Retro News, Retro Features - Page 15 of 48

Time to work on your Japanese

The original NES Final Fantasy was released on the Famicom in Japan in December 1987, which means that this year will be a landmark 25 year anniversary for the series. Release in the west was substantially delayed, but Square Enix is starting the celebrations in Japan with an anniversary website to show off the legacy...

The doctor is in

While some of us may consider ourselves useful when playing some old-school games, there are few that are legitimately world-beating retro gamers. Dr. Hank Chien is one of the elite, as he's the record holder for the original Donkey Kong arcade title, an honour that he currently holds despite constant competition from fellow retro...

Sharing the power

In recent weeks we’ve written about console launches such as Wii, 3DS and GameCube. This is all because we’re currently gearing up for the Wii U launch later this year, and E3 promises to build hype and excitement to astronomical levels. In the coming months most of us will learn all about Wii U online with various websites...

Such care-free times

It's easy to underestimate how long some of the current Nintendo senior figures have been working at the company: some of them have been there since the very beginning of NES, for example. Andriasang has unearthed a picture from a 1993 Nintendo Strategy book to make us, and the Nintendo legends in question, feel a bit old. The...

Get down to business

If your GameCube's given up the ghost or there's more nails in your Nintendo 64's coffin than hairs on your head, you might be thinking of recycling it. Etsy store GreenCüb goes one better and upcycles dead consoles and controllers into office equipment. Graeme Abraham turns GameCubes into desk organisers — cleverly the...

Cute baby included

Sometimes video games deserve to be passed from one generation to the next, with The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D being a perfect example that brings the Nintendo 64 classic to 3DS gamers. Kyle Hilliard and Ben Hanson from Game Informer have decided that age is no barrier to learning about this particular adventure; they've...

Nobody says you shouldn't

You might remember some of our previous coverage of Famicase, where artists create stickers for fictional Famicom games. A Game By Its Cover (AGBIC) takes this concept to the next stage, inviting developers to create games based on the stickers. The competition runs from 17th June until 18th August and is open to anyone...

Suitably epic

The Legend of Zelda is a franchise with immediately recognisable themes and soundtracks, which naturally prompts fans to produce their own arrangements and covers of the iconic music. In an interesting approach, one musician has opted to, in his words, produce a 'post-rock inspired rearrangement of Koji Kondo's music', giving it a new...

Or Rockman, to be precise

About a month ago we told you about the Mega Man Robot Master Field Guide from UDON Entertainment, which is packed with facts about the series and its characters. The blue bomber is famous in a lot of places, with a new book just released in Thailand to give fans in the region their own comprehensive tome on all things Mega...

SEGA fans rejoice

The Sonic the Hedgehog franchise may have lurched from genius to disaster, and back again, but like any series with two decades worth of games it has built up an impressive library of music. Many gamers fondly remember hearing the Green Hill Zone music for the first time, and the blue blur has given us plenty of classic chip tunes...

The only female finalist

Nintendo may be in a battle for supremacy in the gaming industry at the moment, but there was a time when, in North America at least, the company was truly on top. With NES and Game Boy flying off the shelves in 1990, this period of pop-culture dominance was perhaps best represented by the Nintendo World Championships 1990...

The Mega Man Revolution is here

The Mega Man franchise has one of the most loyal fan-bases in the gaming industry, as shown by the Mega Man Legends 3 campaign reaching 100,000 followers recently. Will Capcom cave in and produce Mega Man Legends 3: Prototype Version for the 3DS eShop? It seems unlikely, but we can hope. With the 25th anniversary for...

Soft sell

An NES controller coffee table is all well and good, but we'd rather have something softer in our living room, wouldn't you? Online store Felt Sew Good just opened up and sells a range of cute cushions based on retro gaming consoles and controllers. NES, SNES, Game Boy and more are all represented in adorable form; there's even a Speak...

Music 24/7

One thing that you may think about occasionally is that, unlike characters in video games, movies and TV shows, we don't have a music soundtrack following us through our daily lives. Animal Crossing on GameCube, meanwhile, followed the same clock as us and its characters had an active soundtrack for every hour of the day. Courtesy of a...

Bro-off

Mario marathons are nothing new, but this weekend sees an oft-overlooked entry in the franchise take centre stage — and all for charity. The Bro-Off puts Mario Bros. front and centre, with four world class players battling simultaneously to set a new world record. It all kicks off tomorrow at 12 midday Eastern (9am Pacific, 5pm UK, 6pm...

Before they were famous, of course

Many of you probably know the drill with 'before they were famous' shows, where long-lost advertisements or TV appearances featuring well-known stars are put on display for our amusement. Video game historian Patrick Scott Patterson has compiled a collection of video game commercials featuring some celebrities in...

Time for some celebratory cake

We celebrated the ten year anniversary of the Nintendo GameCube last year, including a rather fond retrospective on the console with the coolest handle. That was the North American anniversary, but today the console turns ten in Europe. Although the GameCube wasn't Nintendo's greatest success in the home console...

A bit better than Mode 7

The Star Fox franchise hasn't had a great deal of love recently, the only recent glimmer of hope being Star Fox 64 3D, a remake of the highly regarded Nintendo 64 title. Will Wii U revive the franchise, or was the N64 remake a warmup for a new title on 3DS? Who knows, but we'll always have the power of nostalgia. YouTube...

An epic montage

For gamers of a certain age that grew up in the era of 2D pixel-based platformers and action titles, there are a lot of happy memories of one simple activity: running to the right. Yes, a lot of games did involve some backtracking in the other direction, but the main task was to keep moving right until you'd reached the goal or...