KingMike

@Friendly "Who wants to deal with the USA these days?" Well, I would think that customers of the USA branch of Nintendo would sure like to.
As great as it would be for Nintendo of AMERICA to employ people of its own country to provide support, that obviously has not been the way for a long time as companies have long since outsourced their support services to foreign countries, including agencies whose employees may or may not be simultaneously literal scamming people at the same time.

I am remembering that Ben Heck gave a story of how he worked at GameStop (or one of the stores they bought out) in the '90s and had one kid call in every day asking for Aaahh!! Real Monsters. Then he didn't know it was a real game (and I'll guess he was a little too old to have been a Nick watcher to know of the cartoon) so it became a joke between him and his friends.

@Debo626 I don't know about further context, but that kanji means "shop" or "dealer".

@Questionable_Duck Well, this week marks the second Japanese Bomberman grandma I've heard of. Who knows if either them have visited this site before.

I recall Game Boy getting one mention when my mom used to record and watch it every day when I was a child. But maybe I'm misremembering.

I do also remember Murder, She Wrote having a child concealing sensitive information or something inside a Game Boy, Will Smith Enemy of the State style.

(though in the case of the Will Smith movie, why a 1998 film used a TurboExpress as a film prop... I guess some director found a thrift store maybe, I don't know, but I suppose the fact that apparently PCMCIA cards fit into the TurboChip slot maybe helped?)

I feel like the Age of Imprisonment is one with a lot of Big Game Key Cards.

Surely, that's an unoriginal joke by this point...

@GoproGO Spongebob only debuted about half a year before the millennium, in the US (May 1999, I think.) That just barely counts as '90s.

Ren & Stimpy is yes, either separate license, or a desire to not be associated with the creator. (I recall Spike TV ran an "adult" version of the cartoon which got pulled REALLY fast in the 2000s. I've heard it described as "Nickelodeon censored it too much, Spike didn't censor it enough." among fan reactions to the initial airing.)

As to limiting access to specialized game controllers, I can remember that even in the Wii era, the limited edition SNES Classic Controller was never offered to the American region's physical prize redemption shop. I saved up my points from registering many physical games but I was never offered it.

@Misima I think Animaniacs was the last licensed cartoon Nickelodeon ran reruns of, in the early 2000s. I think after that, it seemed like Nick had moved to airing its original content only.

I do remember for a time in the '90s, they ran the 1960s Alvin and the Chipmunks cartoon (with the opening edited to have Nick logos throughout) before briefly running the '80s Alvin series.

@Uncle_Franklin It was a puzzle platform, or as the first post called it, "escort mission" game.
I thought it was an alright game, just way too short. Which still puts it far above most SNES license games.

@Mana_Knight On the SNES and Genesis, I think these and the Ren & Stimpy games were the only Nickelodeon games.
The Rugrats and Doug games didn't come out until the 1998 revival run of Rugrats (which was around the time Disney got ownership of Doug).
I remember because I had grown up on watching reruns of the 1991 run of Rugrats.

@HammerGalladeBro Rocko is a decent game for what it is, a puzzle-platformer. Or "escort mission" as you call it, that's exactly what genre of game it was.
It's just that, it only had about a rental's worth of content. I owned the game as a kid, and even I felt bad that I got my parents to pay full price for it.

I hadn't played GUTS much, but I recall it was definitely a "read the manual" sports game.
One bad sign is that the platforming stages used Y to jump and B to run. You can tell they hadn't played any other SNES platformers with those controls.

"Tournament Edition" That was an obscure unreleased variant of the SNES port, I've heard? Possibly even unannounced.
I suppose it would make sense since the released version said "Competition Edition" on the box.

Does that collection included the censored Japanese version of the SNES MK2 port? Considering the historical significance of the western original, that has to be a curiosity counterpoint.

@Mgalens If there is a distinction between one player character having control over another "subcharacter", then Megami Tensei might not qualify (the subordinate characters are their own party slot).
However, Final Fantasy X definitely would. Whereas previous Final Fantasy games allowed players to summon beasts, those were effectively just a magical spell. However in X, once Yuna summoned one of the "Aeons", that "Aeon" became a playable character for the rest of the battle or until defeated. I can't remember if it replaced the entire party or just Yuna, but it definitely qualified as one player character having control over a subcharacter.

14/22 commercially released games is actually more than I thought I would make it, if those are confirmed to be included.

I can only imagine Nester's Funky Bowling and Panic Bomber are likely to make it out of the missing games.

That list includes two of the wallet-destructing "Elite Four" rare Japanese games.
Virtual Lab, the third one, is arguable as the worst game on the console, for that it was the one most unfinished before they released it. The box itself is a thing of amazing awfulness.

@Aneira It might be shocking that Blizzard made that one.

I haven't heard much spoken of the Superman games that Sunsoft made, that is the Genesis game and their unreleased NES game (better known as Sunman, a game that was completely unknown until a prototype cartridge was preserved and people instantly knew it had to have been intended as a Superman game, even before an earlier proto verifying that fact turned up a few years later).

@rvcolem1 DS would've been perfect for Lemmings but sadly that IP is within Sony's hold.

@ValentineMeikin No way this is passing. What amazes me is that Nintendo has the balls to take such an old idea and claim it as their own.
The first thing that immediately comes to mind is Final Fantasy X, a 24 year old game. And that's far from the first example, I know.

@KITG_GROUP There are FAR FAR FAR worse games than Bubsy. The bottom of the barrel on NES and SNES garbage games is far worse. I haven't looked at it but GBA has to have its own share of a trash.
All that will make the original Bubsy look like a masterpiece in comparison.
I understand why one of my favorite streamers The RetroPals use the original Bubsy as their median line for rating platformers "Is it better or worse than Bubsy?"

@Tom-Massey The Super Famicom version publisher Poppo I think only otherwise published Iron Commando, a beat-em-up that can be argued has its own problems.
Nintendo themselves actually published the original game in some European countries. (there are two license variants of the PAL version)

But it in the case of the original Bubsy, I can only recommend that the Glide button should be used almost as much as the run button in Mario.

I have to pick the cover with the lady. If not for that, for the reason the other one looks like preorder placeholder art you'd have seen in the Electronics Boutique catalog back in the day.

@h3s No, PAL Super Metroid is a different ROM. The Japan/USA version has English and Japan language options (which effectively just disables or enables Japanese subtitles in the opening cutscene as the actual gameplay text is always English. Despite that I could've sworn renting the game from Blockbuster as a child and getting a version with a Spanish option. But I haven't been able to see any confirmation of such a version existing or anyone else playing, and that would be a really odd thing to have a false memory of since I'm not a Spanish speaker.)
The PAL version however had French and German options which I assume function the same as the "Japanese" option in the NTSC version.

I haven't heard of any SNES (original market) games being completely identical across all regions so I think at the least all PAL version game ROMs are unique.

@Thomystic It should look the same because it's the same developer.

I wouldn't expect a translation.
I can only remember this for the DS sequel selling so bad that my local Target store gave it the disrespect of bundling it with Deal or No Deal as one of their custom-made two-game "value" bundles. (as if DoND wasn't already the definition of a shovelware game, the WORST choice of a game show to make a video game adaptation people were expected to pay money for, its RNG was reportedly busted and you could "win" the top prize every time)

The realization that Smash Bros. was Samus' only appearance on the N64.
She also didn't get a proper game on the Wii U, did she?
The DS only got a couple spinoffs.

@Tasuki I'm said I didn't get the guide but I am so glad I at least got an EarthBound cart before the prices got crazy. I liked nearly every RPG I could play (even Secret of the Stars, yet I don't know why) but EB was a pretty special one to have enjoyed in the rental days.
The only one I recall not getting much out of was Ultima VI. Too much for my teenage brain to process but I hope I will someday give it another shot. I mean I have asked myself for future difficulty as I even was glad to have picked up a copy of the SNES port of The Savage Empire. I believe it was an American game for which only the Japanese localization got released, yet even that took some patience to get a copy.

@Tasuki I passed up grabbing a copy from the rental store in 2000 for like $15 with the box cut to fit the rental case. I was tempted but passed up since I was most into collecting RPGs.
Now I have a complete Japanese copy which still cost more.

I'll have to go with the NA box art.
(even though that image is actually a bootleg, though the differences from the real box are very pedantic)

The European boxart is the most sensible but also rather dull to look out.

Japan just has our guy and his livestock popping out of horseshoe dimensional portal in the sky (at least it's on the ground in the NA art).

That said, the Japanese version is the only box you can reasonably purchase these days, so I guess it has that in its favor.

30:00 "No regional differences between the games." Indeed, Mario Paint and Super Metroid are the only two SNES games where the Japanese and USA versions have identical ROMs.
(That would be limited to first-party games. Despite that Japanese developers weren't required to, NoA effectively required that every third-party game at least have "Licensed by Nintendo". And even though Acclaim was the only western publisher I can immediately recall to establish a Japanese subsidiary and every game they published in Japan seemed nearly identical to the USA version in content (such they could have been recycled), the Japanese versions all at least REMOVED that "Licensed" text.)
(oh so, I recall Activision also created a JP branch, but they only published two SFC games in Japan, and one PS1 game according to GameFAQs.)

Unfortunately a lot of little homebrew shmups are probably lost to time in the form of the shmup-maker Dezaemon on the FC, SFC and N64. Save data has most certainly been lost from most copies at this point.

@Anti-Matter That's not really the point of why people look at Mario Paint these days.
Just like whoever was asking for a "sequel" (which it did have and hopefully NSO will give them the opportunity to formally release what they did have on it, Sound Factory/Fantasy) or "remake".
The point is to be able to make something within the limitations given of the hardware, or to experience the feeling when not nearly as many people had access to far more expensive computers with far more sophisticated software.

It would've been more amazing to backup the cartridge SRAM data from them (assuming none of the copies contained anything obviously personal). But I suppose a video would have to do.

Of course Nintendo is going to do something on the 40th anniversary of one of the most significant video games they ever produced.
The release of the original Super Mario Maker was how the celebrated the 30th.

@orbots Yeah, it gained a bit of attention when it was first released as GameStop took preorders for the game and then silently canceled them, leaving it until the announcement it was Walmart exclusive for them to learn why.

Wasn't this the game doomed to be plastered with a Walmart sticker on the box?
(Which when it failed and Walmart resold the remaining stock to other retailers such as my local Best Buy, it got resold with the sticker covered up.)

@Johnny_Arthur Acclaim bought out at least two developers, Probe (who did a lot of ports in the early '90s, likely bought after they did Genesis Mortal Kombat) and Iguana Entertainment (who made Aero the Acrobat).
Probably more.
Acclaim was mostly a publisher, not a developer.

Acclaim did swipe the NBA Jam trademark from Midway, which is why they had to rename them after a couple games.

@Olliemar28 This isn't the first time someone tried to revive the brand name. Some online game company briefly used it in like 2009 or something.

I might be a bit biased since Super Adventure Island was among the first 10 or so games I played on my SNES as a child, but I had to go with the American art.
The others, especially Japan, are too busy.

Though the naked natives with spears might be something more suiting of 1992.

I remember hearing about wasted food from Happy Meal promotions when Beanie Babies were the hot thing in the US in like 1997.
But certainly Japan has a reputation for demanding cleaner stores than that resulting mess.

@HammerGalladeBro I believe the Japanese text at the top is like "the most, shortest, quickest!" and Wario's text I think is "Simple!"

Too busy on the western cover.
I just also noticed that the English logo also missed replicating the 'o' bomb in Wario that the "Made in Wario" logo had. How on Earth did they miss that? Deduction right there.

@HammerGalladeBro Is the American and European GBA "Classic Mini" version of Metroid based on FDS Metroid? (I know the Japanese "Famicom Mini" GBA version was because it was labeled as such and I own that version.)
But I always assumed the western GBA Metroid was just the unlockable from Zero Mission (which was released some months earlier, even) sold on a cartridge by itself.

I do know the Japanese version of Zero Mission still includes the NES version of Metroid.

I wonder if that might be a reason the "Classic NES" GBA release of Kid Icarus was canceled for the west. I guess if that was going to also be a localization of the FDS version (which we wouldn't see until the 3D Classic version on the 3DS eShop), rather than just dropping the NES ROM into their emulator, it could be.

"My Mario"?! I thought Nintendo's lawyers were VERY eager to emphasize Mario is Nintendo's Mario and nobody else's.

@PKDuckman That makes it harder to sell you the filler games.

Why is Baby Mario not represented here?

Was the bikini Samus ending in the FDS version? (which was the game's means of saying "Samus is a woman!" after the instruction manual, even in Japanese where it's much easier to be inconspicuous, called her a man)
Or was PLAYING as bikini Samus the thing that was reportedly exclusive to the NES port?

@h3s Konami was one of seven early adapters with a privileged license allowing them to manufacture their own carts, including a few of Capcom's other arcade rivals, but Capcom themselves was not (those other companies had their first game out in 1984 or early 1985, but Capcom wasn't seen until near the end of 1985, the year a ton of other companies also published their first games on the console).
Capcom was also a very newly formed company at the time, so likely Nintendo didn't see a need to give them special consideration at the time they signed on.

@nessisonett Japanese copyright laws can be baffling. But that's how it is over there.
I'm fairly certain in America, it would count as fair use and Nintendo can't object. Not unless they can give a good reason why it would harm them.

@CANOEberry NCL's legal wrath would probably only extend to Japanese users (as in, located there) on Japanese-based websites.
For usage outside that bound, Nintendo would have to comply whatever is considered acceptable legal use of their IP. We have the right to criticize them and their games and upload editorial usage of their content, but not to upload ROMs, etc.

From what I understand, this seems to be a "only Japanese copyright law could allow it" thing.
I don't think Nintendo could legally stop such a thing in the US, can they? I think they'd have to prove just why it would be harmful to their business in order to be able to.