that I’ve so lovingly compiled for you dear readers, some of my selections may feel like obvious choices given their settings and themes. But the primary asset required for inclusion was whether or not the game made me nostalgic for those glorious several weeks away from school, a controller in one hand and an ice cold Coca-Cola within reach of the other. As always, all of the games that made the cut are indeed playable on Wii resulting in chosen software that was made for the system, GameCube and anything on the Virtual Console.
So here we go boys and girls: I present to you our top 5 Nintendo games you should be playing before the Fall strikes back.
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Hank Chien, the plastic surgeon from Queens who famously knocked Billy Mitchell out of the top spot to nab the arcade Donkey Kong high score record for himself a while back has done it again. Topping his reigning high score to reclaim the title from himself, Chien hit 1,110,100 points and says he still has plenty more to earn before hitting the ceiling on his Donkey Kong skills:
“This was not a killscreen game. I died two screens shy of the killscreen so my score would have been a little higher, perhaps 1.12 million points. I had a spare man going into Level 21 and was mentally preparing to sacrifice it on the last barrel board and my game was over a few minutes later. That’s how Donkey Kong rolls sometimes.”
Yeah, yeah. Maybe try a little harder next time there, buddy.
That charger looks familiar.
The shot above that leaked this past week supposedly reveals Nintendo’s finalized design for their upcoming Wii U controller. There aren’t really any drastic changes or anything from what was originally displayed at last year’s E3 but some subtle alterations have been made here and there that will hopefully help some of you nerds out there stop pissing yourselves in your sleep. The most noticeable change is in the control sticks. No longer the same flat “nub” sliding pads that 3DS owners have become familiar with, the new analogue input more closely resembles the traditional sticks we’ve been using since the good old N64 days. Also, the start and select buttons have now been moved from under the screen to the right hand side and there’s a mysterious new square right under the cross pad that industry insiders are speculating houses a very important screw that will hold the entire gamepad together. If nothing in this opening paragraph has made you laugh, that’s because we’re talking serious business here.
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We aren’t responsible in any way for the work that went into this awesome video but I did stumble across it while browsing the internet today and if you didn’t know already: This site is all about sharing.
Just ignore the dipshit in the second half.
It will be mine. Oh yes...
I’ve been watching these limited to 500 Samus Aran action figures come and go on Ebay for about 10 years now. Sure, the sculpting isn’t really all that hot but it comes with a pretty sweet interchangeable head and what can I say? I’ve just always wanted one. There’s an auction currently going with the lowest price I’ve ever seen: A Buy it Now option for $114.99. So uh, if any of you dear readers are feeling…you know, uh…generous or somethin’. Just sayin’.
