Number of Unique NES Games

The NES, according to NintendoAge, has 678 licensed US games and 91 unlicensed games.  NintendoAge is a collector-oriented site, and it considers a unique cartridge as a game.  Of course, many of those cartridges have major and minor label variations.  Major variations include cartridges with old and new Nintendo Seals of Quality.  Minor variations include things like Rev-A or Rev-B on the box.

However, not all cartridges contain unique games.  Nintendo re-released Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!! as Punch-Out!! when their license to use Mike Tyson's name and likeness expired.  They removed the opening screen where there is an image of Mike Tyson with the caption "Mike Tyson is awaiting your challenge!", adjusted the title screen and replaced Mike Tyson in the game with Mr. Dream.  The game plays exactly the same.

If you owned Mike Tyson's Punch-Out and saw Punch-Out on a World of Nintendo M82 Display Demo machine, you might say "Hey, where is Mike Tyson?"  You would understand that both cartridges had the same game.  Similarly, if you were one of the lucky people who purchased Stadium Events, you would see little difference between it and World Class Track Meet.  The only difference between the three releases of Pac-Man, in software, is the copyright text on the title screen.  However, the Namco licensed release of Ms. Pac-Man is very different from the Tengen version.  The former is little more than an improvement on Namco's Pac-Man.  The latter has new mazes, more two player modes, a speed boost, more difficulty selections and a starting level selection.  The Namco version keeps all the action on one screen, but the Tengen version scrolls the screen.  Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade is the title for two very different games, both based on the movie, released by Ubi Soft and Taito.

No multi-cart game is a unique game unless it contains something substantially more than the standalone cartridges, and this requires more than a game selection menu. Maxi-15 is a good example of a multi-cart game that does have something unique.  While it contains fourteen games released by AVE or Color Dreams, Stakk'm was not released as a standalone cartridge.  The only way to play that game in the United States was to buy Maxi-15.  It was released in Taiwan as Poke Ball.  Additionally, while Sunday Funday: The Ride had been previously released as Menace Beach, Sunday Funday is a multi-cart that adds two additional programs.

One should still count games that use the same engine as unique even if little beyond the levels have been changed.  Thus the Adventures of Lolo 2 offers almost nothing beyond the Adventures of Lolo, but the levels are different.  Additionally, Crystal Mines and Exodus use the same engine but have different levels, as do Dudes with Attitude and Trolls on Treasure Island.

Some games had a very limited release.  Stadium Events was released very briefly and then recalled when Nintendo licensed the Power Pad from Bandai.  Flinstones: The Rescue of Dino and Hoppy may have been available only at Blockbuster Video as a rental, but this is debatable.  1,500 copies of Cheetamen II was discovered in a warehouse in 1996 and sold unofficially.  The game is as buggy as a prototype and cannot be finished but exists in numbers far exceeding any prototype.  There may only be 6,000 copies of Action 52, another very buggy collection of games from the same company.  So it appears that Active Enterprises was prepared to ship Cheetamen II to unwitting buyers as a last cash grab but business failure thwarted its plans.  Even though the NES was discontinued the year prior, it would be nine years before somebody else released a cartridge for it.  One can only row so far against the accepted wisdom.  However, unlike Nintendo World Championships 1990, all these games were made available to the public for purchase at some point in time.  NWC 1990 was only given to finalists of that particular contest and winners of a Nintendo Power Contest.  So NWC 1990 is not here or at NintendoAge.

So, according to NintendoAge, there were 678 licensed US NES games.  We have to subtract the following 8 to get to the true number of unique games :

- Pac-Man (Namco re-release)
- Punch-Out!! (re-release of MK's Punch-Out!!)
- World Class Track Meet (re-release of Stadium Events)
- Donkey Kong Classics
- Sesame Street ABC & 123
- Super Mario Bros/Duck Hunt
- Super Mario Bros/Duck Hunt/World Class Track Meet
- Super Spike V'Ball / Nintendo World Cup

Again, NintendoAge says there were 91 unlicensed games released in the US during the NES's lifespan. However, due to the above we have to subtract these 7:

- 6 in 1 by Myriad (Caltron 6-in-1 with a new label sloppily slapped over the old label)
- Bubble Bath Babes (The adult version of Mermaids of Atlantis)
- Gauntlet (licensed version exists)
- Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (licensed version exists)
- Impossible Mission II (AVE is same board in a different shell)
- Pac-Man (licensed versions exist)
- R.B.I. Baseball (licensed version exists)

Therefore 678 + 91 - 8 - 7 = 754.   While there are relatively few duplicates across the Nintendo library, there are many across the Atari 2600 library.  The number of unique games released during the Atari 2600's long 15-year official lifespan only numbered 436 as I had explained in this post : http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.com/2014/12/atari-2600-just-how-many-games.html.  Yet when you see the release lists for various companies it appears to be a lot more.

Famicom Expansion Audio Carts - Best Examples

During the Famicom's lifespan, 26 cartridge games were known to support expansion audio.  The Famicom directed its audio to cartridge port and games that did not use expansion audio would simply loop it back to the RF modulator.  The expansion audio that these 26 games would generate would intercept the internal audio and mix it with the expansion audio and send the combined signal to the RF modulator.  In addition, 75 Famicom Disk System games (4 of them unlicensed) are also known to use expansion audio generated in the FDS RAM Adapter.

Here is a list of all Famicom games known to use Expansion Audio : http://wiki.nesdev.com/w/index.php/List_of_games_with_expansion_audio

In this post, I identify the most accessible games for English speakers using each expansion audio chip and describe what needs to be done to play it.

Sunsoft 5B

Gimmick! - The original cart alone can go for $200 easily, however, there is at least one other more common Famicom cart (Gremlins 2) with a Sunsoft 5B chip, but obtaining one is something of the luck of the draw.  Additionally, one can make a donor NES cart with a Batman Return of the Joker and an AY-3-891x chip, or you can get a INL-ROM NES reproduction board with an AY chip on it.

Konami VRC-VII

Lagrange Point - This is the only game that uses the expansion sound capabilities found in this chip, which is exclusive to this game and Tiny Toons 2 Japanese version.  Tiny Toons 2 does not have an SRAM chip, battery or any of the passive components to mix the audio, so it would be a large undertaking to get it to work in a NES cart.  I am not sure whether the Largange Point board plus a pin converter would fit inside a NES cartridge shell because the game's board is very tall.  You may need an external pin converter.  Interest in this game has also increased substantially because of a full translation patch.

Nintendo MMC5

Just Breed - This is a large strategy RGB from Enix and one of the three games that use the expansion audio of the MMC5.  Because of its translation patch, it is by far the most accessible of those games.  The original cartridge can have its ROM replaced with a translated ROM burned onto an EPROM, some minor reworking will be required.  Because it uses Nintendo's MMC5 board, this can work with a reproduction cart in a NES.  The most suitable NES cart is Gemfire, but I suspect that any of the battery backed MMC5 boards will work with some minor reworking. Castlevania III and Laser Invasion will require the addition of an SRAM chip and a battery, not a beginner mod.

Konami VRC-VI

Akumajou Densetsu - This is the Japanese version of Castlevania III, and does not have so much Japanese text that it requires a ROM swap to enjoy it.  The Famicom board is small enough to fit inside a NES cartridge shell with a converter without difficulty.  Madara and Esper Dream 2, the other games that use the chip, do have translation patches.

Namcot 109/163

Rolling Thunder - Most Namcot 109/163 games with expansion sound are not very English friendly.  This game is basically the NES Tengen version with better sound.  Additionally, Namcot almost always used epoxy-bonded ROMs on their boards because they were cheap.  Unfortunately, this makes replacing these ROMs with translated ROMs on EPROMs very, very difficult.

NEC µPD7755C/µPD7756C & Mitsubishi M50805

The NEC ADPCM Speech chip was found in Jaleco's Japanese baseball games, virtually all of which were ported to the NES in the Bases Loaded series.  The chip stored and could play back voice samples on command.  Grab any one of them, games like Moero!! Pro Yakyuu are as common as they get in Japan, but realize its only a novelty.  Of course, the speech samples are in Japanese for the Famicom cartridge and English for Bases Loaded.  The NES versions had more PRG-ROM space to store the samples in ROM instead of on a special chip and used the NES's internal PCM channel to play them.  The Mitsubishi chip was found in Family Trainer 3: Aerobics Studio, which was similarly ported to the NES as Aerobics Studio.  Roll out your Power Pad for that one.

Famicom Disk System
FDS RAM Adapter + FDSStick
Read my review of this product for reasons why you should get one : http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.com/2015/07/the-fdsstick-compact-solution-to-your.html

See also my list here of games for the Famicom Disk System where I give instructions how to clean the saves, all are easily accessible to English speakers : http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.com/2015/06/cleaning-saved-information-from-famicom.html

Finally, I have generated a list of all Famicom and Famicom Disk System games that use expansion audio and were ported to the cartridge format :

Japanese Name	Expansion Sound Type	US Name
Gimmick!	Sunsoft 5B	Mr. Gimmick! (Europe/Scandanavia Release, US Proto)
Moe Pro! '90: Kandou-hen	D7756	Bases Loaded 3, Ryne Sandberg Plays
Moe Pro!: Saikyou-hen	D7756	Bases Loaded 4
Moero!! Pro Tennis	D7756	Rad Racket
Moero!! Pro Yakyuu	D7756	Bases Loaded
Moero!! Pro Yakyuu '88: Kettei Ban	D7756	Bases Loaded 2: The Second Season
Bio Miracle Bokutte Upa	Famicom Disk System	None (Japan Cartridge Release Only)
Doki Doki Panic	Famicom Disk System	Super Mario Bros. 2 (also Japan)
Dracula 2 - Noroi no Fuuin	Famicom Disk System	Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest
Egger Land	Famicom Disk System	The Adventures of Lolo (different levels)
Exciting Baseball	Famicom Disk System	Double Dribble
Famicom Golf - Japan Course	Famicom Disk System	Golf (different courses)
Famicom Golf - Japan Course Prize Card	Famicom Disk System	NES Open Tournament Golf
Famicom Golf - US Course	Famicom Disk System	Golf (different courses)
Famicom Golf - US Course Prize Card	Famicom Disk System	NES Open Tournament Golf
Gyruss	Famicom Disk System	Gyruss
Hao-kun no Fushigi na Tabi	Famicom Disk System	Mystery Quest
Hikari Shinwa: Parutena no Kagami	Famicom Disk System	Kid Icarus
Kaettekita Mario Bros.	Famicom Disk System	Mario Bros.
Link no Bouken: The Legend of Zelda 2	Famicom Disk System	Zelda II: The Adventure of Link
Metroid	Famicom Disk System	Metroid
Tobidase Daisakusen	Famicom Disk System	The 3-D Battles of the Worldrunner
Vs. Excitebike	Famicom Disk System	Excitebike
Zelda no Densetsu (Zelda)	Famicom Disk System	The Legend of Zelda (also Japan)
Family Trainer 3: Aerobics Studio	M50805	Dance Aerobics
Rolling Thunder	Namco 163	Rolling Thunder (Unlicensed Tengen Release)
Akumajou Densetsu	Konami VRC6	Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse

Swaps and Loads: Famicom Disk System Games Least Appreciated Development

The Famicom Disk System always had loading times for its games.  In fact, the Legend of Zelda was released as a launch title and used both sides of the disk.  The game required the user to flip the disk at a certain point and would load new data at certain times.  Over time, the loads and swaps became more frequent.  When you consider the major advantages of the FDS, namely the sound channel and no need for passwords, consider the tradeoffs over their cartridge releases in the form of disk swaps and load times.  Whether running a game off real disks, an disk emulator like FDSLOADR or the FDSStick or a NES emulator (Nestopia probably has the best FDS sound emulation), you will have to face these inconveniences.  Below let me give some examples of games that were ported to the NES and their loading and swapping requirements.

Zelda no Densetsu - The Hyrule Fantasy
Yume Koujou! Doki Doki Panic

These titles are the easiest to deal with when it comes to swaps and loads.  Both require you to swap to side B at the title screen.  Zelda will load each Underworld dungeon level as you enter it and the Overworld when you exit.  DDP will load each time you start a new world (but not a new level) and the incomplete ending.    Zelda saves to side B, but DDP saves to side A, requiring a swap when you want to save your game.  DDP also requires a swap to side A when you want to see the real ending.

Metroid
Palutena no Kagami

Metroid and Palutena require you to swap to side B after you start a game.  Metroid will load each of the five areas as you go up or down the elevators.  It will require you to swap back to side A for the ending and for saving.  Because Metroid saves to both sides of the disk, the swap instances take upwards of a minute.

Palutena has short loads before and after every boss palace level.  When entering Medusa's level, 4-1, you will have to swap to side A.  There is a final load after you defeat Medusa.

Akumajou Dracula

In all versions of this game, there is a load before every level.  The last level where Dracula is the boss has a second load between stages 17 and 18.  However, different versions of this game handle their swaps at different points in the game.  The same saves to side A.

In v1.0 and v1.1 of the game, you will swap to side B when you start the second level.  You swap back to side A after you beat Dracula to view the ending.  In v1.2, you will swap to side B when you start the first level.  When you reach stage 18 in v1.2, you will swap back to side A.  I believe that Konami was trying to give more experienced players a break in v1.2 by not requiring them to swap when they try to beat Dracula for the umpteenth time.

Legend of Zelda 2 - Link no Bouken
Dracula II: Noroi no Fuuin

These games win the prize for the most loads of any that were ported to the NES.  While both require you to swap to side B to start a game, they have many more loads.  The Legend of Zelda 2 has a load for each entrance to and exit from the eight towns and seven palaces.  Also, there is a load when you cross a land boundary.  There are four land boundaries in the game: Western Hyrule, Spectacle Rock,  Eastern Hyrule and Maze Island.  Finally, you must swap the disk to enter the Great Palace (the last palace) and there is a load for the ending but the disk swap does not occur until the credits roll.  The game mercifully lets you continue at the Great Palace if you lose all your lives (but not at previous Palaces), so you don't have to swap the disks again until you play a game from the main menu.

Similarly, Dracula II: Noroi no Fuuin has a load for every time you enter or exit one of the seven towns or the screen with one of the five Mansion entrances.  Even when you just want to walk on past the Mansion entrance, it is annoying because you have to put up with two loads!  If you get knocked back from a screen, you have to suffer through two loads.  If that was not bad enough, in the last half of the game there are frequent loads and swaps.  To give you an exact description of the loads and swaps, here is a plan of the last part of the game and the areas you must visit to complete the game in an efficient manner :

Town of Ondol - > Deborah Cliff - > Bodley Mansion - > Uta Lower Road 1 & 2 - > Debious Woods - > Joma Marsh 1 - > Laruba Mansion -> Joma Marsh 1 -> Debious Woods -> Uta Lower Road 1 & 2 -> Bodley Mansion -> Wicked Ditch -> Town of Doina -> North Bridge -> Dora Woods -> Town of Yomi -> Vrad Graveyard -> West Bridge -> Castlevania -> Ending -> Title Screen

 -> Loading
 -> Loading and Swap to Side A
 -> Loading and Swap to Side B

Before this sequence, you had only one swap to side B when you started a game.  There are nine loads and five disk swaps in a somewhat short period of the game map!  No wonder why even Japanese gamers appear to rate this game substantially lower than its predecessor or its sequel!

The Ethics of the Reproduction Cartridge

Reproduction cartridges are, in many cases, illegal.  They constitute a copyright violation because they contain an unauthorized copy or derivative work and often can constitute trademark infringement.  For many people, that would be the end of the discussion regarding the ethics of making unauthorized reproduction cartridges.

When ROMs are available for download at no cost and hacks and translations are simply available in freely-available software patches, usually it is not for profit and therefore less of a morally challenging issue.  But when you put this software into a cartridge and sell it, things start to weigh into the immoral area of the morality scale.  Even in this illegal world, there degrees of ethics and moral compromises when selling reproduction cartridges.

Not every reproduction is illegal.  For example, Beggar Prince was originally released in Taiwan in the 1990s, but Super Fighter Team secured the rights to it from C&E, translated it, fixed many (but not all) of the bugs and released it on a Genesis cartridge in 2006 and off and on ever since.  You can buy Beggar Prince and other cartridges from Super Fighter Team secure in the knowledge that you are buying an authorized product.  Similarly, Piko Interactive secures permission to release unreleased SNES games with the permission of the rights owners.  However, the guy who runs Piko Interactive used to have a separate label called RetroQuest which sold reproductions without authorization.

Here are some categories of games where the moral issues of reproduction cartridges become increasingly difficult :

1.  Pirates

Games like Somari and Final Fantasy VII for the Famicom go in this category.  In this case, the reproducer is a thief stealing from a thief.  The Taiwanese and Chinese pirate outfits who programmed these games use graphics and sound and often code taken directly from the games whose success they are trying to cash in on.  Final Fantasy VII for the Famicom also liberally helps itself to graphics from the Famicom Final Fantasies.  However, there is usually some original content here.  Does whatever original content lose all moral rights to protection because it is coupled with stolen content and sold with the intention of profiting off the creativity of others?  If someone made a reproduction of Leisure Suit Larry and the Long Look for a Luscious Lover, it would also fall into this category.

2.  Prototypes

Time Diver: Eon Man, the prototype versions of Maniac Mansion and the English translation of Final Fantasy II, and Star Fox 2 fall into this category.

In this case, the original cartridges were usually supposed to be destroyed or returned to the publisher or developer.  Other times, they were simply abandoned as trash when a company went out of business.  In the first sense, the person who buys a prototype may really be buying stolen property.  There is assumption that a 35mm print of a feature film in a private collection has a questionable chain of title. In the second, there are complicated questions of whether something was truly abandoned or whether the copyrights remain for the artistic elements or because of a finished game.  However, video game companies usually had atrocious storage abilities, so the first scenario may very well become the second scenario if someone did not rescue it.

Especially in the case of prototypes which never saw an actual release, there is an important concern in preserving these games and distributing them far and wide.  Star Fox 2 and Earthbound Beginnings are important examples of prototypes that should have been released then and provide a lot of enjoyment since.  Unfortunately, copyright law will protect this software for as long as it would officially published software, so if it is not distributed, it could be lost.

In Earthbound Beginnings' case, Nintendo has recently made it available on the Wii U Virtual Console.  This is unfortunately only one example of a prototype receiving official exploitation.  [Update : in 2017 Nintendo made the final, never-leaked version of Star Fox 2 available for the SNES Classic Mini, finally giving fans of the beta version and a franchise a legitimate way to play the game.]

3.  Contest & Limited Time-Availability Games

I include Nintendo World Championships 1990 and its successors in this list.  These games typically used unique hardware on their PCBs, making them unplayable as intended with ordinary hardware.  Also, one should consider the Sega Genesis Sega Channel Games and the SNES BS Satellaview games as also falling into this category.  The Nintendo Campus Challenges, 1991 (NES) and 1992 (SNES), and Nintendo PowerFest '94 cartridges also fall into this category.  They were never released to the public but were playable by the public for a period of time, often short

Nintendo World Championships 1990 gray cartridges were given to competition finalists and could be won as gold cartridges in a Nintendo Power competition, but Super Star Fox Weekend (Official Competition) and Donkey Kong Country Competition Cartridge were offered for sale in Nintendo Power.  Their print runs were low so they command high prices.  I actually did purchase a  Super Star Fox Weekend cartridge from Nintendo Power and regret the day I let it go.

4.  Hacks & Translations

Hacked games like Zelda Outlands and Super Mario Bros. 3 Mix fall into this category.  In this case, the reproducer is rarely reproducing his own work.  In this case, the reproducer is profiting off the hard work of not only the original developer but the hacker, who released his hack to the public gratis.

Porting a Famicom game to the NES often involves applying a translation patch.  Popular titles include Lagrange Point, Splatterhouse: Wanpaku Graffiti, Final Fantasy II & III and Sweet Home.  SNES games include large RPGs like Tales of Phantasia and Star Ocean.  Not only do these games need to fit hardware, most have to be translated as well.

Japanese Famicom games are playable with a pin converter and a minor modification for those games with expansion audio.  Japanese Super Famicom and N64 games are playable either by putting them in a SNES shell or breaking off a pair of tabs inside the SNES or N64.  Sega systems require a pin converter (Master System) or a trivial mod (Genesis).

Virtually no reproduction outfit produces their own translations, they use the typical translations available at romhacking.net.  (Super Fighter Team is a notable exception) Here is another ethical issue, not only is the reproducer profiting off the original game but the translator's efforts.

5.  Extremely Rare Release

This is when you make a reproduction of rare games like Little Sampson or The Flinstones: Rescue of Dino and Hoppy.  Collectors often react with scorn for these reproductions, even when the seller clearly states that it is a reproduction cartridge.  Many rare games use common boards and can be converted with little more than an EPROM programmer and a soldering iron.  Considering the high prices that sellers tend to charge for these, it is much cheaper to buy a NES PowerPak or Everdrive N8 and play these games with a multi-cart.  Collector-oriented sites like NintendoAge and AtariAge have no compunction about allowing forum members to sell cartridges falling into ##1-4 but get into a real hypocritical frenzy when it comes to #5.

I am aware of video game completionists who have to have every game on their shelf.  They may buy a reproduction to fill a hole, but while may satisfy their OCD-need to fill a hole, the reproduction will never legitimately acquire value anywhere near the real cartridge.

Consider Stadium Events, by far the most pricey of any licensed NES cartridge.  It is estimated that only 1,000 survived the recall when Nintendo took over the distribution of the Power Pad from Bandai.  Nintendo subsequently re-released it as World Class Track Meet, both individually and as a multi-cart with Super Mario Bros. and Duck Hunt.  WCTM in both releases is very common and has only cosmetic differences with Stadium Events.  There is no legitimate reason to make a reproduction of this game when the gameplay is so readily accessible.

Piko Interactive made a reproduction of Super Noah's Ark 3D for the SNES, but it obtained the permission of Wisdom Tree to release it.  Its reproduction uses a standard SNES shell instead of the unique one the original release used.  It also does not require an official cartridge to be plugged-in to a passthrough connector to bypass the lockout chip, unlike the original from the 1990s.  Clones of the SNES lockout chip exist which will allow the game to work with regular consoles.

Slipped by the NES Censor

Nintendo had a reputation of being a tough censor in the days of the NES and SNES before the establishment of ratings boards.  In these eras, the big-N implemented a modern day version of the Hays Code.  Who needed a video games rating system when every game has been vigorously inspected and cleansed to make it appropriate for children?  Nintendo controlled all licensed cartridge production, and if it did not approve a game then it would not be produced.  (It is a myth that Nintendo manufactured all cartridges, there are PCBs and chips in licensed US cartridges made by Konami, Sunsoft, Namco, Acclaim and Virgin Games).

Maniac Mansion is the best example of how Nintendo would control the approval process.  It required developers to send a prototype cartridge and a text dump.  Any objectionable content would be noted and sent to the company to fix.  Often, developers and publishers would engage in self-censorship to speed the approval process along.

References to sexual activity and nudity were not allowed.  Graphic, life-like violence was also forbidden. Language was to avoid words like "hell", "damn", "crap" and no stronger expletives were allowed.  Over time, Nintendo became more strict about what it would allow on its system.  Most of these examples given below were from the earlier years of the NES's development.

Nintendo of Europe was even more strict on violence.  Germany has long video games on its List of Media Harmful to Young People, the BPjM.  River Raid for the Atari 2600 was the first game on that list and it stayed there until 2002, so Nintendo games had to be very circumspect when it came to depicting any kind of realistic violence.  Thus games like Contra were given a sprite overhaul, replacing all human-like characters with robots and released a Probotector in Europe.  Unfortunately, because of the German standards, all of Europe suffered from this type of lowest common demonimator censorship.

Eventually, Nintendo's strict censorship began to work against it.  When Mortal Kombat for the Sega Genesis, which had the blood and graphic fatalities unlockable with a code, drastically outsold the SNES version, Nintendo began to realize the value of the ratings system.  Both companies and their eventual competitors submitted to the ESRB.  The sales for Mortal Kombat II, which was not censored, were better than the Genesis version.

Bionic Commando

At the end of the game, you must destroy the helicopter of the main villain of the game, "Master-D".  Master D's portrait had a death animation that was very graphic for the time.

Also, Master D's facial features obviously resemble Adolf Hitler's.  This is intentional because the original Japanese game, title : Hitler no Fukkatsu: Top Secret, made explicit that Hitler was the main villain.  While Capcom removed visual and textual references to the Nazi Party in the U.S. version, they kept Hitler's portrait unaltered.  Years later, when Wolfenstein 3D was ported to the SNES, not only were all Nazi references removed, but the posters found on the walls of Hitler were adjusted to reduce the resemblance to the Fürher.

Master-D also calls the hero a "damn fool" for challenging him, and "damn" is a Bad Word which shouldn't have made it into the U.S. release, but it did.

Castlevania

Level 3 of Castlevania features nude statutes in the background.  They may have been harder to notice on small TVs back running the NES video through an RF input back in the day, but the graphics were not changed.  By the time Konami ported Castlevania III to the U.S., the nude statute graphics were changed, but there were more examples of nudity in that game.

Eventually Nintendo would get around to removing crosses in the SNES era, but in the NES era, crosses were not particularly objectionable. All three Castlevania NES games have them, as does Zelda II: The Adventure of Link.

Castlevania II: Simon's Quest

We have the use of "Hell" in this game, right in the introductory text that scrolls if you do not press start at the title screen.

Golgo 13

The censor must have been asleep when this game was approved!  On at least two occasions during the game, Golgo 13 sleeps with female operatives he meets during the game.  He goes up to their hotel rooms after making prior arrangements, suggestive words are spoken, an animation shows the two coming together from their window, the lights go black and all your health is regained.  The voyeuristic view of the latter portion of the sequence only highlights the inappropriateness of this sequence by Nintendo's guidelines.   The Japanese version shows the ladies actually take their clothes off, showing toplessness.

In addition, this game is rather graphic when killing enemies in a first-person view.  When you shoot enemies, blood spurts from their heads.  This happens in the sniping sequences and the maze sequences.  At one point, you smoke a cigarette to regain health.  What kind of message did that send to the kids?

The enemy organization in the US version is called DREK, but in the Japanese original they are clearly identified as Nazis.  The file you obtain in the Greece Maze has a Swastika in the Japanese version and the true enemy is a cyborg version of Adolf Hitler, not "Smirk".  The US version keeps Hitler's likeness for "Smirk".

The sequel The Mafat Conspiracy: Golgo 13, is much more tame but does feature Golgo 13 smoking in the cutscenes and plenty of violence with Ninja Gaiden like cutscenes.

Kid Icarus

The statutes in world 4-1 are topless, as is the illustration of the Syren enemy in the game's manual.

The Legend of Zelda

The third Dungeon in the first quest is called "Manji" and the rooms are in the shape of a swastika.  This followed the Buddhist usage and faces counter-clockwise, not the Nazi usage which is usually clockwise and angled at 45 degrees.  The swastika had been in use in Japan for over one thousand years before Hitler appropriated it.

However, the counter clockwise version of the swastika was used by the Nazis, perhaps most notably as part of the standard for the 1st SS-Panzer Division Leibstandarte [bodyguard] SS Adolf Hitler after the fall of France.  No one complained about the use of the symbol at the time The Legend of Zelda was released apparently.  A decade later, parents did complain when the symbol was found on Pokemon cards and Nintendo announced that it would no longer use the symbol on Pokemon cards it released to the United States (and probably Europe) because of the negative cultural connotations.

Also, Link's shield and the Darknut shields have crosses on them.  Nintendo let religious symbols like crosses by in the early days.  

Magic of Scherezade

The boss of the second world, Curly, has obvious breasts.  "Curly" should really have been "Kali", the Hindu goddess of death, who is typically depicted topless and with six arms, which Curly's second form has.

Maniac Mansion

Although this game was heavily censored to remove objectionable content, Razor or Sid can explode Weird Ed's hamster by putting it in the microwave in the U.S. version.  Nintendo got wise to this and this act of animal cruelty was no longer possible when the game was later released in Europe.

Here is the original article "The Expurgation of Maniac Mansion", which describes what was left out and what was later removed from the game :

http://www.crockford.com/wrrrld/maniac.html

Metal Gear

In Metal Gear, cigarettes as a usable item, helpful when trying to beat the timed sequence at the end of the game where you must escape the building after beating the final boss before a bomb blows it up.  Smoking is bad, but in the NES era it was not high on the censor's priorities.  This would eventually changed as demonstrated by the cigarette item being changed to "fogger" in Metal Gear Solid for the Game Boy Color. The item still looks like a cigarette.

Ninja Gaiden

Ninja Gaiden has a rare use of the verb "to kill" when Foster is discussing the death of Dr. Smith.  Use of the verb "to kill" or any of its conjugations was strongly discouraged in the NES era.  In RPGs, a character is never "killed", usually they "died", were "slain" or "perished".  A party may be "annihilated".  This went to goofy levels when Final Fantasy II/IV's U.S. SNES release used the word "swooned".

Also, in Jaquio's lair and on his chest you can see six-sided stars, better recognized as a Star of David. During the NES and SNES era, Stars of David were frequently removed from RPGs like Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy II/IV, where they alluded to mystical abilities.  These were altered or removed for the Ninja Gaiden Trilogy release.

Ninja Gaiden II: The Dark Sword of Chaos

Similar to Ninja Gaiden, Jaquio has a pentagram (instead of a hexagram, maybe he lost a point because he died) on his chest.  This was altered for the Ninja Gaiden Trilogy. When you defeat Jaquio, his blood touches the Dark Sword of Chaos, transforming him into a demon.  The blood was turned from red to green in the Ninja Gaiden Trilogy.

Rambo

At the beginning of the game, Colonel Trautman tells Rambo : "You've got 36 hours to get in, complete your assignment, and get the hell out."  H-E-Double hockey sticks was a big no-no thereafter.

Ring King

Ring King has become particularly infamous for its in-between round animation of the corner men.  When looking at the animation, it is hard to find a non-obscene explanation.  The animation is not quite as suggestive in the arcade original.

I was too lazy to make an animated GIF, but there are no intervening frames.

River City Ransom

River City Ransom has a spa area where your character can recover his stamina.  The game shows you showering in Pop's Health Club, and among the graphics is a shot of your character toweling off his bare backside.  They show a dimpled butt.

Sqoon

Sqoon has a topless mermaid enemy, which appears on the title screen and later in the game.  This would not have gone unnoticed during a later period.

Taboo: The Sixth Sense

Taboo was practically unique in the NES library because it advertised on the box that it is not intended for children under fourteen.  Taboo is a tarot card reading simulator.  You input your name, date of birth and your gender, ask a question and the game will deal ten tarot cards and give you its interpretation of them. Among the cards that can be revealed are The Lovers, which shows rear male nudity and nearly-nude female nudity.  After it reads the cards, it will give you some "Lucky Numbers", asking you to select your state of residence.  The name/birthdate/gender screen has a cross and a pentagram.

This is a RareWare game, and I would suggest that only Rare's close relationship with Nintendo allowed them to publish this simulator.  Divination, occultism and fortune telling is offensive to Biblical Christianity.

The Famicom Microphone - Obscure Functionality

The Famicom's Controller II does not have start and select buttons, instead it has a microphone.  The microphone has a volume slider which will turn the microphone off is slid all the way to the left.  Internally, the microphone is a small condenser microphone.  The microphone is mixed with the Famicom's audio output so you can hear anything that it picks up in the TV's speaker.

In addition, the microphone can be used as an input to the CPU.  The Controllers communicate serially by sending a stream of data bits on one data line to particular memory locations in the 2A03's memory map. Each bit represents a button press or a D-pad direction.  Even though Controller II communicates with the Famicom via D0 of $4017, the microphone communicates via D2 of $4016.  Controller I communicates by D0 of $4016.

On a Vs System, the service button uses the same input as the microphone.  Pressing the service button in must Vs System games acts as an insert coin signal to the game.  So by blowing into the microphone you can insert a coin when running VS games in a Famicom, such as with a PowerPak or Everdrive.  While this does not work on every game, it is pretty neat to see the credit number increase rapidly as you blow into the microphone.  Of course, the games will look very strange because the palette entries are scrambled compared to a regular console PPU.  Some are unplayable for other reasons, but the feature is still amusing for a bit.

Here are the games I have personally confirmed work with a real Famicom and its attached microphone :

Zelda no Densetsu - The Hyrule Fantasy

This is the original version of The Legend of Zelda, released on the Famicom Disk System on February 21, 1986.  The Microphone can be used to kill Pols Voice, the enemy that looks like a rabbit and is first encountered in Dungeon 5.  I find blowing into the microphone to be the most effective method.  The NES did not have a microphone, so instead they made Pols Voices weak to arrows.  Unfortunately, they forgot to change the hint in the manual.  One arrow kills a Pols Voice in the NES version, but arrows do nothing to these enemies in the Famicom Disk System version.

Hikari Shinwa - Palutena no Kagami

This is the original version of Kid Icarus, released on the Famicom Disk System on December 19, 1986.  The microphone is used to try to persuade the shopkeeper to lower his prices.  The function works by blowing into the microphone while pressing the A button on Controller II.  Whenever I try this function at the first shopkeeper's shop in Stage 1-2, he always raises his prices.

I believe shouting something also work, but blowing hard is a lot nicer when other people are around and is definitely more effective for this game.  The game appears to be looking for a rapid series of 1s and 0s. Blowing into the microphone is the human equivalent of a noise generator.  Emulators that support the microphone often lack the ability to simulate a rapid expansion and contraction of the microphone. In the NES version, A and B on Controller 2 perform the same function.

Zelda no Densetsu 1 - The Hyrule Fantasy

This is the official Famicom cartridge port of the Zelda no Densetsu - The Hyrule Fantasy, released on February 19, 1994 at the very end of the Famicom's life.  It and Wario's Woods are the last Famicom cartridges Nintendo released.  It takes the NES cartridge port and reinserts the Japanese text (except for the introductory story).  It microphone functions identically to the Famicom Disk System version.  Unfortunately, despite the Famicom AV's release, they did not make Pols Voice weak to arrows in this version.

Raid on Bungeling Bay

In the 2-player mode of this game, the first player controls the helicopter and the second player can control the enemy forces.  The second play can rotate and fire the enemy canons with his controller.  If he blows into the microphone, the screen will show a microphone icon.  Keep blowing into it and it will turn red.  This will cause jets to attack the first player, although when they appear seems a bit random.  The microphone function works on both the Famicom and NES version of the game.

Other Games and Microphone Support

Other NES games it may work in include Kid Niki: Radical Ninja and Star Soldier, but the areas where they were tend to be far into the game.  Several Japanese-exclusive Famicom games use it but due to the language barrier most of these uses are unconfirmed.  Considering that 1,050 or so official licensed cartridges and 200 or so licensed disk system games exist, the true number may never be known.

One well-known game is Takeshi no Chosenjou, (Takeshi's Challenge).  This game was designed in part by Japanese comedian and later auteur filmmaker "Beat" Takeshi Kitano.  The game requires you to do all sorts of odd and often extremely repetitious tasks.  Some commentators have suggested that Kitano was trying to use Andy Kauffman-style humor by frustrating players with such goofy goals as hitting a button 1,000 times or leaving the controller alone for an hour.  There is a karaoke mini-game that requires you to use the microphone to "sing" (make noise) in time with the music.  There is also a lot of physical violence, another Kitano trademark, for a story of a salaryman trying to escape the humdrum of everyday life.

Here is a list of games which have been known to support the Microphone and a link to a description of their microphone usage, where known :

Apple Town Monogatari - Little Computer People (disk)
Atlantis no Nazo (a.k.a. Super Pitfall 2 prototype)
Bakushou!! Jinsei Gekijou
Bakushou!! Jinsei Gekijou 2
Doraemon
Hikari Shinwa - Palthena no Kagami (disk)
Kaiketsu Yancha Maru (a.k.a. Kid Niki: Radical Ninja)
Kamen Rider Club
Raid on Bungeling Bay
Star Luster
Star Soldier
Super Chinese 2 - Dragon Kid (a.k.a. Little Ninja Brothers)
Takeshi no Chousenjou
Zelda no Densetsu - The Hyrule Fantasy (cart and disk)

I have read on Wikipedia and elsewhere that Takeshi no Chosenjou removed the kareoke mini-game in later versions and other games would allow you to use the Select button in place of the microphone.  I believe these statements are wholly unfounded.  Takeshi no Chosenjou was released on December 10, 1986 and as far as I have seen, there is only one version of the game.  Moreover, every official iteration of Nintendo's hardaware, the Famicom, the Sharp C1 Famicom Television, the Sharp Twin Famicom and the Sharp Famicom Titler had the microphone on their hard-wired Controller II until the Famicom AV was released on December 1, 1993.  I sincerely doubt that game makers were anticipating that Nintendo would be ditching the microphone when every version of the hardware included it. Note that the microphone is read at the same memory location as the data from Controller I, so any claim that you should press select on Controller II (which does not have Start and Select buttons), is very dubious.

100(ish) Game Boy Games Worth Playing

I previously created a list of 250 NES Games Worth Playing, and now I would like to do the same for Nintendo's other 8-bit success the Game Boy.  Here I have fashioned a list of 100 good games that show off the best the library has to offer.  The Game Boy has over five hundred licensed, non-Color titles, so I cannot say I am an authority on every game ever made for the platform.  However, I am familiar with most of the titles listed below.

I have limited this list to monochrome-only Game Boy games.  No hybrid Game Boy/Game Boy Color games here.  This includes Pokemon Yellow, which has Game Boy Color-specific features but little more than Super Game Boy level of color.  Most of the games released in 1994 and later have some form of Super Game Boy support.  This list is not meant to say that there are only 100 good Game Boy games in the monochrome library or that this is a top 100, I'm always happy to learn of other good games.  It is limited to games that were released in the United States.

Some games are included not because they are particularly good but are part of a larger series.  Disney's DuckTales, for example, was a great game on the NES but only passable on the Game Boy.  Mega Man II is easily one of the worst Mega Man games in the series, but it is part of a much greater series.  The first Castlevania has your character move like molasses, but it has redeeming features and it makes you appreciate its sequels more.  Final Fantasy Legend is little more than a grindfest, but some people like that sort of thing.

While this list is clearly biased, I tried to balance it.  There are few, if any sports games or fighting games, but lots of action/adventure games.  The Game Boy was known for its puzzle games, so I have included pretty much any official Tetris game.  You cannot go wrong with Tetris and the Game Boy is the system for lovers of this classic.  In fact, casual gaming on the go was practically invented by the Game Boy.

I have tried to avoid ports of arcade games, of which there are several, unless there is something truly unique about the game.  Space Invaders is unique because not only does it have Super Game Boy compatibility, but it will also let you play a recreation of the arcade version using the full SNES hardware!  These days there are so many ways to play the real deal on a portable device.  There are several ports of console games, but I only include ones that can stand on their own when you want to play a game on the go.

I have included certain games that are ports of NES games or close conversions.  Milon's Secret Castle is a true port of the NES game which takes the Game Boy's limitations in mind.  The Duck Tales games use the same structure as the NES games and most of the graphics and sound, but the level layouts are different.

A Boy and His Blob: Rescue of Princess Blobette
Adventures of Lolo
Alleyway
Balloon Kid
Batman: The Video Game
Batman: The Animated Series
Battle Arena Toshinden
Battle of Olympus, The
Bionic Commando
Bomberman GB
Bonk's Adventure
Bonk's Revenge
Castlevania Adventure, The
Castlevania II: Belmont's Revenge
Castlevania Legends
Contra III: The Alien Wars
Cosmo Tank
Disney's Darkwing Duck
Disney's DuckTales
Disney's DuckTales 2
Donkey Kong
Donkey Kong Land
Donkey Kong Land 2
Donkey Kong Land III
Dr. Franken
Dr. Franken 2
Dr. Mario
F-1 Race
Faceball 2000
Final Fantasy Adventure
Final Fantasy Legend, The
Final Fantasy Legend 2
Final Fantasy Legend 3
Fortified Zone
Game Boy Gallery
Game & Watch Gallery
Gargoyle's Quest
GhostBusters II
Gradius: The Interstellar Assault
Great Greed
Harvest Moon GB
Hudson's Adventure Island
Hudson's Adventure Island II
James Bond 007
Kid Dracula
Kid Icarus: Of Myths and Monsters
Kirby's Block Ball
Kirby's Dream Land
Kirby's Dream Land 2
Kirby's Pinball Land
Kirby's Star Stacker
Kung' Fu Master
Kwirk
Legend of the River King GB
The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening
Mario's Picross
Mega Man
Mega Man II
Mega Man III
Mega Man IV
Mega Man V
Mercenary Force
Metroid II
Milon's Secret Castle
Mole Mania
Motocross Maniacs
Nemesis
Ninja Gaiden Shadow
Operation C
Quarth
Pinball - Revenge of the 'Gator
Pokemon Blue
Pokemon Red
Popeye 2
Prehistorik Man
Prince of Persia
R-Type
Radar Mission
Rolan's Curse
Rolan's Curse 2
SolarStriker
Space Invaders
Star Trek 25th Anniversary
Super Mario Land
Super Mario Land 2: Six Golden Coins
Sword of Hope
Sword of Hope II
Tamagotchi
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Fall of the Foot Clan
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: Back from the Sewers
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III: Radical Rescue
Tetris
Tetris 2
Tetris Attack
Tetris Blast
Tetris Plus
Tiny Toon Adventures: Babs' Big Break
Trax
Wario Blast Featuring Bomberman!
Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3
Wario Land II
Who Framed Roger Rabbit
Yoshi
Yoshi's Cookie
Zen: Intergalactic Ninja

NES Front Loader Maintenance

The NES-001 Control Deck, usually referred to as the Front Loader, Front Loading NES or simply the "toaster", is the epitome of a video game generation.  The console had, for the time, a very modern design.  There was no plastic woodgrain anywhere to be found, a design aesthetic that was was finally being phased out in the mid-1980s.  No chintsy metal plating, another dying design element.  Instead of brown and black it gave you light and dark gray to match the high-priced consumer electronics of the era, camcorders, tape decks, stereos, CD players and especially VCRs.  Unlike almost every console before it and since, the game cartridges were inserted horizontally and were covered by the dust lid.  The console was called the Nintendo Entertainment System, not a "video computer system", not a "video game system".  The console was officially called the Control Deck and the cartridges Game Paks in order to further appeal to the more affluent buyer and avoid the nomenclature associated with the failed consoles of the past. The controllers had four buttons instead of the silly number pads, fit well in the hand and were extremely responsive compared to the joystick and silly disc models of the previous generation.

Because the console was front loading, the controller cables had long wires and connected in the front of the system, it could fit conveniently on a middle shelf of the TV stand or in a compartment of entertainment furniture.  Moreover, it was highly convenient that the RF switch was autoswitching, you did not have to fiddle with the TV/Game switch to turn the NES on and off.  Finally, for buyers with nice TVs, the NES came with RCA output jacks for video and audio output.  AV jacks were pretty much introduced with VCRs in home consumer electronic equipment and the NES tried to look like and function like a VCR, which were front loading.

I do not believe it can be known how much these features helped earn the NES sales.  I am rather inclined to believe that the quality of the games like Super Mario Bros. did far more to persuade customers to buy a NES than its modern design.  Nintendo produced millions upon millions of the NES-001 from 1985-1993.  Of the 34 million consoles sold, at least 33 million were of the NES-001.  I would suggest that only a million of the NES-101 Top Loading model were sold.  The front loader is much cheaper than the top loader, far more common and does not require any kind of modding to obtain decent video quality.

Many people tend to avoid the front loader because of the cartridge connector.  The cartridge connector uses a spring and latch mechanism to get the cartridge pins to make contact with both sides of the cartridge connector.  This was the front loader's only major design flaw, but with some careful maintenance, it should be remediable without having to use cheap 3rd party replacements.  3rd party replacement connectors, with the exception of the Blinking Light Win, may get games to work they typically have a Grip of Death and wear out very quickly.  The official connector has a near-zero insertion force mechanism and will not place unnecessary wear on your Game Pak connectors.

In order to keep your Front Loading NES in top shape, here is a list of things to do :

1.  Clean both ends of the cartridge connector

2.  Clean all cartridges

3.  Clean the card edge from the NES motherboard that connects to the cartridge connector

When you clean contacts, use a minimum of 91% isopropyl alcohol.  99% is even better, and you can find it at electronics stores. The 70% stuff contains 30% water, and you do not want to use water on your electronics unless absolutely necessary.  Use a Q-Tip and have one side wet and one side dry and scrub those connectors until you see no more black on the Q-Tip.  You can also use a pink rubber eraser, but I have rarely found a cartridge that would not yield to alcohol.

Water is OK when you are trying to clean a dirty board, but that is about it.  Never use water unless you have the ability to dry it off quickly with a heating element.  Nintendo did no one any favors when they told people to use water for the official NES cleaning kit.  You can also use Deoxit or a similar electronics contact cleaner for tough cases, but alcohol is cheaper and usually does the job.

NES-specific cleaning kits can be hard to find.  For the cartridge connector, it is hard to get to it without a cleaning kit.  What I recommend is removing the top cover of the NES and the top RF shielding and the metal bar across the cartridge loading tray.  Then use a credit card wrapped around on one edge with printer paper, wet the paper with alcohol and insert it into the cartridge connector.  A few little wiggling and bending the pins slightly and remove it.  You should see some dirt on the paper.  Use a dry piece of paper as well.  Keep going across the pin connector until the paper comes out clean.  Obviously do not use an important card.

4.  Clean your NES interior

Compressed air and alcohol Q-tips usually work well here.  You may need some running water for the plastic shells, just be careful around the paper-backed labels if you care to preserve them.

5.  Make sure the cartridge tray is firmly screwed in

A lot of use may cause the cartridge tray screws to loosen.  This can cause a lack of good contact with the upper pins of the cartridge connector.  They should be firmly screwed in so the plastic of the cartridge tray is in contact with the PCB and the spring and latch mechanism works.

If you remove your cartridge tray and try to replace it, you may see a gap between the plastic and the PCB.  This means that the cartridge tray has not been inserted correctly.  There is a lip on the bottom of the front of the cartridge tray that cannot be resting on the PCB.  This prevents the spring and latch from working correctly if you try to screw the tray in all the way.  It warps the cartridge tray.  It also makes the top shell of the Control Deck not have a proper fit.  Wiggle it about and shift the PCB a little until you get a proper fit.  The front black plastic of the cartridge tray must sit naturally on the PCB

6.  Make sure the cartridge tray is in the up position when you turn off your NES

This saves wear on the spring and latch mechanism and gives your cartridge connector pins a chance to relax.

7.  Use Electronics Contact Cleaner on AC Adapter and Controller Ports

If these ports look a little rusty and are not giving reliable contact, spray some electronics contact cleaner to try to remove some of the rust.

Things to avoid :

There are two things that are commonly done which I do not recommend doing.  First is to disable the lockout chip.

The lockout chip only takes 4 of the 72 pins of the connector, so if you are getting the blinking light regularly, it is usually a symptom that the cartridge connector is not working very well.  If you are getting a solid color on your screen, and you usually will, that indicates that other pins on the connector are not receiving a good connection or any at all.  If there is no blinking, only a solid color screen, then the lockout chip is not the problem.  Only if you consistently are seeing the game's title screen reset should you consider disabling it.

Disabling the lockout chip solely by cutting pin 4 and leaving it floating may cause the chip to fail prematurely.  When that happens, your system will not work.  Finally, rare games like the NES World Championships 1990 cartridge hardware require a fully functional lockout chip in the console to work.  If you must disable it, try pulling the pin out instead of snipping it off.  Then solder the pin to ground on pin 8.

Second, do not try to bend pins unless absolutely necessary.  The cartridge connector gives you very little room to work with and you can easily misalign the pins.  When this happens, they will bend and not bend back properly.  If you bend the bottom set up too much, you will experience a Grip of Death common to cheap replacement connectors.  Also, the top set of pins are deeply recessed and getting to them will be difficult.

As far as boiling the cartridge connector goes, my connector is very reliable so I never had to try that extreme method.  I believe this method does nothing good for the long term reliability of the connector.  Plastics and metals do not like extremes of heat, metal tends to rust with water and the heating and cooling can cause warping.  Only a small section of the cartridge connector pin will make contact with the cartridge pin, so I would focus on that area with a cleaning kit or the credit card solution mentioned above.

The Nintendo Family Computer/Famicom - The NES before there was a NES

Which one of these systems is playing the game?  Bonus if anyone notes the oddity regarding the game shown.

The Nintendo Family Computer, released in 1983, was the console which kick started console gaming in Japan and revitalized console gaming in the US as the Nintendo Entertainment System.  The Famicom had 1,056 licensed cartridge games released for it.  The system was directly supported for over eleven years with games.

The original console, of which Nintendo sold millions and millions, gets shortchanged these days.  People seek Famicom AV's for their detachable controllers, video quality and relative age.  People want top loaders because their cartridge slot is more reliable than a front loader.   Interest in front loaders is present due to the prices of the other systems and the easy obtainability of cartridge connectors.

Design decisions

The original hardware developers included items like the eject lever and the microphone, even though they were not strictly necessary.  A great deal of force is not required to remove cartridges from the slot.  The eject button made its way to the Super Famicom and the SNES, and it was equally unnecessary there as well.  The eject mechanism also makes it a bit cramped for modding purposes.

The microphone was intended as a novelty feature.  Using the microphone, you can hear a distorted version of your voice from your TV speakers.  However, it would later be used in games, mostly in a non-essential way.  Gaining the microphone meant losing the start and select buttons on controller II, so no Japanese game is likely to respond to Famicom AV's controller 2 start and select button input.  The Famicom AV was released in 1994 just as companies were no longer making games for the Famicom.  The holder of controller I has all the game select and game start/pause authority when playing games.

The color scheme of the Famicom, red and white, was intended to make the system look attractive to children.  Nintendo gave the controllers a touch of class with their metal face plates.  Those face plates did not hold up well over time against sweaty Japanese thumbs.  They have a tendency to show tarnish and wear unlike NES controllers.  The white plastic will become discolored by exposure to UV light.  Retrobright may be useful to restore the original color, but the stickers and decals may suffer from being submerged in oxyclean and peroxide.  My Famicom has been severely discolored from UV exposure, but the resulting color is something like a burnt orange and rather appealing.  The SNES is far worse.

Like the face plates, making the controllers hard wired and routing the cables through the rear of the console is another design decision straight from the 1970s.  Consoles released in the 1970s connected their controllers in the back and were frequently hard wired.  The idea was to reduce cable clutter and eliminate those "I can't find my controller" moments.  Because the controller cables were so short, instead of having the controller cables across the living room, the whole Famicom had to be pulled away from the TV, leaving the power and RF cables visible and frequently strewn across the room.  The NES introduced detachable controller ports located on the front of the console and every subsequent console since then has followed.

The controller cables were short because Japan is far more urbanized than the US.  Japanese gamers were accustomed to living, on average, in more confined circumstances than their US counterparts, so Nintendo believed they did not need to make long cables.  Even the Famicom AV controller cables are about half the length of the US version of the controller.  The NES revised controllers (dog bone) have a cable length of 93.25", and the regular NES controller has a length about 2" shorter.  The Famicom controllers have a cable length of just 29.25", and you loose 8.25" if you account for the width of the Famicom because the controllers come out of the back of the console.

The Famicom does not have a power LED, when you flip the power switch on, there is a little orange sticker that appears, showing you that the console is on.  Thankfully the power switch is not spring/latch operated like on the NES.  The reset button does not protrude above the enclosure, making it less likely that someone will press it accidentally than the NES's button.

The dust flap is unconnected to the eject mechanism and has no springs, so it has a cheap feeling.  It is just a piece of plastic that swings 180 degrees.  The NES's lid has a little tension in it, making it appear less cheap.  The Famicom Disk System RAM Adapter sits completely flush on the Famicom, whereas it has a slight overhang on the Famicom AV.  Even so, the Famicom is not that much larger than the Famicom AV.

The Famicom and the Famicom AV use the same power adapter, 10VDC, 850mA, center-tip negative.  Sega Master System and Sega Genesis Model 1 Power Adapters work perfectly and are easier to find in the US than Nintendo Famicom power adapters.

Inside the Famicom

Unlike every other iteration of Nintendo's 8-bit hardware, the Famicom's PCB is screwed into the top half of the shell, not the bottom half.  However, like the NES, the chip side of the PCBs face the ground.  All screws are Phillips head screws.

All Famicoms come with two PCBs, but the earlier Famicoms connect their PCBs solely by a ribbon cable. The smaller PCB houses the power conversion circuitry and the RF unit.  The larger PCB has the CPU, PPU and the rest of the chips needed to function.  The later VCI Famicoms have the smaller PCB sturdily connected to the larger PCB because the metal RF shielding on the smaller board is soldered to the larger board.  The larger PCB has the expansion port and a pair of headers for the controllers to plug into.

Hardware wise, there are roughly three generations of Famicoms.  First come the square button Famicoms.  These have rubbery square buttons on their controllers, smooth bottoms and are the least reliable of all the Famicoms.  Some may have survived the 1983 recall.  They also tend to have early and buggy revisions of the CPU and PPU.  They are pretty much museum pieces.

Next come the round button Famicoms.  They have solid CPU and PPU revisions and round plastic buttons on their controllers.  The bottom half of the case shell has a rough matted surface.  If treated properly, these will run well, but the video output is noisy and will show jailbars even without an AV mod once you know what to look for.

Sample video quality (does not capture the jailbars well)

Finally come the VCI Famicoms.  They have more robust RF shields, a metal shield fitted over the cartridge connector and more filtering capacitors.  They also have the power switch connected to the main PCB instead of the RF PCB as found on the non-VCI Famicoms.  VCI Famicoms can be distinguished from non-VCI Famicoms by the labels on the bottom of the case.

The Famicom has a comparatively minimalist design compared to the NES' PCB.  The NES PCB has an expansion slot which was never used, separately mounted power and reset buttons, separately mounted controller ports, a U-shaped cartridge connector, internal RF shielding for the top and bottom of the PCB, a tray-loading mechanism and extra circuitry for the lockout chip.

My Famicom works fine with the Everdrive N8 Famicom Edition.  The Everdrive is a bit of a tight fit inside the cartridge slot.  Square-button vintage Famicoms may have trouble with these devices. The NES PowerPak and NES game cartridges work with an adapter, I recommend this one :

Early CPU and PPU Revsisions

My Famicom is a round button non-VCI version, and it uses 2A03E and 2C02E chips, just like the first NES consoles. Its PCB is marked with HVC-CPU-07. The rev E CPU and PPU chips appear to be used in many of these non-VCI Famicoms, but I have seen revision A, B and D PPUs and revisionless CPUs.  The revision G chips appear to be the most common of all the CPU/PPU revisions Nintendo used in its products, but I have only seen them in VCI Famicoms.

Revisionless 2A03 CPU will be found mainly in square button Famicoms, but there are some later square button Famicoms with 2A03E CPUs.  The revisionless 2A03 lacks the short-period noise feature of the 2A03E and its successors.  Short period noise has a very metallic sound can be heard in Fire Man's stage in Mega Man 1 and Quick Man's stage in Mega Man 2.  Without short noise period the noise will sound like more typical white noise.  the It can also be heard at the end of the game over tune in Balloon Fight, but this may be unintentional.

The 2C02E and its predecessors lack the ability to read sprite data through a particular register.  Micro Machines uses this reading function to position graphics on the title screen and menu screens.  As a result, these graphics will look glitchy on a Famicom or a NES with a 2A03E or lower PPU revision.  This added ability was rather obscure and the timing was touchy.  There are no known instances of other games, licensed or unlicensed, using it in such a way as to cause noticeable visual differences as with Micro Machines.

The RF Output

The Famicom uses RF only-output, and it can be something of a pain to get working with US TVs.  The design of the RF unit is somewhat in between an Atari 2600 and a NES.  All three have the RF signal generating circuitry inside their respective consoles.  The Atari uses a TV/Game switchbox with a large sliding switch to select the game's signal or the antenna/cable signal.  The Famicom has the TV/Game switch integrated into the internal RF unit and has the physical switch on the rear of the console.  The NES has an automatic switch box where turning the console on acts as the TV/Game switch.

Options, options...

The Famicom did come with an external RF adapter.  This RF adapter is very, very odd by US standards because it requires you to strip cables to connect to the proper adapter.  Let me try to describe its operation.  The box has three screw terminals, one thin wire with the RCA plug and one thick wire with no plug.  The thin wire with the RCA cable, underneath the RF switch label in the photo above, goes to the Famicom.  That is the easy bit.  The thick wire is a 75 ohm coaxial cable which goes to the TV.  Some Japanese TVs will accept a bare cable, shown as #3.  In this situation, the ground wire mesh is held in place by a metal clamp and the thick signal wire is wrapped around one of the VHF terminals like a speaker wire.

If you do not have this kind of setup, something may have to go on the other end.  Owners could be expected to strip wire, something that would be intolerable today.  You can use a straight through F-type twist on connector, shown as #4.  Nintendo advised using a right-angle box that will fit the bare wire, shown as #1.  If your TV had only the 300-ohm split lead antennal terminals, then you would have to attach a 75-300 ohm converter, shown as #2.  Nintendo used to include ones in the Famicom's box where you could just snap the wire in.

Finally, the Famicom RF box required the same thing if you wanted to route an antenna or cable signal through it.  The two side-by-side terminals were for the 300-ohm split antenna leads.  The third screw terminal was to hold a 75 ohm cable in place and provide a connection for the ground mesh, and the signal wire wrapped around one of the two side-by-side screw terminals.  If your TV had 75 ohm inputs, all you had to do was to remove any connector from the cable wire and screw it as shown on the label.  Later Japanese Nintendo devices used the same RF switchboxes as the NES, making life a heck of a lot easier for many people.

The Famicom can use Japanese TV channels 1 and 2. Japanese Channel 1 uses the FM band in the 90-96MHz range, and channel 2 uses 96-102MHz.  In the US, the 87.9MHz-107.9MHz band was allocated for FM radio.  Later, cable channels 95 and 96 were allocated the frequencies used by Japanese channels 1 and 2.  In fact, the audio from the Famicom's RF unit can be heard in theory if you set your radio to 95.7 or 101.7 and touch the radio's antenna with an RCA cable from the Famicom's RF unit.

You can use Nintendo RF switchboxes with a Famicom.  However today it is easier just to use a thick RCA cable and a coaxial adapter, like an Atari 2600, unless for some reason you want to daisy-chain devices to the coaxial input on your TV.  I had little difficulty in setting my two CRTs to channel 95 or 96, but you may have to manually add those channels.  Keep your remote and TV manual handy.  I found that channel 95 was fuzzy on my TV while channel 96 was sharp, so I use channel 96.

US game consoles would often allow players to choose between channel 2, 54-60MHz, channel 3, 60-66MHz or channel 4, 66-72MHz.  A choice was almost always given because the user's area would often broadcast one channel more strongly than the other, giving for less interference with the weaker broadcast signal.  If your FM radio stations are particularly strong at the 95.7 and 101.7 frequencies, your picture quality may suffer.  However, where I live there is no strong 95.7 radio station but the 101.7 radio station is very clear.  This is counter-intuitive, but on Channel 1 (which overlaps the 95.7 signal) the video is fuzzy but on Channel 2 the video is much sharper.  There are more interference patterns on the Famicom RF than the NES RF, otherwise the video quality appears pretty close.

Castlevania II and Metroid - Best Ending Advice

Castlevania II and Metroid were two of the few NES/Famicom games that use the time the player takes to beat the game to determine the ending.  The better the time, the better the ending.  Getting the best ending in both games is something of a challenge, but in this blog post I would like to share some tips and general guides so you can save time as you try to get the best endings for these games.

Castlevania II: Simon's Quest/Dracula II : Noroi no Fūin

As the second game in the Castlevania series for the NES/Famicom, CV2 sticks out for a couple of reasons.  First, its gameplay is non-linear, unlike its predecessor.  Second, there are RPG elements like acquiring hearts to buy items and level up by killing enemies.  Third, there is a total absence of difficult bosses and the lethal areas other entries in the series were known for.  Fourth, death in this game is merely an inconvenience and at times it may be advisable to lose all your lives.  As a result, CV2 is not quite the heralded classic as its bookend games, but it was popular in its time and has a strong legacy as the precursor to the Metroidvania-style of gameplay later firmly established in Castlevania: Symphony of the Night.

If you approach CV2's challenge as acquiring the best ending, things become much more challenging.  In order to obtain the best ending, you must beat the game in seven days or less.  You start the game at 12:00 (noon) on day 1.  CV2 uses 24-hour time notation.  Mornings begin at 06:00 and evenings begin at 18:00, each time period lasting for twelve hours.  When you restart a game, you start at 12:00 on the day were you last left off, regardless of the actual time left in the day when you ended your game.  

Each second of real time equals four minutes of in-game time.  Each day will take six minutes.  The in-game clock does not run when you are inside a town building, have brought up the menu screen or inside a mansion or castle.  During the morning, monsters take fewer hits to kill and typically yield small hearts and sometimes half hearts.  During the evening, monsters usually take double the hits to kill and yield half hearts and sometimes full hearts.  Also during the evening, zombies are present on the town streets, the town buildings cannot be entered and the townspeople are not present.  

When you start the game, you have three lives.  You can lose a life by losing all your health or by drowning in water.  Once you lose all three of your lives, you will go to a game over screen.  Here you will have the option to Continue or to Save Game/Reveal Password.  If you continue then, you will return to the area in which you died but without all your hearts or accumulated experience.  Existing levels earned will be kept.  If you decided to continue using a saved game or password save, in addition to the above you will start back at the first town, Jova.  You will always keep the items you have found, including the consumables : laurels, garlic and the stake.  

In order to shave time off your game, you should avoid the obvious.  Do not talk to townspeople outside unless you have to.  Fall off ledges instead of using stairs when the area below is known to be safe.  Avoid fighting monsters when you don't need to and don't chase after them.  Use maps to find the most direct routes to where you want to go.  Pause the game by bringing up the submenu.  Avoid backtracking when possible.  Unlike Metroid, it is easy to avoid a lot of backtracking in this game.

In the Famicom Disk System version, once you beat the game you can continue where you left off with all the items you had acquired.  So it is easy to get all items in the second game.  However, you pay for it with frequent loads (every town and mansion) and disk flipping toward the end of the of the game.

Here is the basic efficient path through the game :

Town of Jova
White Crystal
Holy Water
Thorn Whip

Berkeley Mansion
Dracula's Rib

Town of Veros
Chain Whip

Dabi's Path
Sacred Flame (optional)

Town of Aljiba
Blue Crystal

Rover Mansion
Dracula's Heart

Braham Mansion
Golden Knife
Dracula's Eyeball

Town of Aldora
Red Crystal

Town of Oldon
Morning Star

Uta Lower Road
Flame Whip (only if you purchased a Morning Star)

Bodley Mansion
Dracula's Nail

Laruba Mansion
Magic Cross
Dracula's Ring

Town of Doina

Town of Yomi

Castlevania

In the above list, all whip upgrades are quite optional.  However, enemies take more hits with the regular leather whip than with the stronger whips, and eventually the game gets quite tedious.  However, if you forgo the whip upgrades, you will not have to accumulate hearts beyond those required to purchase the holy water.

When you begin the game, immediately buy the White Crystal.  Unfortunately, it will almost certainly be night time on Day 1 before you can earn 50 hearts to buy the Holy Water.  While it may be tempting to fight the Mermen on the South Bridge, stay in Jova Woods until nightfall.  You do not want to risk precious lives by getting hit and falling into the water.  Then go to the Town of Jova and fight zombies on the top floor for hearts.  If you stay just above the platform where the White Crystal merchant walks, you can get zombies to come at you from left and right by moving a little to the left, then a little to the right.  Zombies can be killed in two hits and often leave half hearts.  Between Jova Woods and the Town of Jova, you should be able to earn 150 hearts for the Holy Water and Thorn Whip.

If you are pushing closer to 200 hearts, then bypass the Thorn Whip and head to Veros to buy the Chain Whip.  You should have earned enough hearts on the way there.  Alternatively, if you are a little more shy of 200 and want to save up for the Chain Whip, head to Berkeley Mansion.  Either way, if you go for the Chain Whip, there will be a little backtracking.

Every time you enter a Mansion, the in-game time stops completely.  You can stay in the Mansion and earn hearts as long as you wish.  However, you will not continue to earn experience after a certain point if you stay in one area.

On the way to the Town of Aljiba and Rover Mansion, you can easily get the Sacred Flame from Dabi's Path without having to waste much time.

When you get to Rover Mansion, you may have a difficult choice, depending on how many times you died.  If you have a lot of hearts, you may want to brave the long journey to the Town of Oldol for the Morning Star.  If you do not, then die and save the game and get a password.  When your game is restored, you will be at the Town of Jova again, much closer to the Ferryman.  If you save and restore, then farm hearts in Braham Mansion in order to get the Morning Star.

When you arrive at Bodley Mansion, if you have the Morning Star you should get the Flame Whip before tackling the Mansion.  Although this involves a small amount of backtracking, it is worth it.

Items I recommend avoiding are the Knife, which costs 50 hearts in the Town of Veros, the Silver Knife, which is given if you drop garlic (costs 50 hearts) in Carmilla Cemetery, the Diamond in the Jam Wasteland (requires going to a dead end past Braham Mansion), and the Silk Bag in the Storigoi Graveyard (requires going to a dead end past the Town of Aldora and using garlic).

One spot that can give players a bit of concern are the marshes.  You have to cross Belasco Marsh to get from the Town of Jova to the Ferryman.  Youl also have to cross Joma Marsh to get to Laruba Mansion.  If your level is not around 2, then you should invest in some laurels for these crossings.  You can find laurels to purchase for 50 hearts (quantity 2) in every town except Jova, Veros and Yomi.  A guy in Laurba Mansion will also give you laurels for free.  If hearts are not meaningful, just wade through quickly.

Towns with churches are Jova, Veros, Aldora and Doina.  Churches and leveling up are the only ways to restore your life, but the churches in Jova and Aldora are on the top floor, making them time consuming to get to.

Defeat Death and Carmilla with a whip and Dracula with the Golden Knife.  If you are quick, you can kill Dracula with the knife before he has a chance to attack.  Alternately, the Sacred Flame will stun Dracula.

Metroid

Metroid needs no introduction.  It is one of the first known platformers to encourage exploration.  It is also one of the first non-linear NES games.  Its item acquiring, corridor and shaft structure and isolating experience has made it legendary.

In order to get the best ending in Metroid, you must beat the game in under one hour.  In order to get Armorless Samus, you must beat the game in under three hours.  Otherwise after you get an ending you will restart as Armored Samus.  After the ending you can play a new game with all the powerups you have accumulated except for Energy Tanks and Missile Containers.  If you cannot get under an hour on your first game, you should be able to on your second.

Metroid saves the number of energy tanks you have, your current number of missiles, you maximum number of missiles, and which powerups and beam weapons you have acquired.  It also saves the destruction of each missile door and each Zeebite destroyed in Mother Brain's chamber.  It will save when the mini-bosses Kraid and Ridley are defeated.  Finally, it saves the amount of time you have spent in the game.  Shaving time off that last value is what this guide is all about.

Unfortunately, the one thing Metroid does not save is the current amount of health you have.  It also starts you off with only 30 life, even if you have six energy tanks.  You can die easily early in the game if you are not cautious and do not grab energy balls, but getting your energy up this way is time consuming.  However, once you acquire a few items it gets much easier to survive.

Time passes in Metroid whenever you can control your character.  This does not include when you pause the game, collect a special item, energy tank or missile container, go through a door or up or down an elevator.

Basic Path

Brinstar
Maru Mari
Missile Container (near Norfair elevator)
Long Beam
Energy Tank (near Bomb)
Bomb
Ice Beam
Varia
Missile Tank (near Varia)
Energy Tank (near Varia)

Norfair
Missile Container (right door at the end of the shaft with the elevator to Brinstar)
Missile Container (right door at the end of the shaft with the elevator to Brinstar)
Missile Container (near Ice Beam)
Missile Container (near Ice Beam)
Missile Container (near Ice Beam)
Missile Container (near Ice Beam)
Missile Container (near Ice Beam)
High Jump
Screw Attack

Mini-Boss Hideout II
Missile Container (above door in corridor to the right of the shaft with the elevator to Norfair)
Energy Container (watch out for the trap)
Missile Tank (a hard jump, optional)
Ridley
Energy Tank (the 10-missile door beyond Ridley's room)

Mini-Boss Hideout I
Energy Tank (2nd door on the left of the shaft with the elevator leading to Brinstar)
Missile Container (1st door on the left of the shaft with the elevator leading to Brinstar)
Missile Container (1st door on the right of the shaft with the elevator leading to Brinstar)
Missile Container (near Fake Kraid)
Kraid
Energy Tank (in Kraid's room)
Missile Container (door on the left of the shaft that leads up from Kraid's room)

Tourian
Mother Brain

In this basic guide, you will have the maximum of six Energy Tanks.  You should have a maximum missile capacity of 220-225 Missiles (game max is 255).  You won't obtain the Wave Beam or the missiles in the green bubble area of Norfair and the tank at the very bottom of Hideout II.  They are just too time consuming to acquire.  You should have more than enough missiles for Mother Brain and her Zeebites, and the Metroids in Tourian respawn to give you more.

The most difficult part of this path is getting the Varia.  When you get to the green corridors, you have to freeze the Waver in the small corridor just under the door to the Varia.  You must shoot the blocks to get the Waver to fly up the screen and clear all the blocks.  You freeze the Waver when he is at the fifth block.  With the cartridge version, the Waver's patterns are less random, making this easier.  In fact, if you approach the corridor from the left door, you should be able to make the Waver go up the blocks when he comes back to the right for the first time.  When the blocks reform and he unfreezes, he should fly to the open area above.  Then you have to make sure it stays up there and alive so you can freeze it to use as a platform to get to the Varia door.  Both of these tasks can take a decent amount of time, depending on luck and skill.

When you defeat Ridley and get the Energy Tank, you should go to the continue/password or continue/save screen by pressing Up and A on the second controller when the game is paused.  This will take you back to the starting point in Brinstar if you are playing the FDS version.  If you are playing the cartridge version, you will need to do it to get you to the Hideout II elevator, go up the elevator, do it again, go up the Norfair elevator to Brinstar, then do it a third time.  You will then be back at the Brinstar starting point.  From there you can go to Hideout I and get the Energy Tank on the second door to the right in the shaft where the elevator is located.  From there, beat Kraid and then go to Tourian.

In Tourian Metroids give you 30 missiles instead of the 2 that other enemies give, so you can replenish your stock.  If you are a bit low on life, their energy balls give 30 life instead of the 5 or 20 that other enemies give.  Metroids always give a life ball or a missile.

In the original version of Metroid for the Famicom Disk System, the endings are a bit different.  You get the best ending if you beat the game in two hours or less (instead of one).  There is no Armorless Samus in the game and you do not start a new game with any previously acquired powerups.  All you get is a stack of moneybags next to your character on the character select screen showing you the quality of the ending you previously achieved.  Because there are five endings, you get five moneybags for the best ending, four for the next best, and so on.