NES Classic, At Last

It took me an insane four and a half months to track one down, but I finally got my NES Classic Edition earlier this week. I posted about the NES Classic when it was first announced last July, but now I own one for myself.

I knew the NES Classic was going to be small, but it didn’t fully sink in how small it is until I saw it first-hand. For comparison, here’s the NES Classic next to my New Nintendo 3DS XL.

NES Classic Edition system next to a red New 3DS XL.THE GOOD

I really like the game library overall, and it really helps that it includes third-party games. The 30 games provide a good variety of genres and include many of the system’s best games.

I also like that there are different ways to sort the game list. Sort them alphabetically, by publisher, by two-player games, by recently played, by the number of times played, or by release date.

You can also save your progress with “suspend points,” and you can keep up to four suspend points per game. Very helpful.

And of course, I also like the HDMI cable. You get a much better quality picture than composite video or RF. My top-loader NES only has the RF connections, so the quality isn’t very good. That’s also a reason I haven’t made many NES game videos on my Youtube channel. You can expect videos of some of these games in the future.

THE BAD

The controller cord is too short. WAY too short. Only 2.5 feet (76cm) long. So you’ll need to be sitting very close to the system. Also, you can’t change games by using the controller alone; you have to press the reset button on the system itself. Well at least it won’t be more than a couple feet away, I suppose. 😛

And while the menu has a tab for manuals, that tab only provides a QR code. You’ll need to scan that QR code with a smartphone or tablet to view the manuals. Why aren’t they built in, as they are in Virtual Console versions? Nintendo keeps making it more and more difficult to access game instructions.

The Games

The NES Classic has 30 games built-in, and while I haven’t played them all in depth yet, I have at least sampled each one. There are many that I’m already quite familiar with, and some others that are new to me. I’ll talk about them in groups, based on my previous experiences with each game. You can also view my page of NES Reviews for my thoughts on the games I’ve already played on the original hardware.

2-Player Favorites

Dr. Mario, Super C, Double Dragon II: The Revenge, and Tecmo Bowl have long been among my favorite two-player games on the original Nintendo Entertainment System. While I do already own these four games in one form or another, the NES Classic provides an easy way to take it all with me without having to lug around a bunch of cartridges. And fortunately, the second player can use a Wii Classic Controller or Classic Controller Pro.

Gameplay screenshot of Super C on NES Classic Edition.
Super C
Single Player Great-NES

The Legend of Zelda, Super Mario Bros. 1-3, Ninja Gaiden, Castlevania, Mega Man 2, Metroid, Kirby’s Adventure, Excitebike, and StarTropics are enjoyable NES games I’ve played in the past. But a few of these, particularly The Legend of Zelda and Ninja Gaiden, are games I haven’t owned in years. So it’s good to have them back in my collection.

Gameplay screenshot of Super Mario Bros. 3 on NES Classic Edition.
Super Mario Bros. 3
Nintend-ordinary

Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr., Mario Bros., Balloon Fight, and Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest are games that I’ve played before, but aren’t really anything special to me. Galaga and Pac-Man also fit into this category, even though I haven’t played them on NES before–just on other platforms. They’re decent games, but they’re not as great as the games mentioned above.

Gameplay screenshot of Balloon Fight on NES Classic Edition.
Balloon Fight
Know the Series, But Not the Game

Final Fantasy, Gradius, Ghosts ‘n Goblins, and Zelda II: The Adventure of Link are games that I haven’t played before, but they’re from series that I am familiar with. These should be good games to delve into.

Gameplay screenshot of Gradius on NES Classic Edition.
Gradius
Mostly New to Me

Ice Climber, Kid Icarus, Punch-Out!!, and Bubble Bobble are mostly new to me. Why mostly? Because three of the four (all but Bubble Bobble) were featured in NES Remix Pack on Wii U. The full games weren’t included of course, just very brief challenges from those games.

Gameplay screenshot of Bubble Bobble on NES Classic Edition.
Bubble Bobble

Overall Thoughts

I’m really happy with the NES Classic so far. I will probably end up buying an extension cable for the controller, though. I’m enjoying playing some of these old games once again, and the system itself is just a cool collectible that I’m happy to add to my collection.

I particularly have an urge to (fully) re-play Super Mario Bros. 2, Super Mario Bros. 3, and the original Legend of Zelda. It’s been a very long time since I’ve completed those games, and I’m looking forward to enjoying them once again. I will likely talk about them in a future blog entry, although at the moment, I want to get back into Breath of the Wild soon.

If classic games (and the NES in particular) appeal to you, I think you’ll be pleased with the NES Classic Edition. If you’re able to find one, that is. Good luck and happy hunting!

Joining the Hunt

In The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild lately, I’ve been doing more exploring and less advancing the story. I returned to the Great Plateau, beat my first Stone Talus, and then jumped off the plateau to paraglide into a new region of the map. As I was climbing a lookout tower, I saw a shooting star crash into the mountain in the distance.

A shooting star in the sky as I climb a lookout tower.I completed a shrine and then headed to the Central Tower. I started climbing up, and guardians were targeting me and shooting at me the whole time! They have an extremely long range on their lasers! But I made my way to the top and activated the tower.

I soon snagged myself a wild horse and continued exploring. I found a sleeping giant, and I hoped I could talk to him. But when I got close, he woke up, and he wasn’t in a talking mood. He wanted to fight me!

Hinox the giant wanted to fight me.
He’s grumpy when he first wakes up.

I got back on my new horse and flew out of there as fast as I could. Eventually I ended up at Outskirt Stable. I used the opportunity to register my new horse and give him a name: Brown Fox. I know he’s not a fox, but he is brown. And I was up way too late playing Zelda that night and that’s all that came to mind. 😛

Embry: Are you sure you want to name this horse Brown Fox?The Rota Ooh Shine was nearby, so I stopped to complete it. After that, I returned to Impa in Kakariko Village. I showed her my camera, and she said this is the same camera Zelda used 100 years ago. Wow, and the battery still works?!

There are some pictures already stored on the camera, and she told me I should visit the locations in those pictures. I’m also supposed to return to her once I’ve visited at least one of them.

But for now, I decided to teleport back to Zora’s Domain and start my trek up to Ploymus Mountain. The ability to swim up waterfalls helps a lot here. But when I made my way up, this boss enemy was kicking my butt.

A large boss on Ploymus Mountain kicks my butt.
This dude has some anger issues.

After a couple “game over” screens, I decided to paraglide out of there for the time being. And as I sailed away, I witnessed some hunting going on beneath me!

Monsters hunt a bull beneath me as I paraglide through the air.Some Bokoblins were on horseback, hunting a bull with fire arrows. I guess they’re trying save time by cooking the meat as they hunt it. 😛

So I dropped in, shot the bull with an arrow to finish him off, and took the meat for myself. Of course, the Bokoblins were shooting at me by now, and they were hot on my trail.

A fire arrow appears to hit me as I pick up the raw prime meat in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.I shot back at the Bokoblin, knocking him off his horse. I then ran over and finished him off…and then stole his horse. 😛

But it wasn’t long until I ran into his buddies. They shot at me with fire arrows, killing the stolen horse! I then tracked them down and killed them, but that was quite an entertaining series of events.

After clearing a couple of shrines and exploring in other parts of the world, I paraglided down into South Akkala Stable. As I approached, a bolt of lightning nearly hit a girl named Jana who was standing by a large tree.

Lightning strikes near a tree in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (BOTW).

Inside the stable, I found the unstable Beedle once again. He said that since we keep running into each other, that must be a sign that we were once married in a previous life. o.O

Beedle: We must have been married in our past lives.
Uh, no.

I tried ascending the Akkala Citadel Ruins for a bit. There were some tough drone guardians flying around that made things tricky. But when a blood moon occurred to bring monsters back to life, I decided to get my akkala outta there. I redeemed some spirit orbs for another heart container, and then I teleported up to the plateau and paraglided off to another new area.

There, I activated Lake Tower before clearing two more shrines in the area–including one on Hylia Island. I saw a Zora fishing on a small island nearby, and that’s where I ended my game the other night. I don’t even know where I’ll go next time, but that’s what’s so fun about this game. The possibilities seem endless.

Splatoon 2 Global Testfire

The Splatoon 2 global testfire (multiplayer demo) for Nintendo Switch is taking place this weekend, at six designated times. The first one was held this afternoon, and I made sure not to miss it. It starts off with a quick tutorial on how to use the controls. Unfortunately, you can’t customize the controls until after you’ve completed the tutorial. And then you can’t test your changes until you’re in a battle against other people.

So I inverted the X-axis camera controls, adjusted the sensitivity slightly to match my Splatoon settings, and joined my first match.

Trying the Weapons

I started out with the splat roller, and I quickly noticed that it seemed much slower than the Krak-on roller I’m used to in Splatoon. It also seems to run out of ink quickly, so I’m thinking they severely nerfed the roller.

The splat roller, out of ink, in Splatoon 2.Of course, this is just a demo and the final attributes likely haven’t been determined yet. But I hope the standard rollers aren’t like this, or I won’t be using them very often.

Anyway, the special weapon on the splat roller is the splashdown. You jump up and slam back down to the ground with the power of a mini-airstrike. It would be best used for dropping in on enemies from above, but it’s not that great if you’re just using it for ink coverage (since it’s just inking turf right where you’re already at).

I also tried out the brand new splat dualies. It’s actually two guns that you hold, one in each hand.

Using the splat dualies in Splatoon 2 for Nintendo Switch.When using them, you have the unique ability to roll while shooting (up to twice in succession). That’s a very cool feature. The special weapon on the dualies is the ink jet printer. You fly up into the air and hover there, and you can shoot blobs of ink at your opponents or onto the ground. I think this is my favorite of the new special weapons so far.

The ink jet special weapon in Splatoon 2 for Nintendo Switch.I also played a couple of matches with the splattershot, which is a basic gun. Its special weapon is tenta missiles. They can lock onto an enemy and then fire. But one time I tried using it, and it couldn’t lock on to anyone. So I was kinda stuck just standing there for a couple seconds and I couldn’t fire it or cancel it. It’s probably just a matter of learning the right way to do it.

Controls

I had some issues with the controls in the game, but they’re really just things I’ll need to get used to. After spending hundreds of hours playing the first Splatoon, it may take some time to un-learn some things and switch to the new ways.

The biggest change was that the jump button has been moved from X to B. The X button now brings up the map, which blocks your view of the action. So quite a few times, I would accidentally bring up the map when I meant to jump. And then I would scramble to figure out how to cancel out of the map again. 😛 I really wish they would have kept X as the jump button, but I’m sure I’ll get used to it eventually.

The superjump/map screen in Splatoon 2 for Nintendo Switch.Superjumping seemed a bit tricky too…except for the times that I did it by accident. 😛

Maps

Two maps are available in the demo, Musselforge Fitness and The Reef. They’re both pretty basic, medium sized stages with lots of ramps. The Reef reminds me a bit of Urchin Underpass (at least the central part), but with a bridge connecting the two sides.

Since I’ve only played each map a handful of times, it’s too early for me to really finalize my opinions of them. But so far, they seem fine, although not spectacular. I’m sure Nintendo is saving some more interesting stages for the full game.

Global Testfire Thoughts

Overall, I really enjoyed the global testfire. It was fun and it re-confirmed that I really want to buy the game when it comes out this summer. Also, I did not have any connection troubles today either, so that was a good sign.

I’ll be playing more of the global testfire over the weekend, and I’ll post a video or two as well. If I have any additional thoughts about the game, I’ll add them to this entry.

Updates

Update #1: One thing that I really like is that when you’re submerged in ink, your ink indicator shows a line that lets you know how much ink you need to use your sub weapon. Very helpful.

Update #2: Here’s a gameplay video showing two matches from Musselforge Fitness. In one, I used the new splat dualies, and in the other, I used the splat roller.

Update #3: I’ve now played in four of the testfires: Two on Friday and two on Saturday. Now that I’ve had more time with the game, here are some updated thoughts:

  • The splashdown special has really grown on me; I like it quite a bit now. You just need to think of it as an attack weapon, and not a way to ink a bunch of turf. It’ll be great for any map with some height to it. I would love to use it in a map like Flounder Heights.
  • The ZL and ZR buttons on the JoyCons don’t seem to stay pressed in as easily as they do on the Wii U gamepad. There were times I stopped shooting or stopped ducking in ink, even though I didn’t mean to. I’m sure the Switch ProController will be better, though.
  • I’m already a bit tired of those two maps in the testfire, particularly Musselforge Fitness (which seemed to show up a lot for me). We don’t know how many maps the game will launch with, but I’m looking forward to seeing what other stages they add.
  • After no disconnections on Friday, I had quite a few of them on Saturday. Hopefully things will be better once the full game comes out.
  • The splat dualies is my favorite weapon of the four options (although I didn’t try the charger, since I’m not interested in sniping). But I always seem to forget to use the roll move! So I’d probably be a better player with it, if I could remember to use its highlight feature. 😉

I’m really looking forward to the game’s launch, and I’m wondering if there will be more testfires before then. Guess we’ll have to wait and see. In the meantime, I’ll add some videos from the global testfire.

Update #4: Here is a video showing two matches in The Reef:

Update #5: Here is a video showing some highlights from the global testfire. It features three of the new special weapons in the game, as well as some of my splats, combos, fails, laggy moments, and more.

Related: 7 Things I’d Like to See in Splatoon 2