The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an
8-bit
In computer architecture, 8-bit Integer (computer science), integers or other Data (computing), data units are those that are 8 bits wide (1 octet (computing), octet). Also, 8-bit central processing unit (CPU) and arithmetic logic unit (ALU) arc ...
third-generation home video game console
A home video game console is a video game console that is designed to be connected to a display device, such as a television, and an external power source as to play video games. Home consoles are generally less powerful and customizable than ...
produced by
Nintendo
is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company headquartered in Kyoto, Japan. It develops video games and video game consoles.
Nintendo was founded in 1889 as by craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi and originally produce ...
. It was first released in Japan in 1983 as the commonly known as the The NES, a redesigned version, was released in American test markets on October 18, 1985, before becoming widely available in North America and other countries.
After developing a series of successful
arcade games
An arcade game or coin-op game is a coin-operated entertainment machine typically installed in public businesses such as restaurants, bars and amusement arcades. Most arcade games are presented as primarily games of skill and include arcade v ...
in the early 1980s, Nintendo planned to create a home video game console. Rejecting more complex proposals, the Nintendo president
Hiroshi Yamauchi
was a Japanese businessman and the third president of Nintendo, joining the company in 1949 until stepping down on 24 May 2002, being subsequently succeeded by Satoru Iwata. During his 53-year tenure, Yamauchi transformed Nintendo from a hanafu ...
called for a simple, cheap console that ran games stored on
cartridges. The
controller
Controller may refer to:
Occupations
* Controller or financial controller, or in government accounting comptroller, a senior accounting position
* Controller, someone who performs agent handling in espionage
* Air traffic controller, a person ...
design was reused from Nintendo's portable
Game & Watch
The Game & Watch brand ( ''Gēmu & Uotchi''; called ''Tricotronic'' in West Germany and Austria, abbreviated as ''G&W'') is a series of handheld electronic games developed, manufactured, released, and marketed by Nintendo from 1980 in video gam ...
games. Nintendo released several add-ons, such as a
light gun
A light gun is a pointing device for computers and a control device for arcade and video games, typically shaped to resemble a pistol.
Early history
The first light guns were produced in the 1930s, following the development of light-sensing ...
for shooting games.
The NES was one of the
best-selling consoles of its time and helped revitalize the US game industry following the
video game crash of 1983
The video game crash of 1983 (known as the Atari shock in Japan) was a large-scale recession in the video game industry that occurred from 1983 to 1985, primarily in the United States. The crash was attributed to several factors, including ma ...
. It introduced a now-standard
business model
A business model describes how an organization creates, delivers, and captures value,''Business Model Generation'', Alexander Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur, Alan Smith, and 470 practitioners from 45 countries, self-published, 2010 in economic, social, ...
of licensing
third-party developers to produce and distribute games. The NES featured a number of groundbreaking games, such as the 1985 platform game ''
Super Mario Bros.
is a platform game developed and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). The successor to the 1983 arcade game '' Mario Bros.'' and the first game in the ''Super Mario'' series, it was first released in 1985 for ...
'' and the 1986 action-adventure games ''
The Legend of Zelda
''The Legend of Zelda'' is an action-adventure game franchise created by the Japanese game designers Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka. It is primarily developed and published by Nintendo, although some portable installments and re-rele ...
'' and ''
Metroid
is an action-adventure game franchise created by Nintendo. The player controls the bounty hunter Samus Aran, who protects the galaxy from Space Pirate (Metroid), Space Pirates and other malevolent forces and their attempts to harness the powe ...
,'' which became long-running franchises. It was succeeded in 1990 by the
Super Nintendo Entertainment System
The Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES), commonly shortened to Super NES or Super Nintendo, is a 16-bit home video game console developed by Nintendo that was released in 1990 in Japan and South Korea, 1991 in North America, 1992 in Eur ...
. In 2011, ''
IGN
''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...
'' named the NES the greatest video game console of all time.
History
Development
![Nintendo Famicom Tietokonemuseo](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/50/Nintendo_Famicom_Tietokonemuseo.JPG)
Following a series of
arcade game
An arcade game or coin-op game is a coin-operated entertainment machine typically installed in public businesses such as restaurants, bars and amusement arcades. Most arcade games are presented as primarily games of skill and include arcade v ...
successes in the early 1980s, Nintendo made plans to create a cartridge-based console called the Family Computer, or Famicom.
Masayuki Uemura
was a Japanese engineer, video game producer, and professor. He was known for his work as an employee of Nintendo from 1971 to 2004, most notably for serving as a key factor in the development of the Nintendo Entertainment System.
A former ...
designed the system. The console's hardware was largely based on
arcade video game
An arcade video game takes player input from its controls, processes it through electrical or computerized components, and displays output to an electronic monitor or similar display. Most arcade video games are coin-operated, housed in an arca ...
s, particularly the hardware for
Namco
was a Japanese multinational corporation, multinational video game and entertainment company, headquartered in Ōta, Tokyo. It held several international branches, including Namco America in Santa Clara, California, Namco Europe in London, Na ...
's ''
Galaxian
is a 1979 fixed shooter arcade video game developed and published by Namco. The player assumes control of the Galaxip starfighter in its mission to protect Earth from waves of aliens. Gameplay involves destroying each formation of aliens, who ...
'' (1979) and Nintendo's ''
Radar Scope
is a 1980 shoot 'em up arcade game developed by Nintendo R&D2 and published by Nintendo. The player assumes the role of the Sonic Spaceport starship and must wipe out formations of an enemy race known as the Gamma Raiders before they destroy t ...
'' (1980) and ''
Donkey Kong
is a video game franchise created by Shigeru Miyamoto and owned by Nintendo. It follows the adventures of a gorilla named Donkey Kong (character), Donkey Kong and his clan of other Ape, apes and monkeys. The franchise primarily consists of plat ...
'' (1981), with the goal of matching their powerful
sprite and
scrolling
In computer displays, filmmaking, television production, and other kinetic displays, scrolling is sliding text, images or video across a monitor or display, vertically or horizontally. "Scrolling," as such, does not change the layout of the text ...
capabilities in a home system.
[
*] Original plans called for an advanced
16-bit
16-bit microcomputers are microcomputers that use 16-bit microprocessors.
A 16-bit register can store 216 different values. The range of integer values that can be stored in 16 bits depends on the integer representation used. With the two mos ...
system which would function as a full-fledged computer with a keyboard and floppy disk drive, but Nintendo president
Hiroshi Yamauchi
was a Japanese businessman and the third president of Nintendo, joining the company in 1949 until stepping down on 24 May 2002, being subsequently succeeded by Satoru Iwata. During his 53-year tenure, Yamauchi transformed Nintendo from a hanafu ...
rejected this and instead decided to go for a cheaper, more conventional cartridge-based game console as he believed that features such as keyboards and disks were intimidating to non-technophiles. A test model was constructed in October 1982 to verify the functionality of the hardware, after which work began on programming tools. Because 65xx CPUs had not been manufactured or sold in Japan up to that time, no cross-development software was available and it had to be produced from scratch. Early Famicom games were written on a system that ran on an
NEC PC-8001 computer and LEDs on a grid were used with a digitizer to design graphics as no software design tools for this purpose existed at that time.
The code name for the project was "GameCom", but Masayuki Uemura's wife proposed the name "Famicom", arguing that "In Japan, 'pasokon' is used to mean a personal computer, but it is neither a home nor personal computer. Perhaps we could say it is a family computer." Meanwhile, Hiroshi Yamauchi decided that the console should use a red and white theme after seeing a billboard for DX Antenna (a Japanese antenna manufacturer) which used those colors.
The Famicom was also influenced by the
ColecoVision
ColecoVision is a second-generation home video-game console developed by Coleco and launched in North America in August 1982. It was released a year later in Europe by CBS Electronics as the CBS ColecoVision.
The console offered a closer expe ...
,
Coleco
Coleco Industries, Inc. was an American company founded in 1932 by Maurice Greenberg as The Connecticut Leather Company. It was a successful toy company in the 1980s, mass-producing versions of Cabbage Patch Kids dolls and its video game console ...
's competition against the
Atari 2600
The Atari 2600, initially branded as the Atari Video Computer System (Atari VCS) from its release until November 1982, is a home video game console developed and produced by Atari, Inc. Released in September 1977, it popularized microprocessor- ...
in the United States;
[
*] the ColecoVision's top-seller was a port of Nintendo's ''Donkey Kong''.
The project's chief manager Takao Sawano brought a ColecoVision home to his family, impressed by its smooth graphics, which contrasts with the flicker and slowdown commonly seen on Atari 2600 games. Uemura said the ColecoVision set the bar for the Famicom. They wanted to surpass it and match the more powerful ''Donkey Kong'' arcade hardware; they took a ''Donkey Kong'' arcade cabinet to chip manufacturer
Ricoh
is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational imaging and electronics company (law), company. It was founded by the now-defunct commercial division of the Riken, Institute of Physical and Chemical Research (Riken) known as the ''Riken ...
for analysis, which led to Ricoh producing the
Picture Processing Unit
A video display controller or VDC (also called a display engine or display interface) is an integrated circuit which is the main component in a video-signal generator, a device responsible for the production of a TV video signal in a computin ...
(PPU) chip for the NES.
Original plans called for the Famicom's cartridges to be the size of a cassette tape, but ultimately they ended up being twice as big. Careful design attention was paid to the cartridge connectors because loose and faulty connections often plagued arcade machines. As it necessitated 60 connection lines for the memory and expansion, Nintendo decided to produce its own connectors.
The controllers are hard-wired to the console with no connectors for cost reasons. The controller designs were reused from the
Game & Watch
The Game & Watch brand ( ''Gēmu & Uotchi''; called ''Tricotronic'' in West Germany and Austria, abbreviated as ''G&W'') is a series of handheld electronic games developed, manufactured, released, and marketed by Nintendo from 1980 in video gam ...
machines, although the Famicom design team originally wanted to use arcade-style joysticks, even dismantling some from American game consoles to see how they worked. There were concerns regarding the durability of the joystick design and that children might step on joysticks on the floor. Katsuya Nakawaka attached a Game & Watch
D-pad
A D-pad (short for directional pad or digital pad; officially referred to by Nintendo as a +Control Pad) is a flat, usually thumb-operated, often digital, four-way directional control with one button on each point, found on nearly all modern vid ...
to the Famicom prototype and found that it was easy to use and caused no discomfort. Ultimately though, they installed a 15-pin expansion port on the front of the console so that an optional arcade-style joystick could be used.
Gunpei Yokoi
, sometimes transliterated Gumpei Yokoi, was a Japanese video game designer. He was a long-time Nintendo employee, best known as creator of the Game & Watch handheld system, inventor of the cross-shaped Control Pad, the original designer of th ...
suggested an eject lever to the cartridge slot which is not necessary, but he believed that children could be entertained by pressing it. Uemura adopted his idea. Uemura added a microphone to the second controller with the idea that it could be used to make players voices sound through the TV speaker.
Japanese release
The console was released on July 15, 1983, as the for () with three
ports
A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as H ...
of Nintendo's successful arcade games ''
Donkey Kong
is a video game franchise created by Shigeru Miyamoto and owned by Nintendo. It follows the adventures of a gorilla named Donkey Kong (character), Donkey Kong and his clan of other Ape, apes and monkeys. The franchise primarily consists of plat ...
'', ''
Donkey Kong Jr.
is a 1982 arcade platform game that was released by Nintendo. It is the sequel to ''Donkey Kong'', but with the roles reversed compared to its predecessor: Mario (previously named "Jumpman") is now the villain and Donkey Kong Jr. is trying to ...
'', and ''
Popeye
Popeye the Sailor Man is a fictional cartoon character created by E. C. Segar, Elzie Crisler Segar.[crash
Crash or CRASH may refer to:
Common meanings
* Collision, an impact between two or more objects
* Crash (computing), a condition where a program ceases to respond
* Cardiac arrest, a medical condition in which the heart stops beating
* Couch su ...](_blank)
. Following a
product recall
A product recall is a request from a manufacturer to return a product after the discovery of safety issues or product defects that might endanger the consumer or put the maker/seller at risk of legal action.
The recall is an effort to limit ruin ...
and a reissue with a new
motherboard
A motherboard (also called mainboard, main circuit board, mb, mboard, backplane board, base board, system board, logic board (only in Apple computers) or mobo) is the main printed circuit board (PCB) in general-purpose computers and other expand ...
, the Famicom's popularity soared, becoming the best-selling game console in Japan by the end of 1984.
Nintendo launched the system with only first-party games, but after being approached by
Namco
was a Japanese multinational corporation, multinational video game and entertainment company, headquartered in Ōta, Tokyo. It held several international branches, including Namco America in Santa Clara, California, Namco Europe in London, Na ...
and
Hudson Soft
was a Japanese video game company that released numerous games for video game consoles, home computers and mobile phones, mainly from the 1980s to the 2000s. It was headquartered in the Midtown Tower in Tokyo Midtown, Akasaka, Minato, Tokyo ...
in 1984, agreed to produce third-party games for a 30% fee for console licensing and production costs. This rate continued in the industry for consoles and digital storefronts through the 21st Century.
North American release
Nintendo also had its sights set on the North American market, entering into negotiations with
Atari, Inc.
Atari, Inc. was an American video game developer and home computer company founded in 1972 by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney. Atari was a key player in the formation of the video arcade and video game industry.
Based primarily around the Sunny ...
to release the Famicom under Atari's name as the Nintendo Advanced Video Gaming System. The deal was set to be finalized and signed at the Summer
Consumer Electronics Show
CES (; formerly an initialism for Consumer Electronics Show) is an annual trade show organized by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA). Held in January at the Las Vegas Convention Center in Winchester, Nevada, United States, the event typi ...
in June 1983. However, Atari discovered at that show that its competitor Coleco was illegally demonstrating its
Coleco Adam
The Coleco Adam is a home computer and expansion device for the ColecoVision released in 1983 by American toy and video game manufacturer Coleco. It was an attempt to follow on the success of the company's ColecoVision video game console. The Ad ...
computer with Nintendo's ''Donkey Kong'' game. This violation of Atari's exclusive license with Nintendo to publish the game for its own computer systems delayed the implementation of Nintendo's game console marketing contract with Atari. Atari's CEO
Ray Kassar
Raymond Edward Kassar (January 2, 1928 – December 10, 2017) was president, and later CEO, of Atari Inc. from 1978 to 1983. He had previously been executive vice-president of Burlington Industries, the world's largest textile company at the t ...
was fired the next month, so the deal went nowhere, and Nintendo decided to market its system on its own.
![Nintendo Advanced Video System (retouched)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cf/Nintendo_Advanced_Video_System_%28retouched%29.jpg)
Subsequent plans for the Nintendo Advanced Video System likewise never materialized: a North American repackaged Famicom console featuring a keyboard,
cassette data recorder, wireless
joystick
A joystick, sometimes called a flight stick, is an input device consisting of a stick that pivots on a base and reports its angle or direction to the device it is controlling. A joystick, also known as the control column, is the principal cont ...
controller and a special
BASIC
BASIC (Beginners' All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) is a family of general-purpose, high-level programming languages designed for ease of use. The original version was created by John G. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz at Dartmouth College ...
cartridge.
By the beginning of 1985, more than 2.5 million Famicom units had been sold in Japan, and Nintendo soon announced plans to release it in North America as the Advanced Video Entertainment System (AVS) that year. The American
video game press was skeptical that the console could have any success in the region, as the industry was still recovering from the
video game crash of 1983
The video game crash of 1983 (known as the Atari shock in Japan) was a large-scale recession in the video game industry that occurred from 1983 to 1985, primarily in the United States. The crash was attributed to several factors, including ma ...
. The March 1985 issue of ''
Electronic Games
An electronic game is a game that uses electronics to create an interactive system with which a player can play. Video games are the most common form today, and for this reason the two terms are often used interchangeably. There are other common ...
'' magazine stated that "the videogame market in America has virtually disappeared" and that "this could be a miscalculation on Nintendo's part".
The Famicom hardware first made its North American debut in the
arcades, in the form of the
Nintendo VS. System in 1984; the system's success in arcades paved the way for the official release of the NES console.
With US retailers refusing to stock game consoles, Yamauchi realized there was still a market for video games in the arcades, so he decided to introduce the Famicom to North America through the arcade industry.
The VS. System became a major success in North American arcades,
becoming the highest-grossing
arcade machine of 1985 in the United States. By the time the NES launched, nearly 100,000 VS. Systems had been sold to American arcades. The success of the VS. System gave Nintendo the confidence to release the Famicom in North America as a video game console, for which there was growing interest due to Nintendo's positive reputation in the arcades. It also gave Nintendo the opportunity to test new games as VS. Paks in the arcades, to determine which games to release for the NES launch.
At June 1985's
Consumer Electronics Show
CES (; formerly an initialism for Consumer Electronics Show) is an annual trade show organized by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA). Held in January at the Las Vegas Convention Center in Winchester, Nevada, United States, the event typi ...
(CES), Nintendo unveiled the American version of its Famicom, with a new case redesigned by Lance Barr and featuring a "
zero insertion force
Zero insertion force (ZIF) is a type of IC socket or electrical connector that requires very little (but not literally zero) force for insertion. With a ZIF socket, before the IC is inserted, a lever or slider on the side of the socket is mo ...
" cartridge slot.
The change from a top-loader in the Famicom to a front-loader was to make the new console more like a
video cassette recorder
A videocassette recorder (VCR) or video recorder is an electromechanical device that records analog audio and analog video from broadcast television or other source on a removable, magnetic tape videocassette, and can play back the recordin ...
, which had grown in popularity by 1985, and differentiate the unit from past video game consoles. Additionally, Uemura explained that Nintendo developers had feared that the console's electronics might face
electrostatic hazards in dry American states such as
Arizona
Arizona ( ; nv, Hoozdo Hahoodzo ; ood, Alĭ ṣonak ) is a state in the Southwestern United States. It is the 6th largest and the 14th most populous of the 50 states. Its capital and largest city is Phoenix. Arizona is part of the Fou ...
and
Texas
Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...
, and a front-loading design would be safer if children handled the console carelessly.
This was deployed as the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). Nintendo seeded these first systems to limited American test markets starting in New York City on October 18, 1985, and followed up in
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
in February 1986; the American nationwide release came on September 27, 1986. Nintendo released 17 launch games: ''
10-Yard Fight
is an American football sports video game that was developed and published in Japan by Irem for arcades in 1983. It was published overseas by Taito in the Americas, by Electrocoin in Europe, and by ADP Automaten GmbH in West Germany.
Gamepl ...
'', ''
Baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...
'', ''
Clu Clu Land
is a puzzle video game developed and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System. It was released in 1984 in Japan for the Famicom and was later released in North America in 1985 as a Nintendo Entertainment System launch tit ...
'', ''
Duck Hunt
is a 1984 light gun shooter video game developed and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) video game console and the Nintendo Vs. System arcade hardware. The game was first released in April 1984, in Japan for the ...
'', ''
Excitebike
is a motocross racing video game developed and published by Nintendo. In Japan, it was released for the Famicom in 1984 and then ported to arcades as ''Vs. Excitebike'' for the Nintendo Vs. System later that year. In North America, it was ini ...
'', ''
Golf
Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible.
Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping wi ...
'', ''
Gyromite
R.O.B. (Robotic Operating Buddy) is a toy robot accessory for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). It was launched in July 1985 as the in Japan, and October 1985 as R.O.B. in North America. Its short lifespan yielded only two games in the ...
'', ''
Hogan's Alley'', ''
Ice Climber
is a platform game developed and published by Nintendo for the arcade Nintendo VS. System, VS. System in 1984, and for the Famicom and Nintendo Entertainment System consoles in 1985. The characters Popo and Nana (Pepe and Nana in the German lan ...
'', ''
Kung Fu
Chinese martial arts, often called by the umbrella terms kung fu (; ), kuoshu () or wushu (), are multiple fighting styles that have developed over the centuries in Greater China. These fighting styles are often classified according to common ...
'', ''
Pinball
Pinball games are a family of games in which a ball is propelled into a specially designed table where it bounces off various obstacles, scoring points either en route or when it comes to rest. Historically the board was studded with nails call ...
'', ''
Soccer
Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...
'', ''
Stack-Up
R.O.B. (Robotic Operating Buddy) is a toy robot accessory for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). It was launched in July 1985 as the in Japan, and October 1985 as R.O.B. in North America. Its short lifespan yielded only two games in the ...
'', ''
Super Mario Bros.
is a platform game developed and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). The successor to the 1983 arcade game '' Mario Bros.'' and the first game in the ''Super Mario'' series, it was first released in 1985 for ...
'', ''
Tennis
Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...
'', ''
Wild Gunman
is a light gun shooter game developed and published by Nintendo. Originally created as an electro-mechanical arcade game in 1974 by Gunpei Yokoi, it was adapted to a video game format for the Famicom console in 1984. It was released in 1985 a ...
'', and ''
Wrecking Crew''.
For expedient production, some varieties of these launch games contain Famicom chips with an adapter inside the cartridge so they play on North American consoles, which is why the title screens of ''Gyromite'' and ''Stack-Up'' show the titles of the Famicom games ''Robot Gyro'' and ''Robot Block'', respectively.
![NES-ROB](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6c/NES-ROB.jpg)
The system's launch represented not only a new product, but also a reframing of the severely damaged home video game market in North America. The 1983 video game crash had occurred in large part due to a lack of consumer and retailer confidence in video games, which had been partially due to confusion and misrepresentation in video game marketing. Prior to the NES, the packaging of many video games presented bombastic artwork which did not represent a game's actual graphics. Furthermore, a single game such as ''
Pac-Man
originally called ''Puck Man'' in Japan, is a 1980 maze action video game developed and released by Namco for arcades. In North America, the game was released by Midway Manufacturing as part of its licensing agreement with Namco America. Th ...
'' appeared across consoles with substantial variations in graphics, sound, and general quality. In contrast, Nintendo's marketing strategy aimed to regain consumer and retailer confidence by delivering a singular platform whose graphics could be represented truthfully and whose qualities were clearly defined.
To differentiate Nintendo's new home platform from the perception of a troubled and shallow video game market still reeling from the 1983 crash, the company freshened its product nomenclature and established a strict product approval and licensing policy. The overall platform is referred to as "Entertainment System" instead of a "video game system", is centered upon a machine called a "Control Deck" instead of a "console", and features software cartridges called "Game Paks" instead of "video games". This allowed Nintendo to gain more traction in selling the system in toy stores. To deter production of games which had not been licensed by Nintendo, and to prevent copying, the
10NES lockout chip
In a general sense, a lockout chip is a chip within an electronic device to prevent other manufacturers from using a company's device to perform certain functions.
A notable example is the lockout chip found in Nintendo's Nintendo Entertainment Sy ...
system act as a lock-and-key coupling of each Game Pak and Control Deck. The packaging of the launch lineup of NES games bear pictures of close representations of actual onscreen graphics. To reduce consumer confusion, symbols on the games' packaging clearly indicate the genre of the game. A seal of quality is on all licensed game and accessory packaging. The initial seal states, "This seal is your assurance that Nintendo has approved and guaranteed the quality of this product". This text was later changed to "
Official Nintendo Seal of Quality".
Unlike with the Famicom, Nintendo of America marketed the console primarily to children, instituting a strict policy of censoring profanity, sexual, religious, or political content. The most famous example is
Lucasfilm
Lucasfilm Ltd. LLC is an American film and television production company and a subsidiary of Walt Disney Studios, which is a business segment of The Walt Disney Company. The studio is best known for creating and producing the ''Star Wars'' and ' ...
's attempts to port the comedy-horror game ''
Maniac Mansion
''Maniac Mansion'' is a 1987 graphic adventure video game developed and published by Lucasfilm Games. It follows teenage protagonist Dave Miller as he attempts to rescue his girlfriend Sandy Pantz from a mad scientist, whose mind has been ensla ...
'' to the NES, which Nintendo insisted be considerably watered down.
The optional Robotic Operating Buddy, or
R.O.B.
R.O.B. (Robotic Operating Buddy) is a toy robot accessory for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). It was launched in July 1985 as the in Japan, and October 1985 as R.O.B. in North America. Its short lifespan yielded only two games in the ...
, was part of a marketing plan to portray the NES's technology as being novel and sophisticated when compared to previous game consoles, and to portray its position as being within reach of the better established toy market. Though at first, the American public exhibited limited excitement for the console itself, peripherals such as the
light gun
A light gun is a pointing device for computers and a control device for arcade and video games, typically shaped to resemble a pistol.
Early history
The first light guns were produced in the 1930s, following the development of light-sensing ...
and R.O.B. attracted extensive attention.
[Boyer, Steven. "A Virtual Failure: Evaluating the Success of Nintendos Virtual Boy." Velvet Light Trap.64 (2009): 23–33. ProQuest Research Library. Web. May 24, 2012.]
Other markets
In Europe and
Oceania
Oceania (, , ) is a region, geographical region that includes Australasia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Spanning the Eastern Hemisphere, Eastern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres, Oceania is estimated to have a land area of ...
, the NES was released in two separate marketing regions. The first consisted of mainland Europe (excluding Italy) where distribution was handled by a number of different companies, with Nintendo responsible for manufacturing. The NES saw an early launch in Europe in 1986 although most of the European countries received the console in 1987. The release in Scandinavia was on 1 September 1986, where it was released by
Bergsala
Bergsala AB is a Swedish distribution company based in Kungsbacka. It was established in 1976 and has operated as the agent and distributor of Nintendo products in the Nordic countries since 1981. Bergsala's administrative center and warehouse ...
. In the Netherlands, it was distributed by
Bandai
is a Japanese multinational toy manufacturer and distributor headquartered in Taitō, Tokyo. Its international branches, Bandai Namco Toys & Collectables America and Bandai UK, are respectively headquartered in Irvine, California and Richmond ...
BV. In France it was released in October 1987,
while in Spain between late 1987 and 1988 through distributor Spaco.
Also in 1987,
Mattel
Mattel, Inc. ( ) is an American multinational toy manufacturing and entertainment company founded in January 1945 and headquartered in El Segundo, California. The company has presence in 35 countries and territories and sells products in more ...
handled distribution for the second region, consisting of the United Kingdom, Ireland, Italy, Australia and New Zealand. Mattel handled distribution for Nintendo in Canada as well, however it was unrelated to the aforementioned European / Australian releases.
In Brazil, the console was released late in 1993 by
Playtronic
Playtronic Industrial Ltda. is a Brazilian video game company. Its original iteration was also a toy manufacturer and was based in Manaus, Brazil, and was a joint venture between companies Gradiente Industrial S.A. (consumer electronics compa ...
, even after the SNES. But the Brazilian market had been dominated by unlicensed NES clones — both locally made, and smuggled from Taiwan.
One of the most successful local clones was the Phantom System, manufactured by
Gradiente, which licensed Nintendo products in the country for the following decade.
The sales of officially licensed products were low, due to the cloning, the quite late official launch, and the high prices of Nintendo's licensed products.
Outside of Japan, regions in greater Asia received an "Asian Version" of the front-loader NES despite the prevalence of imported Famicom systems.
Due to
import restriction
Protectionism, sometimes referred to as trade protectionism, is the economic policy of restricting imports from other countries through methods such as tariffs on imported goods, import quotas, and a variety of other government regulations ...
s, NES consoles in India and South Korea were rebranded and distributed by local licensees.
The Indian version is called the ''Samurai Electronic TV Game System'' and the Korean version is called the ''Hyundai Comboy''.
The console sold very poorly in India.
Later redesigns and bundles
![NES-Console-Set](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/82/NES-Console-Set.jpg)
For its complete North American release, the Nintendo Entertainment System was progressively released over the ensuing years in several different bundles, beginning with the Deluxe Set, the Basic Set, the Action Set and the Power Set. The Deluxe Set, retailing at (),
included R.O.B., a
light gun
A light gun is a pointing device for computers and a control device for arcade and video games, typically shaped to resemble a pistol.
Early history
The first light guns were produced in the 1930s, following the development of light-sensing ...
called the
NES Zapper
The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit third-generation home video game console produced by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan in 1983 as the commonly known as the The NES, a redesigned version, was released in American ...
, two controllers, and two Game Paks: ''Gyromite'' and ''Duck Hunt''. The Control Deck, first released in 1987, retailed at with no game, and bundled with the ''Super Mario Bros.'' cartridge. The Action Set, retailing in November 1988 for , came with the Control Deck, two game controllers, an NES Zapper, and a dual Game Pak containing both ''
Super Mario Bros.
is a platform game developed and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). The successor to the 1983 arcade game '' Mario Bros.'' and the first game in the ''Super Mario'' series, it was first released in 1985 for ...
'' and ''
Duck Hunt
is a 1984 light gun shooter video game developed and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) video game console and the Nintendo Vs. System arcade hardware. The game was first released in April 1984, in Japan for the ...
''.
In 1989, the Power Set included the console, two game controllers, an NES Zapper, a Power Pad, and a triple Game Pak containing ''Super Mario Bros'', ''Duck Hunt'', and ''
World Class Track Meet
''Stadium Events'' is a sports fitness game developed by Human Entertainment and published by Bandai for the Nintendo Entertainment System. This and ''Athletic World'' are the two games in the ''Family Fun Fitness'' series, designed and brande ...
''. In 1990, a Sports Set bundle was released, including the console, an
NES Satellite
The NES Satellite is a Nintendo Entertainment System multiplayer adaptor accessory (multitap), created by Nintendo and released in 1989 as a part of the NES Sports Set.
With select supporting games, the Satellite allows up to four players to pla ...
infrared wireless
multitap
:''Multi-tap also refers to a text-entry system for mobile phones.''
A multitap is a video game console peripheral that increases the number of controller ports available to the player, allowing additional controllers to be used in play, similar t ...
adapter, four game controllers, and a dual Game Pak containing ''
Super Spike V'Ball'' and ''
Nintendo World Cup
''Nintendo World Cup'' is a soccer video game for the Family Computer/NES and Game Boy, developed by Technōs Japan and released in 1990. It is a localization of the fourth ''Kunio-kun'' game released for the Family Computer. Ports for the PC ...
''.
Two more bundle packages were later released using the original model NES console. The Challenge Set of 1992 included the console, two controllers, and a ''
Super Mario Bros. 3'' Game Pak for a retail price of . The Basic Set retailed at ; it included only the console and two controllers, and no pack-in game.
Instead, it contained a book called the ''
Official Nintendo Player's Guide'', which contained detailed information for every NES game made up to that point.
Finally, the console was redesigned for the Australian, North American and Japanese markets. As part of the final Nintendo-released bundle package, the product included the
New-Style NES
The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), an 8-bit third-generation home video game console produced by Nintendo, had numerous model variants produced throughout its lifetime. It was originally released in 1983 as the (and widely known as the ) i ...
, or NES-101, and one redesigned "dogbone" game controller. In Australia, this version of the system was also available with a cartridge compiling ''Super Mario Bros'', ''Tetris'' and ''Nintendo World Cup''. Released in October 1993 in North America and 1994 in Australia, this final bundle retailed for and ( with the pack-in game) respectively, and remained in production until the discontinuation of the NES in 1995.
Discontinuation
On August 14, 1995, Nintendo discontinued the Nintendo Entertainment System in both North America and Europe.
In North America, replacements for the original front-loading NES were available for in exchange for a broken system until at least December 1996, under Nintendo's Power Swap program. The Game Boy and Super NES were also covered in this program, for and respectively.
On May 30, 2003, Nintendo announced the discontinuation of the Famicom in September alongside the Super Famicom and the disk rewriting services for the Famicom Disk System. The last Famicom, serial number HN11033309, was manufactured on September 25;
it was kept by Nintendo and subsequently loaned to the organizers of Level X, a video game exhibition held from December 4, 2003, to February 8, 2004, at the
Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography
The is an art museum concentrating on photography.
As the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, it was founded by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, and is in Meguro-ku, a short walk from Ebisu station in southwest Tokyo. The museum al ...
, for a Famicom retrospective in commemoration of the console's 20th anniversary. Nintendo offered repair service for the Famicom in Japan until 2007, when it was discontinued due to a shortage of available parts.
Hardware
Configurations
Although all versions of the Famicom/NES include essentially similar hardware, they vary in physical characteristics. The original Famicom's design is predominantly white plastic, with dark red trim; it featured a top-loading cartridge slot, grooves on both sides of the deck in which the hardwired game controllers could be placed when not in use, and a 15-
pin
A pin is a device used for fastening objects or material together.
Pin or PIN may also refer to:
Computers and technology
* Personal identification number (PIN), to access a secured system
** PIN pad, a PIN entry device
* PIN, a former Dutch ...
expansion port located on the unit's front panel for accessories.
In contrast, the design of the original NES features a more subdued gray, black, and red color scheme; it includes a front-loading cartridge slot covered by a small, hinged door that can be opened to insert or remove a cartridge and closed at other times, and an expansion port on the bottom of the unit. The cartridge connector
pinout
In electronics, a pinout (sometimes written "pin-out") is a cross-reference between the contacts, or ''pins'', of an electrical connector or electronic component, and their functions. "Pinout" now supersedes the term "basing diagram" that was the s ...
was changed between the Famicom and NES.
In late 1993, Nintendo introduced a redesigned version of the Famicom/NES (officially named the New Famicom in Japan and the New-Style NES in the U.S.) to complement the Super Famicom/NES and prolong interest in the console while implementing cost reduction measures.
For the redesigned NES, Nintendo opted to use a top-loading cartridge slot in to avoid reliability issues with the original console; the redesign also omitted AV output.
Conversely, the redesigned Famicom offered such output while introducing detachable game controllers, though the microphone functionality was omitted as a result. The redesigned Famicom and NES models are cosmetically similar aside from the presence of a cartridge "bump" on the NES model, which the Famicom model lacks to accommodate its shorter cartridges as well as the RAM Adapter for the Famicom Disk System.
Sharp Corporation
is a Japanese multinational corporation that designs and manufactures electronic products, headquartered in Sakai-ku, Sakai, Osaka Prefecture. Since 2016 it has been majority owned by the Taiwan-based Foxconn Group. Sharp employs more than 5 ...
produced three licensed variants of the Famicom in Japan, all of which prominently displayed the shortened moniker rather than the official "Family Computer" name. One variant was a television set with an integrated Famicom; originally released in 1983 as the
My Computer TV in and models, it was later released in the United States in 1989 as a 19-inch model named the Video Game Television. Another variant was the
Twin Famicom
The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), an 8-bit third-generation home video game console produced by Nintendo, had numerous model variants produced throughout its lifetime. It was originally released in 1983 as the (and widely known as the ) i ...
, a console released in 1986 that combined a Famicom with a
Famicom Disk System
The commonly shortened to the Famicom Disk System or just Disk System, is a peripheral for Nintendo's Nintendo Entertainment System, Family Computer home video game console, released only in Japan on February 21, 1986. It uses proprietary flopp ...
. Sharp then produced the
Famicom Titler
The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), an 8-bit third-generation home video game console produced by Nintendo, had numerous model variants produced throughout its lifetime. It was originally released in 1983 as the (and widely known as the ...
in 1989; intended for video capture and production, it featured internal RGB video generation and video output via
S-Video
S-Video (also known as separate video, Y/C, and erroneously Super-Video ) is an analog video signal format that carries standard-definition video, typically at 525 lines or 625 lines. It encodes video luma and chrominance on two separate channe ...
while including inputs for adding
subtitles
Subtitles and captions are lines of dialogue or other text displayed at the bottom of the screen in films, television programs, video games or other visual media. They can be transcriptions of the screenplay, translations of it, or informati ...
and
voice-over
Voice-over (also known as off-camera or off-stage commentary) is a production technique where a voice—that is not part of the narrative (non-Diegetic#Film sound and music, diegetic)—is used in a radio, television production, filmmaking, th ...
s.
Hardware clones
![FC-Twin-Console-Set-H](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5a/FC-Twin-Console-Set-H.jpg)
A thriving market of unlicensed NES hardware
clones
Clone or Clones or Cloning or Cloned or The Clone may refer to:
Places
* Clones, County Fermanagh
* Clones, County Monaghan, a town in Ireland
Biology
* Clone (B-cell), a lymphocyte clone, the massive presence of which may indicate a pathologi ...
emerged during the climax of the console's popularity. Initially, such clones were popular in markets where Nintendo issued a legitimate version of the console long time after unlicensed hardware. In particular, the
Dendy (russian: link=no, Де́нди), an unlicensed hardware clone produced in Taiwan and sold in the former
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
, emerged as the most popular video game console of its time in that setting and it enjoyed a degree of fame roughly equivalent to that experienced by the NES/Famicom in North America and Japan. A range of Famicom clones was marketed in Argentina during the late 1980s and early 1990s under the name of
"Family Game", resembling the original hardware design. Thailand got Family FR brand famiclones, the
Micro Genius
''Micro Genius'' () is a brand name used for Famicom clone consoles marketed in several countries around the world, particularly in areas where Nintendo consoles were not readily available, including the Middle East, Southeast Asia, South Ameri ...
(
Simplified Chinese
Simplification, Simplify, or Simplified may refer to:
Mathematics
Simplification is the process of replacing a mathematical expression by an equivalent one, that is simpler (usually shorter), for example
* Simplification of algebraic expressions, ...
: 小天才) was marketed in Southeast Asia as an alternative to the Famicom; and in Central Europe, especially Poland, the
Pegasus
Pegasus ( grc-gre, Πήγασος, Pḗgasos; la, Pegasus, Pegasos) is one of the best known creatures in Greek mythology. He is a winged divine stallion usually depicted as pure white in color. He was sired by Poseidon, in his role as hor ...
was available. Since 1989, there were many Brazilian clones of NES,
and the very popular Phantom System (with hardware superior to the original console) caught the attention of Nintendo itself.
![RetroUSB-AVS-Console-wController-FL](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7a/RetroUSB-AVS-Console-wController-FL.jpg)
The unlicensed clone market has flourished following Nintendo's discontinuation of the NES. Some of the more exotic of these resulting systems surpass the functionality of the original hardware, such as a portable system with a color LCD (
PocketFami). Others have been produced for certain specialized markets, such as a rather primitive personal computer with a keyboard and basic word processing software. These unauthorized clones have been helped by the invention of the so-called
NES-on-a-chip.
As was the case with unlicensed games, Nintendo has typically gone to the courts to prohibit the manufacture and sale of unlicensed cloned hardware. Many of the clone vendors have included built-in copies of licensed Nintendo software, which constitutes copyright infringement in most countries.
Design flaws
![Nintendo-Entertainment-System-NES-Deconstruction-03](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/15/Nintendo-Entertainment-System-NES-Deconstruction-03.jpg)
Nintendo's design styling for US release was made deliberately different from that of other game consoles. Nintendo wanted to distinguish its product from those of competitors and to avoid the generally poor reputation that game consoles had acquired following the
video game crash of 1983
The video game crash of 1983 (known as the Atari shock in Japan) was a large-scale recession in the video game industry that occurred from 1983 to 1985, primarily in the United States. The crash was attributed to several factors, including ma ...
. One result of this philosophy is to disguise the cartridge slot design as a front-loading
zero-insertion force (ZIF) cartridge socket, designed to resemble the front-loading mechanism of a
VCR
A videocassette recorder (VCR) or video recorder is an electromechanical device that records analog audio and analog video from broadcast television or other source on a removable, magnetic tape videocassette, and can play back the recording. ...
. The socket works well when both the connector and the cartridges are clean and the pins on the connector are new. However, the socket is not truly zero-insertion force. When a user inserts the cartridge into the NES, the force of pressing the cartridge into place bends the contact pins slightly and presses the cartridge's ROM board back into the cartridge. Frequent insertion and removal of cartridges wears out the pins, and the ZIF design proved more prone to interference by dirt and dust than an industry-standard card edge connector.
The design problems were exacerbated by Nintendo's choice of materials. The console slot nickel connector springs wear due to design and the game cartridge's brass plated nickel connectors are also prone to
tarnish
Tarnish is a thin layer of corrosion that forms over copper, brass, aluminum, magnesium, neodymium and other similar metals as their outermost layer undergoes a chemical reaction. Tarnish does not always result from the sole effects of oxygen in ...
ing and oxidation. Nintendo sought to fix these problems by redesigning the next generation
Super Nintendo Entertainment System
The Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES), commonly shortened to Super NES or Super Nintendo, is a 16-bit home video game console developed by Nintendo that was released in 1990 in Japan and South Korea, 1991 in North America, 1992 in Eur ...
(SNES) as a top loader similar to the Famicom.
Many players try to alleviate issues in the game caused by this corrosion by blowing into the cartridges, then reinserting them, which actually speeds up the tarnishing due to moisture. One way to slow down the tarnishing process and extend the life of the cartridges is to use
isopropyl alcohol
Isopropyl alcohol (IUPAC name propan-2-ol and also called isopropanol or 2-propanol) is a colorless, flammable organic compound with a pungent alcoholic odor. As an isopropyl group linked to a hydroxyl group ( chemical formula ) it is the s ...
and swabs, as well as non-conductive metal polish such as
Brasso
Brasso is a metal polish designed to remove tarnish from brass, copper, chrome and stainless steel. It is available either directly as a liquid or as an impregnated wadding pad.
History
Brasso originated in Britain in about 1905. Reckitt & ...
or Sheila Shine.
Users have attempted to solve these problems by blowing air onto the cartridge connectors, inserting the cartridge just far enough to get the ZIF to lower, licking the edge connector, slapping the side of the system after inserting a cartridge, shifting the cartridge from side to side after insertion, pushing the ZIF up and down repeatedly, holding the ZIF down lower than it should have been, and cleaning the connectors with alcohol. Many frequently used methods to fix this problem actually risk damaging gaming cartridges or the system. In 1989, Nintendo released an official NES Cleaning Kit to help users clean malfunctioning cartridges and consoles.
In response to these hardware flaws, "Nintendo Authorized Repair Centers" sprang up across the U.S. According to Nintendo, the authorization program was designed to ensure that the machines were properly repaired. Nintendo would ship the necessary replacement parts only to shops that had enrolled in the authorization program. In practice, the authorization process consisted of nothing more than paying a fee to Nintendo for the privilege of stocking such parts.
With the release of the top-loading
NES-101 (NES 2) in 1993 toward the end of the NES's lifespan, Nintendo resolved the problems by switching to a standard
card edge connector
An edge connector is the portion of a printed circuit board (PCB) consisting of signal trace, traces leading to the edge of the board that are intended to plug into a matching jack (connector), socket. The edge connector is a money-saving device ...
and eliminating the lockout chip. All of the Famicom systems use standard card edge connectors, as do Nintendo's two subsequent game consoles, the
Super Nintendo Entertainment System
The Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES), commonly shortened to Super NES or Super Nintendo, is a 16-bit home video game console developed by Nintendo that was released in 1990 in Japan and South Korea, 1991 in North America, 1992 in Eur ...
and the
Nintendo 64
The (N64) is a home video game console developed by Nintendo. The successor to the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, it was released on June 23, 1996, in Japan, on September 29, 1996, in North America, and on March 1, 1997, in Europe and Au ...
.
Lockout
![Nintendo-10NES-Lockout-Chip](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a5/Nintendo-10NES-Lockout-Chip.jpg)
The Famicom as released in Japan contains no lockout hardware, which led to unlicensed cartridges (both legitimate and bootleg) becoming extremely common throughout Japan and East Asia.
Nintendo tried to promote its "Seal of Quality" in these regions to identify licensed games to combat bootlegs, but bootleg Famicom games continued to be produced even after Nintendo moved production onto the Super Famicom, effectively extending the lifetime of the Famicom.
The original NES released for Western countries in 1985 contains the
10NES lockout chip, which prevents it from running cartridges unapproved by Nintendo. The inclusion of the 10NES was a direct influence from the 1983 video game crash in North America, partially caused by a market flooded with uncontrolled publishing of games of poor quality for the home consoles. Nintendo did not want to see that happen with the NES and used the lockout chip to restrict games to only those they licensed and approved for the system. This means of protection worked in combination with the Nintendo "Seal of Quality", which a developer had to acquire before they would be able to have access to the required 10NES information prior to publication of their game.
Initially, the 10NES chip proved a significant barrier to unlicensed developers seeking to develop and sell games for the console. However, hobbyists in later years discovered that disassembling the NES and cutting the fourth pin of the lockout chip would change the chip's mode of operation from "lock" to "key", removing all effects and greatly improving the console's ability to play legal games, as well as bootlegs and converted imports.
Original NES consoles sold in different regions have different lockout chips, thereby enforcing
regional lockout
A regional lockout (or region coding) is a class of digital rights management preventing the use of a certain product or service, such as multimedia or a hardware device, outside a certain region or territory. A regional lockout may be enforced ...
(regardless of TV signal compatibility). Such regions include North America; most of continental Europe (PAL-B);
Asia; and the British Isles, Italy, and Australasia (PAL-A).
Problems with the 10NES lockout chip frequently result in one of the console's most common issues: the blinking red power light, in which the system appears to turn itself on and off repeatedly because the 10NES would reset the console once per second. The lockout chip required constant communication with the chip in the game to work.
Dirty, aging, and bent connectors often disrupt the communication, resulting in the blink effect.
In other cases, the console turns on but only displays a solid white, gray, or green screen.
Technical specifications
![Nintendo-NES-Mk1-Motherboard-Top](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5a/Nintendo-NES-Mk1-Motherboard-Top.jpg)
The console's main
central processing unit
A central processing unit (CPU), also called a central processor, main processor or just processor, is the electronic circuitry that executes instructions comprising a computer program. The CPU performs basic arithmetic, logic, controlling, an ...
(CPU) was produced by
Ricoh
is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational imaging and electronics company (law), company. It was founded by the now-defunct commercial division of the Riken, Institute of Physical and Chemical Research (Riken) known as the ''Riken ...
, which manufactured different versions between NTSC and PAL regions; NTSC consoles use a
2A03 clocked at 1.79 , while PAL consoles use a
2A07 clocked at 1.66 MHz. Both CPUs are
second source
In the electronics industry, a second source is a company that is licensed to manufacture and sell components originally designed by another company (the first source).
It is common for engineers and purchasers to avoid components that are only av ...
variants of the
MOS Technology 6502
The MOS Technology 6502 (typically pronounced "sixty-five-oh-two" or "six-five-oh-two") William Mensch and the moderator both pronounce the 6502 microprocessor as ''"sixty-five-oh-two"''. is an 8-bit microprocessor that was designed by a small t ...
, an 8-bit
microprocessor
A microprocessor is a computer processor where the data processing logic and control is included on a single integrated circuit, or a small number of integrated circuits. The microprocessor contains the arithmetic, logic, and control circu ...
prevalent in contemporary
home computers and consoles; Nintendo ostensibly disabled the 6502's
binary-coded decimal
In computing and electronic systems, binary-coded decimal (BCD) is a class of binary encodings of decimal numbers where each digit is represented by a fixed number of bits, usually four or eight. Sometimes, special bit patterns are used for ...
mode on them to avoid
patent infringement
Patent infringement is the commission of a prohibited act with respect to a patented invention without permission from the patent holder. Permission may typically be granted in the form of a license. The definition of patent infringement may v ...
against or licensing fees towards
MOS Technology
MOS Technology, Inc. ("MOS" being short for Metal Oxide Semiconductor), later known as CSG (Commodore Semiconductor Group) and GMT Microelectronics, was a semiconductor design and fabrication company based in Audubon, Pennsylvania. It is mo ...
, which was owned by then-rival
Commodore International
Commodore International (other names include Commodore International Limited) was an American home computer and electronics manufacturer founded by Jack Tramiel. Commodore International (CI), along with its subsidiary Commodore Business Mach ...
.
The CPU has access to 2 of onboard work .
The console's graphics are handled by a Ricoh 2C02,
a processor known as the Picture Processing Unit (PPU) that is clocked at 5.37 MHz.
A derivative of the Texas Instruments
TMS9918
IMAGE:TMS9918A 01.jpg, VDP TMS9918A
IMAGE:TMS9918A 02.jpg, VDP TMS9918A
IMAGE:TMS9928A 01.jpg, VDP TMS9928A
The TMS9918 is a video display controller (VDC) manufactured by Texas Instruments, in manuals referenced as 'Video Display Processor' (VDP ...
—a
video display controller
A video display controller or VDC (also called a display engine or display interface) is an integrated circuit which is the main component in a video-signal generator, a device responsible for the production of a TV video signal in a computing ...
used in the
ColecoVision
ColecoVision is a second-generation home video-game console developed by Coleco and launched in North America in August 1982. It was released a year later in Europe by CBS Electronics as the CBS ColecoVision.
The console offered a closer expe ...
—the PPU features 2
KB of
video RAM
Dual-ported video RAM, or VRAM, is a dual-ported variant of dynamic RAM (DRAM), which was once commonly used to store the framebuffer in graphics adapters. Note that most computers and game consoles do not use this form of memory, and dual-porte ...
, 256
byte
The byte is a unit of digital information that most commonly consists of eight bits. Historically, the byte was the number of bits used to encode a single character of text in a computer and for this reason it is the smallest addressable unit ...
s of on-die "object attribute memory" (OAM) to store
sprite display information on up to 64 sprites, and 28 bytes of RAM to store information on the
YIQ
YIQ is the color space used by the analog NTSC color TV system, employed mainly in North and Central America, and Japan.
''I'' stands for ''in-phase'', while ''Q'' stands for ''quadrature'', referring to the components used in quadrature amplitud ...
-based
color palette; the console can display up to 25 colors simultaneously out of 54 usable colors.
The console's standard
display resolution
The display resolution or display modes of a digital television, computer monitor or display device is the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution is ...
is 256 × 240
pixel
In digital imaging, a pixel (abbreviated px), pel, or picture element is the smallest addressable element in a raster image, or the smallest point in an all points addressable display device.
In most digital display devices, pixels are the smal ...
s,
though video output options vary between models. The original Famicom features only
radio frequency (RF) modulator output, while the NES additionally includes support for
composite video
Composite video is an analog video signal format that carries standard-definition video (typically at 525 lines or 625 lines) as a single channel. Video information is encoded on one channel, unlike the higher-quality S-Video (two channels) a ...
via
RCA connector
The RCA connector is a type of electrical connector commonly used to carry audio and video signals. The name ''RCA'' derives from the company Radio Corporation of America, which introduced the design in the 1930s. The connectors male plug and ...
s.
The redesigned Famicom omits the RF modulator entirely, only outputting composite video via a proprietary "multi-out" connector first introduced on the Super Famicom/NES; conversely, the redesigned NES features RF modulator output only, though a version of the model including the "multi-out" connector was produced in rare quantities.
The console produces sound via an
audio processing unit
A sound card (also known as an audio card) is an internal expansion card that provides input and output of audio signals to and from a computer under the control of computer programs. The term ''sound card'' is also applied to external audio ...
(APU) integrated into the processor.
It supports a total of five sound channels: two
pulse wave
A pulse wave or pulse train is a type of non-sinusoidal waveform that includes square waves (duty cycle of 50%) and similarly periodic but asymmetrical waves (duty cycles other than 50%). It is a term used in synthesizer programming, and is ...
channels, one
triangle wave
A triangular wave or triangle wave is a non-sinusoidal waveform named for its triangular shape. It is a periodic, piecewise linear, continuous real function.
Like a square wave, the triangle wave contains only odd harmonics. However, the ...
channel, one
white noise
In signal processing, white noise is a random signal having equal intensity at different frequencies, giving it a constant power spectral density. The term is used, with this or similar meanings, in many scientific and technical disciplines, ...
channel, and one channel for
sample
Sample or samples may refer to:
Base meaning
* Sample (statistics), a subset of a population – complete data set
* Sample (signal), a digital discrete sample of a continuous analog signal
* Sample (material), a specimen or small quantity of s ...
playback. Audio playback speed is dependent on the CPU clock rate, which is set by a
crystal oscillator
A crystal oscillator is an electronic oscillator circuit that uses a piezoelectric crystal as a frequency-selective element. The oscillator frequency is often used to keep track of time, as in quartz wristwatches, to provide a stable cloc ...
.
Accessories
Controllers
The
game controller
A game controller, gaming controller, or simply controller, is an input device used with video games or entertainment systems to provide input to a video game, typically to control an object or character in the game. Before the seventh generation ...
for both the NES and the Famicom has an oblong brick-like design with a simple four button layout: two round buttons labeled "A" and "B", a "START" button, and a "SELECT" button.
Additionally, the controllers utilize the cross-shaped
D-pad
A D-pad (short for directional pad or digital pad; officially referred to by Nintendo as a +Control Pad) is a flat, usually thumb-operated, often digital, four-way directional control with one button on each point, found on nearly all modern vid ...
, designed by Nintendo employee
Gunpei Yokoi
, sometimes transliterated Gumpei Yokoi, was a Japanese video game designer. He was a long-time Nintendo employee, best known as creator of the Game & Watch handheld system, inventor of the cross-shaped Control Pad, the original designer of th ...
for Nintendo
Game & Watch
The Game & Watch brand ( ''Gēmu & Uotchi''; called ''Tricotronic'' in West Germany and Austria, abbreviated as ''G&W'') is a series of handheld electronic games developed, manufactured, released, and marketed by Nintendo from 1980 in video gam ...
systems, to replace the bulkier
joystick
A joystick, sometimes called a flight stick, is an input device consisting of a stick that pivots on a base and reports its angle or direction to the device it is controlling. A joystick, also known as the control column, is the principal cont ...
s on controllers of earlier gaming consoles.
The original model Famicom features two game controllers, both of which are hardwired to the back of the console. The second controller lacks the START and SELECT button, featuring a small
microphone
A microphone, colloquially called a mic or mike (), is a transducer that converts sound into an electrical signal. Microphones are used in many applications such as telephones, hearing aids, public address systems for concert halls and public ...
instead; however, few games use this feature.
The earliest produced Famicom units have square A and B buttons;
issues with them getting stuck when pressed down led Nintendo to change their shape to a circular design in subsequent units following the console's recall.
Instead of the Famicom's hardwired controllers, the NES has two proprietary seven-pin ports on the front of the console to support detachable controllers and third-party peripherals. The controllers bundled with the NES are identical and include the START and SELECT buttons, lacking the microphone on the original Famicom's second controller.
The cables for NES controllers are also generally three times longer than their Famicom counterparts.
A number of special controllers are intended for use with specific games, though are not commonly utilized. Such peripherals include the
NES Zapper
The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit third-generation home video game console produced by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan in 1983 as the commonly known as the The NES, a redesigned version, was released in American ...
(a
light gun
A light gun is a pointing device for computers and a control device for arcade and video games, typically shaped to resemble a pistol.
Early history
The first light guns were produced in the 1930s, following the development of light-sensing ...
),
R.O.B.
R.O.B. (Robotic Operating Buddy) is a toy robot accessory for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). It was launched in July 1985 as the in Japan, and October 1985 as R.O.B. in North America. Its short lifespan yielded only two games in the ...
(a
toy robot
An entertainment robot is, as the name indicates, a robot that is not made for utilitarian use, as in production or domestic services, but for the sole subjective pleasure of the human. It serves, usually the owner or his housemates, guests or cl ...
),
and the
Power Pad
The Power Pad (known in Japan as Family Trainer, and in Europe and briefly in the United States as Family Fun Fitness) is a floor mat game controller for the Nintendo Entertainment System. It is a gray mat with twelve pressure-sensors embedded be ...
(a
dance pad
A dance pad, also known as a dance mat or dance platform, is a flat electronic game controller used for input in dance games. Most dance pads are divided into a 3×3 matrix of square panels for the player to stand on, with some or all of the pane ...
).
The original Famicom has a deepened
DA-15
The D-subminiature or D-sub is a common type of electrical connector. They are named for their characteristic D-shaped metal shield. When they were introduced, D-subs were among the smallest connectors used on computer systems.
Description, n ...
expansion port on the front of the unit to accommodate them.
Two official advanced controllers were produced for the NES: the
NES Advantage
The NES Advantage is an arcade style controller manufactured by Asciiware and released by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1987.Nintendo Power: "Also from Asciiware, who actually made the NES Advantage that Nintendo of America t ...
, an
arcade controller
An arcade controller is a collective set of input devices designed primarily for use in an arcade cabinet. A typical control set consists of a joystick and a number of push-buttons. Less common setups include devices such as trackballs or steering ...
produced by
Asciiware
was a Japanese publishing company based in Chiyoda, Tokyo. It became a subsidiary of Kadokawa Group Holdings in 2004, and merged with another Kadokawa subsidiary MediaWorks on April 1, 2008, becoming ASCII Media Works. The company published ...
and licensed by Nintendo of America; and the
NES Max
The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit third-generation home video game console produced by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan in 1983 as the commonly known as the The NES, a redesigned version, was released in American ...
, a controller with grip handles that featured a "
cycloid
In geometry, a cycloid is the curve traced by a point on a circle as it rolls along a straight line without slipping. A cycloid is a specific form of trochoid and is an example of a roulette, a curve generated by a curve rolling on another curve ...
" sliding-disc D-pad in place of the traditional one.
Both controllers have a "Turbo" feature, which simulates multiple rapid button presses, for the A and B buttons; the NES Max has manually pressed Turbo buttons, while the NES Advantage offers
toggle buttons for Turbo functionality along with knobs that adjust the firing rate of each button.
The latter also includes a "Slow" button that rapidly pauses games, though this function is not intended for games that invoke a pause menu or screen.
The standard game controller was redesigned upon the introduction of the redesigned console. Though the original button layout was retained, the shape of the redesigned controller—nicknamed the "
dog bone" controller—resembles that of the Super Famicom/NES. In addition, the redesigned Famicom adopted NES-style detachable controller ports.
The original NES controller has become one of the most recognizable symbols of the console. Nintendo has mimicked the look of the controller in several other products, from promotional merchandise to limited edition versions of the Game Boy Advance.
Japanese accessories
![Nintendo-Famicom-Family-Basic-Keyboard-wCart](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fb/Nintendo-Famicom-Family-Basic-Keyboard-wCart.jpg)
Few of the numerous
peripheral devices
A peripheral or peripheral device is an auxiliary device used to put information into and get information out of a computer. The term ''peripheral device'' refers to all hardware components that are attached to a computer and are controlled by the ...
and software packages for the Famicom were released outside Japan.
The
Famicom 3D System
The Famicom 3D System is a Japan-exclusive accessory for the Nintendo Family Computer releasedPlunkett, Luke. Nintendo's First 3D Technology Shot A Spaceship At Mario's Face'. Kotaku. 30 April 2010. in 1987.
Overview
The 3D System consists of ...
, an
active shutter 3D headset headset peripheral released in 1987, enabled the ability to play
stereoscopic video game
A stereoscopic video game (also S-3D video game) is a video game which uses stereoscopic technologies to create depth perception for the player by any form of stereo display. Such games should not to be confused with video games that use 3D ga ...
s. It was a commercial failure and never released outside Japan; users described the headset as bulky and uncomfortable. Seven games are compatible with the glasses, with three of them developed by
Square
In Euclidean geometry, a square is a regular quadrilateral, which means that it has four equal sides and four equal angles (90-degree angles, π/2 radian angles, or right angles). It can also be defined as a rectangle with two equal-length adj ...
; two titles received worldwide releases as ''
Rad Racer
''Rad Racer'', known as in Japan, is a racing video game developed and published by Square for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in 1987. In this game, players drive a Ferrari 328 or a generic Formula One racing machine through a ...
'' and ''
The 3-D Battles of WorldRunner
''The 3-D Battles of WorldRunner'' (shortened to ''3-D WorldRunner'' on the North American box art), originally released in Japan as , is a 1987 Third-person shooter, third-person Shoot 'em up, rail shooter Platform game, platform video game develo ...
''.
''
Family BASIC
is a consumer product for programming on the Nintendo Family Computer, the Japanese equivalent to the Nintendo Entertainment System. ''Family BASIC'' was launched on June 21, 1984 to consumers in Japan by Nintendo, in cooperation with Hudson Sof ...
'' is an implementation of BASIC for the Famicom, packaged with a keyboard. Similar in concept to the Atari 2600 ''BASIC'' cartridge, it allows the user to write programs, especially games, which can be saved on an included cassette recorder. Nintendo of America rejected releasing ''Famicom BASIC'' in the US in favor of its primary marketing demographic of children.
The
Famicom Modem
The , also known as the Famicom Net System and Famicom Modem, is a peripheral for Nintendo's Family Computer video game console, and was released in September 1988 only in Japan. Predating the modern Internet, its proprietary dial-up information ...
connected a Famicom to a now defunct proprietary network in Japan which provided content such as financial services. A dial-up modem was never released for the NES after a partnership with
Fidelity Investments
Fidelity Investments, commonly referred to as Fidelity, earlier as Fidelity Management & Research or FMR, is an American multinational financial services corporation based in Boston, Massachusetts. The company was established in 1946 and is on ...
.
=Famicom Disk System
=
By 1986, the cost and size limitations of
ROM chip
Read-only memory (ROM) is a type of non-volatile memory used in computers and other electronic devices. Data stored in ROM cannot be electronically modified after the manufacture of the memory device. Read-only memory is useful for storing soft ...
s used in the Famicom's
ROM cartridge
A ROM cartridge, usually referred to in context simply as a cartridge, cart, or card, is a replaceable part designed to be connected to a consumer electronics device such as a home computer, video game console or, to a lesser extent, electroni ...
s were apparent, with no new advancements present to address them.
With this in mind, Nintendo looked at the
personal computer
A personal computer (PC) is a multi-purpose microcomputer whose size, capabilities, and price make it feasible for individual use. Personal computers are intended to be operated directly by an end user, rather than by a computer expert or tec ...
(PC) market, where the
floppy disk
A floppy disk or floppy diskette (casually referred to as a floppy, or a diskette) is an obsolescent type of disk storage composed of a thin and flexible disk of a magnetic storage medium in a square or nearly square plastic enclosure lined w ...
was gaining wide adoption as a
computer data storage
Computer data storage is a technology consisting of computer components and Data storage, recording media that are used to retain digital data (computing), data. It is a core function and fundamental component of computers.
The central pro ...
medium.
Partnering with
Mitsumi
was a Japanese manufacturer of consumer electronic components, founded in 1954.
The company was listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, was constituent of the Nikkei 225 stock index and provided its products through its subsidiaries in Asia, Euro ...
to develop a floppy disk add-on for the Famicom based on the latter's
Quick Disk
A floppy disk is a disk storage medium composed of a disk of thin and flexible magnetic storage medium encased in a rectangular plastic carrier. It is read and written using a floppy disk drive (FDD). Floppy disks were an almost universal data fo ...
format,
Nintendo officially released it as the Family Computer Disk System in Japan on February 21, 1986, at a retail price of ¥15,000.
The advantages of the format (called "Disk Card") were apparent on launch: it offered more than triple the data storage capacity of the then-largest cartridge (used for ''
Super Mario Bros.
is a platform game developed and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). The successor to the 1983 arcade game '' Mario Bros.'' and the first game in the ''Super Mario'' series, it was first released in 1985 for ...
'') and introduced
game save
A saved game (also called a game save, savegame, savefile, save point, or simply save) is a piece of digitally stored information about the progress of a player in a video game.
From the earliest games in the 1970s onward, game platform hardw ...
capability while offering lower production costs compared to cartridges, which resulted in lower retail prices for consumers.
The add-on also offered upgraded sound capability by adding a
wavetable synthesis
Wavetable synthesis is a sound synthesis technique used to create Periodic function, quasi-periodic waveforms often used in the production of musical tones or Musical note, notes.
Development
Wavetable synthesis was invented by Max Mathews i ...
channel while including more space that developers could use for the Famicom's
audio sample
In sound and music, sampling is the reuse of a portion (or sample) of a sound recording in another recording. Samples may comprise elements such as rhythm, melody, speech, sounds or entire bars of music, and may be layered, equalized, sped up or ...
channel.
Taking advantage of the disk's re-writability, Nintendo set up "Disk Writer"
interactive kiosk
An interactive kiosk is a computer terminal featuring specialized hardware and software that provides access to information and applications for communication, commerce, entertainment, or education.
By 2010, the largest bill pay kiosk network ...
s at retail stores throughout Japan; at each kiosk, consumers could rewrite their disks with new games; new blank disks to write onto were also offered inside it.
Nintendo also set up "Disk Fax" kiosks for players to submit their
high score
In games, score refers to an abstract quantity associated with a player or team. Score is usually measured in the abstract unit of points (except in game shows, where scores often are instead measured in units of currency), and events in th ...
s on special blue disks for contests and rankings, predating the online leaderboard by several years.
Although Nintendo committed to exclusively releasing games on the Disk System after its release, numerous external issues plagued its long-term viability. Just four months after launch,
Capcom
is a Japanese video game developer and video game publisher, publisher. It has created a number of List of best-selling video game franchises, multi-million-selling game franchises, with its most commercially successful being ''Resident Evil' ...
released a Famicom port of ''
Makaimura'' (known as ''Ghosts 'n Goblins'' in the U.S.) on a cartridge with more data storage capacity than what was possible on Disk Cards, nullifying one of the Disk System's major advantages by using
discrete logic
A logic gate is an idealized or physical device implementing a Boolean function, a logical operation performed on one or more binary inputs that produces a single binary output. Depending on the context, the term may refer to an ideal logic gate ...
chips to perform
bank switching
Bank switching is a technique used in computer design to increase the amount of usable memory beyond the amount directly addressable by the processor instructions. It can be used to configure a system differently at different times; for example ...
.
Nintendo also demanded half of the copyright ownership for each game it selected for release on the Disk System, resulting in developers electing to remain on cartridge instead as the latter gained functionality previously considered unique to the former. Developers additionally loathed the Disk Writer kiosks due to their lower profit margin, while retailers complained of their presence taking up valuable space as interest in the format waned.
Usage of a floppy disk-based medium brought about further complications; Disk Cards were more fragile than cartridges and were prone to data corruption from magnetic exposure.
Their unreliability was exacerbated by their lack of a shutter, which Nintendo substituted with a wax sleeve and clear
keep case
A keep case or poly-box is a type of packaging, most commonly used with DVDs and Blu-ray videos (and sometimes CDs).
Besides DVD-Video films, keep cases are very common with most disc-based video games since the PlayStation 2, and they are al ...
to reduce costs; blue disks
and later Disk Cards included shutters.
The rubber belt-based disk drives were also unreliable, with cryptic error codes complicating troubleshooting;
even when fully functional, players accustomed to cartridges were annoyed with the introduction of loading times and disk flipping.
Furthermore, the rewritable nature of the format resulted in rampant
software piracy, with Nintendo's attempts at anti-piracy measures quickly defeated.
Despite selling close to two million units for all of 1986, Nintendo only managed to increase the total to 4.4 million units by 1990, falling well short of internal projections.
By then, the Disk System was rendered obsolete due to advancements in ROM cartridge production:
memory mapping chips for expanded data storage capacity, battery-backed for game saving, and declining overall production costs.
While Nintendo alluded to a Western release for the Disk System, going so far as to successfully file a U.S. patent for it and having the Famicom's cartridge pins used by its RAM Adapter for enhanced audio rerouted to the NES's little-used bottom expansion port, such a release never materialized due to its reception in Japan.
Most of its games were re-released with workarounds on cartridge for both the Famicom and NES, albeit without the enhanced audio.
Although the last game for the Disk System was released in December 1992, Nintendo continued to offer repair and rewrite services for it until September 2003.
NES Test Station
The NES Test Station diagnostics machine was introduced in 1988. It is an NES-based unit designed for testing NES hardware, components, and games. It was only provided for use in World of Nintendo boutiques as part of the Nintendo World Class Service program. Visitors were to bring items to test with the station, and could be assisted by a store technician or employee.
The NES Test Station's front has a Game Pak slot and connectors for testing various components (AC adapter, RF switch, Audio/Video cable, NES Control Deck, accessories and games), with a centrally-located selector knob to choose which component to test. The unit itself weighs approximately 11.7 pounds without a TV. It connects to a television via a combined A/V and RF Switch cable. By actuating the green button, a user can toggle between an A/V Cable or RF Switch connection. The television it is connected to (typically 11" to 14") is meant to be placed atop it.
In 1991, Nintendo provided an add-on called the "Super NES Counter Tester" that tests Super NES components and games. The Super NES Counter Tester is a standard Control Deck on a metal fixture with the connection from the back of the unit re-routed to the front. These connections may be made directly to the test station or to the TV, depending on what is to be tested.
Games
Game Pak
![NES-Cartridge](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/40/NES-Cartridge.jpg)
The NES uses a 72-pin design, as compared with 60 pins on the
Famicom
The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit third-generation home video game console produced by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan in 1983 as the commonly known as the The NES, a redesigned version, was released in American ...
. To reduce costs and inventory, some early games released in North America are simply Famicom cartridges attached to an adapter to fit inside the NES hardware.
Early NES cartridges are held together with five small
slotted screws. Games released after 1987 were redesigned slightly to incorporate two plastic clips molded into the plastic itself, removing the need for the top two screws.
The back of the cartridge bears a label with handling instructions. Production and software revision codes were imprinted as stamps on the back label to correspond with the software version and producer. All licensed NTSC and PAL cartridges are a standard shade of gray plastic, with the exception of ''
The Legend of Zelda
''The Legend of Zelda'' is an action-adventure game franchise created by the Japanese game designers Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka. It is primarily developed and published by Nintendo, although some portable installments and re-rele ...
'' and ''
Zelda II: The Adventure of Link'', which were manufactured in gold-plastic carts. Unlicensed carts were produced in black, robin egg blue, and gold, and are all slightly different shapes than standard NES cartridges. Nintendo also produced yellow-plastic carts for internal use at Nintendo Service Centers, although these "test carts" were never made available for purchase. All licensed US cartridges were made by Nintendo, Konami, and Acclaim. For promotion of ''
DuckTales: Remastered'', Capcom sent 150 limited-edition gold NES cartridges with the original game, featuring the ''Remastered'' art as the sticker, to different gaming news agencies. The instruction label on the back includes the opening lyric from the
show's theme song, "Life is like a hurricane".
Famicom cartridges are shaped slightly differently. Unlike NES games, official Famicom cartridges were produced in many colors of plastic. Adapters, similar in design to the popular accessory
Game Genie
Game Genie is a line of video game cheat cartridges originally designed by Codemasters, sold by Camerica and Galoob. The first device in the series was released in 1990 for the Nintendo Entertainment System, with subsequent devices released for th ...
, are available that allow Famicom games to be played on an NES. In Japan, several companies manufactured the cartridges for the Famicom.
This allowed these companies to develop customized chips designed for specific purposes, such as superior sound and graphics.
Third-party licensing
![Famicom Family logo](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/28/Famicom_Family_logo.svg)
Nintendo's near monopoly on the home video game market left it with a dominant influence over the industry. Unlike Atari, which never actively pursued third-party developers (and even went to court in an attempt to force
Activision
Activision Publishing, Inc. is an American video game publisher based in Santa Monica, California. It serves as the publishing business for its parent company, Activision Blizzard, and consists of several subsidiary studios. Activision is one o ...
to cease production of
Atari 2600
The Atari 2600, initially branded as the Atari Video Computer System (Atari VCS) from its release until November 1982, is a home video game console developed and produced by Atari, Inc. Released in September 1977, it popularized microprocessor- ...
games), Nintendo had anticipated and encouraged the involvement of third-party software developers, though strictly on Nintendo's terms.
[GameSpy.com – Article](_blank)
Web.archive.org (March 20, 2008). Retrieved on August 23, 2013. Some of the Nintendo platform-control measures were adopted in a less stringent way by later console manufacturers such as Sega, Sony, and Microsoft.
To this end, a
10NES authentication chip is in every console and in every licensed cartridge. If the console's chip can not detect a counterpart chip inside the cartridge, the game does not load.
Nintendo portrayed these measures as intended to protect the public against poor-quality games, and placed a
golden seal of approval on all licensed games released for the system.
Nintendo found success with Japanese arcade manufacturers such as
Konami
, is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company, video game and entertainment company headquartered in Chūō, Tokyo, Chūō, Tokyo, it also produces and distributes trading cards, anime, tokusatsu, pachinko machin ...
,
Capcom
is a Japanese video game developer and video game publisher, publisher. It has created a number of List of best-selling video game franchises, multi-million-selling game franchises, with its most commercially successful being ''Resident Evil' ...
,
Taito
is a Japanese company that specializes in video games, toys, arcade cabinets and game centers, based in Shinjuku, Tokyo. The company was founded by Michael Kogan in 1953 as the importing vodka, vending machines and jukeboxes into Japan. It b ...
and
Namco
was a Japanese multinational corporation, multinational video game and entertainment company, headquartered in Ōta, Tokyo. It held several international branches, including Namco America in Santa Clara, California, Namco Europe in London, Na ...
, which signed on as third-party developers. However, they found resistance with US game developers including
Atari Games
Atari Games Corporation, known as Midway Games West Inc. after 1999, was an American producer of Arcade game, arcade Video game, games. It was formed in 1985 when the coin-operated Arcade game, arcade game division of Atari, Inc. was transfered ...
,
Activision
Activision Publishing, Inc. is an American video game publisher based in Santa Monica, California. It serves as the publishing business for its parent company, Activision Blizzard, and consists of several subsidiary studios. Activision is one o ...
,
Electronic Arts
Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the d ...
and
Epyx
Epyx, Inc. was a video game developer and publisher active in the late 1970s and 1980s. The company was founded as Automated Simulations by Jim Connelley and Jon Freeman, originally using Epyx as a brand name for action-oriented games before rena ...
refusing Nintendo's one-sided terms.
Acclaim Entertainment
Acclaim Entertainment, Inc. was an American video game publisher based in Glen Cove, New York. Originally formed by Greg Fischbach, Robert Holmes and Jim Scoroposki out of an Oyster Bay storefront in 1987, the company established a worldwide ...
, a fledgling game publisher founded by former Activision employees, was the first major third-party licensee in the United States to sign on with Nintendo in late 1987. Atari Games (through
Tengen) and
Activision
Activision Publishing, Inc. is an American video game publisher based in Santa Monica, California. It serves as the publishing business for its parent company, Activision Blizzard, and consists of several subsidiary studios. Activision is one o ...
signed on soon after.
Nintendo was not as restrictive as Sega, which did not permit third-party publishing until
Mediagenic
Activision Publishing, Inc. is an American video game publisher based in Santa Monica, California. It serves as the publishing business for its parent company, Activision Blizzard, and consists of several subsidiary studios. Activision is one o ...
in late summer 1988.
Nintendo's intention was to reserve a large part of NES game revenue for itself. Nintendo required that it be the sole manufacturer of all cartridges, and that the publisher had to pay in full before the cartridges for that game be produced. Cartridges could not be returned to Nintendo, so publishers assumed all the risk. As a result, some publishers lost more money due to distress sales of remaining inventory at the end of the NES era than they ever earned in profits from sales of the games. Because Nintendo controlled the production of all cartridges, it was able to enforce strict rules on its third-party developers, who were required to sign a contract that would obligate them to develop exclusively for the system, order at least 10,000 cartridges, and only make five games per year.
The global
1988 shortage of DRAM and ROM chips reportedly caused Nintendo to only permit an average of 25% of publishers' requests for cartridges, with some receiving much higher amounts and others almost none.
GameSpy
GameSpy was an American provider of online multiplayer and matchmaking middleware for video games founded in 1996 by Mark Surfas. After the release of a multiplayer server browser for the game, QSpy, Surfas licensed the software under the GameS ...
noted that Nintendo's "iron-clad terms" made the company many enemies during the 1980s. Some developers tried to circumvent the five game limit by creating additional company brands like
Konami
, is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company, video game and entertainment company headquartered in Chūō, Tokyo, Chūō, Tokyo, it also produces and distributes trading cards, anime, tokusatsu, pachinko machin ...
's
Ultra Games
Ultra Software Corporation was a shell corporation and publishing label created in 1988 as a subsidiary of Konami of America, in an effort to get around Nintendo of America's strict licensing rules in place at the time for the North American ma ...
label; others tried circumventing the 10NES chip.
Nintendo was accused of
antitrust violations because of the strict licensing requirements.
The
United States Department of Justice
The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), also known as the Justice Department, is a federal executive department of the United States government tasked with the enforcement of federal law and administration of justice in the United State ...
and several states began probing Nintendo's business practices, leading to the involvement of Congress and the
Federal Trade Commission
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is an independent agency of the United States government whose principal mission is the enforcement of civil (non-criminal) antitrust law and the promotion of consumer protection. The FTC shares jurisdiction ov ...
(FTC). The FTC conducted an extensive investigation which included interviewing hundreds of retailers. During the FTC probe, Nintendo changed the terms of its publisher licensing agreements to eliminate the two-year rule and other restrictive terms. Nintendo and the FTC settled the case in April 1991, with Nintendo required to send vouchers giving a $5 discount off to a new game, to every person that had purchased an NES game between June 1988 and December 1990. GameSpy remarked that Nintendo's punishment was particularly weak giving the case's findings, although it has been speculated that the FTC did not want to damage the video game industry in the United States.
With the NES near the end of its life, many third-party publishers such as
Electronic Arts
Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the d ...
supported upstart competing consoles with less strict licensing terms such as the
Sega Genesis
The Sega Genesis, known as the outside North America, is a 16-bit Fourth generation of video game consoles, fourth generation home video game console developed and sold by Sega. It was Sega's third console and the successor to the Master Syst ...
and then the
PlayStation
is a video gaming brand that consists of five home video game consoles, two handhelds, a media center, and a smartphone, as well as an online service and multiple magazines. The brand is produced by Sony Interactive Entertainment, a divisi ...
, which eroded and then took over Nintendo's dominance in the home console market, respectively. Consoles from Nintendo's rivals in the post-SNES era had always enjoyed much stronger third-party support than Nintendo, which relied more heavily on first-party games.
Unlicensed games
Companies that refused to pay the licensing fee or were rejected by Nintendo found ways to circumvent the console's authentication system. Most of these companies created circuits that use a voltage spike to temporarily disable the 10NES chip.
A few unlicensed games released in Europe and Australia are in the form of a
dongle
A dongle is a small piece of computer hardware that connects to a port on another device to provide it with additional functionality, or enable a pass-through to such a device that adds functionality.
In computing, the term was initially synonym ...
to connect to a licensed game, in order to use the licensed game's 10NES chip for authentication. To combat unlicensed games, Nintendo of America threatened retailers who sold them with losing their supply of licensed games, and multiple revisions were made to the NES PCBs to prevent unlicensed games from working.
Atari Games
Atari Games Corporation, known as Midway Games West Inc. after 1999, was an American producer of Arcade game, arcade Video game, games. It was formed in 1985 when the coin-operated Arcade game, arcade game division of Atari, Inc. was transfered ...
took a different approach with its line of NES products,
Tengen. The company attempted to
reverse engineer
Reverse engineering (also known as backwards engineering or back engineering) is a process or method through which one attempts to understand through deductive reasoning how a previously made device, process, system, or piece of software accompli ...
the lockout chip to develop its own "Rabbit" chip. Tengen also obtained a description of the lockout chip from the
United States Patent and Trademark Office
The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is an agency in the U.S. Department of Commerce that serves as the national patent office and trademark registration authority for the United States. The USPTO's headquarters are in Alexa ...
by falsely claiming that it was required to defend against present infringement claims. Nintendo successfully sued Tengen for
copyright
A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, education ...
infringement. Tengen's
antitrust
Competition law is the field of law that promotes or seeks to maintain market competition by regulating anti-competitive conduct by companies. Competition law is implemented through public and private enforcement. It is also known as antitrust l ...
claims against Nintendo were never decided.
Color Dreams
Wisdom Tree, Inc. is an American developer of Christian video games. Originally founded in 1988 as Color Dreams, one of the first companies to work around Nintendo's lockout chip technology for the Nintendo Entertainment System, the company cha ...
made
Christian video games
A Christian video game is an aspect of Christian media for video games, this video game genre focuses on the narrative and themes of Christian morals and Christianity. The term can also refer to Christian symbolism, mythology, media franchises, a ...
under the subsidiary name
Wisdom Tree
Wisdom Tree, Inc. is an American developer of Christian video games. Originally founded in 1988 as Color Dreams, one of the first companies to work around Nintendo's lockout chip technology for the Nintendo Entertainment System, the company cha ...
. Historian Steven Kent wrote, "Wisdom Tree presented Nintendo with a prickly situation. The general public did not seem to pay close attention to the court battle with Atari Games, and industry analysts were impressed with Nintendo's legal acumen; but going after a tiny company that published innocuous religious games was another story."
Game rentals
As the Nintendo Entertainment System grew in popularity and entered millions of American homes, some small
video rental shop
A video rental shop/store is a physical retail business that rents home videos such as movies, prerecorded TV shows, video game discs and other media content. Typically, a rental shop conducts business with customers under conditions and terms ...
s began buying their own copies of NES games, and renting them out to customers for around the same price as a
video cassette
A videocassette recorder (VCR) or video recorder is an electromechanical device that records analog audio and analog video from broadcast television or other source on a removable, magnetic tape videocassette, and can play back the recordin ...
rental for a few days. Nintendo received no profit from the practice beyond the initial cost of their game, and unlike movie rentals, a newly released game could hit store shelves and be available for rent on the same day. Nintendo took steps to stop game rentals, but did not take any formal legal action until
Blockbuster Video
Blockbuster or Block Buster may refer to:
* Blockbuster (entertainment) a term coined for an extremely successful movie, from which most other uses are derived.
Corporations
* Blockbuster (retailer), a defunct video and game rental chain
** Blo ...
began to make game rentals a large-scale service. Nintendo claimed that allowing customers to rent games would significantly hurt sales and drive up the cost of games.
[The Morning Call – Article](_blank)
. Retrieved on August 26, 2013. Nintendo lost the lawsuit,
[1UP.com – Article](_blank)
. Retrieved on August 26, 2013. but did win on a claim of copyright infringement.
[SunSentinel – Article](_blank)
. Retrieved on August 26, 2013. Blockbuster was banned from including photocopies of original, copyrighted instruction booklets with its rented games. In compliance with the ruling, Blockbuster produced original short instructions—usually in the form of a small booklet, card, or label stuck on the back of the rental box—that explained the game's basic premise and controls. Video rental shops continued the practice of renting video games.
Reception
By 1988, industry observers stated that the NES's popularity had grown so quickly that the market for Nintendo cartridges was larger than that for all home computer software.
''Compute!'' reported in 1989 that Nintendo had sold seven million NES systems in 1988 alone, almost as many as the number of
Commodore 64
The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, is an 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International (first shown at the Consumer Electronics Show, January 7–10, 1982, in Las Vegas). It has been listed in the Guinness ...
s sold in its first five years.
"Computer game makers
rescared stiff", the magazine said, stating that Nintendo's popularity caused most competitors to have poor sales during the previous Christmas and resulted in serious financial problems for some.
![NES Famicom PAL NTSC European American Japanese](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/64/NES_Famicom_PAL_NTSC_European_American_Japanese.jpg)
In June 1989, Nintendo of America's vice president of marketing Peter Main, said that the Famicom was present in 37% of Japan's households.
By 1990, 30% of American households owned the NES, compared to 23% for all personal computers.
By 1990, the NES had outsold all previously released consoles worldwide.
The slogan for this brand was "It can't be beaten".
The Nintendo Entertainment System was not available in the
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
.
In the early 1990s, gamers predicted that competition from technologically superior systems such as the
16-bit
16-bit microcomputers are microcomputers that use 16-bit microprocessors.
A 16-bit register can store 216 different values. The range of integer values that can be stored in 16 bits depends on the integer representation used. With the two mos ...
Sega Genesis
The Sega Genesis, known as the outside North America, is a 16-bit Fourth generation of video game consoles, fourth generation home video game console developed and sold by Sega. It was Sega's third console and the successor to the Master Syst ...
would mean the immediate end of the NES's dominance. Instead, during the first year of Nintendo's successor console the
Super Famicom
The Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES), commonly shortened to Super NES or Super Nintendo, is a 16-bit home video game console developed by Nintendo that was released in 1990 in Japan and South Korea, 1991 in North America, 1992 in Euro ...
(named Super Nintendo Entertainment System outside Japan), the Famicom remained the second highest-selling video game console in Japan, outselling the newer and more powerful
NEC PC Engine
The TurboGrafx-16, known as the outside North America, is a home video game console designed by Hudson Soft and sold by NEC, NEC Home Electronics. It was the first console marketed in the fourth generation of video game consoles, fourth genera ...
and Sega Mega Drive by a wide margin.
The launch of the Genesis was overshadowed by the launch of ''
Super Mario Bros. 3'' for NES. The console remained popular in Japan and North America until late 1993, when the demand for new NES software abruptly plummeted.
The final licensed Famicom game released in Japan is ''
Takahashi Meijin no Bōken Jima IV
(Adventure Island IV for short) is a 1994 platform game released by Hudson Soft for the Family Computer; it was the final game released for the console in Japan. The game was never released outside of Japan.
Summary
Unlike previous entries in t ...
(Adventure Island IV)'', in North America is ''
Wario's Woods
''Wario's Woods'' is a puzzle video game, puzzle video game developed by TEC and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System. It was released in Japan and North America in 1994 and Europe in 1995. A spin-off of the ''Mario (franchi ...
'', and in Europe is ''
The Lion King
''The Lion King'' is a 1994 American animated musical drama film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and released by Walt Disney Pictures. The 32nd Disney animated feature film and the fifth produced during the Disney Renaissance, it ...
'' in 1995.
In the wake of ever decreasing sales and the lack of new games, Nintendo of America officially discontinued the NES by 1995.
Nintendo produced new Famicom units in Japan until September 25, 2003, and continued to repair Famicom consoles until October 31, 2007, attributing the discontinuation of support to insufficient supplies of parts.
The NES was initially not as successful in Europe during the late 1980s, when it was outsold by the
Sega Master System
The is an 8-bit
third-generation home video game console manufactured by Sega. It was originally a remodeled export version of the Sega Mark III, the third iteration of the SG-1000 series of consoles, which was released in Japan in 1985 and ...
in the United Kingdom. By 1990, the Master System was the highest-selling console in Europe, though the NES was beginning to have a fast-growing user base in the United Kingdom. During the early 1990s, NES sales caught up with and narrowly overtook the Master System overall in Western Europe, though the Master System maintained its lead in several markets such as the United Kingdom, Belgium and Spain.
Legacy
The NES was released two years after the
video game crash of 1983
The video game crash of 1983 (known as the Atari shock in Japan) was a large-scale recession in the video game industry that occurred from 1983 to 1985, primarily in the United States. The crash was attributed to several factors, including ma ...
, when many retailers and adult consumers regarded electronic games as a passing fad,
so many believed at first that the NES would soon fade. Before the NES and Famicom, Nintendo was known as a moderately successful Japanese toy and playing card manufacturer, but the consoles' popularity helped the company grow into an internationally recognized name almost synonymous with video games as Atari had been, and set the stage for Japanese dominance of the video game industry. With the NES, Nintendo also changed the relationship between
console manufacturer
A video game console is an electronic device that outputs a video signal or image to display a video game that can be played with a game controller. These may be home consoles, which are generally placed in a permanent location connected to a ...
s and third-party software developers by restricting developers from publishing and distributing software without licensed approval. This led to higher-quality games, which helped change the attitude of a public that had grown weary from poorly produced games for earlier systems.
The NES hardware design is also very influential. Nintendo chose the name "Nintendo Entertainment System" for the US market and redesigned the system so it would not give the appearance of a child's toy. The front-loading cartridge input allowed it to be used more easily in a TV stand with other entertainment devices, such as a
videocassette recorder
A videocassette recorder (VCR) or video recorder is an electromechanical device that records analog audio and analog video from broadcast television or other source on a removable, magnetic tape videocassette
Videotape is magnetic tape ...
.
The system's hardware limitations led to design principles that still influence the development of modern video games. Many prominent game franchises originated on the NES, including Nintendo's own ''
Super Mario Bros.
is a platform game developed and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). The successor to the 1983 arcade game '' Mario Bros.'' and the first game in the ''Super Mario'' series, it was first released in 1985 for ...
'',
, ''
The Legend of Zelda
''The Legend of Zelda'' is an action-adventure game franchise created by the Japanese game designers Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka. It is primarily developed and published by Nintendo, although some portable installments and re-rele ...
''
and ''
Metroid
is an action-adventure game franchise created by Nintendo. The player controls the bounty hunter Samus Aran, who protects the galaxy from Space Pirate (Metroid), Space Pirates and other malevolent forces and their attempts to harness the powe ...
'',
Capcom
is a Japanese video game developer and video game publisher, publisher. It has created a number of List of best-selling video game franchises, multi-million-selling game franchises, with its most commercially successful being ''Resident Evil' ...
's ''
Mega Man
''Mega Man'', known as in Japan, is a Japanese science fiction video game franchise created by Capcom, starring a series of robot characters each known by the moniker "Mega Man (character), Mega Man". Mega Man (video game), The original game w ...
'' franchise,
Konami
, is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company, video game and entertainment company headquartered in Chūō, Tokyo, Chūō, Tokyo, it also produces and distributes trading cards, anime, tokusatsu, pachinko machin ...
's ''
Castlevania
''Castlevania'' (), known in Japan as is a gothic horror action-adventure video game series and media franchise about Dracula (Castlevania), Dracula, created and developed by Konami. It has been released on various platforms, from early system ...
''
franchise,
Square
In Euclidean geometry, a square is a regular quadrilateral, which means that it has four equal sides and four equal angles (90-degree angles, π/2 radian angles, or right angles). It can also be defined as a rectangle with two equal-length adj ...
's ''
Final Fantasy
is a Japanese video game, Japanese science fantasy anthology media franchise created by Hironobu Sakaguchi and developed and owned by Square Enix (formerly Square (video game company), Square). The franchise centers on a series of fantasy and ...
'',
, and
Enix
was a Japanese video game publisher that produced video games, anime and manga. Enix is known for publishing the ''Dragon Quest'' series of role-playing video games.
The company was founded by Yasuhiro Fukushima on September 22, 1975, as . Th ...
's ''
Dragon Quest
previously published as ''Dragon Warrior'' in North America until 2005, is a franchise of Japanese role-playing video games created by Armor Project (Yuji Horii), Bird Studio (Akira Toriyama) and Sugiyama Kobo (Koichi Sugiyama) to its publi ...
''
, franchises.
NES imagery, especially its controller, has become a popular motif for a variety of products, including Nintendo's Game Boy Advance.
Clothing, accessories, and food items adorned with NES-themed imagery are still produced and sold in stores.
Emulation
The NES can be
emulated
In computing, an emulator is Computer hardware, hardware or software that enables one computer system (called the ''host'') to behave like another computer system (called the ''guest''). An emulator typically enables the host system to run so ...
on many other systems. The first emulator was the Japanese-only Pasofami. It was soon followed by iNES, which is available in English and is cross-platform, in 1996. It was described as being the first NES emulation software that could be used by a non-expert.
[Fayzullin, Mara]
"iNES"
Retrieved on January 10, 2015. The first version of
NESticle
NESticle is a Nintendo Entertainment System emulator, which was written by Icer Addis of Bloodlust Software. Released on April 3, 1997, the widely popular program originally ran under MS-DOS and Windows 95. It was the first freeware NES emulator, ...
, an unofficial
MS-DOS
MS-DOS ( ; acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System, also known as Microsoft DOS) is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and a few ope ...
-based emulator, was released on April 3, 1997. Nintendo offers licensed emulation of some NES games via its
Virtual Console
A virtual console (VC) – also known as a virtual terminal (VT) – is a conceptual combination of the keyboard and display for a computer user interface. It is a feature of some Unix-like operating systems such as Linux, BSD, illumos, Unix ...
service for the
Wii
The Wii ( ) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was released on November 19, 2006, in North America and in December 2006 for most other Regional lockout, regions of the world. It is Nintendo's fifth major ho ...
,
Nintendo 3DS
The is a handheld game console produced by Nintendo. It was announced in March 2010 and unveiled at E3 2010 as the successor to the Nintendo DS. The system features backward compatibility with Nintendo DS video games. As an eighth-generatio ...
, and
Wii U
The Wii U ( ) is a home video game console developed by Nintendo as the successor to the Wii. Released in late 2012, it is the first eighth-generation video game console and competed with Microsoft's Xbox One and Sony's PlayStation 4.
The W ...
, and via its
Nintendo Switch
The is a hybrid video game console developed by Nintendo and released worldwide in most regions on March 3, 2017. The console itself is a Tablet computer#Gaming tablet, tablet that can either be docking station, docked for use as a home video ...
Online
In computer technology and telecommunications, online indicates a state of connectivity and offline indicates a disconnected state. In modern terminology, this usually refers to an Internet connection, but (especially when expressed "on line" or ...
service.
Re-release
On July 14, 2016, Nintendo announced the November 2016 launch of a miniature replica of the NES, named the Nintendo Entertainment System: NES Classic Edition in the United States and Nintendo Classic Mini: Nintendo Entertainment System in Europe and Australia. The emulation-based console includes 30 permanently bundled games from the vintage NES library, including the ''
Super Mario Bros.
is a platform game developed and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). The successor to the 1983 arcade game '' Mario Bros.'' and the first game in the ''Super Mario'' series, it was first released in 1985 for ...
'' series and ''
The Legend of Zelda
''The Legend of Zelda'' is an action-adventure game franchise created by the Japanese game designers Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka. It is primarily developed and published by Nintendo, although some portable installments and re-rele ...
'' series. The system has
HDMI
High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) is a proprietary audio/video interface for transmitting uncompressed video data and compressed or uncompressed digital audio data from an HDMI-compliant source device, such as a display controller, ...
display output and a new replica controller, which can also connect to the
Wii Remote
The Wii Remote, also known colloquially as the Wiimote, is the primary game controller for Nintendo's Wii home video game console. An essential capability of the Wii Remote is its motion sensing capability, which allows the user to interact with ...
for use with
Virtual Console
A virtual console (VC) – also known as a virtual terminal (VT) – is a conceptual combination of the keyboard and display for a computer user interface. It is a feature of some Unix-like operating systems such as Linux, BSD, illumos, Unix ...
games. It was discontinued in North America on April 13, 2017, and worldwide on April 15, 2017. However, Nintendo announced in September 2017 that the NES Classic Mini would return to production on June 29, 2018, only to be discontinued again permanently by December of that year.
See also
*
History of Nintendo
The history of Nintendo begins in 1889, founded to produce handmade playing cards. In the mid-1900s, the company licensed third-party card graphics, such as Disney characters. In the 1960s, it expanded into countless varieties of toys, includ ...
*
Nintendo hard
*
Nintendo World Championships
The Nintendo World Championships (NWC) is a nationwide video game competition series, organized by Nintendo of America at no particular interval.
The first Nintendo World Championships was in 1990, touring 29 American cities, being hosted in L ...
Notes
Transliterations
References
Bibliography
*
External links
*
*
*
*
NES Classic Edition official website
{{Portal bar, Video games, Electronics, 1980s, 1990s
Nintendo Entertainment System
Home video game consoles
Third-generation video game consoles
1983 in video gaming
1980s in video gaming
1990s in video gaming
2000s in video gaming
1980s toys
1990s toys
2000s toys
Computer-related introductions in 1983
Products introduced in 1983
Products introduced in 1985
Products introduced in 1986
Products and services discontinued in 2003
1995 disestablishments in North America
2003 disestablishments in Japan
Discontinued video game consoles