Oh why hello! I didn't hear you come in. Please - please take a seat and make yourself feel right at home. You know, when I'm not updating Nintendo Player, visiting Nintendo message boards, or thinking how much lasted life I've spent obsessing over a twenty year old toy whilst simultaneously popping Prozac pills like it were delicious M&M Minis: I like to look back on life and reminisce.

Thanks to my tenure at Nintendo Player I've had the chance to come across many a new and exciting thing pertaining [but not limited] to video gaming, the game industry, and international culture abroad. Sure some of this learned knowledge has been anything but intellectually beneficial (I have three words for you: Bubble Bath Babes); but for the most part I feel as if the great reservoirs of information I sifted through a World Wide Web sieve during these past couple of years taught me much about topics I would have not ventured into had it not been for my deep interest in the NES (such as big-business politics and global economics and tentacle hentai sex).

I felt as if I had a duty to share some of the more interesting things I found out with you and the rest of my audience. These cold, hard facts will surely bewilder, bore, enlighten, or somehow do all at once in one swift motion. Like ninjas. Ho ho! Like ninjas.

Before I begin let me clarify by saying I know damn well that a few of the things mentioned is considered "common knowledge" to most seasoned NESers, while other morsels of information are simply thrown in for sheer hilarity to break up the banal nature that most of these numerical lists tend to become. However I can just about guarantee at least something below is news to you.

In quick summary form: this is where humor and information come together to make humor and information babies. Now be off to witness humor and information sexual relations.

Warning: Long download times ahead! If you're on a dial-up: put on the Mr. Coffee and watch some dreaded sitcom like Dharma and Greg; you're in for a wait.

25. There is a Famicom adventure game entitled Jesus. Actually, the full title is Jesus: Dreadful Bio-Monsters and it is based on an anime of the same name. Jesus Christ Superstar this ain't. Does Jesus still love the little children of the world? Short answer: NO! But Jesus sure loves you, darlin'. This I know. A rump a dump dum! Who's your Lord and Savor, honey child? Scream it loooooud and clear upon mountaintop high! 24. In Ultima: Exodus, you can battle and destroy any NPC character--including innocent children and even the king! Most wicked! "Wench, my honor has been challenged. BATTLE TO THE DEATH!" I only feel like a real man when I beat a defenseless little girl into submission. Unfortunately for my party a horde of soldiers seemed displeased by this. // How many times did you want to whoop a king's ass in an RPG? Speaking from personal experience: MANY MANY. They're always giving orders and sitting high and mighty and such and so forth and stuff. And and. And. And so I'll win one for the little guys or go down in a blaze of glory! (As a follow up: the king strucketh our asses down almightily.) 23. 65% of Gamestop, the leading retailer of pre-owned NES paraphernalia in the US, is owned by the money-hungry Barnes & Noble retailer. A single, wealthy discount bookstore fiscally controls Gamestop, Babbages, Software Etc., and Funcoland. On top of that they fiercely pressure employees of said organizations to forcibly sell subscriptions to Game Information--an ad-infested gaming magazine--also owned by the conglomerate. (BN owns B. Dalton bookstores too.) That's America's real Freedom, bitches. I suggest you ditch Gamestop and go support local ma & pa stores, or better yet, charitable organizations like Goodwill. According to a recent report from The New York Times, Barnes & Noble is hurting in online sales and from their ownership of Gamestop. (You can read the entire article online here.) Gosh gee that's odd. They outta start pressing those cleaning kits and magazine subscriptions a little harder, huh, Wall Street Kid? Wall Street Kid only had this statement to make: "Rad-tad-tad-ticious, Mister Kotter!" 22. The original name for the North American release of the Family Computer was actually the Advanced Video System (AVS) and NOT the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). It was only until five months later at the Summer CES show in Las Vegas that it officially changed to the NES. AVSPlayer.com...? Naaah. 21. The very last licensed NES game to hit stores was the puzzle genre title from Nintendo Wario's Woods in the December of '94. The final unlicensed (non-pirated) game was Sunday Funday released in 1995 by the Bible-loving Wisdom Tree. "Wah-hah-hah-ha." Before there was Waluigi, there was Wario. Wario Woods is also a landmark of the beginning of a new era of gaming: game ratings. Wario is the one and only NES title to receive an ESRB rating of K-A ("Kids to Adults" which is the same as saying E for "Everyone"). Only imagine if the ESRB had formed earlier in the NES years and used this ambiguous ratings system to judge some of the classics . . . 20. Searching for another reason not to vote for Senator Joe LIEberman if he (heh) gets the nominee in the 2004 presidential election? Mr. Joe "hypocritical conservative" LIEberman has on many occasions defended and even praised the Hollywood entertainment business, while at the same time denouncing and even making an attempt to pass a ban on violent video games. Sex, drugs, cop killings, and crude language is fine in motion pictures but Mortal Kombat is the devil and will devour the first born child in every family. My recommendation: if you know of a rally around your region that Mr. Lieberman plans to attend, grab your Zapper and pay him a visit. How did this have to do with the NES? Well, it doesn't... but as the aforementioned rating on Wario Woods was used an example, it goes to show that not even back in the NES times were game companies safe! 19. Part 1/2: The most expensive and sought after licensed Nintendo video game (not including the Nintendo World Championships) is Stadium Events: an average fitness game from Bandai that had a short shelf life in September of 1987. The NTSC is sought after far more than the only "uncommon" PAL version and worth much, much more money. Stadium Events (NTSC) on the right is completely identical to the ultra-common World Class Track Meet that was often found bundled inside of Super Mario Bros. / Duck Hunt cartridge variations and packaged inside of consoles. The only difference between the $200 original version and a 25 cent repeat is the title screen above and the replacement of 'Bandai' with 'Nintendo' on some of the events. Don't 'ya just love how collecting greed has soured some of the classic gaming community? Stadium Events is the greatest epitome of collector-produced price guides showing proof that one day they will ruin the collecting scene. I can see the high demand for gold/gray NWC carts as owning a piece of history - I mean, even Panesian prices to an extent (I sure made a lucrative trade to eventually get my own copy of Hot Slots) - but when a game such as this, which offers absolutely nothing interesting or new and is widely available through other variations of the same formula. . . Well, damn, you really have to question the ilk going on behind the online scenes driving these prices upward. Rarity-schmararity my ass! Fight the power, brother man. 18. Part 2/2: Bandai released a short-lived accessory called the Family Fun Fitness Pad alongside their release of Stadium Events/Athletic World cartridges. These pads are in very limited quantities and the NTSC version was only available in certain parts of the US. Nintendo later converted Bandai's fitness pad to make the Power Pad and then released World Class Track Meet. In essence it was Bandai (not Nintendo) that created the entire concept of the Power Pad. 17. According to the most popular search engine online - Google/dmoz.org's extensive directory of video game websites - readily available and uploaded NES fansites outnumber Nintendo 64 sites by approximately 19 to 13; Gameboy 19 to 10; and Super Nintendo 19 to 7, making the NES the most popular retired Nintendo home system in cyberspace. (Of course there are countless more dead websites on free-servers and many lost .com's unaccounted for.) 16. Believe it or not, original NES games are still being produced to this very day! Whether they're any good or not remains undecided. Okay, since I'm sharing my honest observations and all, the truth is most of them really suck. Is fuck! These carts are essentially brand new games, mostly developed by Chinese pirate organizations, to then be cheaply copied onto a cartridge form or clone for profit worldwide. Repeat: these are not rehashes or hacks but actually new, fully functional, and playable eight-bit titles. Here's a small list of some pirate originals: Donkey Kong Country, Super Mario World, Boogerman, Kart Fighter, Harry Potter (below), Bio Hazard (Resident Evil; below-- see FAQ for more info), Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter, Sonic the Hedgehog, Toy Story, Pokemon. 15. There is a total of roughly 680 some licensed (NTSC) Nintendo NES video game releases in North America, or 773 counting the most widely-accepted unlicensed games. That's 773 reasons to be happy and 7 (the number of released titles in the Wisdom Tree library) reasons to kill yourself! Hip hip hooray! Hip hip hooray! Hip hip hooray! 14. The Famicom (short for "Family Computer"; in other words: the Japanese equivalent to the NES) Network System was truly the first console to "go online" in the most basic sense. The main purpose of this add-on machine was to give the user the ability to trade stocks and check his or her own bank account. Let's see your PS2, Dreamcast, or Saturn do that! Nintendo released the Family Computer Network System strictly in Japan. The keyboard controller, which plugged into the system's port, included new controls and the inclusion of numerical keys. Famicom-Net, the connectable telephone network, was once accessible by attaching a phone line underneath the console. I think we can all agree it was way ahead of its time and really showed Nintendo's innovative side. Click on pictures to enlarge: (1) Side // (2) Bottom // (3) Keyboard Controller (source: eBay) 13. The classic NES action-RPG Crystalis was released as God Slayer - Haruka Tenkuu no Sonata in Japan. This just goes to show Nintendo's very strict release policy concerning potential controversial titling and games. As a rule of thumb, Nintendo no likey associating with anything religious. [While we're on the subject, you can also blame them for blocking the passage of Sweet Home.] I can just imagine the angry religious fundamentalists protesting and burning a pit of NESes in those tight conservative circles down south. 12. Still, on the other hand, some officially licensed titles for the original Nintendo hid sexual innuendo or contained flat out nudity and were passed by the censors. Naughty, naughty. (left) Golgo 13: Top Secret Pimp (right) River City Ransom sauna = naked butt cheeks. (left) Of all places in a Capcom Disney video game! During the ending cut-scene as Ariel is transformed into human form, Capcom chose to show The Little Mermaid in a very revealing way. (right) Look everyone! It's woman-groping, 20 Hummer-owning, Calyfornia-pronouncing, naked Ahnuld in Terminator 2! (left) Ultima: Orgy (right) In Shadowgate, if you choose the "USE" command then click "SELF", you'll see this screen. Teacher says masturbation is a one-way ticket to see Lucifer. (left) Taboo: The Sixth Sense may be haunting and at times disturbing, but it's also shows another example of nudity in licensed NES games. (right) And the same licensed NES title is the only to show full frontal nudity. 11. Think it's downright disgraceful that some NES titles--examples: MC Kids and Yo! Noid--show blatant advertisement? Well in Japan the same thing's being done too; only in more subtle ways, you see. The first is from a strange, little game: Hana no Star Kaidou. Apparently you control two "hot" pop singers, both at the same time, while wooing the oncoming paparazzi and obsessive fans with attacks of sweet, sweet vocal notes. Some of the buildings display the very familiar looking arches of Mickey D's. Sponsored by McDonald's or "M" as in Musical Industries, Inc.? MacGyver knows. Do you know? The next case makes reference to the delicious milk chocolate candy bar that begins with the letter "H". Mmm so good. Again like the above game, whether or not an advertisement is the intention remains unclear. [Kaiketsu Yanchamaru 2 - Karakuri Land] 10. Nintendo's longest-standing support for a home system goes to the Nintendo Entertainment System. First and third party licensed NES video games were still being shelled out to the end of 1994; marking the game library releases' run encompass roughly 9 years and 4 months in the United States. 09. Legendary spokesman, quality-tester, and Nintendo Power counselor during the NES days; a one Mr. Howard Phillips currently works for Nintendo's main competition: Microsoft. His latest game he helped in production as of writing this was Midtown Madness 3, a title available for the Xbox. Ouch, Mr. bow-tie man. 08. Here is another example of anal Nintendo product analysts judging game material and determining if titles were suitable for players of all ages: Jaleco, the makers of Maniac Mansion for the NES, were told specifically by the aforementioned game testers to remove statue and poster nudity, names on one of the arcade machines found in the game (MUFF DIVER), and some coarse dialogue before it could be released to the public. Jaleco did make the changes but also added in one of their own: the notorious exploding hamster trick. If you sneak into Weird Ed's room while he is away and grab his hamster, Razor or Syd can place it inside of the microwavable oven. Then if you let Ed catch that character and give him the exploded hamster, your character will disappear and a tombstone pops up outside of the mansion lawn. The tombstone reads: "And good riddance!" This Easter egg shipped in the first 250,000 batch of NTSC cartridges before Nintendo ordered its removal from future copies, therefore the majority of the game paks out in the wild should allow you to pull off this neat cheat. (Note to PAL gamers: track down an NTSC copy since Nintendo removed the "hamster nuke" trick from all PAL copies.) Jaleco is certainly not one of PETA's leading advocates, that's for sure. 07. GBA SP. NES. Together. This is what the folks at Nintendo don't want you to hear: perfect NES emulation achieved on the Gameboy Advance. Thanks to a couple of hard working guys (loopy and flubba), a program called PocketNES has successfully cloned 99.9% of NES games to work on the GBA. By downloading the emulator, the Menu Maker tool, and desired game ROMs (over 100 games fit onto a 256M flash card at one time) you can link your GBA to a computer and transfer a lump sum of ROMs to a flash development card's memory. Play any NES game, instantly, and at your disposal on the run. Link-play too! Trust me from my own experience this trick works better than Redant's GameAxe and the Game Theory, and is the best portable option when running on an SP. You're going to need a USB link cable and one of the many flash cards out there for this to work. I can definitely recommend the E2F Advance 256M over the others. To prevent possible legal trouble I cannot direct you to online retailers that carry these flash cards. Remember to continue supporting Nintendo's efforts of bringing and updating NES classics to the newer generations. For a quick round of a Panesian game, that's another story . . . Please Note: I am not held responsible for any repercussions or problems you may run into while ordering from a foreign outfit. Understand the consequences beforehand. 06. Some just don't know when to give up. Quite a few of the publishers/developers alive during the NES days left through bankruptcy, including the late Data East, or by other means. Did you know though that the infamous King of bad games, the lowly LJN LTD., is still alive and kicking today? That's right, the folks who brought you such titles as Major League Baseball, Incredible Crash Dummies, and X-Men on the NES are still making a bad name for themselves. In 2000, a Dreamcast racing game called Spirit of Speed: 1937 (which received unimpressive review grades of 2.2 from IGN and 1.9 "abysmal" from GameSpot) was released by the once-development house turned Acclaim property. It's important to point out that LJN is still first and foremost a toy line, but at the same time it's scary to know they're still present in the modern video gaming field. No one is safe from that rainbow of doom. No one. Follow the rainbow to an evil leprechaun played by the always-adorable Warwick Davis. 05. NES unlicensed companies: Where are they now? Color Dreams has changed names to StarDot Technology [link] and currently sells net cams. A company called Panesian LTD. [link], that is also stationed in Hong Kong, is now producing "computer hardware and peripherals" and is a distributor of MAG computer monitors. Wisdom Tree's stock [link] is still around and continues to sell NES, Gameboy, SNES, and PC Christian software (although most NES titles say out of print) online at a directory website proudly displaying "Conservative Truth: the Antidote to Liberal Media" ads and Mel Gibson's The Passion of Christ. Contact address : Wisdom Tree Internet Sales P.O. Box 8682 Tucson, AZ 85738 (800) 772-4253 No. 04. Not measuring the hype poured over the previously unreleased California Raisins, nor the still-missing Parker Brothers' New Kids on the Block and Tengen's Police Academy, and you have the most rumored and talked about unreleased Nintendo game to date: Hellraiser. The title was planned and developed by the unlicensed company Color Dreams in 1990. Hellraiser was unlike any other cartridge on the NES for it supposedly ran an internal Z-80 processor (dubbed as "Super-16"). For the non-dev NES heads: the Nintendo Entertainment System itself had only 1/3 that kind of power. Along with the extra power in the cartridge was attached to it 64k RAM of memory, similar to that of the Aladdin's Deck Enhancer, to portray more vivid graphics and have use of the sub-processor for complete control over the visual aspect of Hellraiser alone. Unlike the slight enhancements of the Aladdin though, Color Dreams workers insisted that the graphics achieved 16-bit just like that of the Super Nintendo. Why so much graphic processing power needed to run Hellraiser? I have a three-letter acronym to answer: FPS. The movie-based game would have been the one and only first person shooter on the NES with respect to the PC's Wolfenstein 3-D. The company isn't pulling our leg here: widely spread advertisements displayed Hellraiser to the gaming public and the box and cart labels were actually produced for it. Ultimately it seemed Color Dreams backed off from the project on the account of the expected price, which according to sources, would have most likely cost $80 to 100. This sounds awfully expensive no doubt, but in relation to Action 52's $200 price tag, it was much more reasonable. Nothing beyond this information is really known and Hellraiser will forever remain a mystery. All that is left is a brief game excerpt in one of the many ad spots Color Dreams ran before the game got scrapped: Hellraiser is the first game to use advanced technology that pushes the NES further than ever before. Experience the pleasure of 16-bit performance. Experience the pain of Clive Barker's Hellraiser. Can you locate the strange cubes that open doorways to a dark realm? Can you solve the puzzle of the Lament Configuration? Pinhead, the Cenobites, and all of Hell know the answer. From the darkness far away laughter echoes. Other known unreleased and/or abandoned game projects in the history of Color Dreams include: Code Blue, Escape from Atlantis, Free Fall, Happy Camper, Happily Ever After, Starblade, Storm Lords, and Targhan. 03. Listen up people not majoring in criminal justice: one interpretation on the legality of read-only memory (ROM) that make up NES games released prior to the year 1992 is that all titles released after the initial "mask" cartridge of the system (in this system's case, Super Mario Bros.) fall under the fair use category of copyright law. Another interpretation is a ROM can also be legal if you yourself used a burner and transferred the game memory onto a computer for strictly back-up purposes only. However trademark characters, artwork, even music and code do not apply to these interpretations. This means Nintendo can try suing your f-ing ass off anyway if you decide to upload a site - for the sake of argument lets say "NESRomPlayer.com" - housing the entire GoodNes catalog. Still it's a reassuring legal reminder nonetheless for you to know you may have a case if you're ever caught in a tight spot, and granted you could ever convince Johnny Cochran to defend you. "If the ROM ain't the 'Bros.', you must acquit your Nintendo's!" 02. Nintendo.com recently announced this caution that could've been helpful say, I don't know, sixteen years ago: By blowing directly into the bottom of NES cartridges you are in fact slowly damaging them. Moisture from your breath may actually lead to the corrosion of the connectors on your game and NES system in the long run. "SONOFABITCH!" could be heard shouted by thousands of classic gamers across the globe. 01. Typing and reading are time wasters, when you could instead be gaming. Go play some NES! Let's party like it's 1989, baby!