Boy, did I ever find a treasure today.

[Weltall]

I was going through some old stuff in the house, in a room that is no longer used since my grandmother moved out, and I found something amazing.

It's an SNES bundle, with Link to the Past as a pack-in game. The machine was never removed from the box, and everything's in it, completely mint-condition. It was purchased from Target in 1998. I have no idea at all why my grandmother had this, or why she was holding onto it, but still, a mint-condition SNES isn't something you happen across every day.

Having a brand-new copy of LTTP doesn't hurt, either. :D

[Dark Jaguar]

I would suspect she originally intended it as a gift but when it came time to wrap it she couldn't find it. She probably was very upset for a long time because of the money spent on it too and eventually gave up the quest. Who knows who it was originally meant for, but now it's yours by the legally binding "finders keepers" act passed back when life began.

[Weltall]

Well, it is mine, now. She's not in what one would call a state of optimal mental awareness.

But its function as a gift baffles me. I have no idea who it would be for. My sister and I already had one, all of my videogame-playing cousins had one, she herself had one for Tetris and Dr. Mario...

[Great Rumbler]

I wish I could find something like that in my house.

[Dark Jaguar]

Had one when? That's the kicker. When did she buy it? It had to be back when that particular package was actually in stores.

[Sacred Jellybean]

I have no idea who it would be for. My sister and I already had one, all of my videogame-playing cousins had one, she herself had one for Tetris and Dr. Mario...

Maybe she bought it for someone who she later found out already had one. Or someone gave it to her.

[Dark Jaguar]

Or she was senile and bought it from ebay only a short time ago.

[A Black Falcon]

Had one when? That's the kicker. When did she buy it? It had to be back when that particular package was actually in stores.

It's a SNES 2, weren't those just available in 1997 and 1998?

[Dark Jaguar]

SNES 2? Dang, no S-Video support. Still, if that's no big deal then it's fine. Besides that my experience with S-Video recently has shown me first hand that A: the improvement is noticable and B: actually after looking at a few games I'd rather take the digital glasses off.

Some of it looks better, but for the most part with the full clarity you finally see exactly how pixelated the old games look. The games were clearly designed to actually USE the blur to create a smoothing effect, and that sometimes tragically applies to in game text which is now clear but not as legible.

It both looks better and looks worse. Tragic really, pick your poison. Those filters they put on Metroid in Metrod Prime and the two NES Zelda games in the Zelda Collection? Those were there for a reason, the reason being if you happen to be using component.

[A Black Falcon]

Some of it looks better, but for the most part with the full clarity you finally see exactly how pixelated the old games look. The games were clearly designed to actually USE the blur to create a smoothing effect, and that sometimes tragically applies to in game text which is now clear but not as legible.

This is why most console games look so awful emulated on PCs, they aren't meant to be used on sharp monitors... they do sometimes have filters that are supposed to help, but those can sometimes make the games look too clear (all the edges smoothed, etc) and look equally wrong... but this problem will hit TVs too this generation, what with sharp, high-res HDTVs becoming more and more common... and TV consoles don't usually have filters to attempt to make things look nicer, or higher resolution modes. They may have mandatory changes (like how the Mega Man Anniversary Collection uses higher resolutions than a NES, or those filters in Metroid), but they aren't options, and there are far fewer of them than you'd find in an emulator...

[EdenMaster]

I say, unless you're really wanting some SNES retro love, I bet a mint condition, never opened SNES with original packaging would fetch a tidy sum on eBay. Somewhere out on the Internet, some collector is just waiting for you to make his day.

[Sacred Jellybean]

Yeah, there are many alternatives to opening the package, all of them infinitely more sensible.

-Emulators
-Dreamcast emulators
-Buy a used SNES
-drop acid and open an old copy of Nintendo Power

et cetera. Pawn it on ebay and get top dollar for it (or wait even longer, since the price value will probably just go up as time goes by).

[Weltall]

I've looked on eBay, and I determined that I can get maybe $200-$300 for it.

But I plan to keep it and use it myself, and here's why.

1. I now am basically assured of having a working SNES until at least the age of 40 (since I have two others already. One is over ten years old and heavily-used, the other is about 6 and hasn't been used much).

2. I prefer having the real thing over an emulator. Therefore, when my current SNES dies, and then my other one goes, I'll have one ready to go. If they're going for this much money now, think of how much I'd have to pay to acquire one in ten or fifteen years.

Hell, think of how much I could sell this one for in ten or fifteen years. :D

[A Black Falcon]

You have to consider that over the next decade most SNES games' save batteries will die and will need to be replaced, of course, but it probably would be worth the trouble since games definitely are better in their original formats...

[Sacred Jellybean]

Although the real thing is always better, I could probably stand for emulation if I had a decent PC controller.

(ABF if you use this post as a springboard to a 10+ paragraph reply about PC controllers, so help me god...)

[A Black Falcon]

(ABF if you use this post as a springboard to a 10+ paragraph reply about PC controllers, so help me god...)

Why would I do that when all I have to say is "Saitek P880/P990, $20, best PC controller I've used, get one!"? :)

[Great Rumbler]

*Xbox360 wired controller*

[A Black Falcon]

*twice the price and, I believe, with triggers mapped as analog axes that most games won't let you use as buttons*

[Dark Jaguar]

Don't worry about that ABF because there are 3rd party drivers out there for it that let you map the controller as you see fit. That's what I've been using, switching profiles as fits my needs. The only real improvement is I'd like to map the "guide" button to switch between profiles, with light status indicating which one I'm using.

When batteries start to fail on my old NES games, IT BEGINS. I will endevor to find a way to carefully remove and insert a new battery while using a custom built device to provide power to the cartridge during the switch. I think I'll have a heart rate moniter sound looping in the background for dramatic effect as I do this.

[A Black Falcon]

My Super Mario World cart has had a dying battery since last fall, and several of my GB/GBC games have erased themselves... not sure if those were dying batteries or some other problem, though, but for at least some the battery is probably a reasonable assumption. GB games use smaller batteries than major console carts do, so it makes sense that they wouldn't last as long...

[Dark Jaguar]

Your best bet would be to stop storing them in an electrified bucket of water in the freezer.

[A Black Falcon]

Hah... :)

It is odd though. While a year ago all of my GB/C/A carts were fine with the possible exception of several of my GBC ones, now... well... SMB Deluxe doesn't boot up (the most I've been able to get it to do in the past couple of years is get to the title screen, which quickly hangs... and usually it just does nothing), Zelda: OoS's cartridge broke and now is nonfunctional, OoA erased my save files, and so did Survival Kids... at least with the original GB stuff (when I turned on Kirby 2 and Donkey Kong Land and found them blank (as well as Mole Mania, but that one's had memory issues off and on for years, so that battery might not actually be dead... same with Kirby Pinball Land -- it is one of my older carts so it might be a dead battery, but given that the highscores were erased right after I accidentally flipped the power on and off a bunch of times... I suspect that did it. Same for Donkey Kong Country 2 on the SNES -- erased after a bunch of quick on/offs, but it's worked fine since so I don't suspect the battery.

In short... yes, turning the power on and off quickly really CAN erase battery-backed cart games' memory. :)

It is odd though. While I have several SNES games with possibly dying batteries (Super Mario All-Stars also is dying, I think), all five or six Genesis games I have with batteries are perfectly fine... you never can tell with these things...

At least Illusion of Gaia (what I'm playing right now, actually... very good game, better than I expected...) and Secret of Mana are fine. :)

Don't worry about that ABF because there are 3rd party drivers out there for it that let you map the controller as you see fit. That's what I've been using, switching profiles as fits my needs. The only real improvement is I'd like to map the "guide" button to switch between profiles, with light status indicating which one I'm using.

That's very nice to hear, that default mapping with triggers as axes reminded me of my old Gravis Xterminator gamepad... it had analog triggers, which were mapped to the plus and minus ends of an axis. Needless to say, they were pretty much useless because no games actually had any use for such a mapping...