Nostalgia is a funny thing. I didn’t have an NES growing up, I had a Master System. Yet seeing the NES invokes more warm and fuzzy feelings than the Master System does.
It’s probably for some of the same reasons you mentioned. The NES is overexposed, from YouTube videos on it, articles, merchandise, etc. I have many NES t-shirts and other merch but like no Master System stuff.
I do like the Master System better than the NES now, but with everyone talking up the NES and waxing poetic about it (in many cases understandably so) it’s easier to be more nostalgic for the NES than any of its contemporary consoles.
‘00 Zoomer here, I have to say it, but I’m not a fan of the NES. There’s a few games on it I love: Mario 3 and Megaman 2 will always be some of my favorites, and Mother 1 is a criminally underrated game. But I mostly find the NES to be a console of games trying their best to do something and not having the tools they need to do it very well. These games tend to feel clunky, like they’re really straining for ways to implement their ideas and really wish they had more than two buttons on the controller. I love Castlevania 1, but it hurts using special items without a dedicated special items button.
Sometimes simple is best, but for the most part I find that everything I wanted an NES game to do, an SNES game does it better. It has the tools to implement the game’s vision and provide a satisfactory experience that doesn’t feel watered-down by technological limitations. Super Metroid vs. Metroid, LoZ1 vs. Link to the Past. I didn’t grow up with SNES, but I can go back to an SNES game and enjoy it as thoroughly as a Wii game from 2009 or PC game from 2011. Same goes for GBA and a handful of Gameboy games. Not a big fan of N64, barely played GameCube, so I won’t comment on those.
Culturally, the NES nostalgia really got old by the late 2010s, but it’s basically totally disappeared. You’re right, Wii nostalgia is showing up, and I understand because I grew up with it. I think Millennials who grew up with the NES and gushed about it as adults just got old enough to move on and got it all out of their system. Or maybe they didn’t, and were just drowned out by Zoomers who didn’t care to hear it anymore. Don’t worry, we’ll be next!
I mean, I don't really blame you for not being a fan of the NES, particularly if you didn't grow up with it. A lot of the game design - even in the most celebrated games - is outdated and needlessly challenging.
Most NES games - probably about 2/3 of them - are mediocre to bad. Not just by today's standards, but by yesterday's standards, as well. They remain fascinating artifacts of a different age, though, and I'm excited to look back at them.
I'm not just gonna barrel through the NES library, buuut, if I'm honest, I'm more excited to play just about every other system on this quest.
Thanks for your comment, Wolliver, and for your perspective. Hope to see you again here!
Yea, the NES was 8-bit but look at what it gave us: Super Mario Bros at home (no more quarters in arcade), Ninja Gaiden, Metroid, Final Fantasy, Castlevania , Mega Man 2, Tetris, Zelda & Zelda II.
You cannot deny the ground that was broken with games like Final Fantasy, Ninja Gaiden and Zelda. Eventually we got Super Mario Bros. 3, which was divine at the time! And lets not forget about the accessories foundation that was also built: third party accessories like the Game Genie. Without devices like the Game Genie would we ever have had the X-BAND for the SNES?
I think taking a more personal look at these games is a grand idea, especially since (a) you’re good as such writing, and (b) you’ve already done conventional reviews of every single NES game. So I’m looking forward to this immensely.
Love the backstory. And I've struggled with this myself. What can I say about a game that hasn't been said before? I think the personal experiences and connections to the game are what brings something unique to the conversation. Not a formal review, but a personal experience put to words. Good luck!
Totally agree. Formal reviews have their place, but I've never really been interested in writing those. Personal experiences/creative writing exercises are more my speed. Thanks John!
I do love the original Super Mario Bros though. Platformers have come a long way since, but the fundamentals that the games follow today are all in that title!
One thing I'm realizing: the NES was only your primary console for about a year. I did the math and I think we got ours in late 1987, which would make it my primary console for 4 years. I'm not sure what to do with that knowledge just yet, but it surely colors our perspectives and nostalgia around the console in a number of ways.
But then the experience with your grandparents surely has a lot to do with it too. There was probably a feeling that, somehow, the NES wasn't out-of-date in the context of your grandparents' house.
Some family friends made the ill-fated decision to buy an Atari 7800 at some point after the NES came out, I think because they had a large collection of Atari 2600 games. In the context of my own home, I'd have hated playing Atari when Nintendo was something that existed. But I always jumped at the chance to go over to their house and play Atari. In my mind it wasn't out-of-date at all, in the context of their home. At some point they traded it in for an NES, which they were excited about, but it made me sad, even though they had a number of good NES games that I hadn't played much.
Yeah, that's a good point about the NES only being my primary console for about a year. I really didn't experience a lot of "the good stuff" on the console until years later, in the late 90s or even 2000s. Whereas I grew up with the Genesis and SNES more in real time and enjoyed a lot of those consoles' best games around when they first released. And yeah, the NES felt like a perfect fit at my grandparents' house. Fun fact: it's still hooked up there, it still works, and my cousins and I still play it together when they come to visit. It's been rocking for almost 35 years!
Wow, getting an Atari 7800 around the time of the NES? That's more depressing than being the one kid on the block with the Master System (I don't hate the Master System, but let's face it, it's no NES). No offense to them, but I'd be like you, upset if the 7800 was in my house. Pretty fascinating glimpse into an alternate gaming reality for your young mind, though!
The main problem with the Master System, looking back at it, is the lack of depth of its library. And lack of Mario. But it had its share of good games. I don't think that's something you can say about the 7800.
But that's looking back at it. One difference when you were living it out in real time was the lack of a rental market.
You could say that Blockbuster "overdetermined" the winners of the console wars in the US in the late 1980s and 1990s. Any kid could go to Blockbuster (which our family did weekly) and tell which console was winning simply by looking at the number of games on the shelves. If you bought a losing console, not only did it have all the problems that caused it to lose in the first place, but also there was nothing to rent for it. You were buying all the games at full price, untested. So while you could theoretically build a pretty good library for the Master System, the average quality of your games was going to be lower because you're going to buy more duds.
I guess you could look at shelf space at other kinds of stores, but for some reason it seems it was more balanced. Maybe due to some sort of marketing subsidies? I remember Toys R' Us allocating TONS of space to the Master System in the late 80s, like maybe fully 50% as much space as they allocated to the NES, and even some space for Atari (I still recall the cover for Yar's Revenge freaking me out on multiple separate visits to the store) but I don't think Blockbuster or our other local rental place EVER carried Master System or Atari games.
Japan supposedly didn't really have a rental market. I wonder how this influenced the console wars over there.
Good point about Blockbuster determining the console war "winners." At the store I went too, during the 32/64 bit days, PS1 games got the most space, followed by N64. I'm sure they rented Saturn but I don't remember seeing any.
Toys 'R Us, though, really had a wide and varied selection of games across all formats, at least through the 90s. I discovered games that I didn't know existed, games that weren't even featured in magazines at the time, just walking down those aisles.
As for the Master System, yeah its shallow library is the problem, at least in the States where new games stopped appearing for it around 1990. Too many arcade ports of varying quality and not enough to really stand out, besides Phantasy Star and Zillion; maybe Alex Kidd in Miracle World. Europe and Brazil would get some pretty interesting and unique titles, but too little too late for Japan and America. The NES has a pretty shallow library too until 1987, when Zelda, Metroid, Kid Icarus, Mike Tyson's Punch Out, and Castlevania all appeared.
Nostalgia is a funny thing. I didn’t have an NES growing up, I had a Master System. Yet seeing the NES invokes more warm and fuzzy feelings than the Master System does.
Wow, that's fascinating JT! Never heard that before.
Do you have any idea why that might be?
It’s probably for some of the same reasons you mentioned. The NES is overexposed, from YouTube videos on it, articles, merchandise, etc. I have many NES t-shirts and other merch but like no Master System stuff.
I do like the Master System better than the NES now, but with everyone talking up the NES and waxing poetic about it (in many cases understandably so) it’s easier to be more nostalgic for the NES than any of its contemporary consoles.
Yeah, that makes sense to me. What are some of your favorite Master System games? Like, top 3?
Shinobi is #1. Second is probably Golden Axe Warrior. Third is a toss up, I’ll say Ghostbusters.
HELL YES! I love to play both Golden Axe and Shinobi. Oh man, Shinobi takes me back to the arcade at the skating rink days!
Yea, I have never heard that either. I guess it shows you the power of Nintendo marketing and the nostalgia that some of there characters have earned?
‘00 Zoomer here, I have to say it, but I’m not a fan of the NES. There’s a few games on it I love: Mario 3 and Megaman 2 will always be some of my favorites, and Mother 1 is a criminally underrated game. But I mostly find the NES to be a console of games trying their best to do something and not having the tools they need to do it very well. These games tend to feel clunky, like they’re really straining for ways to implement their ideas and really wish they had more than two buttons on the controller. I love Castlevania 1, but it hurts using special items without a dedicated special items button.
Sometimes simple is best, but for the most part I find that everything I wanted an NES game to do, an SNES game does it better. It has the tools to implement the game’s vision and provide a satisfactory experience that doesn’t feel watered-down by technological limitations. Super Metroid vs. Metroid, LoZ1 vs. Link to the Past. I didn’t grow up with SNES, but I can go back to an SNES game and enjoy it as thoroughly as a Wii game from 2009 or PC game from 2011. Same goes for GBA and a handful of Gameboy games. Not a big fan of N64, barely played GameCube, so I won’t comment on those.
Culturally, the NES nostalgia really got old by the late 2010s, but it’s basically totally disappeared. You’re right, Wii nostalgia is showing up, and I understand because I grew up with it. I think Millennials who grew up with the NES and gushed about it as adults just got old enough to move on and got it all out of their system. Or maybe they didn’t, and were just drowned out by Zoomers who didn’t care to hear it anymore. Don’t worry, we’ll be next!
I mean, I don't really blame you for not being a fan of the NES, particularly if you didn't grow up with it. A lot of the game design - even in the most celebrated games - is outdated and needlessly challenging.
Most NES games - probably about 2/3 of them - are mediocre to bad. Not just by today's standards, but by yesterday's standards, as well. They remain fascinating artifacts of a different age, though, and I'm excited to look back at them.
I'm not just gonna barrel through the NES library, buuut, if I'm honest, I'm more excited to play just about every other system on this quest.
Thanks for your comment, Wolliver, and for your perspective. Hope to see you again here!
Umm yea and now a 74 GenX guy will chime in. ;)
Yea, the NES was 8-bit but look at what it gave us: Super Mario Bros at home (no more quarters in arcade), Ninja Gaiden, Metroid, Final Fantasy, Castlevania , Mega Man 2, Tetris, Zelda & Zelda II.
You cannot deny the ground that was broken with games like Final Fantasy, Ninja Gaiden and Zelda. Eventually we got Super Mario Bros. 3, which was divine at the time! And lets not forget about the accessories foundation that was also built: third party accessories like the Game Genie. Without devices like the Game Genie would we ever have had the X-BAND for the SNES?
I appreciate your perspective also, Steven!
I think taking a more personal look at these games is a grand idea, especially since (a) you’re good as such writing, and (b) you’ve already done conventional reviews of every single NES game. So I’m looking forward to this immensely.
Thanks Alex, I appreciate your encouragement!
Love the backstory. And I've struggled with this myself. What can I say about a game that hasn't been said before? I think the personal experiences and connections to the game are what brings something unique to the conversation. Not a formal review, but a personal experience put to words. Good luck!
Totally agree. Formal reviews have their place, but I've never really been interested in writing those. Personal experiences/creative writing exercises are more my speed. Thanks John!
Great read! I’m really curious as to what your favourite NES title is? May have been in another post.
Favorite NES title is probably the original Super Mario Bros. I've played it hundreds of times, and it never gets old to me.
How about you?
Ah! It was before my time.
I do love the original Super Mario Bros though. Platformers have come a long way since, but the fundamentals that the games follow today are all in that title!
Enjoyed this discussion.
One thing I'm realizing: the NES was only your primary console for about a year. I did the math and I think we got ours in late 1987, which would make it my primary console for 4 years. I'm not sure what to do with that knowledge just yet, but it surely colors our perspectives and nostalgia around the console in a number of ways.
But then the experience with your grandparents surely has a lot to do with it too. There was probably a feeling that, somehow, the NES wasn't out-of-date in the context of your grandparents' house.
Some family friends made the ill-fated decision to buy an Atari 7800 at some point after the NES came out, I think because they had a large collection of Atari 2600 games. In the context of my own home, I'd have hated playing Atari when Nintendo was something that existed. But I always jumped at the chance to go over to their house and play Atari. In my mind it wasn't out-of-date at all, in the context of their home. At some point they traded it in for an NES, which they were excited about, but it made me sad, even though they had a number of good NES games that I hadn't played much.
Yeah, that's a good point about the NES only being my primary console for about a year. I really didn't experience a lot of "the good stuff" on the console until years later, in the late 90s or even 2000s. Whereas I grew up with the Genesis and SNES more in real time and enjoyed a lot of those consoles' best games around when they first released. And yeah, the NES felt like a perfect fit at my grandparents' house. Fun fact: it's still hooked up there, it still works, and my cousins and I still play it together when they come to visit. It's been rocking for almost 35 years!
Wow, getting an Atari 7800 around the time of the NES? That's more depressing than being the one kid on the block with the Master System (I don't hate the Master System, but let's face it, it's no NES). No offense to them, but I'd be like you, upset if the 7800 was in my house. Pretty fascinating glimpse into an alternate gaming reality for your young mind, though!
The main problem with the Master System, looking back at it, is the lack of depth of its library. And lack of Mario. But it had its share of good games. I don't think that's something you can say about the 7800.
But that's looking back at it. One difference when you were living it out in real time was the lack of a rental market.
You could say that Blockbuster "overdetermined" the winners of the console wars in the US in the late 1980s and 1990s. Any kid could go to Blockbuster (which our family did weekly) and tell which console was winning simply by looking at the number of games on the shelves. If you bought a losing console, not only did it have all the problems that caused it to lose in the first place, but also there was nothing to rent for it. You were buying all the games at full price, untested. So while you could theoretically build a pretty good library for the Master System, the average quality of your games was going to be lower because you're going to buy more duds.
I guess you could look at shelf space at other kinds of stores, but for some reason it seems it was more balanced. Maybe due to some sort of marketing subsidies? I remember Toys R' Us allocating TONS of space to the Master System in the late 80s, like maybe fully 50% as much space as they allocated to the NES, and even some space for Atari (I still recall the cover for Yar's Revenge freaking me out on multiple separate visits to the store) but I don't think Blockbuster or our other local rental place EVER carried Master System or Atari games.
Japan supposedly didn't really have a rental market. I wonder how this influenced the console wars over there.
Good point about Blockbuster determining the console war "winners." At the store I went too, during the 32/64 bit days, PS1 games got the most space, followed by N64. I'm sure they rented Saturn but I don't remember seeing any.
Toys 'R Us, though, really had a wide and varied selection of games across all formats, at least through the 90s. I discovered games that I didn't know existed, games that weren't even featured in magazines at the time, just walking down those aisles.
As for the Master System, yeah its shallow library is the problem, at least in the States where new games stopped appearing for it around 1990. Too many arcade ports of varying quality and not enough to really stand out, besides Phantasy Star and Zillion; maybe Alex Kidd in Miracle World. Europe and Brazil would get some pretty interesting and unique titles, but too little too late for Japan and America. The NES has a pretty shallow library too until 1987, when Zelda, Metroid, Kid Icarus, Mike Tyson's Punch Out, and Castlevania all appeared.