Justin Thorn

This weekend was a nice, relaxing weekend after traveling the week before. Friday night Laurend and I got to have dinner with my great friend Jon and his new girlfriend Sandy. We had a good time catching up on the latest and of course talking about back in the day. Speaking of which… Lauren was out of town from Saturday afternoon on. After we had lunch together and she was on her way to Fayeteville I went back home and quickly settled into my old bachelor lifestyle. This of course consisted of frozen pizza for dinner, mountain dew and the occasional beer or two. All this wrapped around an extended video game session that stretched past 2AM. In between the Xbox and PS2 keeping me company I took a break to jump online to check email and read my news.

I saw a story about Nintendo’s 20th birthday for the 8-Bit NES. For whatever reason I was always under the impression that the NES was released to the US in 1985 but evidently that was only in New York and LA. The official launch was February 1986. If you have some time to kill and really want to feel nostalgic check out this special on Gamespot. Be sure to watch the streaming video they offer which features the Gamespot employees talking all about the NES. It is done in the flavor of those cheesy VH1 shows like “I Love The 80’s” and is quite entertaining. So many good memories come flooding back from all these wonderful games that I had to play. Many of them classics that can still hold their own today… Mario 3 comes to mind. Now I am breaking out the emulators again to get my nostalgic fix on the computer. Watchout Mushroom Kingdom and land of Hyrule. Here I come!

Today I read this story on Joystiq that mentioned this month also marks the birthday of another Nintendo console. The Nintendo 64 turns 10 years old in February. While it certainly didn’t make as huge an impression on the gaming world as the original 8-Bit NES or even the 16-Bit SNES the N64 had a few notable titles under its belt. Mario 64 was the first 3D platformer game to really make that idea work smoothly and the first time mario jumped out of his flat 2D lifestyle. The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time was such a great game that it got awarded best game of the year for both 1998 and 1999.

I think everyone can agree that the number one game for the N64 ever made was easily Goldeneye 007. I can not even begin to count the amount of time spent playing this game back in the day. If I could they would easily add up to many months or years. A 4 player deathmatch could easily run into 4AM nearly every Saturday night. There was something so addicting about that game that it made it impossible to put down. Even when you were by yourself, working your way through the various difficulty levels in the 1-player missions. The fun never stopped.

Now it is time to look forward to Nintendo’s future in 2006 and beyond. The GameCube is on its last leg along with the PS2 and Xbox. Everyone is preparing for the next generation of consoles. While Sony and Microsoft have been focusing on ridiculous tech specs and online features galore that don’t necissarily make for better games Nintendo is sticking to it’s winning formula. The upcoming Nintendo Revolution is all about the games and keeping this form of entertainment fun not complex. The most compelling and exciting feature they are adding to this new console is a special magic wand like remote control that has motion sensors to change the way we play games. A new level of interactivity beyond mashing buttons and using a joystick. Another feature I am looking forward to is the backwards compatibility of all the previous Nintendo games over the past 20 years. You will be able to download them over the internet to your Revolution for an unknown price and they will be emulated in real-time. No word on whether the games will have enhanced graphics from the original glory days. Nintendo has said you will be able to buy oldskool style wireless controllers that look like the NES, SNES and N64 controllers if you want that genuine feel while playing all those Nintendo classics. I know Im saving up my money for this fall. Keep up with the latest over at RevolutionFanboy.